e of thousand shares?"

"When I have any further orders," says he, puffin' out his face, "you
will get them!"

"Oh, slush!" says I. "Don't play so rough, Piddie."

I was onto him, all right. I've seen these hot-air plungers before. They
follow up a stock for weeks, and buy and sell in six figures, and reckon
up how they've hit the market for great chunks--but it's all under their
lids. You can't spend pipe dreams, if you win; and if you lose, it
don't shrink the size of your really truly roll. It's almost as
satisfyin' as walkin by the back door of a bakery when you're hungry.
That kind of game is about Piddie's size, too. All it calls for is
plenty of imagination, and he's got that by the bale. I was kind of glad
to see him enjoyin' himself so innocent, and now and then I'd help along
the excitement.

"Heard about how Morgan's tryin' to get hold of Blitzen?" I'd say, and
Piddie would prick up his ears like a fox-terrier sightin' a rat.

"Who told you?" Piddie'd ask.

"Why," I'd say, "I got it straight from a delicatessen man that lives on
the same block with a man that runs a hot dog cart in John-st. Don't
want anything closer'n that, do you!"

Then Piddie'd look kind of foolish, and go off and call down some one
good and hard, just to relieve his feelin's.

First thing I knew, though, Piddie was havin' star-chamber sessions with
a seedy-lookin' piker that wore an actor's overcoat and a brunette
collar that looked like it had been wished onto his neck about last
Thanksgivin'. They'd get together in a corner of the reception room and
whisper away for half an hour on a stretch. If it hadn't been Piddie,
I'd put it down for a hard-luck tale with a swift touch for a curtain;
but no one that ever took a second look at Piddie would ever waste
their time tryin' a touch on him. So I guessed the gent was a bucketshop
tout who was tryin' to interest Piddie in some kind of a deal.

Still, I couldn't get any picture of Piddie takin' a chance with real
money. It wa'n't until I seen him walkin' around stary-eyed one day, and
gettin' nervous by the minute, that I could believe he's really been
rung in. He was goin' through all the motions, though, of a man that's
shoved everything, win or lose, on the red, and it was a circus to keep
tabs on him. He makes a bluff at bein' awful busy with the billbook; but
he couldn't stay at the desk more'n three minutes at a spell. Inside of
an hour I counted four times that he washed his