nd. Bivens will sell out his partners in the
deal."

"Man, he can't sell out!" the cashier insisted. "It's his own deal.
He's in it for all he's worth!"

The doctor rose with sudden excitement.

"Adams, this is the first time in my life I've ever been tempted to buy
stocks."

"You can't lose, sir."

"But I'm in desperate need of money. I've a note for three thousand
due. I've two thousand dollars set aside to finish my little girl's
musical studies. I've got to meet that note somehow and I've got to
have the money for her. It looks like a chance. I'll go in and watch
the market to-morrow."

"If it don't act exactly as I say--don't touch it. It if does, go in
for all you're worth. If stocks start down as I say they will, sell
short, cover at noon, and then buy for the rise. Don't listen to fools,
just buy, buy, buy! You can sell before the market closes and make
twenty thousand dollars."

"I'll drop into a broker's office and watch the market open any way,
Adams."

The doctor seized his hand cordially.

"And I want to thank you for your thoughtfulness in coming to me."

"I wish I could do more, sir," the cashier said, with deep feeling.
"I'll never forget your kindness to me the past three months. When the
sun shines again, you'll hear from me."

"Oh, that's all right, my boy. Some men invest in stocks, some in
bonds, some in real estate. My best investments have always been in the
good turns I've done my neighbours. Good night."

CHAPTER VI

THE STORM BREAKS

The morning came in a mist of dull gray clouds that clung in rings
about the street lamps like the damp fog of a typical February thaw,
yet it was the last day of October. Such weather was uncanny. It added
to the strange feeling of impending calamity which had been hanging
over the business world during the summer and had broken at last into
the fierce storms of disaster of the past two weeks. Men who usually
rose at nine o'clock were up at dawn. Some of them hadn't slept at all.

The more optimistic traders on the Stock Exchange expected to-day a
change in the market. Stocks had declined for two weeks with appalling
swiftness and fatality. Every hour had marked the ruin of men hitherto
bulwarks of solidity. Experienced men reasoned and reasoned from
experience that there must be a turn somewhere. The bottom surely had
been reached. The time for a rally had come. Nine men out of every ten
in the market at its close the night before exp