added a brief interview to explain it."

Richard's impulse was to ask a dozen questions; he restrained himself
and asked none. Richard was not so fond of fiction as to invite it. He
sent the report and interview to the _Daily Tory_, and dispatched a
private message to Mr. Bayard, giving him the news and congratulating
him on his unerring gifts as a seer.

CHAPTER XVII

HOW NORTHERN CONSOLIDATED WAS SOLD

When the President of these United States so dauntlessly flourished the
Monroe Doctrine in the German face, and shook the Presidential fist
beneath the German nose, the flourishing and fist-shaking were
accomplished through the medium of a special message to Congress
which--a clap of thunder from a cloudless sky--made its appearance in
House and Senate upon a certain Tuesday afternoon at four of the
congressional clock. The hour of four had been settled upon to diminish
as much as might be, so the President said, the chances of an earthquake
in the New York stock market, which closed at three. In San Francisco,
which is three hours younger than New York, the winds of disastrous
speculation blew a hurricane that afternoon; but no one east of the
Mississippi cares what happens in San Francisco. Besides, the New York
hurricane was only deferred.

Tuesday afternoon, after word of that Presidential fist-shaking had
soaked into the souls of men, speculative New York went nervous to the
frontiers of hysteria. Tuesday night, speculative New York couldn't
sleep; it sat up till morning, for, like cattle, it could smell in the
breeze the coming storm. Wednesday heard the crash; and the crashing
continued unabated throughout Thursday and Friday. The papers of that
hour in attempting to describe stock conditions drew exhaustively on
such terms as "tornado," "blizzard," "simoon," "maelstrom," "cyclone,"
"landslide," "avalanche," and whatever else in the English language
means death and devastation. No one found fault of those similes, which
were justified of the hopeless truth. Values were beaten as flat as a
field of turnips. The best feature was that no banks failed; two or
three of the weaker sisters wavered, but the big, burly concerns gave
them the arm of their aid and led them through.

Days before the smash, that osprey pool had perfected the last fragment
of its arrangements. The old gray buccaneer, who had charge of the
pool's interests, was as ready for action as was Mr. Bayard. The latter
stock-King was perh