At last, however, their favorite banks were full to overflowing and at the danger-point. They could take no more.
“No, no, no!” Hand declared to Phineas Hull over the ’phone. “I can’t risk another dollar in this venture, and I won’t! It’s a perfect proposition. I realize all its merits just as well as you do. But enough is enough. I tell you a financial slump is coming. That’s the reason all this stock is coming out now. I am willing to protect my interests in this thing up to a certain point. As I told you, I agree not to throw a single share on the market of all that I now have. But more than that I cannot do. The other gentlemen in this agreement will have to protect themselves as best they can. I have other things to look out for that are just as important to me, and more so, than American Match.”
It was the same with Mr. Schryhart, who, stroking a crisp, black mustache, was wondering whether he had not better throw over what holdings he had and clear out; however, he feared the rage of Hand and Arneel for breaking the market and thus bringing on a local panic. It was risky business. Arneel and Merrill finally agreed to hold firm to what they had; but, as they told Mr. Hull, nothing could induce them to “protect” another share, come what might.
In this crisis naturally Messrs. Hull and Stackpole—estimable gentlemen both—were greatly depressed. By no means so wealthy as their lofty patrons, their private fortunes were in much greater jeopardy. They were eager to make any port in so black a storm. Witness, then, the arrival of Benoni Stackpole at the office of Frank Algernon Cowperwood. He was at the end of his tether, and Cowperwood was the only really rich man in the city not yet involved in this speculation. In the beginning he had heard both Hand and Schryhart say that they did not care to become involved if Cowperwood was in any way, shape, or manner to be included, but that had been over a year ago, and Schryhart and Hand were now, as it were, leaving both him and his partner to their fates. They could have no objection to his dealing with Cowperwood in this crisis if he could make sure that the magnate would not sell him out. Mr. Stackpole was six feet one in his socks and weighed two hundred and thirty pounds. Clad in a brown linen suit and straw hat (for it was late July), he carried a palm-leaf fan as well as his troublesome stocks in a small yellow leather bag. He was wet with perspiration and in a gloomy state of mind. Failure was staring him in the face—giant failure. If American Match fell below two hundred he would have to close his doors as banker and broker and, in view of what he was carrying, he and Hull would fail for approximately twenty million dollars. Messrs. Hand, Schryhart, Arneel, and Merrill would lose in the neighborhood of six or eight millions between them. The local banks would suffer in proportion, though not nearly so severely, for, loaning at one-fifty, they would only sacrifice the difference between that and the lowest point to which the stock might fall.
Cowperwood eyed the new-comer, when he entered, with an equivocal eye, for he knew well now what was coming. Only a few days before he had predicted an eventual smash to Addison.
“Mr. Cowperwood,” began Stackpole, “in this bag I have fifteen thousand shares of American Match, par value one million five hundred thousand dollars, market value three million three hundred thousand at this moment, and worth every cent of three hundred dollars a share and more. I don’t know how closely you have been following the developments of American Match. We own all the patents on labor-saving machines and, what’s more, we’re just about to close contracts with Italy and France to lease our machines and processes to them for pretty nearly one million dollars a year each. We’re dickering with Austria and England, and of course we’ll take up other countries later. The American Match Company will yet make matches for the whole world, whether I’m connected with it or not. This silver agitation has caught us right in mid-ocean, and we’re having a little trouble weathering the storm. I’m a perfectly frank man when it comes to close business relations of this kind, and I’m going to tell you just how things stand. If we can scull over this rough place that has come up on account of the silver agitation our stock will go to three hundred before the first of the year. Now, if you want to take it you can have it outright at one hundred and fifty dollars—that is, providing you’ll agree not to throw any of it back on the market before next December; or, if you won’t promise that” (he paused to see if by any chance he could read Cowperwood’s inscrutable face) “I want you to loan me one hundred and fifty dollars a share on these for thirty days at least at ten or fifteen, or whatever rate you care to fix.”
Cowperwood interlocked his fingers and twiddled his thumbs as he contemplated this latest evidence of earthly difficulty and uncertainty. Time and chance certainly happened to all men, and here was one opportunity of paying out those who had been nagging him. To take this stock at one-fifty on loan and peddle it out swiftly and fully at two-twenty or less would bring American Match crumbling about their ears. When it was selling at one-fifty or less he could buy it back, pocket his profit, complete his deal with Mr. Stackpole, pocket his interest, and smile like the well-fed cat in the fable. It was as simple as twiddling his thumbs, which he was now doing.
“Who has been backing this stock here in Chicago besides yourself and Mr. Hull?” he asked, pleasantly. “I think that I already know, but I should like to be certain if you have no objection.”
“None in the least, none in the least,” replied Mr. Stackpole, accommodatingly. “Mr. Hand, Mr. Schryhart, Mr. Arneel, and Mr. Merrill.”
“That is what I thought,” commented Cowperwood, easily. “They can’t take this up for you? Is that it? Saturated?”
“Saturated,” agreed Mr. Stackpole, dully. “But there’s one thing I’d have to stipulate in accepting a loan on these. Not a share must be thrown on the market, or, at least, not before I have failed to respond to your call. I have understood that there is a little feeling between you and Mr. Hand and the other gentlemen I have mentioned. But, as I say—and I’m talking perfectly frankly now—I’m in a corner, and it’s any port in a storm. If you want to help me I’ll make the best terms I can, and I won’t forget the favor.”
He opened the bag and began to take out the securities—long greenish-yellow bundles, tightly gripped in the center by thick elastic bands. They were in bundles of one thousand shares each. Since Stackpole half proffered them to him, Cowperwood took them in one hand and lightly weighed them up and down.
“I’m sorry, Mr. Stackpole,” he said, sympathetically, after a moment of apparent reflection, “but I cannot possibly help you in this matter. I’m too involved in other things myself, and I do not often indulge in stock-peculations of any kind. I have no particular malice toward any one of the gentlemen you mention. I do not trouble to dislike all who dislike me. I might, of course, if I chose, take these stocks and pay them out and throw them on the market to-morrow, but I have no desire to do anything of the sort. I only wish I could help you, and if I thought I could carry them safely for three or four months I would. As it is—” He lifted his eyebrows sympathetically. “Have you tried all the bankers in town?”