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reserve, he did not hesitate to run. If this were true, a great hour had struck. There would be
wide-spread panic and disaster. There would be a terrific slump in prices of all stocks. He must
be in the thick of it. Wingate must be on hand, and his two brothers. He must tell them how to
sell and when and what to buy. His great hour had come!
Chapter LIX
The banking house of Jay Cooke & Co., in spite of its tremendous significance as a banking and
promoting concern, was a most unpretentious affair, four stories and a half in height of gray
stone and red brick. It had never been deemed a handsome or comfortable banking house.
Cowperwood had been there often. Wharf-rats as long as the forearm of a man crept up the
culverted channels of Dock Street to run through the apartments at will. Scores of clerks worked
under gas-jets, where light and air were not any too abundant, keeping track of the firm's vast
accounts. It was next door to the Girard National Bank, where Cowperwood's friend Davison still
flourished, and where the principal financial business of the street converged. As Cowperwood
ran he met his brother Edward, who was coming to the stock exchange with some word for him
from Wingate.
"Run and get Wingate and Joe," he said. "There's something big on this afternoon. Jay Cooke
has failed."
Edward waited for no other word, but hurried off as directed.
Cowperwood reached Cooke & Co. among the earliest. To his utter astonishment, the solid
brown-oak doors, with which he was familiar, were shut, and a notice posted on them, which he
quickly read, ran:
September 18, 1873. To the Public--We regret to be obliged to announce that, owing to
unexpected demands on us, our firm has been obliged to suspend payment. In a few days we
will be able to present a statement to our creditors. Until which time we must ask their patient
consideration. We believe our assets to be largely in excess of our liabilities.
Jay Cooke & Co.
A magnificent gleam of triumph sprang into Cowperwood's eye. In company with many others
he turned and ran back toward the exchange, while a reporter, who had come for information
knocked at the massive doors of the banking house, and was told by a porter, who peered out
of a diamond-shaped aperture, that Jay Cooke had gone home for the day and was not to be
seen.
"Now," thought Cowperwood, to whom this panic spelled opportunity, not ruin, "I'll get my
innings. I'll go short of this--of everything."
Before, when the panic following the Chicago fire had occurred, he had been long--had been
compelled to stay long of many things in order to protect himself. To-day he had nothing to
speak of-- perhaps a paltry seventy-five thousand dollars which he had managed to scrape
together. Thank God! he had only the reputation of Wingate's old house to lose, if he lost, which
was nothing. With it as a trading agency behind him--with it as an excuse for his presence, his
right to buy and sell--he had everything to gain. Where many men were thinking of ruin, he was
thinking of success. He would have Wingate and his two brothers under him to execute his
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