"Hello!" he said after a moment. "Hello! ... Buy five hundred May, at
the market, right away."

He hung up the receiver and leaned back in his chair.

"They'll report the trade in a minute," he said. "Better wait and see."

Cressler stood at the window, his hands clasped behind his back,
looking down into the street. He did not answer. The seconds passed,
then the minutes. Crookes turned to his desk and signed a few letters,
the scrape of his pen the only noise to break the silence of the room.
Then at last he observed:

"Pretty bum weather for this time of the year."

Cressler nodded. He took off his hat, and pushed the hair back from his
forehead with a slow, persistent gesture; then as the ticker began to
click again, he faced around quickly, and crossing the room, ran the
tape through his fingers.

"God," he muttered, between his teeth, "I hope your men didn't lose any
time. It's up again."

There was a step at the door, and as Crookes called to come in, the
office messenger entered and put a slip of paper into his hands.
Crookes looked at it, and pushed it across his desk towards Cressler.

"Here you are," he observed. "That's your trade. Five hundred May, at a
dollar ten. You were lucky to get it at that--or at any price."

"Ten!" cried the other, as he took the paper.

Crookes turned away again, and glanced indifferently over his letters.
Cressler laid the slip carefully down upon the ledge of the desk, and
though Crookes did not look up, he could almost feel how the man braced
himself, got a grip of himself, put all his resources to the stretch to
meet this blow squarely in the front.

"And I said another eighth would bust me," Cressler remarked, with a
short laugh. "Well," he added, grimly, "it looks as though I were
busted. I suppose, though, we must all expect to get the knife once in
a while--mustn't we? Well, there goes fifty thousand dollars of my good
money."

"I can tell you who's got it, if you care to know," answered Crookes.
"It's a pewter quarter to Government bonds that Gretry, Converse & Co.
sold that wheat to you. They've got about all the wheat there is."

"I know, of course, they've been heavy buyers--for this Unknown Bull
they talk so much about."

"Well, he ain't Unknown to me," declared Crookes. "I know him. It's
Curtis Jadwin. He's the man we've been fighting all along, and all
hell's going to break loose down here in three or four days. He's
cornered the market."

"Jadwin