Читать книгу My Adventures with Your Money - George Graham Rice - Страница 4

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The place was New York. The time, March, 1901. My age was thirty. My cash capital, tightly placed in my pocket, was $7.30, and I had no other external resources. I was a rover and out of a job.

Since August of the year before I had been loafing. My last position, seven months before, was that of a reporter for the New Orleans Times-Democrat. My last newspaper assignment was the great Galveston cyclonic hurricane in which 15,000 lives were lost and $100,000,000 in property was destroyed. I covered that catastrophe for the New York Herald and other journals as well as for the New Orleans newspaper. It was a "beat" and I netted a big sum for a few days' hard work, but the money had all been spent for subsistence.

At the corner of Fortieth Street and Broadway I met an old-time racetrack friend, Dave Campbell. His face wore a hardy, healthful hue, but he bore unmistakable evidence of being down on his luck.

"Buy me a drink," he said.

"I've got thirty cents in change and I must have a cigar," I answered, "and you know I like good ones."

"Well, I'll take a beer," he said, "and you can buy yourself a perfecto."

No sooner said than done. The cigar and the drink were forthcoming. We sat down. It was a café with the regulation news-ticker near the lunch counter.

"Do you still bet on the horses?" asked Campbell.

"No, I haven't had a bet down in more than a year," I answered.

"Well, here's a letter I just received from Frank Mead at New Orleans, and it ought to make you some money," he said.

"There's a 'pig' down here named Silver Coin," the letter said, "that has been raced for work recently. I think he's fit and ready and that within the next few days they will place him in a race that he can win, and he will bring home the coonskins at odds of 10 to 1."

I had seen letters like that before, but my interest was aroused. I picked up a copy of the New York Morning Telegraph from the table. Turning the pages, I noticed a number of tipsters' advertisements, all claiming they were continually giving the public winners on the races.