"They listen to me," said Walter, a little wistfully, but with a brave smile, "or else they do not listen--but no one has ever yet taken my advice! Do you wet your hair when you part it, sir?""What," said Cleggett, carefully concealing from Walter the fact that he spoke of himself, "would be your advice to a man with $100,000 who wished to double it in a few weeks?""Double it!" cried Walter. "Why, I could show such a person how to multiply it by ten inside of two months." And he rapidly outlined to Cleggett a scheme so audacious and so brilliant that it fairly took our hero's breath away. Moreover, it stood the test of reflection; it was sound. Not to descend to the sordid details, in three weeks Cleggett found himself possessed of a million dollars' gain. Half of this he gave to the excellent Walter, and in three months ran the other half million up to twenty millions.
Then he withdrew permanently from business, as Lady Agatha complained that it took too much of his time; moreover, he shrank from notoriety, which his stock market operations were beginning to bring upon him.
Giuseppe Jones, who recovered of his wounds, forswore anarchy andbecame a newspaper reporter, and grew to be a fast friend of Cleggett, who discovered that he was a lad of parts. Cleggett eventually made him president of a college of journalism which he founded. While he was establishing the institution the man Wharton, his old managing editor, broken, shattered, out of work, and a hopeless drunkard, came to him and begged for a position. The man had sunk so low that he was repeatedly arrested for pretending to be blind on the street corners, and had debauched an innocent dog to assist in this deception. Cleggett forgave him the slights of many years and made him an assistant janitor in the new college of journalism.
The post is a sinecure, and well within even the man Wharton's powers.
Cap'n Abernethy travels with the Cleggetts a great deal, under the hallucination, which they humor, that he is of service to them. The children are very fond of him. At Claiborne Castle Cleggett has had a shallow lake constructed for him. There the Captain, still firm in the belief that he is a sailor, loves to potter about with catboats and rafts.