The Bay State's venture showed a profit afterward of four millions of dollars, but of my share of this large sum I was deprived, as I will detail later.
At this juncture there occurred one of those strange and sad fatalities which with its attendant circumstances helps to explain why those of us who play with stock-markets grow superstitious. I have spoken of my secretary, Mr. Vinal, a man of admirable discretion and absolute loyalty, who was my right hand in executing the minutiæ of the various operations I then was engaged in. In such affairs the fidelity of one's aides must be beyond all question, for if the merest detail of one's plans leaks out at the critical moment, one is undone beyond recovery. After my talk with Addicks I had laid out the campaign for the next day's engagement and called in Vinal to explain to him his own part. He was to attend to taking up and transferring the loans that had been called, and I armed him with my power of attorney and blank checks, instructing him to put these matters through without further consultation with me, for my entire time must belong to my brokers during the battle of prices which I knew must inevitably come with the stroke of the gong that opened the Exchange next morning at ten, and which would rage until its close at three. As I had anticipated, the assault was fierce. It was give and take, charge and retreat, all day. A few minutes after twelve, Vinal pushed through a crowd of brokers to me and said: "I'm about half through my shifting, but a telephone has just come from Mrs. Lawson saying that something has happened at the school and will I at once get a carriage and bring your daughters home. It will take half an hour. Shall I go?" I replied: "You had better, but get back as quickly as possible." A minute later a thought occurred to me, and I sent a boy to call Vinal back. He reported that my secretary had jumped into "Ben's" cab ("Ben" was a cabman whose stand had been in front of my office, 33 State Street, since my boyhood days). I returned to the fray. Fifteen minutes later the appalling message that startled all Boston at the time came over the ticker tape: "Terrible Explosion! Boston Gas Company's pipes in the Subway have blown scores to death." Then there floated in to me a rumor, vague, indefinite, that Vinal was a victim. I jumped into a cab and in a few moments was at the undertaker's to whose place the corpses were being removed. The undertaker stepped up to me and said: "Poor Vinal! Don't look at him, for it is frightful. He was on the very apex of the explosion, and he and 'Ben' were both instantly killed and are frightfully burned. The only thing recognizable is this envelope, which I found among the rags that were left of his coat." He handed me over the large envelope in which I had seen Vinal that very morning depositing the various documents, checks, and securities which he required for his day's operations. It was burned around the edges, but the contents were uninjured, and among the papers was a carefully prepared memorandum showing to a dot where my secretary had left off in his exchanges. He had evidently just finished making notes, for so carefully arranged were the contents of the envelope that all that was necessary to complete the business was to turn it over to Vinal's assistant. No further explanation was required. That envelope represented two millions of money and securities.