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_ The growth of young Frank Algernon Cowperwood was through years
of what might be called a comfortable and happy family existence.
Buttonwood Street, where he spent the first ten years of his life,
was a lovely place for a boy to live. It contained mostly small
two and three-story red brick houses, with small white marble steps
leading up to the front door, and thin, white marble trimmings
outlining the front door and windows. There were trees in the
street--plenty of them. The road pavement was of big, round
cobblestones, made bright and clean by the rains; and the sidewalks
were of red brick, and always damp and cool. In the rear was a
yard, with trees and grass and sometimes flowers, for the lots were
almost always one hundred feet deep, and the house-fronts, crowding
close to the pavement in front, left a comfortable space in the
rear.
The Cowperwoods, father and mother, were not so lean and narrow
that they could not enter into the natural tendency to be happy and
joyous with their children; and so this family, which increased at
the rate of a child every two or three years after Frank's birth
until there were four children, was quite an interesting affair
when he was ten and they were ready to move into the New Market
Street home. Henry Worthington Cowperwood's connections were
increased as his position grew more responsible, and gradually he
was becoming quite a personage. He already knew a number of the
more prosperous merchants who dealt with his bank, and because as
a clerk his duties necessitated his calling at other banking-houses,
he had come to be familiar with and favorably known in the Bank of
the United States, the Drexels, the Edwards, and others. The
brokers knew him as representing a very sound organization, and
while he was not considered brilliant mentally, he was known as a
most reliable and trustworthy individual.
In this progress of his father young Cowperwood definitely shared.
He was quite often allowed to come to the bank on Saturdays, when
he would watch with great interest the deft exchange of bills at
the brokerage end of the business. He wanted to know where all the
types of money came from, why discounts were demanded and received,
what the men did with all the money they received. His father,
pleased at his interest, was glad to explain so that even at this
early age--from ten to fifteen--the boy gained a wide knowledge of
the condition of the country financially--what a State bank was
and what a national one; what brokers did; what stocks were, and
why they fluctuated in value. He began to see clearly what was
meant by money as a medium of exchange, and how all values were
calculated according to one primary value, that of gold. He was
a financier by instinct, and all the knowledge that pertained to
that great art was as natural to him as the emotions and subtleties
of life are to a poet. This medium of exchange, gold, interested
him intensely. When his father explained to him how it was mined,
he dreamed that he owned a gold mine and waked to wish that he did.
He was likewise curious about stocks and bonds and he learned that
some stocks and bonds were not worth the paper they were written
on, and that others were worth much more than their face value
indicated.
"There, my son," said his father to him one day, "you won't often
see a bundle of those around this neighborhood." He referred to
a series of shares in the British East India Company, deposited
as collateral at two-thirds of their face value for a loan of one
hundred thousand dollars. A Philadelphia magnate had hypothecated
them for the use of the ready cash. Young Cowperwood looked at
them curiously. "They don't look like much, do they?" he commented.
"They are worth just four times their face value," said his father,
archly.
Frank reexamined them. "The British East India Company," he read.
"Ten pounds--that's pretty near fifty dollars."
"Forty-eight, thirty-five," commented his father, dryly. "Well,
if we had a bundle of those we wouldn't need to work very hard.
You'll notice there are scarcely any pin-marks on them. They
aren't sent around very much. I don't suppose these have ever
been used as collateral before."
Young Cowperwood gave them back after a time, but not without a
keen sense of the vast ramifications of finance. What was the
East India Company? What did it do? His father told him.
At home also he listened to considerable talk of financial
investment and adventure. He heard, for one thing, of a curious
character by the name of Steemberger, a great beef speculator
from Virginia, who was attracted to Philadelphia in those days by
the hope of large and easy credits. Steemberger, so his father
said, was close to Nicholas Biddle, Lardner, and others of the
United States Bank, or at least friendly with them, and seemed to
be able to obtain from that organization nearly all that he asked
for. His operations in the purchase of cattle in Virginia, Ohio,
and other States were vast, amounting, in fact, to an entire
monopoly of the business of supplying beef to Eastern cities. He
was a big man, enormous, with a face, his father said, something
like that of a pig; and he wore a high beaver hat and a long
frock-coat which hung loosely about his big chest and stomach.
He had managed to force the price of beef up to thirty cents a
pound, causing all the retailers and consumers to rebel, and this
was what made him so conspicuous. He used to come to the brokerage
end of the elder Cowperwood's bank, with as much as one hundred
thousand or two hundred thousand dollars, in twelve months--
post-notes of the United States Bank in denominations of one
thousand, five thousand, and ten thousand dollars. These he would
cash at from ten to twelve per cent. under their face value, having
previously given the United States Bank his own note at four months
for the entire amount. He would take his pay from the Third
National brokerage counter in packages of Virginia, Ohio, and
western Pennsylvania bank-notes at par, because he made his
disbursements principally in those States. The Third National
would in the first place realize a profit of from four to five per
cent. on the original transaction; and as it took the Western
bank-notes at a discount, it also made a profit on those.
There was another man his father talked about--one Francis J.
Grund, a famous newspaper correspondent and lobbyist at Washington,
who possessed the faculty of unearthing secrets of every kind,
especially those relating to financial legislation. The secrets
of the President and the Cabinet, as well as of the Senate and the
House of Representatives, seemed to be open to him. Grund had been
about, years before, purchasing through one or two brokers large
amounts of the various kinds of Texas debt certificates and bonds.
The Republic of Texas, in its struggle for independence from Mexico,
had issued bonds and certificates in great variety, amounting in
value to ten or fifteen million dollars. Later, in connection
with the scheme to make Texas a State of the Union, a bill was
passed providing a contribution on the part of the United States
of five million dollars, to be applied to the extinguishment of
this old debt. Grund knew of this, and also of the fact that some
of this debt, owing to the peculiar conditions of issue, was to be
paid in full, while other portions were to be scaled down, and
there was to be a false or pre-arranged failure to pass the bill
at one session in order to frighten off the outsiders who might
have heard and begun to buy the old certificates for profit. He
acquainted the Third National Bank with this fact, and of course
the information came to Cowperwood as teller. He told his wife
about it, and so his son, in this roundabout way, heard it, and
his clear, big eyes glistened. He wondered why his father did not
take advantage of the situation and buy some Texas certificates for
himself. Grund, so his father said, and possibly three or four
others, had made over a hundred thousand dollars apiece. It wasn't
exactly legitimate, he seemed to think, and yet it was, too. Why
shouldn't such inside information be rewarded? Somehow, Frank
realized that his father was too honest, too cautious, but when he
grew up, he told himself, he was going to be a broker, or a
financier, or a banker, and do some of these things.
Just at this time there came to the Cowperwoods an uncle who had
not previously appeared in the life of the family. He was a
brother of Mrs. Cowperwood's--Seneca Davis by name--solid,
unctuous, five feet ten in height, with a big, round body, a
round, smooth head rather bald, a clear, ruddy complexion, blue
eyes, and what little hair he had of a sandy hue. He was
exceedingly well dressed according to standards prevailing in
those days, indulging in flowered waistcoats, long, light-colored
frock-coats, and the invariable (for a fairly prosperous man) high
hat. Frank was fascinated by him at once. He had been a planter
in Cuba and still owned a big ranch there and could tell him tales
of Cuban life--rebellions, ambuscades, hand-to-hand fighting with
machetes on his own plantation, and things of that sort. He
brought with him a collection of Indian curies, to say nothing of
an independent fortune and several slaves--one, named Manuel, a
tall, raw-boned black, was his constant attendant, a bodyservant,
as it were. He shipped raw sugar from his plantation in boat-loads
to the Southwark wharves in Philadelphia. Frank liked him because
he took life in a hearty, jovial way, rather rough and offhand for
this somewhat quiet and reserved household.
"Why, Nancy Arabella," he said to Mrs Cowperwood on arriving one
Sunday afternoon, and throwing the household into joyous astonishment
at his unexpected and unheralded appearance, "you haven't grown an
inch! I thought when you married old brother Hy here that you were
going to fatten up like your brother. But look at you! I swear to
Heaven you don't weigh five pounds." And he jounced her up and
down by the waist, much to the perturbation of the children, who
had never before seen their mother so familiarly handled.
Henry Cowperwood was exceedingly interested in and pleased at the
arrival of this rather prosperous relative; for twelve years
before, when he was married, Seneca Davis had not taken much notice
of him.
"Look at these little putty-faced Philadelphians," he continued,
"They ought to come down to my ranch in Cuba and get tanned up.
That would take away this waxy look." And he pinched the cheek
of Anna Adelaide, now five years old. "I tell you, Henry, you
have a rather nice place here." And he looked at the main room
of the rather conventional three-story house with a critical eye.
Measuring twenty by twenty-four and finished in imitation cherry,
with a set of new Sheraton parlor furniture it presented a
quaintly harmonious aspect. Since Henry had become teller the
family had acquired a piano--a decided luxury in those days--
brought from Europe; and it was intended that Anna Adelaide, when
she was old enough, should learn to play. There were a few
uncommon ornaments in the room--a gas chandelier for one thing, a
glass bowl with goldfish in it, some rare and highly polished
shells, and a marble Cupid bearing a basket of flowers. It was
summer time, the windows were open, and the trees outside, with
their widely extended green branches, were pleasantly visible
shading the brick sidewalk. Uncle Seneca strolled out into the
back yard.
"Well, this is pleasant enough," he observed, noting a large elm
and seeing that the yard was partially paved with brick and
enclosed within brick walls, up the sides of which vines were
climbing. "Where's your hammock? Don't you string a hammock here
in summer? Down on my veranda at San Pedro I have six or seven."
"We hadn't thought of putting one up because of the neighbors,
but it would be nice," agreed Mrs. Cowperwood. "Henry will have
to get one."
"I have two or three in my trunks over at the hotel. My niggers
make 'em down there. I'll send Manuel over with them in the
morning."
He plucked at the vines, tweaked Edward's ear, told Joseph, the
second boy, he would bring him an Indian tomahawk, and went back
into the house.
"This is the lad that interests me," he said, after a time, laying
a hand on the shoulder of Frank. "What did you name him in full,
Henry?"
"Frank Algernon."
"Well, you might have named him after me. There's something to
this boy. How would you like to come down to Cuba and be a planter,
my boy?"
"I'm not so sure that I'd like to," replied the eldest.
"Well, that's straight-spoken. What have you against it?"
"Nothing, except that I don't know anything about it."
"What do you know?"
The boy smiled wisely. "Not very much, I guess."
"Well, what are you interested in?"
"Money!"
"Aha! What's bred in the bone, eh? Get something of that from
your father, eh? Well, that's a good trait. And spoken like a
man, too! We'll hear more about that later. Nancy, you're
breeding a financier here, I think. He talks like one."
He looked at Frank carefully now. There was real force in that
sturdy young body--no doubt of it. Those large, clear gray eyes
were full of intelligence. They indicated much and revealed
nothing.
"A smart boy!" he said to Henry, his brother-in-law. "I like
his get-up. You have a bright family."
Henry Cowperwood smiled dryly. This man, if he liked Frank,
might do much for the boy. He might eventually leave him some of
his fortune. He was wealthy and single.
Uncle Seneca became a frequent visitor to the house--he and his
negro body-guard, Manuel, who spoke both English and Spanish,
much to the astonishment of the children; and he took an increasing
interest in Frank.
"When that boy gets old enough to find out what he wants to do, I
think I'll help him to do it," he observed to his sister one day;
and she told him she was very grateful. He talked to Frank about
his studies, and found that he cared little for books or most of
the study he was compelled to pursue. Grammar was an abomination.
Literature silly. Latin was of no use. History--well, it was
fairly interesting.
"I like bookkeeping and arithmetic," he observed. "I want to get
out and get to work, though. That's what I want to do."
"You're pretty young, my son," observed his uncle. "You're only how
old now? Fourteen?"
"Thirteen."
"Well, you can't leave school much before sixteen. You'll do
better if you stay until seventeen or eighteen. It can't do you
any harm. You won't be a boy again."
"I don't want to be a boy. I want to get to work."
"Don't go too fast, son. You'll be a man soon enough. You want
to be a banker, do you?"
"Yes, sir!"
"Well, when the time comes, if everything is all right and you've
behaved yourself and you still want to, I'll help you get a start
in business. If I were you and were going to be a banker, I'd
first spend a year or so in some good grain and commission house.
There's good training to be had there. You'll learn a lot that
you ought to know. And, meantime, keep your health and learn all
you can. Wherever I am, you let me know, and I'll write and find
out how you've been conducting yourself."
He gave the boy a ten-dollar gold piece with which to start a
bank-account. And, not strange to say, he liked the whole
Cowperwood household much better for this dynamic, self-sufficient,
sterling youth who was an integral part of it. _
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