“Gee!” muttered the boy. “And I only gave that old fellow fifty dollars for the stock, and here I’ve got back one hundred and fifty already, while the value the company places on five thousand shares is twelve hundred and fifty. Maybe I didn’t strike it lucky when I bought those certificates.” “There must be something interesting in that letter from the way you are smiling over it,” said Millie as she passed him on her way back to her desk. “Hold on, Millie,” he said, and she stopped to listen to what he had to say. “Didn’t I tell you this was my lucky day?” “I think you did,” she answered, with a smile. “Remember that mining stock I bought some months ago from an old gentleman by the name of Tuggs?” She nodded. “I only gave him fifty dollars for the lot, and now I’ve received my first dividend of one hundred and fifty, with more to come, and the company’s estimate of the value of my shares is twelve hundred and fifty dollars. How’s that for luck?” Of course, Millie congratulated him; so also did both Mr. Atherton and Mr. Bishop when they heard about it later on. So likewise did the other employees when the intelligence reached them, though no doubt the younger clerks envied him his luck. Indeed, so elated was Jack over his mining shares that he quite forgot for a time the much more important subject of the D. & G. stock, which, however, still clung around the 90 mark as though those figures had some potent attraction. When he went to lunch he met Oliver Bird coming out of a Broad Street cafe. Of course, he had to tell him about his luck with the Gopher Gold Mining shares. “Glad to hear it, Jack,” said the big broker, patting him on the back. “Nothing succeeds like success, young man. You were successful in pulling five thousand dollars out of the fire when another and more experienced person, had he taken the risks you did with that L. S. stock, would have probably gone up Salt Creek. Had those Gopher certificates been offered to me on the same terms you gobbled them at, I shouldn’t have touched them with a ten-foot pole.” “They were not so wild-catty, after all,” grinned the lad. “It seems not. You’re a pretty ’cute boy.” “It isn’t my fault; I must have been born so,” laughed Jack as the broker gave him another slap on the shoulder and passed on. “Hello, Mr. Hartz,” to that operator, who came up at that moment. “Seen Percy Chamberlain to-day?” The broker’s eyes twinkled, and he shook his head. “He hasn’t dropped in on our Millie for three whole days,” grinned Jack. “Must have struck a new mash somewhere. She has my sympathy. How’s D. & G.?” “What about it?” asked Hartz, sharply, fixing Jack with his gimlet eyes. “You’re buying it, aren’t you?” “Who said so?” demanded the broker, more aggressively than before. “Nobody that I know of. It just struck me that you were--that’s all,” said the boy, lightly. “You must have a reason for mentioning it,” said Hartz, gripping him tightly by the arm.