Our hero made his way out of the crush, jostling past men who were
crying and men who were cursing, men who were tearing their hair and men
who were shaking their fists at the sky--all of them men who had lost
all they owned in the world and saw ruin and starvation ahead of them.
It was a fearful, a hellish scene; but van Rensselaer did not heed it,
he had emotions enough of his own. They were emotions not easy to
describe--emotions of a man who has made seventy or eighty dollars a
share upon a million or two of shares, and who has been made the
wealthiest man in New York in half an hour. Van Rensselaer the elder
came hobbling into the office a few moments later and flung his arms
about his son. "Robbie!" he gasped, "Robbie!" and could say no more, for
he was choking. Shrike and the other three were close behind him, and
the five gentlemen went beside themselves with rejoicing--now singing,
now laughing, now dancing about, now falling on each other's necks.
I have said five; for van Rensselaer the younger, strange to say, joined
them but halfway. Now he would sit back in the chair and laugh
nervously, while his father told over the unthinkable sums he had
gained, and his heart throbbed with exultation; but then a few seconds
later he would be sitting staring in front of him, his quivering hands
wandering aimlessly about. "Poor Robbie!" said the fond father; "it's
easy to see he's done up. Here, have a drop." He was surprised to see
Robbie gulp down the contents of a flask at one draught.
For now the strain was over, the dreadful pressure gone; and Robert van
Rensselaer's nervousness was suddenly coming back. While the others were
still at the stage where it was possible for them to embrace each other,
he arose and excused himself and went out.
He went down to the street, where men were still crying aloud in their
grief, and staggered away. He went on aimlessly, bending his brows and
clenching his hands, and wrestling in his soul to keep before him the
fact that he was the richest man in New York. But he could not do it;
and then suddenly, with a wild, desperate resolve, he sprang into a cab
and shouted an address.
He was at the river-side in a few minutes, and there lay the _Comet_. It
was a wild day on the river; a gale had been raging, and the waves were
high even in the bay; but Robert van Rensselaer thought nothing of that
as he rushed on board and called for the captain. "Steam up!" he
shouted. "Put off the instant you are able."
The captain stared at him in consternation. "To go where?" he cried.
"To put to sea," answered the other.
"But the storm! Surely--"
"Curse the storm!" the man yelled. "Put to sea, I tell you, and get me
out of this town. Do you understand? Why don't you start?"
"But half the crew is away, Mr. van Rensselaer; and provisions--"
"I told you to get ready!" yelled Robbie. "Get ready! Do as I tell you,
and don't argue with me. Get on board what you can, only leave this
place the first instant you have steam up. Now go on!"
And he turned and staggered into the cabin. While men rushed about on
the deck, and the fires burned bright below, he sat with another bottle
of liquor before him; and when at last the _Comet_ slipped away from her
dock, he was sunk against the table in a drunken stupor.