Adventure Magazine Cover, April 1916 — page 106: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

104 “T hate to wake you up, it’s so beautiful,” said Mrs. Buckmuller at last, as Jake was spending his millions in the construction of a combination sun-parlor and rathskeller un- der the lee scuppers of his yacht, ‘‘but, if you don’t hurry up and dress, we’ll be late for the show.” A twenty-point rise in ‘‘C. C.” was re- corded the next day. More than that, all the stocks affected, or likely to be affected by war orders, began to make brilliant flights. The railroads and general indus- trials lagged behind, but they were on the upward slope also, and brokers reported a healthy public demand for them. Thus began Wall Street’s golden season. From all over the country mozxey flowed into the stock market. Brokers’ clerks worked night and day trying to keep up with the business. Outside Wall Street, in- dustry began to sit up and take notice. Bread lines dwindled and disappeared. The leaders of finance lost their air of pre- occupation, and the President of the United States began to smile quite cheerfully. Jake Buckmuller sold out and counted the profits on his ‘‘pyramided”’ speculation to the still incredulous Celia, who was not convinced until he endorsed a check for a hundred thousand dollars to her order. % IT WAS the day on which Celia de- &) posited her big check. The most noted of American bankers, soon to overshadow the Rothschilds as a world financier, sat in his office through whose windows there flowed in a flood of warm Spring sunshine. His strong features were relaxed as he chatted with a portly gentle- man who sat across the desk from him. “Tt has been wonderful, Doctor, to see America shake off her lethargy,” he said. ‘“‘When we were worrying over the matter last Winter, I thought some little thing would start the ball rolling. It has inter- ested me to trace this one of the mysterious impulses that emerge from sources hidden in the great mass of men. “My agents report to me that the first order of that initial flurry in Consolidated Copper was a purchase of twenty shares by a young man employed as advertising man- ager in a concern that prepares and sells a well-known brand of cereals. I have sent for him and he is outside. Let us have him in and learn why he made that investment. The odd thing is that he confidently as- Adventure sured Mr. Flake, the broker, that the stock would goto par. Mr. Williams, a patient of yours by the way, who is president of the company, couldn’t have predicted it then, because he didn’t know it any more than I knew it.” He pressed a button. A clerk opened the office door and looked in, inquiry on his face. The banker nodded. The clerk turned and beckoned, and Jake Buckmuller entered the room, the clerk closing the door behind him. “Mr. Buckmuller,’ said the banker courteously, “‘won’t you take a chair? This is my physician, Dr. Clark.” Jake turned to acknowledge the intro- duction and stood still, staring at the ample brow and the spectacles with the rims of tortoise-shell. For the first time in his life the jaunty self-possession that was his by right of birth, failed him. Recovering his faculties quickly, however, he bowed and sank into the chair the banker had indi- cated. “T was interested in knowing why you bought Consolidated Copper, Mr. Buck- muller,” the banker explained. “Would you have any objection to telling me?” Jake grinned. “Better get the dope from your friend,” he answered. ‘‘He was in, and for a big jump, right at the pop of the gat. Mine was only | piker stuff — follow-the-leader busi- ness.’ The banker turned to the perplexed face of the physician. “I’m sure I don’t know, for the life of me, what the young man is talking about,’’ said Dr. Clark. “Oji-yoi, you don’t!’ said Jake. “You didn’t ride up in the subway with a thin guy on the sixteenth of last December? You didn’t?” “But I did ride uptown with a slender gentleman on that day,” said Dr. Clark. It was the day we opened the Romney Laboratory. My companion was Dr. Teal, the serologist.”’ “Tyon’t short-change on the information, Doc,” urged Jake. “Tell him what you said.” “What I said?” “Righto—about taking five million in Cc. ae ’ 9) “Oh! Why I had a boil on the back of my neck, and I asked Dr. Teal to make me a vaccine for its treatment. I told him I wanted a strength of five million of the dead CoOMmichoooks (CO