In a chip of a minute the whole scene changed; there was almost as wild a panic on the up side as there had been on the down.  Bob Brownley continued buying Sugar until he had pushed it above 150.  He then went about tallying up his trades.  At the end of ten minutes’ calculation he returned to the centre and bought 11,000 shares more; coming out, his eye caught mine.

“Jim, have you been here long?”

“An eternity.  I was here at the opening and I pray God never to put me through another two hours like the past two.  It seems a hideous dream, a nightmare.  Bob, in the name of God what have you been doing?”

He gave me a wild, awful look of exultation.  Sublime triumph shone in those blazing brown orbs, triumph such as I had never seen in the eyes of man.

“Jim Randolph, I have been giving Wall Street and its hell ‘System’ a dose of its own poison, a good full-measure dose.  They planned by harvesting a fresh crop of human hearts and souls on the bull side to give Friday the 13th a new meaning.  Tradition says Friday the 13th is bear Saints’ day.  I believe in maintaining old traditions, so I harvested their hearts instead.  I will tell you about it some time, Jim, but now I must see Beulah Sands.  Jim Randolph, I’ve saved her and her father.  I’ve made them a round three millions and a strong seven millions for myself.”

He almost yelled it as he rushed away and left me dazed, stupefied.  A moment, and I came to.  Something urged me to follow him.

Chapter VI.

As I passed through my office a few minutes later I heard Bob’s voice in Beulah Sands’s office.  It was raised in passionate eloquence.

“Yes, Beulah, I have done it single-handed.  I have crucified Camemeyer, ‘Standard Oil,’ and the ‘System’ that spiked me to the cross a few weeks ago.  You have three millions, and I have seven.  Now there is nothing more but for you to go home to your father, and then come back to me.  Back to me, Beulah, back to me to be my wife!”

He stopped.  There was no sound.  I waited; then, frightened, I stepped to the door of Beulah Sands’s office.  Bob was standing just inside the threshold, where he had halted to give her the glad tidings.  She had risen from her desk and was looking at him with an agonised stare.  He seemed to be transfixed by her look, the wild ecstasy of the outburst of love yet mirrored in his eyes.  She was just saying as I reached the door: 

“Bob, in mercy’s name tell me you got this money fairly, honourably.”

Bob must have realised for the first time what he had done.  He did not speak.  He only stared into her eyes.  She was now at his side.