The Apple of Discord

Wharton Kendrick heaved a scarcely perceptible sigh, and whispered to me, "That settles it; Partridge represents the Golconda Bank, and the rest will follow his lead."

"That is right," said another. "Let us take no chances." And with a few similar expressions the company appeared to have come to a unanimous agreement.

"Then," said Wharton Kendrick, turning to Partridge, "I'll put you down for–"

"For five hundred thousand," replied Partridge.

"Make it a million," said Kendrick. "Nelson here is going to stand responsible for five hundred thousand, and your people should stand for more."

"Well, if you think the emergency calls for it, you can count on a million," said Partridge.

One after another the men named the amounts for which they would stand responsible, and Wharton Kendrick jotted down the figures in his memorandum-book.

"Please make out your checks, gentlemen," he said at last. "Here is ten million dollars pledged to the committee."

"That will be enough," said Coleman with decision. "I think that our arrangements cover every point where there can be a break in the markets."

"Unless it's M. & N., and the bank we mentioned," said Nelson.

"Oh, yes," said Kendrick; "our arrangements cover them, too. We've got to back them up till this storm is over. They are bound to go some day, but if they go now there will be a smash all along the line. Partridge will see to getting the best collateral they have, and we'll feed them just enough to keep their doors open."

"They will draw pretty heavily on the pool if disorder actually starts," said another.

"Oh," said Partridge, "we have a very comfortable reserve, and it isn't likely that there will be an actual outbreak."

"Well, we have prepared for every emergency," said a stout and sleepy-looking man in the corner; "and as we're likely to have a hard day of it to-morrow, I move we get home and to bed. It's three minutes of midnight, now."

The suggestion appeared to be approved, for everybody rose with the breaking-up atmosphere that ends a gathering.

"One moment," said Coleman, raising his hand. "There is one thing we have neglected to discuss. It. is not impossible that the constituted authorities will prove unable to handle the disorderly elements. In case of need, how many of you gentlemen are ready to give your services to the city to preserve order?"

There was a silence for a moment. Then one said:

"Pshaw, Coleman! This isn't fifty-six! We're twenty years older than we were then, and the police and the militia can handle those fellows if they make any trouble."

"I believe," said Coleman with deliberate emphasis, "that we are standing on the crust of a volcano. We should be prepared to give our money and our personal services to the public safety if the need comes."

"There's no danger," growled the sleepy man, "so what's the use of worrying about it? Let's go home."

"Oh," said Kendrick, "we'll all stand in if there's trouble, of course."

"We'll leave Coleman on guard," said another with a facetious nod. "We'll all turn out when he rings the bell."

In the bustle of guests departing, Coleman took me by the arm and led me to a corner.

"Do you know where these guns are stored?" he asked.

I balanced my obligations to Clark against the obvious fact that the publicity given to the armament had relieved him from chance of suspicion, and replied:

"I understand that they were stored near the headquarters of the Council–Blasius' saloon–known to the police as the House of Blazes."

"I think they should belong to the police," said Coleman dryly. "I dare say Chief Ellis has heard of them, but I shall send word to him before I go to bed."

In a moment more Kendrick called me, and we bade good night to our host.

As we reached the Kendrick house the magnate roused himself from a brown study and said:

"The curmudgeon is a rather amusing cuss, Hampden, if you know how to take him. I advise you to cultivate his acquaintance."

"Do you mean–" I began.

"I mean," said Kendrick sharply, "that the closer you get to a man the more you find out about what he intends to do. If he wants to pay for the pleasure of your society it might be a pity to deny him the privilege."

CHAPTER XI

TROUBLES IN THE MARKET

Storm-signals were flying in the financial quarter of San Francisco. California and Sansome Streets were thronged with men whose faces, anxious, confident, hopeful or despairing, pictured a time of commercial stress. There was an unusual bustle about the orderly precincts of the banks, as clerks rushed in and out with the air of men who carried the fate of the day on their shoulders. Bearers of checks jostled one another in their eagerness to be first at the counters of the paying teller. The doors to the offices of bank presidents and cashiers, that on ordinary days opened but sedately to the occasional visitor, were now swinging constantly to admit their customers in search of unusual accommodation. And even at the savings banks there was a flutter of uneasiness; for at the opening hour a long line of timid-faced men and women had formed in front of the paying tellers' counters.

In the banking district this anxious activity was orderly and well-mannered. The center of disturbance was to be found about the rival stock exchanges on Pine and Montgomery Streets, where excited crowds blocked the sidewalks and roadways, curbstone brokers raised a deafening clamor with their offers to buy and sell, and groups of individual traders surged hither and thither in endless but changing combinations. The shouts followed one another in short and rapid volleys, like the popping of a pack of fire-crackers, and as each vocal explosion was the signal for the dissolution or rearrangement of a group of traders, the human herd was tossed about in waves, eddies and cross-currents, like the bay in a storm.

The granite pile on Pine Street that held the San Francisco Stock Exchange–the "Big Board" as it was known in the parlance of the street–was the origin of waves of disturbance that spread to the remotest confines of the crowds. The flight of a messenger down the granite steps would be followed by a roar of inarticulate sound, a wave of human motion spreading out in a circle of eddies, individual groups colliding, coalescing, separating into new combinations in a mad confusion of excited voices, till its impulse was lost on the confines of the crowd or whirled aside into the scores of bucket-shops that lined the adjacent streets. And similar waves of excitement spread in smaller volume from the rival and lesser exchanges on Montgomery and Leidesdorff Streets.

The developing strength of the agitators, and the rumors of the arming of the turbulent elements, had roused a spirit of uneasiness in the city that was not far from panic. As a consequence of their fears, men were rushing to protect their business interests, loans were called in, collections were pressed, lenders became wary, and weak holders of stocks were forced to sell. With these conditions overshadowing the market, professional traders in stocks became fierce and aggressive bears, and hammered at prices with every weapon that money and mendacity put at their hand.

Wharton Kendrick was early at his office, and I sought him for directions.

"Look after the other fellow," was his brusk command. "That is your part of the business. Let me know what Peter Bolton does. Send me reports every ten or fifteen minutes till the exchanges close. I'll be here all day."

Having satisfied myself that my messenger system was in good working order, I awaited the first move of the enemy. It came shortly after the opening of the stock exchanges. I received word that Peter Bolton had started for the "Big Board;" so I made my way thither to observe for myself what sort of activity he might be about.

As I was edging my way forward between the shouting, tossing eddies that divided the crowd, I felt a tap on the shoulder, and turned to find Parks beside me.

"A shameful sight!" he shouted in my ear. "Sad and shameful!" And he gave a vigorous shake to his head that put his shock of hair all a-quiver. "It's like a round-up of helpless cattle driven to the slaughter-house. It's worse than shameful. It's damnable!"

"More like the dairy, isn't it?" I asked. "They are like cows brought up to be milked, and afterward turned loose to accumulate a new supply."

This view of the market brought an angry flame of color into Parks' face.

"Worse than that–worse than that!" he cried indignantly. "It's like those African fellows that cut a steak out of their live cattle and then turn them out to grow another. Those men there," and he shook his fist at the granite front of the Stock Exchange, "and those men there," and he shook his fist at the El Dorado Bank as the nearest representative of speculative finance, "are vampires that grow by sucking the blood of the people."

"The people appear to be willing victims," I suggested, looking at the eager if apprehensive faces about us.

"By heavens, no!" cried Parks, in his high excited voice. "They are driven into the shambles by their poverty–by the inequalities and injustices in the distribution of wealth–as surely as if they had been driven by whips or bayonets." He glared about him as though he sought contradiction. "They are here in the hope of wresting from knavery and rapacity the share of the earth's products of which they have been despoiled."

"I suspect," was my scoffing reply, "that they are here in the hope of doing exactly what the owners of the El Dorado Bank have done–of taking all they can get and a little more."

"Sir," said Parks, "you lose sight of the mass in looking at the individual. The individual has been corrupted by a false system of society into striving for unjust gains. But the mass calls only for simple justice."

"Well, Parks," I returned, "I admire your optimism, though I can't say as much for your judgment."

"Admire it or not, sir, as you like," said Parks. "That will not alter facts. But this," he added, shaking his fist again at the frowning front of the Exchange, "is one of the iniquities that we shall sweep away."

"If we can judge by the patronage it is getting to-day it won't have to close very soon," was my comment.

"Sir," said Parks, "the day when it will be closed is nearer than you imagine. Our denunciations of the robbers of the stock exchanges excite more applause than anything except our denunciations of the Chinese."

"I should think it quite likely. Men like to hear hard words said of those who succeed where they themselves have failed. But the applause means nothing."

"It means," said Parks, "that we shall have the masses behind us when we give the word to abolish these iniquities."

"Abolish them? Pooh! It would take a despotism to do that."

"A despotism? No. A revolution. The revolution that will bring equality to the people is all that is needed."

"And you still think your revolution is coming?" I asked.

"Not the slightest doubt of it." And Parks gave a mysterious nod as though he could tell many things if he would, and then closed his mouth tightly as though tortures could not wring another word from him.

At this moment I caught sight of Peter Bolton intent on pressing a way to the entrance of the Exchange. His gaunt face was drawn into harsh, determined lines, his sharp chin was thrust forward, and his whole attitude was an expression of grim purpose. I lost sight of him in the struggle of making my way through the throng, and I had reached the door before I brought him under my eye again. He was pausing in the lobby to pass a word with an alert, bright-eyed man whom I knew as a broker, and I surmised that he was giving orders in regard to sales or purchases of stocks.

Inside the Board-room the clamor was more insistent and disturbing than on the street. The confined space compressed the waves of sound till they struck upon the ear with a force that benumbed my unaccustomed nerves. The cries, shouts, and yells of the brokers bidding for stocks or making their offerings came only as a confused roar.

Except for the noise, the scene on the floor of the Exchange resembled nothing so much as a magnified foot-ball scrimmage. The scores of excited brokers were rushing hither and thither within the railed pit, shouting, screaming, waving their arms, shaking their fists, forming groups about a half-dozen of their fellows, flinging one another aside to get to the center, struggling with all signs of personal combat, and then separating a moment later to form new groups. The dissolving combinations, the quick rushes, the kaleidoscopic changes among the circling men, were as confusing to the eye as the swelling dissonance of shouts was deafening to the ear.

The spectators of this tournament of riot made themselves a part of the brabble. They felt all the interest of those unarmed citizens who watched a battle which was to settle the fate of their goods and households. They were mostly speculators, winning or losing money with each burst of sound that rose from the bedlam dance in the pit. They filled the seats and crowded the aisles, and added their quota of outcries to the uproar, now shouting instructions to their brokers, now bargaining among themselves, and now voicing an exclamation of satisfaction or discomposure as the stocks changed prices at the call.

Peter Bolton dropped into a seat that had been reserved for him at the rail, and watched the scene with keen and wary eye. It was plain that he had been brought there by no idle curiosity. For the first time in the knowledge of the frequenters of the Exchange he took an open part in the trading, called brokers to him at every turn of the battle of the pit, and gave his directions with confident brevity.

The Exchange was not altogether a novelty to me, and after I had become accustomed to the confusion of sight and sound, I had no difficulty in discerning the progress of the struggle that was going on before me. It needed no broker to tell me that a hot financial battle was being fought in that confined arena. A novice in trade could have seen that there was a determined effort to break the market, met by an equally determined effort to uphold it. The attacking force had strong support. The alarms and anxieties caused by the signs of approaching trouble had brought into the market the stocks held by small margins, those of frightened investors, and those held by speculative merchants who found their credits suddenly shortened. The rumors of coming disorder had also brought to the bear side the professional traders who foresaw a probable fall in prices, and by sales for future delivery did their utmost to bring it about for their own profit.

But there were strong influences on the other side. And though each call of stock was followed by an avalanche of offers, I soon observed that every stock after a sharp decline was brought back to something near its former quotations. I surmised that the steadying hand of the syndicate was at work. It was not for nothing that Wharton Kendrick had held his midnight session with the financial barons of the city.

As the session wore away with fierce assault and resolute defense, with detonations of cries and shouts, with surges and clashes of conflicting factions of traders, I thought I saw an air of disappointment settling on the face of Peter Bolton. He spoke sharply to the brokers that from time to time he summoned about him. These conferences were followed by renewed activities and fresh outbreaks of sound among the gyrating, dissolving groups upon the floor; but after a flutter of changing prices the quotations returned to the level from which they started.

The session came to an end at last, and the throng of men poured out of the Exchange, bearing on their faces the record of success and failure, of excitement and fatigue, that had been scored by the morning's work. But so far as the official figures of the session showed it might have been a time of stagnation instead of fierce battle. The closing prices were not a point away from those that ruled at the close of the previous day.

"The El Dorado Bank has run against a snag this time," said one broker to his neighbor, as he wiped his perspiring face and adjusted his limp collar.

"The El Dorado Bank isn't the only one to feel a little sick over the morning's business," said his companion, with a toss of his thumb toward the bowed figure of Peter Bolton huddled in the seat by the rail and contemplating with vacant intentness the floor of the deserted pit. "Old Tightfist must have dropped a pile of money here to-day."

"He?" exclaimed his companion. "Not much he didn't. He always caught the turn at just the right minute. When the books are made up he's as likely to be ahead as behind."

"He has the devil's own luck," said the first broker.

"He found out what he was bucking against early in the game," said the other, "and after that he didn't need anybody to tell him when to get out."

As the throng passed out, Peter Bolton still sat in his seat by the rail. A grim air of reflection was on his face, the lines of stern determination still drew his chin forward and his lips back, and he studied the floor of the Exchange as though it were a blackboard on which his problem was being worked out. Then at last he slowly rose, and with a sour shake of his head walked toward the door, I turned my eyes on the clock in the hope of escaping his observation; but as he came by my seat he halted.

"So, young man," he said, with the compressed force of anger audible in his sarcastic drawl, "you think you have beat me, do you?–you and that smirking scoundrel you call Kendrick!" There was the concentrated essence of venom in his tone that testified to the depth of his hatred and chagrin.

His words were an admission that I was quick to understand. In a moment my mind flashed to the conclusion that the whole enginery of rumor and riot had been set in motion by this man to serve the purposes of his malignity. He had sought to pull down the commercial edifice of San Francisco in the hope of burying Wharton Kendrick in the ruins.

The design was the worthy offspring of the malevolent mind before me, but it was rather his insulting reference to my client than the wickedness of the thing he had attempted to do that stirred me with anger. A harsh answer was on my lips, but it was checked by the sudden recollection of Wharton Kendrick's advice to "cultivate Peter Bolton's acquaintance."

Accepting this recommendation as a command, I bowed with a smile as sarcastic as his own, and replied cheerfully:

"You do seem to have made a failure of it, Mr. Bolton."

A flash of anger came into the pale blue eyes, a shade of red flamed in the sallow cheeks, and Peter Bolton broke forth into passionate speech:

"Maybe you've beat me this time. Maybe you've had things your own way for once. But the fight isn't over yet. There's plenty of it coming, and I'll see that you get it. Let that scoundrel Kendrick look out for himself. He can hire whipper-snappers"–by this term I judged that Peter Bolton referred to me, and I was pleased to think that he credited his discomfiture in part to my humble efforts–"he can hire a line of whipper-snappers that would reach from here to the ferries, but he can't save himself. I'll drag him down. I'll strip him to the last rag. When I get through with him he won't have a dollar to his name. There won't be a foot of land or one brick on top of another that he can call his own." Peter Bolton spoke more rapidly than I had supposed was possible to him, and his face flamed with the wrath that had carried his tongue away.

"I'm sorry to hear it," I said politely. "I hope it won't happen before I collect my month's salary."

Bolton looked at me venomously from his deep-set eyes, and his thin lips curled with sarcastic lines.

"You've earned your salary this month," he said, with a return to his harsh drawl, "but it doesn't follow that you'll get it. You beat me this time, but it isn't the end."

"You did make rather a mess of it," I admitted. "You ought to have consulted somebody about it–an attorney, for instance."

I spoke idly, without special meaning; but at my words Bolton's face softened into a glance of sardonic humor.

"Oh," he said slowly, "I don't know but what you are right. Come around to my office in a day or two, and we'll talk about the fee." He jumped to the conclusion that I was ready to accept a bribe, and he continued: "It'll be anything in reason, young man, anything in reason."

CHAPTER XII

THE LOTTERY TICKET

In the midst of the lull that followed the failure of Peter Bolton's assault on the fortifications of commerce, I was surprised to find on my office desk one morning the following letter:

RESPECTFUL SIR:

to yours we this day instructed to remind you that your presence is more than agreeable. Having placed to your credit a money sum drawn according to ticket, should be your worshipful servant to have presented for payment.

As ever your faithful,

KWAN LUEY & Co.

This missive, written in a beautiful Spencerian hand, was for some minutes a puzzle. I read over its tangle-worded lines two or three times before it dawned upon me that it must concern the lottery ticket that I had purchased in Peter Bolton's office. The ticket had been handed to me with the promise that I should have "heap big money," and I drew from the letter's flowery but uncertain language the inference that the promise had been fulfilled. If confirmation had been necessary, the letter confirmed the testimony of my eyes when they had assured me that the seller of the ticket was Big Sam. It was impossible that any other Chinese would have known that I was the holder of the paper, or would have procured the sending of the derangement of words that had come over the name of Kwan Luey. As nothing more important called for my attention I indulged my curiosity by setting put at once for Kwan Luey's store.

Kwan Luey showed himself superior to any narrow prejudices in regard to the objects in which it was fitting for a merchant to trade. In one window he exhibited a fine collection of silks, ebony carvings, sandal-wood ornaments, and figured Chinese coats. In the other he had piled all manner of fine porcelain, ivory and lacquered ware. The counters in the front part of the store showed a similar division of salable goods. Farther back could be seen mats of rice, boxes of tea, bags of Chinese roots, and piles of mysterious and uncanny Chinese edibles. In his office clerks were counting Mexican dollars and packing them in stout boxes for shipping to China, the earnings of his countrymen. The closed rear rooms, I surmised, were devoted to the operation of the two or three lotteries he was reputed to control.

Kwan Luey himself stood just outside his office, a short, well-fed, well-dressed Chinaman, whose rounded, dark-brown face denoted a cheerful mind. I called him by name.

"What you wan'?" he asked suspiciously, prepared to deny his identity if my errand were not to his liking.

I introduced myself, and as my name brought no sign of enlightenment to his face, I presented his letter as a card of identification.

He gravely read it with all the pride of authorship kindling in his eye, and as gravely handed it back to me.

"How you like him, eh? Plitty good letteh, eh?"

I assured him that I could not have bettered it myself.

Kwan Luey gave a gratified smile.

"I lite him," he explained. "I go Mission school fo' yeah. I leahn lite, all same copy-book. I all same beat teacheh, eh?"

"You are a Christian Chinaman, then, Kwan Luey?"

"You Clistian?" he asked.

"I hope so."

He gave me a sly glance, and said:

"I Clistian Chinaman when Clistian man wan' buy goods."

"But not when Clistian man wants money?" I asked.

Kwan Luey smiled the bland smile of China, and made no direct reply.

"You wan' money, eh?" he said. "You heap lucky, eh?"

"Well, I don't know."

"You catch-em ticket?"

I produced the square of paper I had received from Big Sam.

"What does that say?" I asked.

Kwan Luey took the paper, and drew his eyelids together till there showed but two narrow slanting slits between them as he pretended to examine it.

"Him say–him say–I look-em book and see what him say." And with his bland smile still rendering his face innocent of meaning, he retired to his office. He reappeared a moment later.