-a
half,--three-eighths,--a quarter,--seventy-two!"

Cold beads of sweat gathered on Frye's forehead. One cent more and he
was ruined!

Again the ticker buzzed like a mad hornet, and again the devil's teeth
snapped.

"September wheat now seventy-one seven-eighths,--seven-eighths,
--three-quarters,--seven-eighths split,--now the three-quarter,
--five-eighths,--a half,--a half,--five-eighths,--a half,--a half
again,--three-eighths,--a quarter,--an eighth,--a quarter,--an eighth,
--a quarter,--an eighth,--an eighth,--a quarter split,--an eighth,--

"SEVENTY-ONE!!!"

FRYE WAS RUINED.

He gave one low moan, the first, last, and only one during those three
long weeks of agony!

A few who sat near heard it, but did not even look at him, so lost were
they to all human feeling. The devil's teeth kept snapping, the endless
coils of tape kept unwinding; the boy continued his drawl, but Frye paid
no heed. Only those spider-legs on the wall seemed kicking at him, and
that fatal seventy-one, one, one kept ringing in his ears. He arose, and
staggered out into that palace of glass again and swallowed more brandy.
Then jostling many, but seeing no one, he, with bowed head, made his way
to his office, opened, entered, and locked the door, and sat down.

Whir-r-r-r-r!!!

Click, click, click!!!

Seventy-one, one, one! It was the last he heard, and then he sank
forward on his desk in a drunken stupor.

At this moment Uncle Terry, with Frye's letter in his pocket, and
righteous wrath in his heart, was speeding toward Boston as fast as
steam could carry him.

The clear incisive strokes of an adjacent clock proclaiming midnight
awoke Frye. He raised his head, and in that almost total darkness for a
moment knew not where he was. Then, ere the echoes of those funeral
knells died away, he arose, lit the two gas-jets, and sat down.

Seventy-one, one, one!!

They brought it all back to him, and now, alone in his misery, he
groaned aloud, and with his despair came the dread of the morrow, when
he, the once proud and defiant man, must go forth crushed, broken,
despairing, penniless!

All would know it, and all would rejoice. Out of the many that hated or
feared him, not one would feel a grain of pity, and well he knew it. He
could almost see the looks of scorn on their faces, and hear them say,
"Glad of it! Served him right, the old reprobate!"

Then his past life came back to him. He had never married, and since he
had looked