Matt shook his head and looked round the great room as though in
search of inspiration. He found it. His wandering glance finally
came to rest on Jerry Dooley's alert countenance. Jerry crooked a
finger at him and Matt strolled over to the desk.
"I've been watching you milling the idea round in your head," said
Jerry. "I saw you reject it. You're crazy! It can be done."
"How?" Matt queried eagerly.
"Go get an option on her for the lowest price you can get--then form a
syndicate and sell her to them at a higher price; or, if you don't
want to do that, form your syndicate to buy her at the option price,
and if you work it right you can get the job of managing owner. I
want to tell you that two and one-half per cent. commission on her
freight earnings would make a nice income."
"I wonder whom I could get into the syndicate?" Matt queried.
Jerry scratched his head.
"Well," he suggested, "you're mighty close to old Cappy Ricks. If you
could hook him for a piece of her, the rest would be easy. Any
shipping man on the Street will follow where Cappy Ricks leads. I'd
try Pollard & Reilly; Redell, of the West Coast Trading Company; Jack
Haviland, the ship chandler; Charley Beyers, the ship's grocer and
butcher; A. B. Cahill & Co., the coal dealers; Pete Hansen, of the
Bulkhead Hotel down on the Embarcadero--he's always got a couple of
thousand dollars to put into a clean-cut shipping enterprise.
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