第74章

A DESPERATE RALLY.

When he awoke again he felt that he should get well rapidly.He was weak, but it seemed the weakness of hunger rather than of illness.His head was clear, his nerves tranquil; his mind was as hungry for action as his body was for food.

"As soon as I've had something to eat," he said to himself, "I'll be better than for years.I needed this." And straightway he began to take hold of the outside world.

"Are you there, Pauline?" he asked, after perhaps half an hour during which his mind had swiftly swept the whole surface of his affairs.

The nurse rose from the lounge across the foot of the bed.

"Your wife was worn out, Mr.Dumont," she began."She has--""What day is it?" he interrupted.

"Thursday."

"Of the month, I mean."

"The seventeenth," she answered, smiling in anticipation of his astonishment.

But he said without change of expression,"Then I've been ill three weeks and three days.Tell Mr.Culver I wish to see him at once.""But the doctor--"

"Damn the doctor," replied Dumont, good-naturedly."Don't irritate me by opposing.I shan't talk with Culver a minute by the clock.What I say will put my mind at rest.Then I'll eat something and sleep for a day at least."The nurse hesitated, but his eyes fairly forced her out of the room to fetch Culver."Now remember, Mr.Dumont--less than a minute," she said."I'll come back in just sixty seconds.""Come in forty," he replied.When she had closed the door he said to Culver: "What are the quotations on Woolens?""Preferred twenty-eight; Common seven," answered Culver.

"They've been about steady for two weeks.""Good.And what's Great Lakes and Gulf?"Culver showed his surprise."I'll have to consult the paper,"he said."You never asked me for that quotation before.I'd no idea you'd want it." He went to the next room and immediately returned."G.L.and G.one hundred and two."Dumont smiled with a satisfied expression.

"Now--go down-town--what time is it?"

"Eight o'clock."

"Morning?"

"Yes, sir, morning."

"Go down-town at once and set expert accountants--get Evarts and Schuman--set them at work on my personal accounts with the Woolens Company.Tell everybody I'm expected to die, and know it, and am getting facts for making my will.And stay down-town yourself all day--find out everything you can about National Woolens and that raiding crowd and about Great Lakes and Gulf.

The better you succeed in this mission the better it'll be for you.Thank you, by the way, for keeping my accident quiet.Find out how the Fanning-Smiths are carrying National Woolens.Find out--"The door opened and the plain, clean figure of the nurse appeared."The minute's up," she said.

"One second more, please.Close the door." When she had obeyed he went on: "See Tavistock--you know you must be careful not to let any one at his office know that you're connected with me.See him--ask him--no, telephone Tavistock to come at once--and you find out all you can independently--especially about the Fanning-Smiths and Great Lakes and Gulf.""Very well," said Culver.

"A great deal depends on your success," continued Dumont--"a great deal for me, a great deal--a VERY great deal for you."His look met Culver's and each seemed satisfied with what he saw.

Then Culver went, saying to himself: "What makes him think the Fanning-Smiths were mixed up in the raid? And what on earth has G.L.and G.got to do with it? Gad, he's a WONDER!" The longer Culver lived in intimacy with Dumont the greater became to him the mystery of his combination of bigness and littleness, audacity and caution, devil and man."It gets me," he often reflected, "how a man can plot to rob millions of people in one hour and in the next plan endowments for hospitals and colleges;despise public opinion one minute and the next be courting it like an actor.But that's the way with all these big fellows.

And I'll know how to do it when I get to be one of 'em."As the nurse reentered Dumont's bedroom he called out, lively as a boy: "SOMETHING to eat! ANYthing to eat! EVERYthing to eat!"The nurse at first flatly refused to admit Tavistock.But at half-past nine he entered, tall, lean, lithe, sharp of face, shrewd of eye, rakish of mustache; by Dumont's direction he closed and locked the door."Why!" he exclaimed, "you don't look much of a sick man.You're thin, but your color's not bad and your eyes are clear.And down-town they have you dying."Dumont laughed.Tavistock instantly recognized in laugh and look Dumont's battle expression."Dying--yes.Dying to get at 'em.

Tavistock, we'll kick those fellows out of Wall Street before the middle of next week.How much Great Lakes is there floating on the market?"Tavistock looked puzzled.He had expected to talk National Woolens, and this man did not even speak of it, seemed absorbed in a stock in which Tavistock did not know he had any interest whatever."G.L.and G.?" he said."Not much--perhaps thirty thousand shares.It's been quiet for a long time.It's an investment stock, you know."Dumont smiled peculiarly."I want a list of the stock-holders--not all, only those holding more than a thousand shares.""There aren't many big holders.Most of the stock's in small lots in the middle West.""So much the better."

"I'm pretty sure I can get you a fairly accurate list."Tavistock, Dumont's very private and personal broker, had many curious ways of reaching into the carefully guarded books and other business secrets of brokers and of the enterprises listed on the New York Stock Exchange.He and Dumont had long worked together in the speculative parts of Dumont's schemes.Dumont was the chief source of his rapidly growing fortune, though no one except Culver, not even Mrs.Tavistock, knew that they had business relations.Dumont moved through Tavistock secretly, and Tavistock in turn moved through other agents secretly.But for such precautions as these the great men of Wall Street would be playing with all the cards exposed for the very lambs to cock their ears at.