To Montague the idea that there were men in the country sufficiently
powerful to wreck its business, and sufficiently unscrupulous to use
their power--the idea seemed to him sensational and absurd.
But he had a talk about it one evening with Major Venable, who
laughed at him. The Major named half a dozen men--Waterman and Duval
and Wyman among them--who controlled ninety per cent of the banks in
the Metropolis. They controlled all three of the big insurance
companies, with their resources of four or five hundred million
dollars; one of them controlled a great transcontinental railroad
system, which alone kept a twenty-or thirty-million dollar "surplus"
for stock-gambling purposes.
"If any two or three of those men were to make up their minds,"
declared the Major, "they could wreck the business of this country
in a day. If there were stocks they wanted to pick up, they could
knock them to any price they chose."
"How would they do it?" asked the other.
"There are many ways. You noticed that the last big slump began with
the worst scarcity of money the Street has known for years.
Pages:
228
229
230
231
232
233
234
235
236
237
238
239
240
241
242
243
244
245
246
247
248
249
250
251
252