Mr. Arneel paused, and Mr. Norrie Simms, more excitable than most by temperament, chose to exclaim, bitterly: “The wrecker!” A stir of interest passed over the others accompanied by murmurs of disapproval.
“The moment he got the stock in his hands as collateral,” continued Mr. Arneel, solemnly, “and in the face of an agreement not to throw a share on the market, he has been unloading steadily. That is what has been happening yesterday and to-day. Over fifteen thousand shares of this stock, which cannot very well be traced to outside sources, have been thrown on the market, and we have every reason to believe that all of it comes from the same place. The result is that American Match, and Mr. Hull and Mr. Stackpole, are on the verge of collapse.”
“The scoundrel!” repeated Mr. Norrie Simms, bitterly, almost rising to his feet. The Douglas Trust Company was heavily interested in American Match.
“What an outrage!” commented Mr. Lawrence, of the Prairie National, which stood to lose at least three hundred thousand dollars in shrinkage of values on hypothecated stock alone. To this bank that Cowperwood owed at least three hundred thousand dollars on call.
“Depend on it to find his devil’s hoof in it somewhere,” observed Jordan Jules, who had never been able to make any satisfactory progress in his fight on Cowperwood in connection with the city council and the development of the Chicago General Company. The Chicago Central, of which he was now a director, was one of the banks from which Cowperwood had judiciously borrowed.
“It’s a pity he should be allowed to go on bedeviling the town in this fashion,” observed Mr. Sunderland Sledd to his neighbor, Mr. Duane Kingsland, who was a director in a bank controlled by Mr. Hand.
The latter, as well as Schryhart, observed with satisfaction the effect of Mr. Arneel’s words on the company.
Mr. Arneel now again fished in his pocket laboriously, and drew forth a second slip of paper which he spread out before him. “This is a time when frankness must prevail,” he went on, solemnly, “if anything is to be done, and I am in hopes that we can do something. I have here a memorandum of some of the loans which the local banks have made to Mr. Cowperwood and which are still standing on their books. I want to know if there are any further loans of which any of you happen to know and which you are willing to mention at this time.”
He looked solemnly around.
Immediately several loans were mentioned by Mr. Cotton and Mr. Osgood which had not been heard of previously. The company was now very well aware, in a general way, of what was coming.
“Well, gentlemen,” continued Mr. Arneel, “I have, previous to this meeting, consulted with a number of our leading men. They agree with me that, since so many banks are in need of funds to carry this situation, and since there is no particular obligation on anybody’s part to look after the interests of Mr. Cowperwood, it might be just as well if these loans of his, which are outstanding, were called and the money used to aid the banks and the men who have been behind Mr. Hull and Mr. Stackpole. I have no personal feeling against Mr. Cowperwood—that is, he has never done me any direct injury—but naturally I cannot approve of the course he has seen fit to take in this case. Now, if there isn’t money available from some source to enable you gentlemen to turn around, there will be a number of other failures. Runs may be started on a half-dozen banks. Time is the essence of a situation like this, and we haven’t any time.”
Mr. Arneel paused and looked around. A slight buzz of conversation sprang up, mostly bitter and destructive criticism of Cowperwood.
“It would be only just if he could be made to pay for this,” commented Mr. Blackman to Mr. Sledd. “He has been allowed to play fast and loose long enough. It is time some one called a halt on him.”
“Well, it looks to me as though it would be done tonight,” Mr. Sledd returned.
Meanwhile Mr. Schryhart was again rising to his feet. “I think,” he was saying, “if there is no objection on any one’s part, Mr. Arneel, as chairman, might call for a formal expression of opinion from the different gentlemen present which will be on record as the sense of this meeting.”
At this point Mr. Kingsland, a tall, whiskered gentleman, arose to inquire exactly how it came that Cowperwood had secured these stocks, and whether those present were absolutely sure that the stock has been coming from him or from his friends. “I would not like to think we were doing any man an injustice,” he concluded.
In reply to this Mr. Schryhart called in Mr. Stackpole to corroborate him. Some of the stocks had been positively identified. Stackpole related the full story, which somehow seemed to electrify the company, so intense was the feeling against Cowperwood.
“It is amazing that men should be permitted to do things like this and still hold up their heads in the business world,” said one, Mr. Vasto, president of the Third National, to his neighbor.
“I should think there would be no difficulty in securing united action in a case of this kind,” said Mr. Lawrence, president of the Prairie National, who was very much beholden to Hand for past and present favors.
“Here is a case,” put in Schryhart, who was merely waiting for an opportunity to explain further, “in which an unexpected political situation develops an unexpected crisis, and this man uses it for his personal aggrandizement and to the detriment of every other person. The welfare of the city is nothing to him. The stability of the very banks he borrows from is nothing. He is a pariah, and if this opportunity to show him what we think of him and his methods is not used we will be doing less than our duty to the city and to one another.”
“Gentlemen,” said Mr. Arneel, finally, after Cowperwood’s different loans had been carefully tabulated, “don’t you think it would be wise to send for Mr. Cowperwood and state to him directly the decision we have reached and the reasons for it? I presume all of us would agree that he should be notified.”
“I think he should be notified,” said Mr. Merrill, who saw behind this smooth talk the iron club that was being brandished.
Both Hand and Schryhart looked at each other and Arneel while they politely waited for some one else to make a suggestion. When no one ventured, Hand, who was hoping this would prove a ripping blow to Cowperwood, remarked, viciously:
“He might as well be told—if we can reach him. It’s sufficient notice, in my judgment. He might as well understand that this is the united action of the leading financial forces of the city.”
“Quite so,” added Mr. Schryhart. “It is time he understood, I think, what the moneyed men of this community think of him and his crooked ways.”
A murmur of approval ran around the room.
“Very well,” said Mr. Arneel. “Anson, you know him better than some of the rest of us. Perhaps you had better see if you can get him on the telephone and ask him to call. Tell him that we are here in executive session.”
“I think he might take it more seriously if you spoke to him, Timothy,” replied Merrill.
Arneel, being always a man of action, arose and left the room, seeking a telephone which was located in a small workroom or office den on the same floor, where he could talk without fear of being overheard.
Sitting in his library on this particular evening, and studying the details of half a dozen art-catalogues which had accumulated during the week, Cowperwood was decidedly conscious of the probable collapse of American Match on the morrow. Through his brokers and agents he was well aware that a conference was on at this hour at the house of Arneel. More than once during the day he had seen bankers and brokers who were anxious about possible shrinkage in connection with various hypothecated securities, and to-night his valet had called him to the ’phone half a dozen times to talk with Addison, with Kaffrath, with a broker by the name of Prosser who had succeeded Laughlin in active control of his private speculations, and also, be it said, with several of the banks whose presidents were at this particular conference. If Cowperwood was hated, mistrusted, or feared by the overlords of these institutions, such was by no means the case with the underlings, some of whom, through being merely civil, were hopeful of securing material benefits from him at some future time. With a feeling of amused satisfaction he was meditating upon how heavily and neatly he had countered on his enemies. Whereas they were speculating as to how to offset their heavy losses on the morrow, he was congratulating himself on corresponding gains. When all his deals should be closed up he would clear within the neighborhood of a million dollars. He did not feel that he had worked Messrs. Hull and Stackpole any great injustice. They were at their wit’s end. If he had not seized this opportunity to undercut them Schryhart or Arneel would have done so, anyhow.
Mingled with thoughts of a forthcoming financial triumph were others of Berenice Fleming. There are such things as figments of the brain, even in the heads of colossi. He thought of Berenice early and late; he even dreamed of her. He laughed at himself at times for thus being taken in the toils of a mere girl—the strands of her ruddy hair—but working in Chicago these days he was always conscious of her, of what she was doing, of where
