ing every current Chicagoan of importance,
and this fact alone was certain to be of value. Then the old man was
direct, plain-spoken, simple-appearing, and wholly
unpretentious--qualities which Cowperwood deemed invaluable.

Once or twice in the last three years Laughlin had lost heavily on
private "corners" that he had attempted to engineer, and the general
feeling was that he was now becoming cautious, or, in other words,
afraid. "Just the man," Cowperwood thought. So one morning he called
upon Laughlin, intending to open a small account with him.

"Henry," he heard the old man say, as he entered Laughlin's fair-sized
but rather dusty office, to a young, preternaturally solemn-looking
clerk, a fit assistant for Peter Laughlin, "git me them there Pittsburg
and Lake Erie sheers, will you?" Seeing Cowperwood waiting, he added,
"What kin I do for ye?"

Cowperwood smiled. "So he calls them 'sheers,' does he?" he thought.
"Good! I think I'll like him."

He introduced himself as coming from Philadelphia, and went on to say
that he was interested in various Chicago ventures, inclined to invest
in any good stock which would rise, and particularly desirous to buy
into some corporation--public utility preferred--which would be certain
to grow with the expansion of the city.

Old Laughlin, who was now all of sixty years of age, owned a seat on
the Board, and was worth in the neighborhood of two hundred thousand
dollars, looked at Cowperwood quizzically.

"Well, now, if you'd 'a' come along here ten or fifteen years ago you
might 'a' got in on the ground floor of a lot of things," he observed.
"There was these here gas companies, now, that them Otway and Apperson
boys got in on, and then all these here street-railways. Why, I'm the
feller that told Eddie Parkinson what a fine thing he could make out of
it if he would go and organize that North State Street line. He
promised me a bunch of sheers if he ever worked it out, but he never
give 'em to me. I didn't expect him to, though," he added, wisely, and
with a glint. "I'm too old a trader for that. He's out of it now,
anyway. That Michaels-Kennelly crowd skinned him. Yep, if you'd 'a'
been here ten or fifteen years ago you might 'a' got in on that.
'Tain't no use a-thinkin' about that, though, any more. Them sheers is
sellin' fer clost onto a hundred and sixty."

Cowperwood smiled. "Well, Mr. Laughlin," he observed, "you must have
been on 'change a long time her