“Well,” was the reply, “with what I had and what I have saved since I came I could get together about five thousand dollars, I think.”
“Is it where you c’n put your hands on’t?”
John took some slips of paper from his pocketbook and handed them to David.
“H’m, h’m,” said the latter. “Wa’al, I owe ye quite a little bunch o’ money, don’t I? Forty-five hunderd! Wa’al! Couldn’t you ’a’ done better ’n to keep this here at four percent?”
“Well,” said John, “perhaps so, and perhaps not. I preferred to do this at all events.”
“Thought the old man was safe anyway, didn’t ye?” said David in a tone which showed that he was highly pleased.
“Yes,” said John.
“Is this all?” asked David.
“There is some interest on those certificates, and I have some balance in my account,” was the reply; “and then, you know, I have some very valuable securities—a beautiful line of mining stocks, and that promising Pennsylvania property.”
At the mention of the last-named asset David looked at him for an instant as if about to speak, but if so he changed his mind. He sat for a moment fingering the yellow paper which carried the mystic words. Presently he said, opening the message out, “That’s from an old friend of mine out to Chicago. He come from this part of the country, an’ we was young fellers together thirty years ago. I’ve had a good many deals with him and through him, an’ he never give me a wrong steer, fur ’s I know. That is, I never done as he told me without comin’ out all right, though he’s give me a good many pointers I never did nothin’ about. ’Tain’t nec’sary to name no names, but ‘Bangs Galilee’ means ‘buy pork,’ an’ as I’ve ben watchin’ the market fer quite a spell myself, an’ standard pork ’s a good deal lower ’n it costs to pack it, I’ve made up my mind to buy a few thousan’ barrels fer fam’ly use. It’s a handy thing to have in the house,” declared Mr. Harum, “an’ I thought mebbe it wouldn’t be a bad thing fer you to have a little. It looks cheap to me,” he added, “an’ mebbe bime-by what you don’t eat you c’n sell.”
“Well,” said John, laughing, “you see me at table every day and know what my appetite is like. How much pork do you think I could take care of?”
“Wa’al, at the present price,” said David, “I think about four thousan’ barrels would give ye enough to eat fer a spell, an’ mebbe leave ye a few barrels to dispose of if you should happen to strike a feller later on that wanted it wuss ’n you did.”
John opened his eyes a little. “I should only have a margin of a dollar and a quarter,” he said.
“Wa’al, I’ve got a notion that that’ll carry ye,” said David. “It may go lower ’n what it is now. I never bought anythin’ yet that didn’t drop some, an’ I guess nobody but a fool ever did buy at the bottom more’n once; but I’ve had an idee for some time that it was about bottom, an’ this here telegraph wouldn’t ’a’ ben sent if the feller that sent it didn’t think so too, an’ I’ve had some other cor’spondence with him.” Mr. Harum paused and laughed a little.
“I was jest thinkin’,” he continued, “of what the Irishman said about Stofford. Never ben there, have ye? Wa’al, it’s a place eight nine mile f’m here, an’ the hills ’round are so steep that when you’re goin’ up you c’n look right back under the buggy by jes’ leanin’ over the edge of the dash. I was drivin’ ’round there once, an’ I met an Irishman with a big drove o’ hogs.
“ ‘Hello, Pat!’ I says, ‘where ’d all them hogs come from?’
“ ‘Stofford,’ he says.
“ ‘Wa’al,’ I says, ‘I wouldn’t ’a’ thought the’ was so many hogs in Stofford.’
“ ‘Oh, be gobs!’ he says, ‘sure they’re all hogs in Stofford;’ an’,” declared David, “the bears ben sellin’ that pork up in Chicago as if the hull everlastin’ West was all hogs.”
“It’s very tempting,” said John thoughtfully.
“Wa’al,” said David, “I don’t want to tempt ye exac’ly, an’ certain I don’t want to urge ye. The’ ain’t no sure things but death an’ taxes, as the sayin’ is, but buyin’ pork at these prices is buyin’ somethin’ that’s got value, an’ you can’t wipe it out. In other words, it’s buyin’ a warranted article at a price consid’ably lower ’n it c’n be produced for, an’ though it may go lower, if a man c’n stick, it’s bound to level up in the long run.”
Our friend sat for some minutes apparently looking into the fire, but he was not conscious of seeing anything at all. Finally he rose, went over to Mr. Harum’s desk, figured the interest on the certificates up to the first of January, endorsed them, and filling up a check for the balance of the amount in question, handed the check and certificate to David.
“Think you’ll go it, eh?” said the latter.
“Yes,” said John; “but if I take the quantity you suggest, I shall have nothing to remargin the trade in case the market goes below a certain point.”
“I’ve thought of that,” replied David, “an’ was goin’ to say to you that I’d carry the trade down as fur as your money would go, in case more margins had to be called.”
“Very well,” said John. “And will you look after the whole matter for me?”
“All right,” said David.
John thanked him and returned to the front room.
There were times in the months which followed when our friend had reason to wish that all swine had perished with those whom Shylock said “your prophet the Nazarite conjured the devil into;” and the news of the world in general was of secondary importance compared with the market reports. After the purchase pork dropped off a little, and
