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_ All week every one in the office knew that something new and big
was afoot in Daylight's mind. Beyond some deals of no
importance, he had not been interested in anything for several
months. But now he went about in an almost unbroken brown study,
made unexpected and lengthy trips across the bay to Oakland, or
sat at his desk silent and motionless for hours. He seemed
particularly happy with what occupied his mind. At times men
came in and conferred with him--and with new faces and differing
in type from those that usually came to see him.
On Sunday Dede learned all about it. "I've been thinking a lot
of our talk," he began, "and I've got an idea I'd like to give it
a flutter. And I've got a proposition to make your hair stand
up. It's what you call legitimate, and at the same time it's the
gosh-dangdest gamble a man ever went into. How about planting
minutes wholesale, and making two minutes grow where one minute
grew before? Oh, yes, and planting a few trees, too--say several
million of them. You remember the quarry I made believe I was
looking at? Well, I'm going to buy it. I'm going to buy these
hills, too, clear from here around to Berkeley and down the other
way to San Leandro. I own a lot of them already, for that
matter. But mum is the word. I'll be buying a long time to come
before anything much is guessed about it, and I don't want the
market to jump up out of sight. You see that hill over there.
It's my hill running clear down its slopes through Piedmont and
halfway along those rolling hills into Oakland. And it's nothing
to all the things I'm going to buy."
He paused triumphantly. "And all to make two minutes grow where
one grew before?" Dede queried, at the same time laughing
heartily at his affectation of mystery.
He stared at her fascinated. She had such a frank, boyish way of
throwing her head back when she laughed. And her teeth were an
unending delight to him. Not small, yet regular and firm,
without a blemish, he considered then the healthiest, whitest,
prettiest teeth he had ever seen. And for months he had been
comparing them with the teeth of every woman he met.
It was not until her laughter was over that he was able to
continue.
"The ferry system between Oakland and San Francisco is the worst
one-horse concern in the United States. You cross on it every
day, six days in the week. That's say, twenty-five days a month,
or three hundred a year. Now long does it take you one way?
Forty minutes, if you're lucky. I'm going to put you across in
twenty minutes. If that ain't making two minutes grow where one
grew before, knock off my head with little apples. I'll save you
twenty minutes each way. That's forty minutes a day, times three
hundred, equals twelve thousand minutes a year, just for you,
just for one person. Let's see: that's two hundred whole hours.
Suppose I save two hundred hours a year for thousands of other
folks,--that's farming some, ain't it?"
Dede could only nod breathlessly. She had caught the contagion
of his enthusiasm, though she had no clew as to how this great
time-saving was to be accomplished.
"Come on," he said. "Let's ride up that hill, and when I get you
out on top where you can see something, I'll talk sense."
A small footpath dropped down to the dry bed of the canon, which
they crossed before they began the climb. The slope was steep
and covered with matted brush and bushes, through which the
horses slipped and lunged. Bob, growing disgusted, turned back
suddenly and attempted to pass Mab. The mare was thrust sidewise
into the denser bush, where she nearly fell. Recovering, she
flung her weight against Bob. Both riders' legs were caught in
the consequent squeeze, and, as Bob plunged ahead down hill, Dede
was nearly scraped off. Daylight threw his horse on to its
haunches and at the same time dragged Dede back into the saddle.
Showers of twigs and leaves fell upon them, and predicament
followed predicament, until they emerged on the hilltop the worse
for wear but happy and excited. Here no trees obstructed the
view. The particular hill on which they were, out-jutted from
the regular line of the range, so that the sweep of their vision
extended over three-quarters of the circle. Below, on the flat
land bordering the bay, lay Oakland, and across the bay was San
Francisco. Between the two cities they could see the white
ferry-boats on the water. Around to their right was Berkeley,
and to their left the scattered villages between Oakland and San
Leandro. Directly in the foreground was Piedmont, with its
desultory dwellings and patches of farming land, and from
Piedmont the land rolled down in successive waves upon Oakland.
"Look at it," said Daylight, extending his arm in a sweeping
gesture. "A hundred thousand people there, and no reason there
shouldn't be half a million. There's the chance to make five
people grow where one grows now. Here's the scheme in a
nutshell. Why don't more people live in Oakland? No good
service with San Francisco, and, besides, Oakland is asleep.
It's a whole lot better place to live in than San Francisco.
Now, suppose I buy in all the street railways of Oakland,
Berkeley, Alameda, San Leandro, and the rest,--bring them under
one head with a competent management? Suppose I cut the time to
San Francisco one-half by building a big pier out there almost to
Goat Island and establishing a ferry system with modern
up-to-date boats? Why, folks will want to live over on this
side. Very good. They'll need land on which to build. So,
first
I buy up the land. But the land's cheap now. Why? Because it's
in the country, no electric roads, no quick communication, nobody
guessing that the electric roads are coming. I'll build the
roads.
That will make the land jump up. Then I'll sell the land as fast
as the folks will want to buy because of the improved ferry
system
and transportation facilities.
"You see, I give the value to the land by building the roads.
Then I sell the land and get that value back, and after that,
there's the roads, all carrying folks back and forth and earning
big money. Can't lose. And there's all sorts of millions in it.
I'm going to get my hands on some of that water front and the
tide-lands. Take between where I'm going to build my pier and
the old pier. It's shallow water. I can fill and dredge and put
in a system of docks that will handle hundreds of ships. San
Francisco's water front is congested. No more room for ships.
With hundreds of ships loading and unloading on this side right
into the freight cars of three big railroads, factories will
start up over here instead of crossing to San Francisco. That
means factory sites. That means me buying in the factory sites
before anybody guesses the cat is going to jump, much less, which
way. Factories mean tens of thousands of workingmen and their
families. That means more houses and more land, and that means
me, for I'll be there to sell them the land. And tens of
thousands of families means tens of thousands of nickels every
day for my electric cars. The growing population will mean more
stores, more banks, more everything. And that'll mean me, for
I'll be right there with business property as well as home
property. What do you think of it?"
Therefore she could answer, he was off again, his mind's eye
filled with this new city of his dream which he builded on the
Alameda hills by the gateway to the Orient.
"Do you know--I've been looking it up--the Firth Of Clyde, where
all the steel ships are built, isn't half as wide as Oakland
Creek down there, where all those old hulks lie? Why ain't it a
Firth of Clyde? Because the Oakland City Council spends its time
debating about prunes and raisins. What is needed is somebody to
see things, and, after that, organization. That's me. I didn't
make Ophir for nothing. And once things begin to hum, outside
capital will pour in. All I do is start it going. 'Gentlemen,'
I say, 'here's all the natural advantages for a great metropolis.
God Almighty put them advantages here, and he put me here to see
them. Do you want to land your tea and silk from Asia and ship
it straight East? Here's the docks for your steamers, and here's
the railroads. Do you want factories from which you can ship
direct by land or water? Here's the site, and here's the modern,
up-to-date city, with the latest improvements for yourselves and
your workmen, to live in.'"
"Then there's the water. I'll come pretty close to owning the
watershed. Why not the waterworks too? There's two water
companies in Oakland now, fighting like cats and dogs and both
about broke. What a metropolis needs is a good water system.
They can't give it. They're stick-in-the-muds. I'll gobble them
up and deliver the right article to the city. There's money
there, too--money everywhere. Everything works in with
everything else. Each improvement makes the value of everything
else pump up. It's people that are behind the value. The bigger
the crowd that herds in one place, the more valuable is the real
estate. And this is the very place for a crowd to herd. Look at
it. Just look at it! You could never find a finer site for a
great city. All it needs is the herd, and I'll stampede a couple
of hundred thousand people in here ins two years. And what's
more it won't be one of these wild cat land booms. It will be
legitimate. Twenty years for now there'll be a million people on
this side the bay. Another thing is hotels. There isn't a
decent one in the town. I'll build a couple of up-to-date ones
that'll make them sit up and take notice. I won't care if they
don't pay for years. Their effect will more than give me my
money back out of the other holdings. And, oh, yes, I'm going to
plant eucalyptus, millions of them, on these hills."
"But how are you going to do it?" Dede asked. "You haven't
enough money for all that you've planned."
"I've thirty million, and if I need more I can borrow on the land
and other things. Interest on mortgages won't anywhere near eat
up the increase in land values, and I'll be selling land right
along."
In the weeks that followed, Daylight was a busy man. He spent
most of his time in Oakland, rarely coming to the office. He
planned to move the office to Oakland, but, as he told Dede, the
secret preliminary campaign of buying had to be put through
first. Sunday by Sunday, now from this hilltop and now from
that, they looked down upon the city and its farming suburbs, and
he pointed out to her his latest acquisitions. At first it was
patches and sections of land here and there; but as the weeks
passed it was the unowned portions that became rare, until at
last they stood as islands surrounded by Daylight's land.
It meant quick work on a colossal scale, for Oakland and the
adjacent country was not slow to feel the tremendous buying. But
Daylight had the ready cash, and it had always been his policy to
strike quickly. Before the others could get the warning of the
boom, he quietly accomplished many things. At the same time that
his agents were purchasing corner lots and entire blocks in the
heart of the business section and the waste lands for factory
sites, Day was rushing franchises through the city council,
capturing the two exhausted water companies and the eight or nine
independent street railways, and getting his grip on the Oakland
Creek and the bay tide-lands for his dock system. The tide-lands
had been in litigation for years, and he took the bull by the
horns--buying out the private owners and at the same time leasing
from the city fathers.
By the time that Oakland was aroused by this unprecedented
activity in every direction and was questioning excitedly the
meaning of it, Daylight secretly bought the chief Republican
newspaper and the chief Democratic organ, and moved boldly into
his new offices. Of necessity, they were on a large scale,
occupying four floors of the only modern office building in the
town--the only building that wouldn't have to be torn down later
on, as Daylight put it. There was department after department, a
score of them, and hundreds of clerks and stenographers. As he
told Dede: "I've got more companies than you can shake a stick
at. There's the Alameda & Contra Costa Land Syndicate, the
Consolidated Street Railways, the Yerba Buena Ferry Company, the
United Water Company, the Piedmont Realty Company, the Fairview
and Portola Hotel Company, and half a dozen more that I've got to
refer to a notebook to remember. There's the Piedmont Laundry
Farm, and Redwood Consolidated Quarries. Starting in with our
quarry, I just kept a-going till I got them all. And there's the
ship-building company I ain't got a name for yet. Seeing as I
had to have ferry-boats, I decided to build them myself. They'll
be done by the time the pier is ready for them. Phew! It all
sure beats poker. And I've had the fun of gouging the robber
gangs as well. The water company bunches are squealing yet. I
sure got them where the hair was short. They were just about all
in when I came along and finished them off."
"But why do you hate them so?" Dede asked.
"Because they're such cowardly skunks."
"But you play the same game they do."
"Yes; but not in the same way." Daylight regarded her
thoughtfully. "When I say cowardly skunks, I mean just
that,--cowardly skunks. They set up for a lot of gamblers, and
there ain't one in a thousand of them that's got the nerve to be
a gambler. They're four-flushers, if you know what that means.
They're a lot of little cottontail rabbits making believe they're
big rip-snorting timber wolves. They set out to everlastingly
eat up some proposition but at the first sign of trouble they
turn tail and stampede for the brush. Look how it works. When
the big fellows wanted to unload Little Copper, they sent Jakey
Fallow into the New York Stock Exchange to yell out: 'I'll buy
all or any part of Little Copper at fifty five,' Little Copper
being at fifty-four. And in thirty minutes them cottontails--
financiers, some folks call them--bid up Little Copper to sixty.
And an hour after that, stampeding for the brush, they were
throwing Little Copper overboard at forty-five and even forty.
"They're catspaws for the big fellows. Almost as fast as they
rob the suckers, the big fellows come along and hold them up. Or
else the big fellows use them in order to rob each other. That's
the way the Chattanooga Coal and Iron Company was swallowed up by
the trust in the last panic. The trust made that panic. It had
to break a couple of big banking companies and squeeze half a
dozen big fellows, too, and it did it by stampeding the
cottontails. The cottontails did the rest all right, and the
trust gathered in Chattanooga Coal and Iron. Why, any man, with
nerve and savvee, can start them cottontails jumping for the
brush. I don't exactly hate them myself, but I haven't any
regard for chicken-hearted four-flushers." _
Read next: PART II: CHAPTER XVII
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