"If you want it and will pay for it on delivery next Saturday, I can scheme it for you to take up an extra five thousand dollars' worth of stock in the consolidation; but if I do you must not say one word about it to any one until after everything is settled, or some of these other fellows will be jealous. There's Meers, for instance. He's crazy right now to take over every share of the surplus, but, between you and I, we don't want him to have such a big finger in the pie." "I should say not," agreed Mr. Nickel emphatically. "He's too big as it is. Why, he pretty near runs this town." "He can't run the consolidation; I'll tell him that!" declared Mr. Wallingford with much apparent heat. "It's _my_ project and I'll favor whoever I want to. But about this stock, old man. You think it over, and if you want it let me know by not later than to-day noon. If it isn't spoken for by that time I'll take it myself; but remember, not one word!" Mr. Nickel promised, on his honor as a man and his self-interest as a favored stockholder, to say nothing, and Wallingford started out. At the door he turned back, however. "By the way," said he, "when we get going I've made up my mind to push the Nickelfine and the Double Nickel brands. I've been trying those two boxes you gave me and they're great. But don't say anything. Jealousy, you know!" Mr. Nickel put his finger to his lips and smiled and bowed significantly. Fine man, that Wallingford! Knew a good thing when he saw it, and easy as an old shoe in spite of all his money. Regular howling swell, too. The regular howling swell was at that very moment on his rubber-tired way to the shop of Alfred Norton, where he made a similar proposition to the one he had made Nickel. In all his manipulating he had kept careful track of the gentlemen who had or who might have money, and now he made it his business to visit each of them in turn, to talk additional stock with them and bind them to inviolate secrecy. For three days he kept this up, and on Friday evening was able to mop his brow in content. "Fanny," he opined, "you have a smart husband." "That's the only fault I have to find with you, Jim," she retorted smiling. "What have you done this time?" "I've just tapped Mr. Joseph O. Meers on the solar plexus," he exulted. "I'll show that gentleman how to horn into my game and take the rake-off that's coming to a real artist! He's dreaming happy dreams just now, but when I leave town with the mezuma he'll wake up." "I thought you were going to stay here," she objected with a troubled frown. He understood her at once, and reached over to stroke her hair.