"Jarrocks, dear," she said--and he turned away from the meltingness of her lovely face--"he's so pure, he's so straight, he's so gentle and so brave, that I don't really think I can tell you what I think of him."
There was silence for a moment, then Jarrocks said gruffly:
"That's a clean-enough bill of health. Guess you can bring him into the family, Cynthia."
Then he drummed with his thick, stubby fingers on the arm of his chair.
"The idea," he said at last, "is to turn five hundred dollars into a fortune. You know I don't speculate."
"If you'd come a year ago," he said, "I'd have sent you away. Just at the present moment your proposition isn't the darn-fool thing it sounds."
"I knew you'd agree with me," said Cynthia complacently. "I knew you'd put me into something that was going 'way up."
"Prices are at about the highest level they've ever struck and money was never more expensive. I think we're going to see such a tumble in values as was never seen before. It almost tempts me to come out of my shell and take a flyer--if I lose your five hundred for you, you won't squeal, Cynthia?"
"Then I'll tell you what I think. There's nothing certain in this business, but if ever there was a chance to turn five hundred dollars into big money it's now. You've entered Wall Street, Cynthia, at what looks to me like the psychological moment."
"That's a good omen," said Cynthia. "I believe we shall succeed. And I leave everything to you."
Then she wrote him a check for all the money she had in the world. He held it between his thumb and forefinger while the ink dried.
"By the way, Cynthia," he said, "do you want the account to stand in your own name?"
She thought a moment, then laughed and told him to put it in the name of G. G.'s mother. "But you must report to me how things go," she said.
Jarrocks called a clerk and gave him an order to sell something or other. In three minutes the clerk reported that "it"--just some letter of the alphabet--had been sold at such and such a price.
For another five minutes Jarrocks denied himself to all visitors. Then he called for another report on the stock which he had just caused to be sold. It was selling "off a half."
"Well, Cynthia," said Jarrocks, "you're fifty dollars richer than when you came. Now I've got to tell you to go. I'll look out for your interests as if they were my own."