IN the Board Room, next day, Thorpe awaited the coming of Lord Plowden with the serene confidence of a prophet who not only knows that he is inspired, but has had an illicit glimpse into the workings of the machinery of events.
He sat motionless at his desk, like a big spider for who time has no meaning. Before him lay two newspapers, folded so as to expose paragraphs heavily indicated by blue pencil-marks. They were not financial journals, and for that reason it was improbable that he would have seen these paragraphs, if the Secretary of the Company had not marked them, and brought them to him.
That official had been vastly more fluttered by them than he found it possible to be. In slightly-varying language, these two items embedded in so-called money articles reported the rumour that a charge of fraud had arisen in connection with the Rubber Consols corner, and that sensational disclosures were believed to be impending.
Thorpe looked with a dulled, abstracted eye at these papers, lying on the desk, and especially at the blue pencil-lines upon them, as he pondered many things. Their statement, thus scattered broadcast to the public, seemed at once to introduce a new element into the situation, and to leave it unchanged. That influence of some sort had been exerted to get this story into these papers, it did not occur to him for an instant to doubt.
To his view, all things that were put into papers were put there for a purpose--it would express his notion more clearly, perhaps, to say for a price.
Of the methods of Fleet Street, he was profoundly ignorant, but his impressions of them were all cynical.
Upon reflection, however, it seemed unlikely to him that Lord Plowden had secured the insertion of these rumours.
So far as Thorpe could fathom that nobleman's game, its aims would not be served by premature publicity of this kind.
Gradually, the outlines of a more probable combination took shape in his thoughts. There were left in the grip of the "corner" now only two victims,--Rostocker and Aronson.
They owed this invidious differentiation to a number of causes: they had been the chief sellers of stock, being between them responsible for the delivery of 8,500 Rubber Consols shares, which they could not get;they were men of larger fortune than the other "shorts,"and therefore could with safety be squeezed longest;what was fortunate for him under the circumstances, they were the two men against whom Thorpe's personal grudge seemed able to maintain itself most easily.
For these reasons, they had already been mulcted in differences to the extent of, in round numbers, 165,000 pounds.
On the morrow, the twelfth of September, it was Thorpe's plan to allow them to buy in the shares they needed, at 22 or 23 pounds per share--which would take from them nearly 200,000 pounds more. He had satisfied himself that they could, and would if necessary, pay this enormous ransom for their final escape from the "corner." Partly because it was not so certain that they could pay more, partly because he was satiated with spoils and tired of the strain of the business, he had decided to permit this escape.
He realized now, however, that they on their side had planned to escape without paying any final ransom at all.
That was clearly the meaning of these paragraphs, and of the representations which had yesterday been made to the Stock Exchange Committee. He had additional knowledge today of the character of these representations.
Nothing definite had been alleged, but some of the members of the Committee had been informally notified, so Semple had this morning learned, that a specific charge of fraud, supported by unanswerable proof, was to be brought against the Rubber Consols management on the morrow.
Thorpe reasoned out now, step by step, what that meant.
Lord Plowden had sought out Rostocker and Aronson, and had told them that he had it in his power ignominiously to break the "corner." He could hardly have told them the exact nature of his power, because until he should have seen Tavender he did not himself know what it was. But he had given them to understand that he could prove fraud, and they, scenting in this the chance of saving 200,000 pounds, and seeing that time was so terribly short, had hastened to the Committeemen with this vague declaration that, on the morrow, they could prove--they did not precisely know what. Yes--plainly enough--that was what had happened.
And it would be these two Jew "wreckers," eager to invest their speculative notification to the Committee with as much of an air of formality as possible, who had caused the allusions to it to be published in these papers.
Thorpe's lustreless eye suddenly twinkled with mirth as he reached this conclusion; his heavy face brightened into a grin of delight. A vision of Lord Plowden's absurd predicament rose vividly before him, and he chuckled aloud at it.
It seemed only the most natural thing in the world that, at this instant, a clerk should open the door and nod with meaning to the master. The visitor whom he had warned the people in the outer office he expected, had arrived.
Thorpe was still laughing to himself when Lord Plowden entered.
"Hallo! How d'ye do!" he called out to him from where he sat at his desk.
The hilarity of the manner into which he had been betrayed, upon the instant surprised and rather confused him.
He had not been altogether clear as to how he should receive Plowden, but certainly a warm joviality had not occurred to him as appropriate.
The nobleman was even more taken aback. He stared momentarily at the big man's beaming mask, and then, with nervous awkwardness, executed a series of changes in his own facial expression and demeanour. He flushed red, opened his lips to say "Ah!" and then twisted them into a doubting and seemingly painful smile. He looked with very bright-eyed intentness at Thorpe, as he advanced, and somewhat spasmodically put out his hand.
