“Just the same, you’ll note that Tampico Pet is tumbling at the same time it’s being snapped up, which is a very curious phenomenon,” Regan urged.
“In a bear market all sorts of curious phenomena occur,” Francis bluffed with a mature show of wisdom. “And when they’ve swallowed enough of my dumpings they’ll be ripe to roll on a barrel. Somebody will pay something to get my dumpings out of their system. I fancy they’ll pay through the nose before I’m done with them.”
“But you’re all in, boy. I’ve been watching your fight, even before your return. Tampico Pet is your last.”
Francis shook his head.
“I’d scarcely say that,” he lied. “I’ve got assets my market enemies never dream of. I’m luring them on, that’s all, just luring them on. Of course, Regan, I’m telling you this in confidence. You were my father’s friend. Mine is going to be some clean up, and, if you’ll take my tip, in this short market you start buying. You’ll be sure to settle with the sellers long in the end.”
“What are your other assets?”
Francis shrugged his shoulders.
“That’s what they’re going to find out when they’re full up with my stuff.”
“It’s a bluff!” Regan admired explosively. “You’ve got the old man’s nerve, all right. But you’ve got to show me it isn’t bluff.”
Regan waited, and Francis was suddenly inspired.
“It is,” he muttered. “You’ve named it. I’m drowning over my back-teeth now, and they’re the highest out of the wash. But I won’t drown if you will help me. All you’ve got to do is to remember my father and put out your hand to save his son. If you’ll back me up, we’ll make them all sick....”
And right there the Wolf of Wall Street showed his teeth. He pointed to Richard Henry Morgan’s picture.
“Why do you think I kept that hanging on the wall all these years?” he demanded.
Francis nodded as if the one accepted explanation was their tried and ancient friendship.
“Guess again,” Regan sneered grimly.
Francis shook his head in perplexity.
“So I shouldn’t ever forget him,” the Wolf went on. “And never a waking moment have I forgotten him.——Remember the Conmopolitan Railways Merger? Well, old R.H.M. double-crossed me in that deal. And it was some double-cross, believe me. But he was too cunning ever to let me get a come-back on him. So there his picture has hung, and here I’ve sat and waited. And now the time has come.”
“You mean?” Francis queried quietly.
“Just that,” Regan snarled. “I’ve waited and worked for this day, and the day has come. I’ve got the whelp where I want him at any rate.” He glanced up maliciously at the picture. “And if that don’t make the old gent turn in his grave....”
Francis rose to his feet and regarded his enemy curiously.
“No,” he said, as if in soliloquy, “it isn’t worth it.”
“What isn’t worth what?” the other demanded with swift suspicion.
“Beating you up,” was the cool answer. “I could kill you with my hands in five minutes. You’re no Wolf. You’re just mere yellow dog, the part of you that isn’t plain skunk. They told me to expect this of you; but I didn’t believe, and I came to see. They were right. You were all that they said. Well, I must get along out of this. It smells like a den of foxes. It stinks.”
He paused with his hand on the door knob and looked back. He had not succeeded in making Regan lose his temper.
“And what are you going to do about it?” the latter jeered.
“If you’ll permit me to get my broker on your ‘phone maybe you’ll learn,” Francis replied.
“Go to it, my laddy buck,” Regan conceded, then, with a wave of suspicion, “—I’ll get him for you myself.”
And, having ascertained that Bascom was really at the other end of the line, he turned the receiver over to Francis.
“You were right,” the latter assured Bascom. “Regan’s all you said and worse. Go right on with your plan of campaign. We’ve got him where we want him, though the old fox won’t believe it for a moment. He thinks he’s going to strip me, clean me out.” Francis paused to think up the strongest way of carrying on his bluff, then continued. “I’ll tell you something you don’t know. He’s the one who manœuvred the raid from the beginning. So now you know who we’re going to bury.”
And, after a little more of similar talk, he hung up.
“You see,” he explained, again from the door, “you were so crafty that we couldn’t make out who it was. Why hell, Regan, we were prepared to give a walloping to some unknown that had several times your strength. And now that it’s you, it’s easy. We were prepared to strain. But with you it will be a walk-over. To-morrow, around this time, there’s going to be a funeral right here in your office and you’re not going to be one of the mourners. You’re going to be the corpse——and a not-nice looking financial corpse you’ll be when we get done with you.”
“The dead spit of R.H.M.,” the Wolf grinned. “Lord, how he could pull off a bluff!”
“It’s a pity he didn’t bury you and save me all the trouble,” was Francis’ parting shot.
“And all the expense,” Regan flung after him. “It’s going to be pretty expensive for you, and there isn’t going to be any funeral from this place.”
“Well, to-morrow’s the day,” Francis delivered to Bascom, as they parted that evening. “This time to-morrow I’ll be a perfectly nice scalped and skinned and sun-dried and smoke-cured specimen for Regan’s private collection. But who’d have believed the old skunk had it in for me! I never harmed him. On the contrary, I always considered him father’s best friend.——If Charley Tippery could only come through with some of the Tippery surplus coin....”
“Or if the United States would only declare a moratorium,” Bascom hoped equally hopelessly.
And Regan, at that moment, was saying to his assembled agents and rumor-factory specialists:
“Sell! Sell! Sell all you’ve got and then sell short. I see no bottom to this market!”
And Francis, on his way up town, buying the last extra, scanned the five-inch-lettered headline:
“I SEE NO BOTTOM TO THIS MARKET.—THOMAS REGAN.”
