gan to set out the pieces on the Bay State Gas chessboard
with a view to trying certain new moves that had occurred to his
perpetual-motion mind.

The situation of Bay State Gas stock was fully understood by the public.
While Rogers had possession of the Boston companies, he simply held them
in trust, and must give them up whenever the parent corporation had coin
enough to redeem them. The securities were still in the hands of the
public and my friends, and my own duty to get Bay State Gas on its feet
was plain. It was again a case of raising money, and to do this we had
the issue of securities which we were preparing to float just before
Foster and Braman swooped down on us. Addicks agreed that if I would
undertake the marketing of this stock, he would issue only enough of it
to redeem the properties from Rogers. His directors met and formally
"resoluted" on this point, and I felt satisfied before going ahead that
there was no danger of this money being put in jeopardy without actually
stealing it. The company, for the nonce, had no other business but to
pay office rent and clerk hire, and in spite of Addicks' financial
immorality, all who knew him were aware he took no chances of ever
getting himself sent to jail. So I began to sell the stock in the open
market.

_PART II_

CHAPTER I

THE MAGIC WORLD OF FINANCE

Though this is the twentieth century and enlightenment is supposed to
prevail throughout this broad land of ours, the majority of people still
regard the world of finance as the world of magic. Within the fairy
realm of finance the laws of nature apparently are suspended, and,
overnight, wonders are worked. The ordinary mortal, wise in all other
walks of life, sees the man who yesterday stood beside him at the plough
or at the bench emerging from the mysterious portals bearing the fruits
of the endeavors of a hundred or a thousand lives, although a moment ago
he passed through them with nothing. Who can deny the magic that thus
demonstrates its power, or fail to accord veneration to the magicians
that work such marvels? No wonder the ordinary mortal feels that he has
no license to enter the world of finance save on his knees, hat in hand,
bearing tribute to the divinities enthroned within this enchanted
territory.

It is my purpose to do away with this extraordinary deception and to
show it up as one of the artifices with which tricksters, since the
beginning of the world, have imposed up