“No, mister,” implored the sweet-faced girl. “You don’t want to go, just send the cops away. You want to stay here and watch that property, right?”
“Right,” said Dworcas bitterly. “Beat it, Herb.”
The big cop frowned and objected, “I give him the summons, Del. It says we got to take his stuff in pertective custody.”
“Beat it, Herb!”
The cop shrugged petulantly and, gathering his squad, marched glowering away.
“Good work, Lana,” breathed Mundin.
She shrugged. “All right, you kids,” she said. “You can put the bottles away again. He’ll stay put, won’t you, buster?”
Fervently Dworcas choked, “Sure,” watching the Wabbits with eyes as glassy as the bottles they were stowing away in their clothes again behind him.
Mundin turned limply back to the Big Board. He had missed a couple of movements, but—but——
He held the glasses rigid on Line 333 for long seconds. It said, 333, off 13.
“Don,” he said unbelievingly, “Don, it’s started. Somebody else is selling tool”
Coett? Nelson? Green, Charlesworth themselves? They never knew. But in a minute it was everyone. Old 333 plunged and plunged and plunged. Howling like maniacs, Mundin and
Lavin poured in ten thousand shares at a time, and other thousands appeared from hidden portfolios, from ancient voting trusts, from the very air, it seemed. Off 15. Off 28. Off 47. Off 61.
The whole market was churning now, and the Big Board’s figures had little to do with what was happening then and there; they were minutes behind. Twice there was trouble, and the busted bottles came out, and a couple of bleeding hulks slid to the floor of the Exchange to be trampled into mush. But only twice. The density of the crowd protected them; Hitler’s panzers could not have driven through that mass to get at Mundin.
This was the critical point, Mundin told himself desperately, hunched over his keys, punching out orders and waiting for the slow, the agonizingly slow, response of the once-instantaneous Big Board. This was when they had to feel the pulse of the market, and know when, quietly, to stop selling and when, invisibly, to begin to buy. A hand snaked over his shoulder and picked something up.
“Watch it, bud!” Mundin ordered hoarsely, glancing up. But it was only Del Dworcas, taking back the summons & complaint his man had given Mundin.
His face white but composed, Dworcas quietly tore the paper up. “Yours,” he said to Mundin, letting the pieces slip to the floor. “I know when to get off a losing horse, Charles. And don’t forget who put you in touch with the Lavins.”
The judgment of a practical politician, Mundin thought wonderingly. It was like a voice from the grave, Ryan’s voice.
And by it he knew that they had won.
Chapter Twenty-Six
they celebrated that night in Belly Rave—there seemed no more fitting place. It was quiet but prideful. They had won, all of them together. And they all of them owned the biggest concentration of power the world Lad ever seen. Even now, they didn’t know the full extent of their hold-
ings. Mundin and Norvie had made a laborious computation of their G.M.L. holdings—nearly seventy per cent. All of their own stock back, and probably Coett’s and Nelson’s and enough more to mean that they had dipped into the Green, Charlesworth reserves. But, wherever it came from, enough.
Enough to make the Lavin House—no longer the G.M.L. Home—what Lavin had meant it to be.
“Belt Transport Common B,” sang out Hubble, “two hundred fifty shares.” Don Lavin scouted through his lists, made a mark, called:
“Check.”
Hubble carefully laid away the voucher and picked up another. “National Nonferrous—hey, that’s Nelson! National Nonferrous, fifteen hundred shares.” He scratched his head. “Did I buy those? Well, no m&tter. Tioga Point Kewpie Corporation—wait a minute.” He stared at the Exchange’s voucher. “Anybody here ever hear of a Tioga Point Kewpie Corporation? We seem to have picked up a controlling interest. Got Poore’s around, Mundin?” Nobody had ever heard of it. Hubble shrugged, made a paper plane of the voucher and sailed it to Lana. “Here, kid. Looks like a doll factory. Yours.”
Lana looked startled, then belligerent, then lost. She picked up the voucher and stared at it. “Dolls,” she said, wonderingly.