"Do you suppose I would
have done that had I known what was up?" he asked the men assembled in the
stores. "Go look at the books of the company. Let's have an investigation
here. You will find that Steve and I stuck to the rest of the stockholders.
We lost our money with the rest. If any one was crooked and when they saw a
failure coming went and got out from under at the expense of some one else,
it wasn't Steve and me. The books of the company will show we were game. It
wasn't our fault the plant-setting machine wouldn't work."
In the back room of the bank, John Clark and young Gordon Hart cursed Steve
and Tom, who, they declared, had sold them out. They had lost no money by
the failure, but on the other hand they had gained nothing. The four men
had sent in a bid for the plant when it was put up for sale, but as they
expected no competition, they had not bid very much. It had gone to a firm
of Cleveland lawyers who bid a little more, and later had been resold at
private sale to Steve and Tom. An investigation was started and it was
found that Steve and Tom held large blocks of stock in the defunct company,
while the bankers held practically none. Steve openly said that he had
known of the possibility of failure for some time and had warned the larger
stock-holders and asked them not to sell their stock. "While I was working
my head off trying to save the company, what were they up to?" he asked
sharply, and his question was repeated in the stores and in the homes of
the people.
Pages:
178
179
180
181
182
183
184
185
186
187
188
189
190
191
192
193
194
195
196
197
198
199
200
201
202