He liked going in through the handsome doorway, and seeing all the clerks at their desks, and sitting down in the big leather chair in the paneled room where, once a year, a senior clerk would politely review his account with him.
“I’m wondering,” Uncle Luigi told him, “whether to sell my holdings.”
“Why would you want to do that?” The clerk was a small, dapper man, in his forties.
“The market’s down a bit.”
“There’s been some profit-taking, but that doesn’t surprise us.”
“Nothing goes up forever,” Uncle Luigi pointed out. “Look at real estate.”
It was true that since 1925, despite the astonishing boom in the stock market, the overall price of houses in America had actually been going down. But the clerk only shrugged.
“Real estate’s one thing, the market’s another. The fact is that in the last six years, the market has gone up by five times. On the third of this month, the Dow was at three hundred and eighty-one. That’s the highest in its history, you know.”
“But that’s partly what worries me,” Uncle Luigi said. “On average, the prices of stocks are now over thirty-two times their earnings.”
The clerk smiled, to show that he was impressed that this little Italian should know all this.
“We would agree that future gains may not be so steep, but we don’t see any reason for the market to come down. We think it’s moved to a higher plateau. And I can assure you, the investment is still coming in.”
Uncle Luigi nodded thoughtfully. What the broker said was true. People were still piling money into the market, but they were being encouraged to do so. A year ago, this dapper man had politely informed him: “We have been dealing with you for many years now, sir, and your investments are excellent collateral. We should be glad to lend you extra funds if you’d like to increase the size of your portfolio.” Luigi had declined the offer, but he wondered how much of the money now invested in the stock market was borrowed. The greater the borrowing, the more like a bubble the thing must become.
“So you advise me to hold on to my stocks?” he asked the broker, after a pause.
“We expect the market to rise soon. I’d hate to see you miss out.” The clerk smiled. “I’m buying myself, I assure you.”
Rose Master made a very big decision that night. It wasn’t easy, and she’d been thinking about it for some time. It might, she reckoned, affect the family’s future happiness and position more than they imagined. For clever though her husband and her son were in their different ways, she believed she had more foresight.
It concerned the cottage in Newport.
Charlie came to dinner that evening. She’d been rather hurt by her son that summer. During the whole time, he had come to Newport just once, and his father had undoubtedly dragged him there on that occasion, telling him, “At least come once, to please your mother.” Of course when he did come, he’d been absolutely charming to everyone. But that didn’t really make her feel any better.
She was getting seriously worried about him nowadays. He was nearly thirty and still living in Greenwich Village, on Downing Street—though why anyone would want to live there she couldn’t imagine. He was pretending to work for his father and the last she heard he was writing a play. She didn’t know what kind of women he was seeing, and didn’t want to. He probably wasn’t getting enough exercise of that sort or any other, to judge by his waistline, and he was drinking too much. It was time her son took a pull at himself. And it was time for him to get married too. After all, what was the point in doing all you could for the family if there was no future generation to carry it on?
All in all, she was distressed, and she felt she should speak her mind. But William had cautioned her.
“I know he’s hurt you, but don’t quarrel with him,” he warned. “You might drive him away.”
So when Charlie turned up for dinner that evening, she had gently suggested that he should take more care of his health, but said little more on the subject.
They talked of all sorts of things. Charlie told her anecdotes about some of his playwriting friends, and she pretended to be amused. She told him that she was thinking of redecorating the Newport house, and he pretended to care. They all discussed the stock market. Rose knew that some people were saying it was too high, and she remembered the terrible scare back in 1907. But her husband didn’t seem to be concerned. Conditions were quite different now, he assured her.
“By the way,” Charlie remarked to his father, “do you know we’ve got a new competitor to the brokerage, in the street right across from our offices?” He grinned. “Guess who it is. The boot boy.”
“The boot boy?” cried his mother.
“I swear to God. He was cleaning my shoes, and he started offering me stock tips. He has his own portfolio. Good news, by the way: he told me the market was going up again.”
“Do we have his account?” his father said with a smile.
“I don’t believe so.”
“Well, bring him in then. Earn some commission, boy.” “You’re not serious, are you?” Rose said.
But William shrugged. “Everyone’s in the market now, Rose,” he said.
“I have another piece of news,” Charlie told them. “Edmund Keller’s bringing out a new book. It’s the story of the great days of Rome, but written for the general market. He’s hoping it’ll be a big seller.” Keller had been working on the project ever since he’d returned from three very happy years in Oxford.
“Splendid,” said William. “We’ll buy a copy or two.”
“Any chance you’ll put on a party for him?” Charlie inquired. “You know how he feels about you.”
Rose saw her opportunity.
“If you promise to take some exercise and work on your waistline. And that has to be a promise.”
“All right. I guess that’s a deal,” her son ruefully agreed.
When Charlie had left, William kissed his wife.
“That was nice of you,” he said. “And clever,” he added. “Charlie was really grateful, you know.”
“Well, I’m glad,” she said.
The time had come. Everything that had been said at the dinner just strengthened her resolve all the more.
“William, my dear,” she said gently, “I need you to do something for me.”
“Anything.”
“I want to do some work on the Newport cottage. I want to make it really special.”
“You have a decorator in mind?”
“Actually, dear, I’m going to need an architect. And I’m going to need some money. Could I have some money?”
“I don’t see why not. How much do you need?”
“Half a million dollars.”
In early October, after drifting down for almost a month, the stock market started to rise again. It wouldn’t be long, people were saying, before it was back at its peak again. On Thursday, October 17, Mrs. Master threw a party to celebrate the publication of Edmund Keller’s Mighty Rome. The word was that the book was very good.
Rose left no stone unturned. She invited everybody: people who gave parties, people who gave presents, people who owned bookstores, donors to the New York Public Library—sadly old Elihu Pusey had died—and a slew of journalists, magazine and literary editors drummed up by Charlie. The cream of the social, business and literary world was there. Even Nicholas Murray Butler put in an appearance. An event like this, after all, was quite useful for the university. Keller was put at a table and made to sign copies of his book. They cleared two hundred, and Rose bought another fifty to give away to friends who’d spread the word.
Edmund Keller was overwhelmed by her kindness. And he gave back in return. For the highlight of the evening was the charming speech of thanks that he gave. His years of lecturing had made him a quite delightful and polished performer. He made them all laugh, closing to loud applause; but what gratified Rose most of all were the words he spoke about the Master family.
“This eve
nt is a particular pleasure and honor for me. More than sixty years ago my father, the photographer Theodore Keller, had the good fortune to come to the notice of one of this city’s oldest leading families, when Mr. and Mrs. Frank Master became his patrons and started him on his successful and, if I may say, eminent career. I was glad some years ago, at Columbia, to have the pleasure of teaching their great-grandson Charles Master, whom I nowadays call my friend. And if he could see us now—I hope he can—I know how delighted my father would be to see his son also honored by the kindness and support of the Master family today.”
Sixty years of patronage, one of the city’s oldest leading families. Old money. Rose beamed at him. This party had really turned out better than she could have expected.
It wasn’t very often that Uncle Luigi went to church, but on Sunday he did, and to keep him company, Salvatore went too.
The last two weeks had been very difficult for Uncle Luigi. As the clerk at the brokers had predicted, the market had been going up, clawing its way back toward the peak of early September. Yet Uncle Luigi could not help being troubled. His savings had really accumulated in a remarkable way. He didn’t want to stop working yet, but if he did stop, he had enough to live quite a pleasant life of retirement. He’d never told him, but he’d already stated in his will that Salvatore should inherit his money. It seemed only right. So from a personal point of view, and for his nephew’s sake, he had a duty to safeguard those savings.
Several times he’d almost sold up. Each time, though, the voice of the broker’s clerk had echoed in his head: “I’d hate you to miss out.”
No one wants to look like a fool. No one wants to be left behind.
Finally, in the hope that a visit to church might give him inspiration, or at least clear his mind, he gave religion a try.
The Church of the Transfiguration was quite well attended that morning. But the priest did not fail to notice that Luigi, whom he knew perfectly well, had put in a rare appearance. Since he hadn’t been to confession either, Uncle Luigi decided not to take the wafer—he didn’t want to come even closer under the priest’s eye. He listened to the sermon, though.
It was a sermon about Christ’s temptation in the desert. It surprised Uncle Luigi that the subject should be chosen now, since it normally belonged in Lent, but he paid close attention. The priest reminded the congregation how Our Lord had gone up to a high place, and the devil had urged him to jump out into the void, since the angels would surely save him. “Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God,” Christ had replied. We must accept God’s will, the priest explained. We must not overreach, or make bets that God will help us. This, and much more, the priest said, and Uncle Luigi listened carefully.
Salvatore had not been so enthralled. He’d fidgeted irritably.
“I’m sure I heard a sermon like that when I was a child,” he remarked to his uncle when they got outside.
“And what did you think of it the second time?”
“Not much,” he said.
Uncle Luigi was thinking about the sermon, though. He was thinking about it a lot.
Wednesday, October 23, was a windy day. As usual, William Master was driven to his office in his Rolls-Royce.
There were quite a few Rolls-Royces in New York, these days. A decade earlier, the company had set up an American factory in Springfield, Massachusetts. But only the richest people had them. The sight of Mr. Master arriving at his brokerage house in the Rolls each morning had become quite a tradition. It was reassuring. It was good for business.
William had had this model for five years. The grand old Silver Ghost had given way to the Phantom now. William’s Phantom, its bodywork by Brewster, who operated out in Queensboro, Long Island, was also painted silver. The next model, the Phantom II, had just come out, and if he got that next year, he’d have that body painted silver too.
After being dropped at the office, he’d told Joe, the chauffeur, that he wouldn’t be needing him any more that day, so Joe was to take Rose out shopping. Joe was a good man, came from the Midwest somewhere, said he had an Indian grandmother. Always friendly, but only talked if you asked him to.
But then he’d been called to a meeting up on Forty-second Street, to which he’d taken a taxi. And after the meeting was over, he walked along the street toward Lexington to get a little exercise. As he did so, he glanced up at the soaring skyscraper on the corner. Then he stopped and stared. Then his mouth fell open.
“My God,” said William Master.
You had to hand it to Walter Chrysler. He had style. When the automobile man had taken over the building project that now bore his name, he had insisted on daring art deco designs that incorporated images of wheels, radiator caps and much else besides. The top of the building, which was under construction now, consisted of a beautiful series of arches rising to a capstone, all to be covered in stainless steel. Supremely elegant, there would be nothing like it in the world when it was done.
And then there was the question of height. The tallest building in the world, of course, was the Eiffel Tower in Paris. But the daring men of New York were getting close. A financier named Ohrstrom was building a soaring tower down at 40 Wall Street to compete with Chrysler, and word was that Ohrstrom’s building, if not quite so elegant, would be the taller of the two, rising above any other skyscraper in the city. A third building down at Thirty-fourth might also challenge for the crown, but work hadn’t started on that yet.
Far above, at the top of the Chrysler Building, the pyramid of arches, still unclad, rose as a network of girders into the sky.
But now, as William Master watched, something extraordinary was happening. Suddenly, from the center of the building’s peak, a metal framework tower began to push its way out. Foot by foot it was rising, like the section of a slender telescope. Ten feet, twenty, thirty. It must have been concealed inside the main structure, and now, by some mechanism, it was being raised. Forty feet, fifty now, it was pushing its way up toward the clouds. There was a Stars and Stripes attached to the tip, streaming out in the high wind. William had never seen anything like it. Stranger still, as he glanced around the busy street, no one else seemed to have noticed.
How much higher could it be going? He couldn’t imagine. The clouds were racing across the sky above it—God knows what the wind must be up there—but the great spike kept on rising. A hundred feet, a hundred and twenty, a hundred and fifty, higher and higher.
When it stopped at last, he reckoned it must have added nearly two hundred feet to the building. And now riveters were swarming like ants around its base, fixing the huge spike in place.
Finally, he saw a single, tiny figure climbing up the narrow framework. He just kept going until he was right up there with the streaming flag, halfway to heaven. What was he doing? He was letting down a plumb line, checking that the skyscraper was standing straight. After a little time, satisfied that the thing was as it should be, he came down.
Master continued to observe, fascinated. Only when he tried to glance at his watch, and found he had such a crick in his neck that he could hardly look down, did he realize he’d been staring up for nearly an hour and a half.
He didn’t mind. He’d just witnessed a piece of history. Cunning Chrysler, by this brilliant ploy, must have added the best part of two hundred feet to the height of his building, taking his rivals completely by surprise and vanquishing them. Master wasn’t certain, but he was pretty sure the Chrysler Building had just surpassed the Eiffel Tower itself.
How fitting that it should be so. New York was the center of the world. The market was soaring. The skyscrapers were soaring. It was the spirit of the age.
Late as hell, but not caring at all, he hailed a cab and went cheerfully downtown to his office.
As he approached the door, he passed a little old fellow who was leaving. Maybe in his sixties, Italian by the look of him. He’d encouraged his people not to despise these small investors. “Don’t forget,” he’d tell them, “they are the future of America
.” So when he got inside he asked the senior clerk who the fellow was.
“An Italian man, sir. Had an account with us for years. Remarkable really. He works in Little Italy as a waiter, but he has quite a respectable account.”
“What’s he good for?”
“About seventy thousand dollars. Unfortunately he’s just sold all his stock. We gave him the funds today.”
“Sold everything?”
“I tried to persuade him not to, but he came in on Monday and said he’d decided not to tempt fate.” The clerk smiled. “Said he’d had a sign from St. Anthony.”
“Really? Well, I think he was mistaken.” He grinned. “But I guess he didn’t know: God only talks to the Morgans.”
“Yes, sir. Though actually, sir, while you’ve been out, the market’s been falling quite a bit.”
The start of the great crash of 1929 is usually given as Black Thursday, October 24. This is incorrect. It began on Wednesday, the very day that the Chrysler Building became the tallest structure in the world, when stocks abruptly tumbled 4.6 percent. Strangely, few people had yet noticed the clever trick that Walter Chrysler had played. But everybody noticed Wednesday’s stock market collapse.
On Thursday morning, William Master went into the Stock Exchange as it opened its doors. The atmosphere was tense. Glancing up at the visitors’ gallery, he saw a face he thought looked familiar. “That’s Winston Churchill, the British politician,” one of the traders remarked. “He’s chosen a hell of a day to call.”
He certainly had. As trading began, Master was aghast. The market wasn’t just falling, it was in headlong panic. By the end of the first hour, there were cries of pain, then howls. Men with margin calls were being wiped out. A couple of times, sellers were shouting out prices and finding not a single buyer in the market. As noon approached, he reckoned the market would soon have fallen nearly ten percent. The anguished hubbub from the floor was so loud that, unable to bear it any longer, he walked outside.