Only
the tongue of the demon was in evidence. The brain behind it, with
its thousand slender nerves quivering with the energy of the
globe, Jack never saw, nor, for that matter, did nine-tenths of
the occupants of the chairs. To them its spoken word was the
dictum of fate. Success meant debts paid, a balance in the bank,
houses, horses, even yachts and estates--failure meant obscurity
and suffering. The turn of the roulette wheel or the roll of a
cube of ivory they well knew brought the same results, but these
turnings they also knew were attended with a certain loss of
prestige. Taking a flier in the Street was altogether different--
great financiers were behind the fluctuations of values told by
the tongue of the ticker, and behind them was the wealth of the
Republic and still in the far distance the power of the American
people. Few of them ever looked below the grease paint, nor did
the most discerning ever detect the laugh on the clown's face.
The boy half hidden by the glass screen, through which millions
were passed and repassed every month, caught now and then a
glimpse.
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