In this case it helped the arch-plotter, Simmons, and his backer, Weston, for as the stock held firm, those who were short of it at two, three, and four, had no chance to cover. Then as it began to creep up a little, to even up their shortage they sold still more, and every few days a paid item in the _Market News_ helped matters on. What they were need not be stated. They were all to the same purpose, and that to create confidence in Rockhaven, and as usual every bear on the street discounted these statements and felt more certain that Rockhavens were without substantial value. And they were right. Meanwhile Weston, the great financier, as he now felt himself to be, rubbed his hands with satisfaction and concocted more news items; and Simmons hobnobbed with the street, assuring one and all of the other speculative liars what a safe investment Rockhavens were, and how sure to advance. "We have not sold much stock and do not care to," he said, "we know a good thing when we see it, and in this quarry we have a certain money-maker. It costs us a mere nothing to quarry the stone, the market absorbs all our product at a good price, and the ledge we own is limitless. Then we have an excellent manager in whom the firm trusts implicitly." He always used "we" in speaking of the stock, that pronoun carrying a certain assurance, as he well knew, for Simmons, who had grown old and gray on the street, was a shrewd money-maker and well known to be worth a million or more. But while Weston was happy in his prospective success, Hill was not. He was too greedy, and, narrow-minded as he was, could not wait content until the Rockhaven plum was ripe. He wanted to grasp it at once, even to ruin its fruition entirely. He railed and groaned whenever a dollar was put out, and had from the start. In his narrow vision it was so much thrown away. Every item in the press that called for outlay, the use of the thousands held by Simmons to manipulate the market, and especially the hundred or more that each week had to be sent to the island, each and all added to Hill's misery. Weston, the liberal rascal, had for a long time felt disgusted with his partner's miserly instincts; now he positively hated him and longed for the day when he could deal him a crushing blow. Both were unscrupulous schemers and thieves at heart, but of the two Hill was the worse. Not only did Weston come to hate Hill more and more each day, but he grew tired of the sight of his pinched and hypocritical face, his sunken eyes and clammy handshake--for shake hands with him occasionally he must. Then Hill was so unlike Weston in other ways it added to the feeling of disgust; he never used tobacco or drank, and held up his hands in holy horror at any lapse from the code of morality, and worse than that, if Weston let slip any word of profanity, as he occasionally did, Hill exclaimed against it. To have one's small vices made a daily text for short sermons is unpleasant, even to the best of us.