operators in eye shades and shirt sleeves took the news hot from the
humming wires and clicked it off to the waiting pool rooms.

"Scarecrow wins by a neck!" cried one, "Blackbird second!"

"Make the odds 5 to 3," shouted a short, ill-favored man, who sat at a
desk puffing a large black cigar. The place buzzed like a beehive and
ticked like a clockmaker's. It had an atmosphere of breathless
excitement all its own. Felix watched and marvelled, wondering if dreams
came true.

The short, ill-favored man strolled over and condescended to make Mr.
Felix's acquaintance. An hour later the three of them were closeted
among the zitherns. At the same moment the fifteen operators were ranged
in a line in front, of a neighboring bar, their elbows simultaneously
elevated at an angle of forty-five degrees.

Felix still had lingering doubts. Hadn't Mr. McPherson some little
paper--a letter, a bill, a receipt or a check, to show that he was
really in the employ of the Western Union? No, said "Mac," but he had
something better--the badge which he had received as the fastest
operator among the company's employees. Felix wanted to see it, but
"Mac" explained that it was locked up in the vault at the Farmers' Loan
and Trust Co. To Felix this had a safe sound--"Farmers' Trust Co." Then
matters began to move rapidly. It was arranged that Felix should go down
in the morning and get $50,000 from his bankers, Seligman and Meyer.
After that he was to meet Nelson at the store and go with him to the
pool room where the big financiers played their money. McPherson was to
remain at the "office" and telephone them the results of the races in
advance. By nightfall they would be worth half a million.