CHAPTER XXIII

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_ Fischer, exactly one week after his nocturnal visit to Fourteenth Street, hurried out of the train at the Pennsylvania Station, almost tore the newspapers from the news stand, glanced through them one by one and threw them back. The attendant, open-mouthed, ventured upon a mild protest. Fischer threw him a dollar bill, caught up his handbag, and made for the entrance. He was the first passenger from the Washington Limited to reach the street and spring into a taxi.

"The Plaza Hotel," he ordered. "Get along."

They arrived at the Plaza in less than ten minutes. Mr. Fischer tipped the driver lavishly, suffered the hall porter to take his bag, returned his greeting mechanically, and walked with swift haste to the tape machine. He held up the strips with shaking fingers, dropped them again, hurried to the lift, and entered his rooms. Nikasti was in the sitting-room, arranging some flowers. Fischer did not even stop to reply to his reverential greeting.

"Where's Mr. Van Teyl?" he demanded.

"Mr. Van Teyl has gone away, sir," was the calm reply. "He left here the day before yesterday. There is a letter."

Fischer took no notice. He was already gripping the telephone receiver.

"982, Wall," he said--"an urgent call."

He stood waiting, his face an epitome of breathless suspense. Soon a voice answered him.

"That the office of Neville, Brooks and Van Teyl?" he demanded. "Yes! Put me through to Mr. Van Teyl. Urgent!"

Another few seconds of waiting, then once more he bent over the instrument.

"That you, Van Teyl?... Yes, Fischer speaking. Oh, never mind about that! Listen. What price are Anglo-French?... No, say about what?... Ninety-five?... Sell me a hundred thousand.... What's that?... What?... Of course it's a big deal! Never mind that. I'm good enough, aren't I? There'll be no rise that'll wipe out half a million dollars. I've got that lying in cash at Guggenheimer's. If you need the money, I'll bring it you in half an hour. Get out into the market and sell. Damn you, what's it matter about news! Right! Sorry, Jim. See you later."

Fischer put down the telephone and wiped his forehead. Notwithstanding the fatigue in his face, there was a glint of triumph there. He laid his hand upon Nikasti's shoulder.

"My friend," he said, "there's big proof coming of what I said to you the other day. You'll find that letter you carry will mean a different thing now. There's news in the air."

"There has been a great battle, perhaps?" Nikasti asked slowly.

"All that is to be known you will hear before evening," Fischer replied. "Tell some one to send me some coffee. I have come through from Washington. I am tired."

He sank a little abruptly into an easy-chair, took off his spectacles, and leaned his head back upon the cushions. In the sunlight his face was almost ghastly. A queer sense of weakness had suddenly assailed him. His mind flitted back through a vista of sleepless nights, of strenuous days, of passions held in leash, excitement ground down.

"I am tired," he said. "Telephone down to the office, Nikasti, for a doctor."

Nikasti obeyed, and his summons was promptly answered. The doctor who arrived was pleasantly but ominously grave. In the middle of his examination the telephone rang. Fischer, without ceremony, moved to the receiver. It was Van Teyl speaking.

"I've sold your hundred thousand Anglo-French," he announced. "It's done the whole market in, though--knocked the bottom out of it. They've fallen a point and a half. Shall I begin to buy back for you? You'll make a bit."

"Not a share," Fischer answered fiercely. "Wait!"

"Have you any news you're keeping up your sleeve?" Van Teyl persisted.

"If I have, it's my own affair," was the curt reply, "and I don't tell news over the telephone, anyway. Watch the market, and go on selling where you can."

"I shall do as you order," Van Teyl replied, "but you're all against the general tone here. By the bye, you got my letter?"

"I haven't opened it yet," Fischer snapped. "What's the matter?"

"Pamela and I have taken a little flat in Fifty-eighth Street. Seems a little abrupt, but she didn't want to be alone, and she hates hotels. We felt sure you'd understand."

"Yes, I understand," Fischer said. "Good-by! I'm busy."

The doctor completed his examination. When he had finished he mentioned his fee.

"You work too hard, and you live in an atmosphere of too great strain. The natural consequences are already beginning to show themselves. If I give you medicine, it will only encourage you to keep on wasting yourself, but you can have medicine if you like."

"Send me something to take for the next fortnight," Fischer replied. "After that, I'll take my chance."

The doctor wrote a prescription and took his leave. Fischer leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes. His mind travelled back through these latter days of his over-strenuous life. In such minutes of relaxation, few of which he permitted himself, he realised with bitter completeness the catastrophe which had overtaken him--him, Oscar Fischer, of all men on earth. Into his life of grim purposes, of lofty and yet narrow ambitions, of almost superhuman tenacity, had crept the one weakening strain whose presence in other men he had always scoffed at and derived. There was a new and enervating glamour over the days, a new and hatefully powerful rival for all his thoughts and dreams. Ten years ago, he reflected sadly, this might have made a different man of him, might have unlocked the gates into another, more peaceful and beautiful world, visions of which had sometimes vaguely disturbed him in his cold and selfish climb. Now it could only mean suffering. This was the first stroke. It was the assertion of humanity which was responsible for his present weakness. How far might it not drag him down?

There should be a fight, at any rate, he told himself, as an hour or two later he made his way downtown. He paid several calls in the vicinity of Wall Street, and finished up in Van Teyl's office. That young man greeted him with a certain relief.

"You know the tone of the market's still against you, Fischer," he warned him once more.

Fischer threw himself into the client's easy-chair. The furniture in the office seemed less distinct than usual. He was conscious of a certain haziness of outline in everything. Van Teyl's face, even, was shrouded in a little mist. Then he suddenly found himself fighting fiercely, fighting for his consciousness, fighting against a wave of giddiness, a deadly sinking of the heart, a strange slackening of all his nerve power. The young stockbroker rose hastily to his feet.

"Anything wrong, old fellow?" he asked anxiously.

"A glass of water," Fischer begged.

He was conscious of drinking it, vaguely conscious that he was winning. Soon the office had regained its ordinary appearance, his pulse was beating more regularly. He had once more the feeling of living--of living, though in a minor key.

"A touch of liver," he murmured. "What did you say about the markets?"

"You look pretty rotten," Van Teyl remarked sympathetically. "Shall I send out for some brandy?"

"Not for me," Fischer scoffed. "I don't need it. What price are Anglo-French?"

"Ninety-four. You've only done them in a point, after all, and that's nominal. I daresay I could get ten thousand back at that."

"Let them alone," was the calm reply. "I'll sell another fifty thousand at ninety-four."

"Look here," Van Teyl said, swinging round in his chair, "I like the business and I know you can finance it, but are you sure that you realise what you are doing? Every one believes Anglo-French have touched their bottom. They've only to go back to where they were--say five points--and you'd lose half a million."

Fischer smiled a little wearily.

"That small sum in arithmetic," he remonstrated, "had already passed through my brain. Send in your selling order, Jim, and come out to lunch with me. I've come straight through from Washington--only got in this morning."

Van Teyl called in his clerk and gave a few orders. Then he took up his hat and left the office with his client.

"From Washington, eh?" he remarked curiously, as they passed into the crowded streets. "So that accounts--"

He broke off abruptly. His companion's warning fingers had tightened upon his arm.

"Quite right!" Van Teyl confessed. "There's gossip enough about now, and they seem to have tumbled to it that you're our client. The office has been besieged this morning. Sorry, Ned, I'm busy," he went on, to a man who tried to catch his arm. "See you later, Fred. I'll be in after lunch, Mr. Borrodaile. No, nothing fresh that I know of."

Fischer smiled grimly.

"Got you into a kind of hornets' nest, eh?" he observed.

"It's been like this all the morning," Van Teyl told him. "They believe I know something. Even the newspaper men are tumbling to it. We'll lunch up at the club. Maybe we'll get a little peace there."

They stepped into the hall of a great building, and took one of the interminable row of lifts. A few minutes later they were seated at a side table in a dining room on the top floor of one of the huge modern skyscrapers. Below them stretched a silent panorama of the city; beyond, a picturesque view of the river. A fresh breeze blew in through the opened window. They were above the noise, even, of the street cars.

"Order me a small bottle of champagne, James," Fischer begged, "and some steak."

Van Teyl stared at his companion and laughed as he took up the wine list.

"Well, that's the first time, Fischer, I've known you to touch a drop of anything before the evening! I'll have a whisky and soda with you. Thank God we're away from that inquisitive crowd for a few minutes! Are you going to give me an idea of what's moving?"

Fischer watched the wine being poured into his glass.

"Not until this evening," he said. "I want you to bring your sister and come and dine at the new roof-garden."

"I don't know whether Pamela has any engagement," Van Teyl began, a little dubiously.

"Please go and see," Fischer begged earnestly. "The telephones are just outside. Tell your sister that I particularly wish her to accept my invitation. Tell her that there will be news."

Van Teyl went out to the telephone. Fischer sipped his champagne and crumbled up his bread, his eyes fixed a little dreamily on the grey river. He was already conscious of the glow of the wine in his veins. The sensation was half pleasurable, in a sense distasteful to him. He resented this artificial humanity. He had the feeling of a man who has stooped to be doped by a quack doctor. And he was a little afraid.

His young companion returned triumphant.

"Had a little trouble with Pamela," he observed, as he resumed his place at the table. "She was thinking of the opera with a girl friend she picked up this morning. However, the idea of news, I think, clinched it. We'll be at the Oriental at eight o'clock, eh?"

Fischer looked up from the fascinating patchwork below. Already there was anticipation in his face.

"I am very glad," he said. "There will certainly be news." _

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