Many shifted their eyes from
me and began to murmur.
I raised my voice slightly as I went on: "The speculators, the gamblers,
are the only people who were hurt. Those who sold what they didn't have are
paying for their folly. I have no sympathy for them. Blacklock and Company
wishes none such in its following, and seizes every opportunity to weed
them out. We are in business only for the bona fide investing public, and
we are stronger with that public to-day than we have ever been."
Again I looked from coward to coward of that mob, changed from three
hundred strong to three hundred weak. Then I bowed and withdrew, leaving
them to mutter and disperse. I felt well content with the trend of
events--I who wished to impress the public and the financiers that I had
broken with speculation and speculators, could I have had a better than
this unexpected opportunity sharply to define my new course? And as
Textiles, unsupported, fell toward the close of the day, my content rose
toward my normal high spirits. There was no whisper in the Street that
I was in trouble; on the contrary, the idea was gaining ground that I
had really long ceased to be a stock gambler and deserved a much better
reputation than I had.
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