d desert him. In the air about him he seemed to feel an
influence, a sudden new element, the presence of a new force. It was
Luck, the great power, the great goddess, and all at once it had
stooped from out the invisible, and just over his head passed swiftly
in a rush of glittering wings.

"The thing would have to be handled like glass," observed the broker
thoughtfully, his eyes narrowing "A tip like this is public property in
twenty-four hours, and it don't give us any too much time. I don't want
to break the price by unloading a million or more bushels on 'em all of
a sudden. I'll scatter the orders pretty evenly. You see," he added,
"here's a big point in our favor. We'll be able to sell on a strong
market. The Pit traders have got some crazy war rumour going, and
they're as flighty over it as a young ladies' seminary over a great big
rat. And even without that, the market is top-heavy. Porteous makes me
weary. He and his gang have been bucking it up till we've got an
abnormal price. Ninety-four for May wheat! Why, it's ridiculous. Ought
to be selling way down in the eighties. The least little jolt would tip
her over. Well," he said abruptly, squaring himself at Jadwin, "do we
come in? If that same luck of yours is still in working order, here's
your chance, J., to make a killing. There's just that gilt-edged,
full-morocco chance that a report of big 'visible' would give us."

Jadwin laughed. "Sam," he said, "I'll flip a coin for it."

"Oh, get out," protested the broker; then suddenly--the gambling
instinct that a lifetime passed in that place had cultivated in
him--exclaimed:

"All right. Flip a coin. But give me your word you'll stay by it. Heads
you come in; tails you don't. Will you give me your word?"

"Oh, I don't know about that," replied Jadwin, amused at the
foolishness of the whole proceeding. But as he balanced the half-dollar
on his thumb-nail, he was all at once absolutely assured that it would
fall heads. He flipped it in the air, and even as he watched it spin,
said to himself, "It will come heads. It could not possibly be anything
else. I know it will be heads."

And as a matter of course the coin fell heads.

"All right," he said, "I'll come in."

"For a million bushels?"

"Yes--for a million. How much in margins will you want?"

Gretry figured a moment on the back of an envelope.

"Fifty thousand dollars," he announced at length.

Jadwin wrote the check on a corner of the broker's d