“Now you get the idea!” Francis jubilated. “You’re a member of the Exchange. Then go ahead, sell or buy, do anything your and my merry hearts decide. We can’t lose. Anything from zero always leaves zero. We’ve shot all we’ve got, and more. Let’s shoot what we haven’t got.” Bascom still struggled feebly to protest, but Francis beat him down with a final: “Remember, anything from zero leaves zero.” And for the next hour, as in a nightmare, no longer a free agent, Bascom yielded to Francis’ will in the maddest stock adventure of his life. “Oh, well,” Francis laughed at half-past eleven, “we might as well quit now. But remember, we’re no worse off than we were an hour ago. We were zero then. We’re zero now. You can hang up the auctioneer’s flag any time now.” Bascom, heavily and wearily taking down the receiver, was about to transmit the orders that would stop the battle by acknowledgment of unconditional defeat, when the door opened and through it came the familiar ring of a pirate stave that made Francis flash his hand out in peremptory stoppage of his broker’s arm. “Stop!” Francis cried. “Listen!” And they listened to the song preceding the singer: “Back to back against the mainmast, Held at bay the entire crew.” As Henry swaggered in, carrying a huge and different suit-case, Francis joined with him in the stave. “What’s doing?” Bascom queried of Charley Tippery, who, still in evening dress, looked very jaded and worn from his exertions. From his breast pocket he drew and passed over three certified checks that totaled eighteen hundred thousand dollars. Bascom shook his head sadly. “Too late,” he said. “That’s only a drop in the bucket. Put them back in your pocket. It would be only throwing them away.” “But wait,” Charley Tippery cried, taking the suit-case from his singing companion and proceeding to open it. “Maybe that will help.” “That” consisted of a great mass of orderly bundles of gold bonds and gilt edge securities. “How much is it?” Bascom gasped, his courage springing up like wild-fire. But Francis, overcome by the sight of such plethora of ammunition, ceased singing to gasp. And both he and Bascom gasped again when Henry drew from his inside pocket a bundle of a dozen certified checks. They could only stare at the prodigious sum, for each was written for a million dollars. “And plenty more where that came from,” Henry announced airily. “All you have to do is say the word, Francis, and we’ll knock this bear gang to smithereens. Now suppose you get busy. The rumors are around everywhere that you’re gone and done for. Pitch in and show them, that’s all. Bust every last one of them that jumped you. Shake ‘m down to their gold watches and the fillings out of their teeth.” “You found old Sir Henry’s treasure after all,” Francis congratulated.