The Columbus journal., 1907-04-03

his habitual pose, rooe and withdrew
without another word. An thlD fright
anA sroyeling and treachery for plum
der. the loss Of which would not i'm
pair his fortune -plunder he had
stolen with many. . Jest and gibe at
his helpless victims. Like most OF our
debocair dollars chasers, he was .
good sportsman only when the game
was with him. V<s.
That afternoon he threw bis Coal
holdings on the market in great
blocks. His treaehery took R0ebuck
completely by surprise--for ROebuck
believed in this fairsweather gentle
man." foulweatheri coward. and neg
lected to allow for that quicksand that
ID always under the foundation q the
man who has inherited. not earned.
his wealth. But for the blundefing
credulity of rascals. would honest
men ever get their dues. Roebuck's
brokers had bought many thousands
Of Langdon's shares at the high arti-
fetal price before ROebuck grasped
the situati0n-that it was not my fol-
lowers recklessly gambling to break
the prices, but LangdOn unloading on
his pal" As soon as he saw. he
abruptly withdrew from the market
When the Stock Exchange closed. Ma
ti0nAl Coal securities were offered at
prices ranging from IL for the bonds
to two for the common and three for
the preferred Offered, and NO takers.
We'll, you've done it," said Joe.
coming with the news that Thornley,.
Of the Discount and Deposit bank. had
been appointed receiver.
i've made a beginning" replied I.
had decided to concentrate upon
R0ebuck, because he was the richest
and most powerful of The Seven. %
For, in my pictures of the three main
phases of ''finance"-the industrial.
the life insurance and the banking
he. as arch plOtter in every kind Of
respectable skulduggery, was neces-
sarily In the foreground. My original
intention was to demolish the Power
Trust or, at least. to compel him to
buy back all of its stock which he had
worked of on the public. l had col
lected many interesting facts about it,
facts typical of the conditions that
finance has established in SO many
Of our industries.
For instance. l was prepared to
show that the actual earnings of the
Power Trust was two and half times
what its reports to stockholders al
legged; that the concealed profits were
diverted into the pockets of R0ebuck,
his sons. IL other relatives and four
of THE SeveR," the lions share 60
ing, of course, to the lion. Like al
most all the great industrial enter
prises. too strong for the law and too
remote for the supervision of their
stockholders. it gathered in enormous
revenues to disburse them chiefly in
salaries and commissions and rake
offs on contracts to fav0rites. l had
proof that in one year it had written
OF" 12 millions of profit and loss. 10
millions of which had found its way
to Roebuck's pocket.
ROebuck was the keystone Of the
arch that sustained the structure Of
chicane. To dislodge him was the di-
rect way to collapse it. I was about
to set to work when Langdon. feel
ing that he ought to have large sup
ply of cash in the trOublOus times l
was creating, increased the capital
stock of his already enormously over
capitalized Textile Trust and offered
the new issue to the public. AS the
Textile Trust was even better bull
warked, politically, than the Power
Trust, it was easily able to declare
tempting dividends out of its l0Otings.
So the new stock could not be at
tackled in the one way that would
make the public instantly shun it
could not truthfully charge that it
would not pay the promised divi-
dends. Yet attack I must-f0r that
issue was, in effect. . bold challenge
of my charges against The Seven -
From all parts of the country in
Quiries poured In upon me: What
do you think of the new Textile is
sue: Shall We invest? Is the Textile
company s0und?'
had NO choice. l must turn aside
from Roebuck: l must first show that.
while Textile was. in a sense, sound
just at that time, it had been uns0und.
and would be unsOund again as soon
as Langdon had gathered in sum-
cient number of lambs to make q
battue worth the while of . man deal
ing in nothing less than seven figures.
I proceeded to do SO.
The market yielded slowly. Under
my first days attack Textile preferred
fell six points. Textile common three.
While was in the midst of debating
my letter for the second days attack.
l suddenly came to full stop.
found across my way this thought:
Isn't it strange that Langd0n, after
humbling himself to you, should make
this bold challenge? It's trap"
mo more at present" said I. to my
stenoGrapher. And don't write out
what I've already dictated"
l shut myself in and busted myself
at the telephone. Half an hour after
I set my secret machinery in motion.
a messenger brought me an envelope.
the address typewriter. 1t con-