This must be remedied. As the stranger
passed through the hall into the street, followed by the unwonted
civilities of the spruce hotel clerk and the obsequious attentions of
the negro porter, Peters stepped to the window of the office. "Who was
that man who just passed out?" he asked.
The clerk stared in undisguised astonishment. "You don't mean to say you
didn't know WHO he was--all the while you were talking to him?"
"No," returned Peters, impatiently.
"Why, that was Professor Lawrence Grant!--THE Lawrence Grant--don't you
know?--the biggest scientific man and recognized expert on the Pacific
slope. Why, that's the man whose single word is enough to make or break
the biggest mine or claim going! That man!--why, that's the man whose
opinion's worth thousands, for it carries millions with it--and can't be
bought. That's him who knocked the bottom outer El Dorado last year, and
next day sent Eureka up booming! Ye remember that, sure?"
"Of course--but"--stammered Peters.
"And to think you didn't know him!" repeated the hotel clerk
wonderingly. "And here I was reckoning you were getting points from him
all the time! Why, some men would have given a thousand dollars for your
chance of talking to him--yes!--of even being SEEN talking to him.
Why, old Wingate once got a tip on his Prairie Flower lead worth five
thousand dollars while just changing seats with him in the cars and
passing the time of day, sociable like.
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