Wall STREET was suffering from its worst disease—dullness. The public—the only genuine octopus—did not find the menu printed on the ticker-tape at all appetizing. It was hard at work in its office, miles away from the Stock Exchange, out of hearing of the ticker, scanning the financial pages of the newspapers only on the street-cars to pass away an irksome half-hour. Months before, the fumes of the wine of gambling had gone to its head; and then the public had been made sober suddenly by the “shrinkage in quoted values,” otherwise the shearing. Since then the public had grown a new fleece, though it was not yet itself aware of it.

It was a delicate task, before the president of the Metropolitan National Bank. He was a resourceful stock-market manipulator, though he would have resented being called a thief not half so hotly as being called a speculator, because that sounded worse in a bank president. He desired the public to buy bonds; not necessarily at high prices, but at any prices. It was purely philanthropy on the face of it. That is why the task was delicate. You can disarm suspicion if you are bad, in Wall Street. But, if you are good, the hopelessness of it is appalling. Moreover, there was no time for finesse or subtle strategy or ingenious experiments with the elemental psychology of stock gamblers. The occasion called for broadly-painted effects.

The first thing he did was to offer bonds to savings-banks and trustees of estates all over New England and New York, at concessions too slight to arouse suspicion, but substantial enough to tempt purchasers. This through the best bond “drummers” in the land. Then he sought the Stock Exchange.

The bond-market, which had slumbered profoundly for months, suddenly awoke. Gilt-edged issues were pressed for sale, not violently at all, but insistently. They came from many sources, the Street thought, not knowing the full contents of the huge strong box of the richest man in the world. The fortunes of the ordinary multi-millionaires grow faster in the newspapers and in club-comers than in reality. This fortune was even greater than the gossip of it. Mellen spent time in making people look at his wealth through a reversed telescope, that it might be diminished in the public’s estimate. That is all he had ever done to diminish it, being a practical man.

The bond “specialists” felt faintly alarmed; then they became exultantly busy. It might be unwise to buy stocks the future market-career of which was problematical; but everybody knew what Pennsylvania Central first mortgage fives were. Not to buy them under 125 was to sin regrettably. The bonds sold at 122. To abstain from purchasing them at 120 was lunacy. And at 115 passivity became a crime against one’s family. Many bought, but not enough; and because the supply was greater than the demand the price shrank further.

The Street held its breath and waited for stocks to follow. But, simultaneously with the sales of the best bonds of the best railways in the United States, came purchases of the stocks of the same railways, and though prices of bonds declined, stocks did not. The Street felt that to “trade” in such a market was like playing rouge-et-noir in an utterly dark room. What was the sense of betting on the black if the bettor could not tell, because of the darkness, whether his chips were on it or on the red?

The newspapers, being puzzled, printed dozens of columns and hundreds of explanations, all of them highly ingenious and uniformly incorrect. In his Monday morning article, Philip King, of The Sun, compared the bond-market to the old story of the great psychologist who, dressed as a pedlar, offered on a Broadway sidewalk to sell five-dollar gold-pieces, warranted genuine, to the passers-by at $3.98. Never a fool so foolish, in the passing thousands, as to shake hands with fortune on the psychologist’s coin-laden tray. Now they would not buy bonds.

Of the millions of dollars of bonds that were sold, some were registered in the name of William Mellen or Richard Dawson, or of known stool-pigeons—clerks in their offices, etc. This became known in the end, though Dawson delayed the inevitable as long as possible. Then, of course, the mystery was solved: The “Fort Dawson” crowd was selling bonds and buying stocks! The country was prosperous. There was no cloud in the financial sky. Obviously, the greatest capitalists in the United States were engineering a gigantic stock boom!

The Evening Scold, the greatest journalistic exponent of the Undoubted Wisdom of the Sneer, promptly filled itself with wrath and editorialized its feelings, as follows:

The abnormal increase in the cash resources of the New York banks during the past few weeks, was too good an opportunity for certain bank presidents and their pals to neglect. The banks are not in Wall Street to safeguard the interests and the cash of their depositors, but obviously to help the directors and their schemes. In this instance, the overgrown arrogance of the latest stock-market millionaires has degenerated into imbecility, induced by protracted success in their despoilment of the public. Fortunately, it should prove the undoing of the financial Condottieri, for the stupid public surely cannot be stupid enough to permit itself to be hypnotized into paying absurd prices for brazenly manipulated insecurities like Transcontinental Air Line or Great Southern Preferred, or into sacrificing gilt-edged bonds. Let the would-be buyer of stocks, and the would-be seller of bonds, beware!

But, after all, it was only the very wise—Messrs. Dawson and Mellen—who bought stocks. Only a few foolish lambs sold stocks at the high prices and bought bonds at the low! Also some of the alert-eyed men over whose office doors were foreign names ending in “stein,” and “baum,” and “berg,” and “mann.” The fools in their folly, and the shrewd in their shrewdness, were helping the richest man in the world, and the ablest bank president in the United States, during those stirring days in Wall Street—shivering days when a great crash in the stock-market was expected momentarily by so many that it did not come.

The expected never happens in Wall Street. It can’t afford to.

“How do we stand, Richard?” asked Mr. Mellen, as he walked into the president’s office.

“Almost there,” answered Dawson. “I have sold most of your semi-speculative issues, and we are working off the last better than I expected. You got the memorandum of stocks bought to-day?”

Mellen nodded. Then he walked to the busy ticker in the corner, and regarded the tape.

“The newspapers have warned the public against buying inflated stocks, or selling bonds at unreasonably low prices. A free press, Richard, is the best safeguard of the liberties of a nation. We should be grateful for this boon.” There was a trace of nervousness about his manner; but it was a nervousness as of relief rather than uneasiness.

Mr. Dawson laughed admiringly, and approached his friend.

“Yes. I’ve sold them impartially all over New England, here, and in London and Berlin. But the Governments—”

“Never mind those. The Government will make good, somehow. We’ll keep them to give us the right to agitate the matter later on. I am going to tell my brother George. I told him to come here to-day at—How do you do, George; I was just talking about you.”

George B. Mellen, who had entered, was a strongly-built man, white-haired and clean-shaven. His eyes were of a dean, turquoise blue, that contrasted pleasantly with the white of his eyebrows. He was the vice-president of the International Distributing Syndicate, and at least the sixth richest man in the world. He nodded to his brother, and shook hands with Dawson, who managed to convey the impression that he had risen in order to greet affectionately the new-comer. That having been done, the president returned to his desk.

“George,” said Mellen looking up from the ticker, “I’ve sold every bond I owned; or will have sold the last this afternoon.” He resumed his scrutiny of the tape, very calmly.

“Wh-a-at?” said his brother.

“No obligations payable in gold will be worth anything in a short time. There’s a man who has discovered the secret of making gold. And he’s making it.” He said it in an utterly unexcited voice.

“What are you talking about?” said George with an indecisive smile. His brother was bent over the glass dome of the ticker, and George, still smiling indecisively, looked at Dawson.

An office-boy entered with a note which he gave to the president. Dawson, as he saw the lad coming, instinctively picked up a dagger-like paper-cutter from his desk. But when he glanced at the handwriting, tore open the envelope with his fingers hurriedly, and read the slip it contained. He rose and gave the paper to William Mellen, saying: “That is the last of the bonds. They slaughtered prices, didn’t they? But,” with a jovially apologetic smile, “it was the best that could be done.”

Mellen read the memorandum of the bond sales and the prices received.

“Why, Richard,” he said it with a sort of polite regret that ended with a gentle sigh, “I should say they did slaughter them. It’s a loss of about two millions on this lot, from last week’s prices.” He shook his head several times as in sorrow over a fellow-Christian gone wrong: The stock-market had sinned. Then he studied the busy ticker once more.

“William, will you kindly explain this farce?” There was no sigh to George Mel-len’s voice as he asked this. His frown was deep.

“George, I’m not a fool, am I?” asked the richest man in the world, very earnestly. He must be patient. It was his duty; and duty should be everything to a man who, his friends thought, believed that the eyes of Providence were fixed unblinkingly on the centre of his soul.

“Just now, I should say—”

“Well, just now, I certainly am not one. I’ve sold out all my bonds and bought stocks. Yes, George. That,” gently, “is what I have done.”

“And I’ve done nothing all week but buy bonds and sell stocks!” George’s eyes took on a curious expression—the blue in them seemed to grow strangely darker as he half-closed his eyelids. Often the brothers disagreed. William was the abler. But George was the older; and he could not forget the days when he lorded it over his slender brother by physical might.

“You probably bought my bonds, and I bought your stocks,” said William, nodding as if solving a puzzle the solution of which called for no exultation. “I am sorry, George. But you must at once sell the bonds and buy stocks.”

“Explain, hang you; explain!” shouted George Mellen angrily.

“George, keep cool. Richard, will you kindly tell brother George all about Grin-nell?” He looked at the ticker with an exaggerated air of attention, to save further explanations.

George looked from his brother to the bank president, and back to his brother.

“William,” he said at length, quietly. William did not look up from the ticker. It made George Mellen angry and he said imperiously: “William, listen to me! There may be a good reason why you have sold out all your bonds. But there is none why you should not have told me before. Why didn’t you?”

“I never thought about it,” answered William simply. There was a mild astonishment on his face, as if at his own forgetfulness of his brother’s interest.

“You didn’t, either, Dawson, did you?” said George coldly.

“My dear George, I certainly thought William was selling for both of you. He always does, you know,” said Dawson.

“Oh, have it that way, George; have it that way if it will please you.” Then to Dawson: “Sell George’s bonds, lump results and strike an average,” said William Mellen resignedly. Then, with sudden irritation: “It’s a case of life and death, not of a few dollars.” He began to walk up and down the office, lost in thought. Mechanically he took a small pad from the elaborately carved mahogany table in the centre of the room, walked to an arm-chair by the farthest window, sat down and presently began to jot down figures with a lead-pencil, while Dawson told to George B. Mellen the story of Grinnell.

“But the thing is impossible,” said George angrily.

“Absolutely!” assented the bank president, almost amiably. “You are right, George.” He looked at George with a subtle felicitation in his eyes—at George’s intellect. “But,” he went on gently, “everything you think we’ve already thought. We didn’t go off at half-cock, George. It took facts to convince us. We know that the man can and probably will flood the world with gold. I have no doubt of it. Neither has William. Now, give me the list of your bonds and—”

“And I thought I was getting bargains,” said George Mellen bitterly. “I might have known William’s hand was in it. I thought people had gone crazy, and were being prepared for a grand boom, manufactured on the premises! I tell you,” he exploded suddenly, “there’s a trick somewhere!”

William Mellen looked up suddenly, and stared uncomprehendingly at his brother, his mind still on his figures and calculations.

“No,” went on George, “I don’t mean you. I mean in this Grinnell affair.”

“He has on deposit in this bank some forty millions, and about eight or ten more with other banks.”

“That’s the mystery,” said George musingly. His eyes, as he thought, took on a straining look, as you see near-sighted people look when they try, without their glasses, to read printed characters twenty feet distant, in an optician’s shop.

“I’d make haste, George,” interrupted William Mellen. “When you have sold out all your bonds I will tell you a plan. The world will be told of the Grinnell affair, and—”

“You mean?” said Dawson, with a quick start.

“After we have nothing to lose we have everything to gain.”

“But it will—” began Dawson excitedly.

“Don’t guess, Richard,” gently. “You don’t know the details of my plan.”

George knew his brother. He said grimly: “The public doesn’t love the International Distributing Syndicate; nor us.”

“They’ll love Grinnell less. We are his victims, too; don’t you see? That will comfort the public. Bloated bondholder will be a synonym for pauper. They’ll pity us.” He said this with gentle dolefulness.

“William, but our friends? They’ll be ruined,” said George Mellen doubtfully. He knew his brother.

“You can tell yours to sell out—after you have sold out, not before; and give no reasons to them, or—” His eyes, for the fraction of a second, were menacing; he did not finish the threat orally. George frowned; but he also checked the words that he would have uttered.

“You’ll have my list in fifteen minutes,” George told Dawson. “Willie will bring it over. Good-bye,” and without another look at either of the two men he left the room.

“George is—ah—” began Dawson, with a conciliatory smile.

“He always was,” interrupted William Mellen, not unpleasantly; “from his boyhood up.”

“The public will have more bargains in bonds,” said Dawson.

“Yes.” The richest man in the world smiled and went on musingly: “The public is very wise. It is selling out its stocks because they are too high, and buying bonds because they pay in gold. Now, my plan—”

Williams entered. The president frowned, and stabbed the assistant cashier through the heart with a stiletto made of a vocal icicle: “I am engaged, sir.”

“It’s—it’s Mr. Grinnell, sir. He insisted upon seeing you. And, I think, sir, you told me that if he—”

“Why didn’t you show him in at once?” The vocal stiletto was of steel, and white hot. The timorous assistant cashier left as though a stupendous draught of air had sucked him out of the room through the door. The president arose and greeted Grinnell.

“Walk in, Mr. Grinnell,” he said, and held out his hand.

“Good-morning, Mr. Dawson. How do you do, Mr. Mellen?” said Grinnell cheerfully. Mr. Mellen waved his hand in amicable salutation. It was the first time that ever Mr. Dawson had seen Mellen indulge in such jovial friendliness.

“Quite exciting times lately in Wall Street?” said Grinnell interrogatively, but obviously to make talk. “The people are going stock-mad. I suppose there will be a smash.”

“It is more than likely,” assented Mellen gravely. Had not Mr. Dawson been a bank president, with a professional lack of the sense of humour, he would have winked surreptitiously at his friend.

“Well, if it is only the stock gamblers who suffer, I won’t worry. But, possibly, small investors may become frightened by the decline in bonds and sell out. They would be foolish, of course. But I have sympathy for foolish people; a fellow-feeling, I suppose.” He smiled. Then, seriously: “Why, do you suppose, there’s been such a slump in bonds?”

“More sellers than buyers,” said Dawson, with a tentative grin.

“Ah!” The young man smiled at the timeworn Wall Street phrase; he had not heard it before. “But I think bonds are pretty cheap,” he persisted.

“They certainly look so,” assented Dawson.

“They certainly do,” echoed Mellen gravely.

“That means you are buying them,” said the young man with a sort of naive astuteness. Whereupon Dawson and Mellen congratulated themselves with glances. Grinnell went on: “I feel like doing the same thing. However, what I came to see you about is this: I promised not to deposit any more gold for a month in any bank in New York, didn’t I?”

“In the United States,” said Mellen quickly.

“I don’t think I promised that, but I’ll let it go at that. My promise certainly did not extend to banks in Europe.”

“As to Europe,” said Dawson with a shake of his head, “I took it for granted that—”

“Never mind Europe,” interrupted Mellen with a benevolent air. “Are you going to ship any gold across the ocean, Mr. Grin-nell?”

“I’ve suspended my gold operations entirely, as I promised. That is, I won’t ship any new gold. But you wouldn’t object to my drawing out some of the gold I have here and in other New York banks, I suppose?”

“Why—” began Dawson dubiously.

He could not tell what this new move meant.

“Certainly not,” said William Mellen decisively. He sided with Grinnell, of whom, Grinnell must see, he thought highly.

“Of course not,” echoed Dawson cordially, with an air of primal authority. To show it was his own decision, he added: “We should be delighted.”

“I may draw on you soon,” said Grinnell.

“We can sell you drafts on any part of Europe, Asia, Africa, Australia, South America, and the Philippines,” Dawson told him, smiling.

“I’ll think it over,” Grinnell said seriously. “It won’t prevent me from depositing more gold when my time is up?”

“Not at all,” said Dawson jovially.

“How much will you deposit?” asked Mellen casually.

“Not much;” the young man smiled.

“No,” said Dawson, with playful sarcasm “not much; about a million a minute.”

“You’d object to a million a day,” Grin-nell shook his head dolefully.

“He would not object to that,” interjected the richest man in the world, “if he knew how many days you would keep it up.” There was no playfulness in his voice, though he tried to speak in an easy, conversational tone.

“Well,” began Grinnell doubtfully. He went on quickly: “Oh, yes, he’d object before the end of the first week. I know him.” He nodded toward the bank president with a boyishly mischievous air. Dawson tried to smile back; he said:

“I’m getting to know you, too. I am going to be more generous in the future.”

“Good!” said Grinnell; he would take the president at his word when his month was up. “Now, if I should want drafts on London and Paris in a day or two—”

“Mr. Williams will be at your service, at any time,” the president assured him, as though Mr. Grinnell were an ordinary depositor transacting ordinary business. “No notice is required in this bank,” with a curious suggestion of bravado. He pushed one of a row of electric buttons on his desk. The assistant cashier, his fat face distorted dismally into an anticipatory excuse, appeared.

“Mr. Williams, Mr. Grinnell may call on us for drafts on Europe. You will place yourself at his disposal, and give him your very best efforts at all times.”

“Certainly, sir,” said the assistant cashier, with a hasty deference. “Very glad to do what I can, Mr. Grinnell,” he said, in a grateful voice, to the young man.

“That is all,” said the president. The assistant cashier apologized facially, and left the room.

Grinnell rose to go. “Good-morning, Mr. Dawson. I’ll be around when my month is up.

“You are not doing time, Mr. Grinnell,” smiled the president.

“I feel like it. I don’t like idleness. Good-morning.”

He didn’t like idleness! He would resume the manufacture of gold! Given rope, the young man would hang himself and the bond-holding public. But Dawson now had no bonds. When the discovery came, the community would be convulsed. The bank was fortifying itself with legal tender notes. Gold would have but little value when the crash came. There were various points to study. In the entire affair there was but one danger. The president voiced it.

“William,” he said, “after the cat’s out of the bag, what’s to hinder Grinnell, out of pure philanthropy, from stopping his production of gold in order to avert a disastrous world panic?”

“I’ve thought of that,” answered the richest man in the world, with a calmness that came from previous meditation and settled conviction. “He’s quite likely to cease his operations in new gold, as he calls them. But not before there has been a crash, Richard. And we will then be his principal advisers. I feel he will keep on until the mischief is done. We are prepared now. And yet, somehow—” His face clouded with doubt.

George Mellen entered hurriedly. “Here, Richard, here are my bonds.” The president looked at the long list. “Those I’ve marked with a cross I’ve already ordered sold. Meighan & Cross, and W. A. Shaw & Co. are practically giving them away at this moment,” finished George Mellen, with a touch of bitterness.

William Mellen approached the ticker, and passed the tape through his fingers with a deftness that betrayed practice.

“I think you are right,” he said softly. “Green River general 4s, 87!”

“I should think the insurance companies—” began George Mellen.

“Richard has already sold them all they can take,” returned his brother kindly, as though he were anxious to please brother George.

“Also the savings-banks, and about three hundred estates,” added the president, with a slight touch of pride.

“I’m going to tell Freer, Morrison, Stuyvesant, and one or two others,” announced George Mellen with a trace of defiance. He anticipated opposition, but the richest man in the world said:

“I should tell them this much only: That for certain reasons you cannot divulge, you are selling out your bonds, and that I’ve already sold mine.”

“The last is unnecessary. They’d guess it without my telling them,” and George Mel-len left the room abruptly. Mr. Dawson began to write selling orders, copying the names of the bonds from the list before him. Then he summoned his trusty brokers and bond specialists, and gave them the orders, exhorting them to use caution; also much haste.

Under the new selling pressure the market acted crazily. The inexplicable declines in bond prices of that memorable week had brought into Wall Street deluded “bargain hunters,” who bought the securities at “ridiculously low figures,” but, values went still lower, until the bonds were so very cheap that they were dear—too dear for people to buy who did not know why they should be so cheap. Therefore, the speculators in bonds, who had bought, now sold at a loss, thereby adding to the general uncertainty. But as some sold, others bought, and quotations of gilt-edged issues, usually so staid and slow of movement, fluctuated as violently as, in other times, the manipulated and highly speculative stocks had been wont to do. On the whole, the public bought more bonds than it sold, and sold more stocks than it bought. Yet, bonds fell, and fell, and stocks rose and rose. And there still remained the pet investments of George B. Mellen’s intimate friends; men who, accustomed to risking much on the turn of the wheel of the ticker, yet kept a portion of their fortune safe beyond peradventure by buying bonds which were unassailable by demagogues and socialistic legislatures, unaffected by hard times or strikes, or crop failures; absolutely safe just so long as the United States remained a nation of Americans—or, until such time as aËrial navigation supplanted steam railroads. Also, so long as the gold basis endured, and no longer!

Grinnell had stopped outside and spoken to the assistant cashier.

“I think I should like to have a sight draft on London for two million pounds sterling, Mr. Williams.”

The assistant cashier opened his mouth. Remembering what the president had said—and the tone of his voice—he closed it apologetically and, to excuse himself said, very quickly: “Certainly, Mr. Grinnell, certainly.” He busied himself with the expostulating head of the bank’s foreign exchange department. It was an extraordinary transaction, but the Metropolitan was an extraordinary bank, and Mr. Dawson was an extraordinary man when vexed.

He came back and asked: “Payable to whom, Mr. Grinnell?”

“To my order, please.”

“Yes, sir; yes, sir.”

The bill of exchange for £2,000,000 was made out on Waring Bros., of London, in favour of George K. Grinnell. Mr. Williams handed it to Grinnell with an obsequious little flourish and said, “Thank you, Mr. Grinnell.”

“Thank you,” said Grinnell smiling. “Good-morning.”

Mr. Williams bowed him out.

Grinnell walked briskly up Wall Street to the Wolff Building, and entered the office of Wolff, Herzog & Co.

“I should like to see Mr. Isaac Herzog,” he told a spectacled, middle-aged man who sat by a little table near the gate of a railing on the other side of which was a half-door of ground glass marked “Private.”

The gate-keeper, incredibly myopic, peered at him through such thick lenses that his eyes looked unpleasantly unnatural.

“Vhat ees yoor peezness, pleaze?”

“Tell Mr. Herzog that I come on a very important matter.”

“Ach!” The middle-aged man shrugged his shoulders with a sort of regretful despair, and then shook his head. Everybody that came there always came on very important matters—including book agents and pedlars disguised as gentlemen.

“I’ve come direct from Mr. Richard Dawson, president of the Metropolitan National Bank, to see Mr. Herzog. Tell him that—”

“Pleaze sit down,” he opened the gate and pointed to a chair. Grinnell obeyed and the man left. Presently he returned.

“Mr. Herzog vill see you, sir,” and Grinnell was ushered into the office of the head of the firm, for Mr. Wolff had been dead many years, and his son-in-law and partner reigned in his stead—a far greater king of finance.

He was a little man, white-haired and patriarchially whiskered. His features were of a pronounced Jewish type. His eyes were alert but kindly—kindly rather than merely good-natured. The accumulated wisdom of five thousand years was in this Hebrew banker’s business soul; and with it that respect for the higher Law that has made Israel endure as a nation through the marching centuries while other races have risen, flourished, and disappeared, blended into the composite types of to-day.

“Good-afternoon, sir. Mr. Dawson sent you?” asked Mr. Herzog, with a strong German accent. He knew English thoroughly, like a scholar—a German scholar.

“He didn’t send me. I—”

“You have been admitted under that impression,” Mr. Herzog said this sternly—a rebuke for a falsehood rather than irritation over what seemed likely to be the wasting of a very busy banker’s valuable time. The young man before him did not look shabby enough to be a professional mendicant, but there was something deferential about his manner that might mean a more expensive appeal. Amateurs have exaggerated ideas.

“Excuse me, Mr. Herzog. I told your man, when he thought you couldn’t or wouldn’t see me, that I came from Mr. Dawson’s office to see you. It’s true. I did leave him a few minutes ago. I know your reputation, Mr. Herzog, and I have come to you because I am in need of help.”

Mr. Herzog was famous as a philanthropist. He maintained at his own expense a sort of personal charity bureau to which applicants for help were referred, that he might give much but, above all, that he might give intelligently. He spoke to the young man with cold austerity: “I beg to refer you to Mr. Asiel, room 82, upstairs, sir. He will investigate your case. But I do not like the way in which you have gained admission to this office, sir.” He nodded dismissingly.

“One moment, Mr. Herzog,” said Grin-nell, smiling. “I wish your help in a business matter. I wish to buy one hundred million dollars of the best railroad bonds.”

A spasm of alarm contracted Mr. Herzog’s face. It passed and he said soothingly, with an accent more Germanic than ever: “Why, yes, of course. Yes, yes! I shall be very glad to do so. I will ask the gentleman in charge of our bond department to do as you wish. He is a very nice young man; a very competent young man. He knows all about bonds. Will you allow me to go after him? I shall return directly.”

Grinnell laughed out and out. It was a laugh unaffectedly merry. But Mr. Herzog turned pale and breathed a bit quickly.

The young man drew from his pocket-book some checks.

“Here are four certified checks for one million dollars each, and a draft on Waring Bros., of London, for two millions sterling. Won’t you please look at them before you go for the nice young man in charge of your bond department?”

Mr. Herzog instead looked at the door; the young man barred his exit. He was atavistically a fatalist. What was to be, was to be. Mr. Herzog, calm now from resignation, turned to the checks. One look was enough. His face changed, but having grown resigned to death, the banker did not now sigh with relief. He merely said, very quietly, as if he were resuming the thread of his conversation: “Perhaps you will tell me which bonds you wish to buy?”

“Yes, sir; but before I tell you that, let me tell you this: I come to you because I have absolute confidence in your wisdom and in the integrity of your firm. I wish to buy a hundred millions of bonds, on margin—a margin of fifty per cent or more. None must know of this transaction excepting yourself and those of your partners who must, in the nature of things, know it. I require no pledge but your word.”

“It is all the pledge we ever give, sir. It was unnecessary to speak of it. Nevertheless, I thank you for your confidence in us. Will you be good enough to proceed?”

He was looking at the young man steadily.

“I had on deposit at the Metropolitan National Bank this morning some forty-six millions of dollars, of which I have drawn this £2,000,000. Also with, other banks slightly more than six millions, of which those are four.”

Mr. Herzog nodded. He said meditatively: “You are, then, the gentleman to whom those institutions owe their remarkable gains in gold during the past few weeks?”

“I don’t know whether I am or not.”

“You are, sir.”

“Then I must be.”

“Pray proceed.”

“Well, I propose to purchase one hundred millions of dollars par value of bonds, carefully but steadily. Bonds are very cheap.”

“Owing to circumstances not yet known to the community, or possibly to a misapprehension of certain facts, they are cheap. Huge blocks have been thrown on the market this past week. Prices have been sacrificed; you doubtless know by whom?” His eyes interrogated as well as his voice.

“I know nothing. I think the bonds are very cheap,” said Grinnell impassively.

“I think so too, sir, now. I had begun to fear that they were not cheap, at any price, a few minutes ago.”

“Indeed?” Grinnell was sincerely astonished.

“Yes, sir,” said Mr. Herzog calmly.

“I will give you a check or checks on the Metropolitan National Bank—certified if you wish. Is fifty millions enough margin?”

“We do not take speculative orders.”

“Then, Mr. Herzog, I can only wish you good-morning, and request that you mention this to no one,” and Grinnell rose.

“In this case,” said Mr. Herzog, waving his hand and pointing to the chair from which the young man had risen, “you are conducting a financial operation unparalleled in our history. If you care to have us associated with you in this matter, to share proportionately in the profits—”

“Thank you. We shall consider that later on. I should not be surprised to see bonds rise to the level at which they were before they—ah—”

“Before the misapprehension to which I referred?” prompted Mr. Herzog gravely, but with intention.

“Before they began to decline so inexplicably,” corrected Mr. Grinnell with equal gravity. “Bonds are selling at par and under which should command a great premium.”

“Will there be additional deposits of gold by you at the Metropolitan or other banks?”

“I have not deposited any gold at any bank, Mr. Herzog.”

“I mean Assay Office checks, sir.”

“That is a matter, Mr. Herzog, which I must decline to discuss.”

“Excuse me, sir. I did not know.”

“But in justice to you, I will say that I have pledged myself not to make any deposits whatever for a short time.”

“Ah, that was William Mellen,” said Mr. Herzog with a positiveness that startled Grinnell.

“I mentioned no names, Mr. Herzog.”

“No. But I know how his mind works.”

“Now, what shall I do? Shall I give you a check on the Metropolitan or—”

“By drawing bills of exchange on London,” said the old banker musingly, “Mr. Dawson will not know for some days what you wish the money for.”

“Well, you have one there for £2,000,000 as a starter,” said the young man calmly. Mr. Herzog looked at him searchingly; then he smiled approvingly.

“Good! I see!”

“Well, sir?” asked Grinnell quietly.

“We will sell bills of exchange on London, Berlin, and Paris to Mr. Dawson’s bank. They will presently buy from us, thinking the high rates of exchange tempt us to sell them. This is enough for this week. There are still the bonds of the friends and of the friend’s friends to be sold, Mr.—” The old man paused. “I do not know your name sir; but I know you.”

“My name is Grinnell.”

“Thank you. Of course, it was on the checks. And, if I may ask, sir, what is your business, besides that of a great financier?”

“I am a metallurgical chemist.”

“Chemist?” The old banker started. He looked at Grinnell intently. The young man’s face was impassive; perhaps too impassive. Mr. Herzog blinked his eyes; not dubiously, but as some men will when their thoughts are racing at a furious rate. His head was bent slightly to one side as his alert, intelligent eyes looked and looked at the young man from under the thick, shaggy eyebrows that so heightened the patriarchal aspect of his face. At length he straightened his little body up as though he were on springs, and began to rub his hands briskly. It was imagination—Oriental imagination, more vivid, more opulent in detail than the Occidental.

“I see! I see! Good!” He arose and, unable to contain himself, extended his hand and said: “Mr. Grinnell, I am certain you are a great man. I am proud to have your confidence. Bye-and-bye, when it does no harm, you will tell me all, and I shall see if I am right?”

“Some day we shall both see whether we are right or not,” said Grinnell composedly.

“Yes, yes. Now answer me: Do you find that great wealth is also a great temptation?”

“I do not,” answered Grinnell frankly.

“There are many things you would not do for money if you were penniless, much less would you do them, having fifty or a hundred millions. Is it not so?”

“There are many things I should like to do if I had a thousand millions,” said Grinnell, very earnestly.

“Precisely. That’s what you told them. Ah, William Mellen! William Mellen!” and the little old man shook his head and raised his hands ceilingward, as though he saw the richest man in the world there and were apostrophizing him. “You have imagination, but only one pair of eyes. I see!”

“You know him?” Grinnell asked.

The Hebrew banker, at this question, instantly became merely a banker. He said, briskly: “If bonds are too low, stocks are too high; much too high. It would be well to sell some to those wise rich men who wish to buy them; for the public is not buying stocks. Only the rich can buy—and suffer, it may be, eh, Mr. Grinnell?”

“I shall be glad to join you in such an operation, Mr. Herzog.”

“Thank you, sir; thank you. You leave it to me?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Very well. It is possible you are rich; but it is certain your are wise, Mr. Grinnell. First, we shall buy bonds for you. That is the investment operation. For one hundred millions we may buy one hundred and twenty millions par value, of the best bonds in the world. After that will come the—ah—” He paused and looked at Grinnell. The young man, his face still impassive, said:

“Yes, sir. If you wish any more money—”

“I will let you know, Mr. Grinnell. Come every morning at half after nine. Please let me have your name and address. There is much I should like to ask you; but bye-and-bye, you will tell me of your own accord. And your lawyer is?”

“Col. Gordon McClintock. You know him?”

“Yes. I shall not need him. Come tomorrow morning. There is much to do. Good-afternoon, Mr. Grinnell,” and Mr. Herzog shook hands warmly with the young man.

It happened as Mr. Herzog had said. The friends of the Mellens’s were told in the strictest confidence to sell bonds for good and sufficient reasons. They told their friends, also in strict confidence; and their friends told their friends, and their friends their friends, even unto the fourth and fifth generations, until there came the panic of the millionaires, for these men, in the nature of things, had no poor friends. Their aggregate sales were torrential, appalling. The professionals were too frightened to buy or sell anything, unless it was life insurance policies without the suicide clause.

And the flood of fine investment issues rolled resistlessly over the corpses of little speculators who bought them one day, thinking them incredibly cheap, only to see them on the next day incredibly, fatally cheaper, because the rich were selling! And the insane boom in stocks waxed greater, madder, more stupendous! Because the Mellens were buying!

It could not continue much longer. The Secretary of the Treasury came to New York twice that week to confer with the great financiers, who listened intently—and suggested nothing. The country at large fixed its eyes on Wall Street and endeavoured to see clearly. The tide must turn. The public began to buy bonds outright—to buy a few bonds, pay for them and then, frightened at its own temerity, doubtful of having after all secured bargains, run breathlessly home and lock up its purchase, and not look at the next day’s quotations for fear of finding that the price of the same bonds had dropped farther.

Still the public had begun to buy. But not before Wolff, Herzog & Co. had purchased for $117,000,000 bonds which a month before could not have been purchased for less than $148,000,000, all for account of Mr. George K. Grinnell; and had sold short 250,000 shares of stocks at an average price of $190 per share, stocks which four weeks previously could not have been sold at $125 per share, these for account of “Account G,” which included equally Mr. George K. Grinnell, Wolff, Herzog & Co., of New York; I. Benjamin & Co., of London; Stetheim & Sons, of Frankfort and Amsterdam, and Goldschmidt Freres, of Paris. And because of these operations the bond-market steadied and the stock-market ceased to advance, and people plucked up courage and bought bonds and sold stocks, until bonds began actually to rise slowly and stocks to decline steadily and greater courage gained thereby. And because the public, which is everybody, is greater than anybody, greater even than the richest man in the world, the Paradoxical Panic was checked.

There came a lull. After all, the public had but ceased to fear to buy bonds. It must be made to fear not to buy them; for bonds still were much too low and stocks very much too high. Wherefore, the Evening Scold, which had been importuning Mr. Isaac L. Herzog for an expression of his views, was at last able to publish an interview, double leaded, in its front page, in which the great financier strongly urged investors not to sell bonds but rather to buy. As for stocks, it was not wise to buy them but rather to sell. Investors need not be anxious over fundamental business conditions. Speculators, on the other hand, had before them a highly dangerous stock-market.

It was the first and only interview any newspaper had ever been able to obtain for publication from Mr. Herzog; and the Evening Scold was so uniformly ill-natured and impartially condemnatory that it was above suspicion. It was ultra-Mugwump in politics, art, literature, finance, and base-ball. The morning papers “verified” the interview and reprinted it prominently on the next day. And into Wall Street poured hordes of men, of all ages and political complexions—Jew and Gentile—of all degrees of fortune, and of no fortune at all, but all of them men who believed in Mr. Herzog’s integrity, and particularly in his sagacity. There followed a Great Day. Mostly, the public bought bonds. The selling pressure really was over by now, the enlightened millionaires being practically bondless; so bonds rose quickly, unchecked. And stocks declined, not so quickly, but every whit as steadily.

Mellen read the Herzog interview in Dawson’s office. When he was done with them, he carefully folded the newspapers and piled them neatly on the table. It was an unfailing habit of his—that and saving the twine that came with parcels.

He arose, with a troubled expression on his face, and said to the president:

“Herzog is a very able man. I don’t like this interview. He speaks too confidently.” Into Mellen’s eyes came the puzzled, indecisive look which Dawson had seen there so frequently in the last few weeks, and so seldom in the previous twenty years.

“He has a considerable following,” admitted the president in a cheerful voice, as though to keep his friend from dwelling too much on sorrow. “They have been heavy buyers of bonds and heavy sellers of stocks. That’s for Europe. They’ve sold us nearly all the sterling bills that we needed for Grinnell’s drafts. Grinnell has practically drawn all his money and sent it to London.”

“I don’t like it, Richard; I don’t like it a bit. Perhaps we’ve been too hasty; and yet—” He stared at Dawson unseeingly. “Where did he get it?” His lips were dry; he moistened them with the tip of his tongue and pressed them together.

“William, every bullion dealer in the world has been interviewed. Costello had twenty men in the West visiting the mines and smelters. We have had reports from the Klondike, from the Transvaal, from Australia, from mining engineers everywhere. We have even gone over the manifests of vessels that have brought bullion here and to other ports this year. Costello was twice in the laboratory. Since he promised to stop depositing, Grinnell has been idle. The dynamo has not been running.”

“But there must be a mine.”

“I am certain the gold doesn’t come from any mine on this earth.”

“He may have accumulated it.” The richest man in the world said this without conviction.

“Who gave him the money to pay for it?” asked Dawson, in an intentionally controversial tone, because he vaguely feared his friend’s doubts at this late hour. “And if somebody gave it to him, from whom did the giver buy it? Not from any smelter, or mine or dealer in the last five years. That is certain too.”

“Yes, yes; that’s it,” said Mellen irritably, because the answer would not come. “Is he under surveillance still?”

“Costello returned from the Pacific Coast Tuesday night, and I told him not to lose sight of Grinnell for one instant.” The president approached the ticker.

“Hm!” he said. “Quite a rally in bonds.” From force of habit the richest man in the world drew near. He passed the tape through his fingers slowly; then he told Dawson:

“I think we’d better help stocks go down.” Seeing a doubtful look in the president’s eyes, he added: “Oh, we’ll get them back cheaper.”

The door opened and Costello entered—he had instructions to walk into Mr. Dawson’s private office without being announced, no matter who might be there with the president. Dawson merely looked inquiringly at the detective but the richest man in the world walked up to him quickly and asked: “What is it, Costello?”

“Did you see Mr. Grinnell’s marriage announcement in the Herald, sir?” He looked first at Mellen, then at his chief. “It’s among the ads. in the front page.”

“No,” answered Mellen, turning toward the table, but Dawson had already picked up the Herald. He read aloud, Mellen looking over his shoulder:

GRINNELL-ROBINSON.—On Tuesday, September 12, by the Rev. DeLancy Williamson, at his residence, Margaret, daughter of Thomas M. Robinson, to George Kitchell Grinnell. Middletown, N. Y., and Youngstown, O., papers please copy.

“Robinson?” said Mellen quickly. He answered an unspoken question of his own: “But he hasn’t so much.”

Dawson knew what he meant. He shook his head and said with a slight frown: “I doubt if he has even ten millions. I know he sold out all his Consolidated Steel during the boom but that couldn’t have been more than five millions. I don’t think so.” He looked ill at ease.

“We must see Grinnell at once,” said the richest man in the world, speaking quickly. “If Robinson knows what Grinnell is doing—” He checked himself with a frown. A great anger filled his very soul to overflowing: Always Grinnell came before him—an obstacle to plans, enveloped by doubt-breeding mystery, surrounded by an uncertainty which, by not openly revealing dangers, made the young man a ceaseless menace.

“Mr. Grinnell is now at Wolff, Herzog’s office,” said Costello. “He’s been going there every day for a week.”

“I knew it!” said the richest man in the world explosively. He sat down in an armchair and leaned back, breathing quickly.

“We must make sure,” said Dawson. He sat down at his desk and took up the telephone. Then he said to Costello: “Anything else?”

“No, sir. He went into Mr. Herzog’s private office. The door-keeper told me he was a very rich man and that he came there every day.”

“Very well,” said Dawson, dismissingly. The detective left the room. Mellen stretched his right hand toward Dawson and opened his mouth. But he said nothing. His hand dropped and he stared intently at a paper weight on the president’s desk.

Dawson took up the telephone.

“Let me have Mr. Herzog, at once,” he said sharply. A minute later he said: “Herzog?—This is Dawson—Is Mr. Grinnell in your office?” Mellen drew near and stood beside his friend.

“Hello?” went on Dawson, with a tinge of impatience. “Is Grinnell—” He turned to Meilen and explained, spitefully: “He says to wait a moment—Hello? Yes. I’d like to see him—”

“Tell him to wait for you there,” said Mellen, in a tone of command. Dawson spoke into the telephone:

“Well, if he’ll wait for me at your office I’ll run over at once. Very well. Good-bye.” Dawson rose and, putting on his hat, followed the richest man in the world who had already started out of the office briskly.

In Herzog’s office the old banker, at Dawson’s first question, carefully placed his hand over the transmitter and said to Grinnell: “Dawson wants to know if your are here.”

“I cannot tell a lie,” laughed Grinnell; “I am.”

A moment later Mr. Herzog said: “He says he will come over if you will wait here for him.”

“Very well,” replied Grinnell. He added: “I think this will close the incident.” But Herzog shook his head—he was listening to Dawson and couldn’t hear the young man’s words.

The bank president and the richest man in the world walked more quickly than was their wont, each busy with his own thoughts. The myopic door-keeper at Wolff, Herzog & Co.‘s, knew Mr. Dawson. He opened the gate obsequiously and then hastened ahead and held open the door to Mr. Herzog’s private office. They entered abreast.

Mr. Herzog rose quickly and, walking toward them, extended his hand to Dawson. Then he shook Mellen’s. Grinnell arose from his chair near Herzog’s desk and merely said, “Good-morning, gentlemen.”

Dawson bowed to him, and with his diplomat-at-a-reception smile, replied:

“Good-morning, Mr. Grinnell.”

Mellen used the same words, and no smile.

“Be seated, gentlemen,” said Mr. Herzog with a polite wave of the hand.

“We came over to congratulate Mr. Grin-nell,” said Dawson. “We’ve just seen the Herald.”

“Yes,” said Mellen grimly.

“Oh, thanks,” returned Grinnell, very politely.

“Herzog,” said the richest man in the world abruptly, “you have been buying a great many bonds.”

“We have bought some,” assented the banker, with much gravity.

There was a pause. Grinnell glanced at Dawson, who was looking so extremely unconcerned that the young man smiled slightly. Mellen, who had been leaning forward in his chair, straightened himself and asked curtly: “Why?”

Mr. Herzog arched his eyebrows with a sort of amazed inquisitiveness and said nothing, intending his silence as a snub. But he changed his mind and said: “They were very cheap.”

The richest man in the world turned toward Grinnell. Before he could ask any questions the young man said pleasantly: “You told me so yourself. Don’t you remember, Mr. Mellen?”

“Did you buy any, Mr. Grinnell?” Mel-len’s voice had a serious ring. The young man’s face took on a boyishly confidential look. He said:

“I bought some for my father-in-law. He had been waiting for them to go down. So had I. You see, my marriage was to come off as soon as I had invested his money.”

Mellen’s eyes opened wide, and Dawson, in a very quiet tone, asked: “And did you invest yours as well?”

“It seems to me,” said Grinnell, “that we are drifting toward family matters—”

“I beg your pardon,” said the president stiffly.

“I understood,” the young man said apologetically, “that you wished to speak to me on some business matter. I haven’t overdrawn my account, have I?”

“Perhaps we had better discuss this at the bank, Mr. Grinnell; if you could come—”

“I’m very sorry, Mr. Dawson, but I start on my wedding tour in an hour. I have no business secrets from Mr. Herzog, so if it is a business matter we may discuss it here. In all probability I would repeat our conversation to him.”

Dawson’s face flushed violently; his nostrils dilated unpleasantly. Mellen’s face turned perceptibly paler and the lines of it became harder. But his voice was steady and his manner almost matter-of-fact as he said to the young man: “Then it is almost certain you are not going to deposit too much gold hereafter at the Metropolitan Bank.”

“I am not going to deposit any more gold at any bank, because—” Grinnell hesitated.

“Yes?” Mellen’s eyes were fixed on the young man’s face, is if he thought every fleeting expression was as important as the words themselves.

“Because I haven’t any more gold to deposit,” finished Grinnell, very calmly.

“That is now. But will you not produce any more gold?” The richest man in the world spoke very quietly and very distinctly.

“I never produced any. I sold the Assay Office the last ounce I ever had over a month ago.”

“You must have obtained it somewhere, somehow,” said the richest man in the world. His manner conveyed an impression of patience. “Did you buy it?”

“No, sir. I didn’t buy it.” The young man’s calmness was not theatrical and it had a quieting effect. He paused an instant; then he went on: “In fact, I had no gold of my own. It was all my father-in-law’s.” He turned away and rose as if to go to the window.

Mellen spoke sharply: “Mr. Grinnell!”

“Yes.” He looked the richest man in the world straight in the eyes. Mellen said rudely: “Explain yourself, sir!”

“Mr. Mellen!” interjected Herzog. His voice conveyed a rebuke; but his look was austere rather than offended.

Grinnell frowned. He spoke to Mellen with impatience in his voice: “Mr. Mellen, you have asked me many questions, which you had no right to ask. I’ve not said anything about it before; but I tell you now that you annoy me!”

Mellen turned livid. “I—” he began. “Listen, please,” interrupted Grinnell quickly, his face growing stem. “I am going to tell you about that gold. That is, I shall tell if you do not interrupt me. I don’t wish you to ask me any more questions—not one.”