I
Cycle companies were in the market everywhere. Immense fortunes were
being made in a few days and sometimes little fortunes were being
lost to build them up. Mining shares were dull for a season, and any
company with the word "cycle" or "tyre" in its title was certain to
attract capital, no matter what its prospects were like in the eyes
of the expert. All the old private cycle companies suddenly were
offered to the public, and their proprietors, already rich men, built
themselves houses on the Riviera, bought yachts, ran racehorses, and
left business for ever. Sometimes the shareholders got their money's
worth, sometimes more, sometimes less--sometimes they got nothing
but total loss; but still the game went on. One could never open a
newspaper without finding, displayed at large, the prospectus of yet
another cycle company with capital expressed in six figures at least,
often in seven. Solemn old dailies, into whose editorial heads no
new thing ever found its way till years after it had been forgotten
elsewhere, suddenly exhibited the scandalous phenomenon of "broken
columns" in their advertising sections, and the universal prospectuses
stretched outrageously across half or even all the page--a thing to
cause apoplexy in the bodily system of any self-respecting manager of
the old school.
In the midst of this excitement it chanced that the firm of Dorrington
& Hicks were engaged upon an investigation for the famous and
long-established "Indestructible Bicycle and Tricycle Manufacturing
Company," of London and Coventry. The matter was not one of sufficient
intricacy or difficulty to engage Dorrington's personal attention,
and it was given to an assistant. There was some doubt as to the
validity of a certain patent having reference to a particular method
of tightening the spokes and truing the wheels of a bicycle, and
Dorrington's assistant had to make inquiries (without attracting
attention to the matter) as to whether or not there existed any
evidence, either documentary or in the memory of veterans, of the
use of this method, or anything like it, before the year 1885. The
assistant completed his inquiries and made his report to Dorrington.
Now I think I have said that, from every evidence I have seen, the
chief matter of Dorrington's solicitude was his own interest, and just
at this time he had heard, as had others, much of the money being made
in cycle companies. Also, like others, he had conceived a great desire
to get the confidential advice of somebody "in the know"--advice which
might lead him into the "good thing" desired by all the greedy who
flutter about at the outside edge of the stock and share market. For
this reason Dorrington determined to make this small matter of the
wheel patent an affair of personal report. He was a man of infinite
resource, plausibility and good-companionship, and there was money
going in the cycle trade. Why then should he lose an opportunity
of making himself pleasant in the inner groves of that trade, and
catch whatever might come his way--information, syndicate shares,
directorships, anything? So that Dorrington made himself master of
his assistant's information, and proceeded to the head office of the
"Indestructible" company on Holborn Viaduct, resolved to become the
entertaining acquaintance of the managing director.
On his way his attention was attracted by a very elaborately fitted
cycle shop, which his recollection told him was new. "The Avalanche
Bicycle and Tyre Company" was the legend gilt above the great
plate-glass window, and in the window itself stood many brilliantly
enamelled and plated bicycles, each labelled on the frame with the
flaming red and gold transfer of the firm; and in the midst of all was
another bicycle covered with dried mud, of which, however, sufficient
had been carefully cleared away to expose a similar glaring transfer
to those that decorated the rest--with a placard announcing that on
this particular machine somebody had ridden some incredible distance on
bad roads in very little more than no time at all. A crowd stood about
the window and gaped respectfully at the placard, the bicycles, the
transfers, and the mud, though they paid little attention to certain
piles of folded white papers, endorsed in bold letters with the name
of the company, with the suffix "limited" and the word "prospectus"
in bloated black letter below. These, however, Dorrington observed at
once, for he had himself that morning, in common with several thousand
other people, received one by post. Also half a page of his morning
paper had been filled with a copy of that same prospectus, and the
afternoon had brought another copy in the evening paper. In the list of
directors there was a titled name or two, together with a few unknown
names--doubtless the "practical men." And below this list there were
such positive promises of tremendous dividends, backed up and proved
beyond dispute by such ingenious piles of business-like figures, every
line of figures referring to some other line for testimonials to its
perfect genuineness and accuracy, that any reasonable man, it would
seem, must instantly sell the hat off his head and the boots off his
feet to buy one share at least, and so make his fortune for ever.
True, the business was but lately established, but that was just it.
It had rushed ahead with such amazing rapidity (as was natural with an
avalanche) that it had got altogether out of hand, and orders couldn't
be executed at all; wherefore the proprietors were reluctantly
compelled to let the public have some of the luck. This was Thursday.
The share list was to be opened on Monday morning and closed inexorably
at four o'clock on Tuesday afternoon, with a merciful extension to
Wednesday morning for the candidates for wealth who were so unfortunate
as to live in the country. So that it behoved everybody to waste no
time lest he be numbered among the unlucky whose subscription-money
should be returned in full, failing allotment. The prospectus did not
absolutely say it in so many words, but no rational person could fail
to feel that the directors were fervently hoping that nobody would get
injured in the rush.
Dorrington passed on and reached the well-known establishment of the
"Indestructible Bicycle Company." This was already a limited company of
a private sort, and had been so for ten years or more. And before that
the concern had had eight or nine years of prosperous experience. The
founder of the firm, Mr. Paul Mallows, was now the managing director,
and a great pillar of the cycling industry. Dorrington gave a clerk his
card, and asked to see Mr. Mallows.
Mr. Mallows was out, it seemed, but Mr. Stedman, the secretary, was
in, and him Dorrington saw. Mr. Stedman was a pleasant, youngish man,
who had been a famous amateur bicyclist in his time, and was still an
enthusiast. In ten minutes business was settled and dismissed, and
Dorrington's tact had brought the secretary into a pleasant discursive
chat, with much exchange of anecdote. Dorrington expressed much
interest in the subject of bicycling, and, seeing that Stedman had been
a racing man, particularly as to bicycling races.
"There'll be a rare good race on Saturday, I expect," Stedman said. "Or
rather," he went on, "I expect the fifty miles record will go. I fancy
our man Gillett is pretty safe to win, but he'll have to move, and I
quite expect to see a good set of new records on our advertisements
next week. The next best man is Lant--the new fellow, you know--who
rides for the 'Avalanche' people."
"Let's see, they're going to the public as a limited company, aren't
they?" Dorrington asked casually.
Stedman nodded, with a little grimace.
"You don't think it's a good thing, perhaps," Dorrington said,
noticing the grimace. "Is that so?"
"Well," Stedman answered, "of course I can't say. I don't know much
about the firm--nobody does, as far as I can tell--but they seem
to have got a business together in almost no time; that is, if the
business is as genuine as it looks at first sight. But they want a
rare lot of capital, and then the prospectus--well, I've seen more
satisfactory ones, you know. I don't say it isn't all right, of course,
but still I shan't go out of my way to recommend any friends of mine to
plunge on it."
"You won't?"
"No, I won't. Though no doubt they'll get their capital, or most of it.
Almost any cycle or tyre company can get subscribed just now. And this
'Avalanche' affair is both, and it is so well advertised, you know.
Lant has been winning on their mounts just lately, and they've been
booming it for all they're worth. By Jove, if they could only screw him
up to win the fifty miles on Saturday, and beat our man Gillett, that
_would_ give them a push! Just at the correct moment too. Gillett's
never been beaten yet at the distance, you know. But Lant can't do
it--though, as I have said, he'll make some fast riding--it'll be a
race, I tell you!"
"I should like to see it."
"Why not come? See about it, will you? And perhaps you'd like to
run down to the track after dinner this evening and see our man
training--awfully interesting, I can tell you, with all the pacing
machinery and that. Will you come?"
Dorrington expressed himself delighted, and suggested that Stedman
should dine with him before going to the track. Stedman, for his part,
charmed with his new acquaintance--as everybody was at a first meeting
with Dorrington--assented gladly.
At that moment the door of Stedman's room was pushed open and a
well-dressed, middle-aged man, with a shaven, flabby face, appeared.
"I beg pardon," he said, "I thought you were alone. I've just ripped
my finger against the handle of my brougham door as I came in--the
screw sticks out. Have you a piece of sticking plaster?" He extended a
bleeding finger as he spoke. Stedman looked doubtfully at his desk.
"Here is some court plaster," Dorrington exclaimed, producing his
pocket-book. "I always carry it--it's handier than ordinary sticking
plaster. How much do you want?"
"Thanks--an inch or so."
"This is Mr. Dorrington, of Messrs. Dorrington & Hicks, Mr. Mallows,"
Stedman said. "Our managing director, Mr. Paul Mallows, Mr. Dorrington."
Dorrington was delighted to make Mr. Mallows's acquaintance, and he
busied himself with a careful strapping of the damaged finger. Mr.
Mallows had the large frame of a man of strong build who has had much
hard bodily work, but there hung about it the heavier, softer flesh
that told of a later period of ease and sloth. "Ah, Mr. Mallows,"
Stedman said, "the bicycle's the safest thing, after all! Dangerous
things these broughams!"
"Ah, you younger men," Mr. Mallows replied, with a slow and rounded
enunciation, "you younger men can afford to be active. We elders----"
"Can afford a brougham," Dorrington added, before the managing director
began the next word. "Just so--and the bicycle does it all; wonderful
thing the bicycle!"
Dorrington had not misjudged his man, and the oblique reference to his
wealth flattered Mr. Mallows. Dorrington went once more through his
report as to the spoke patent, and then Mr. Mallows bade him good-bye.
"Good-day, Mr. Dorrington, good-day," he said. "I am extremely obliged
by your careful personal attention to this matter of the patent. We may
leave it with Mr. Stedman now, I think. Good-day. I hope soon to have
the pleasure of meeting you again." And with clumsy stateliness Mr.
Mallows vanished.