High Society to Chain Gang pt 1

8 th May 1929. Wednesday.

She came down main street in that brand new Studebaker of theirs, the 1929 model straight eight one hundred horsepower President model, gee did I feel small, how in the hell could I look her right in the face as I walked down that boarded sidewalk past the chain gang filing in the holes in the dirt street.

She pulled to a halt outside Grays Bank, I couldn’t turn around so I just had to brazen it out.

“Hi John!” she said breezily as she opened the drivers door.

“Hello Mrs Meyer,” I said deferentially, gee she was beautiful, her hair was lighter now, peroxide blonde not the light brown from when we were kids, and her dress was pulled in around that slim waist of hers and the shoulders was padded out and she looked just like some movie star hell she bought her clothes from the same Paris designers that supplied the Oakland or New York stores movie stars bought their stock from so she really ought to have looked like a movie star.

“John,” she says, “Help me with my shoes will you, I can’t walk in these and I can’t drive in my heels.”

I never had a choice, I had to kneel down in the dust in my only half decent suit and ease the flat shoe off of her elegant sheer hosed foot and slip the fancy French heel shoe on in it’s place, and then she changed feet giving me a glimpse of bare skin above her stocking tops, and I had to do the other.

I looked up the street, embarrassed until I saw the chain gang, such a familiar feature except this was a gang of women, chained at the ankles, all in knee length striped dresses, sweeping not mending the streets, sweeping a dirt street, utterly pointless labour, of course I knew about them but, well, never gave them a thought, but the contrast was total, she who had the world, and me literally at her feet and they with nothing, not even their liberty.

It was all such a change from when we were kids, skinny dipping in the creek, all innocent, play fighting, all that, she was my age see, a couple of months in it and we lived on the same side of town, her ma worked in the dress store every now and then, and her pa worked on the railroad, while my ma helped out in the general store and pa was guard at Grays Bank.

I guess my life was mapped out before I was born, yep Bank Clerk.

It never mattered I was top of my class at school, as soon as I got my school certificate pa took me for a job at Grays, old Silas Gray he interviewed me, “What’s the future son?” he asked.

“Gee, sir, I don’t know,” I said. “I’d like an Automobile.”

“Stocks son, some of mine cost a dollar a while back and they’re worth nigh on a thousand today.” he joked, “Now listen up, you pay your ma half your wage and you buy stocks with the other half, no smoking, no drinking, no women, no automobiles, do we have a deal?” he asked.

Of course I said yes and that was that.

She had a different path, I always knew we would get married, we petted enough but never quite went too far, and then I went to work and she went to university at the state capital she was going to be a fashion designer or some such and next thing she comes back in a big swanky Hotchkiss with Toby Meyer, hell he wasn’t a day under forty, big guy with a big nose, some said he was jewish, but hell was that guy loaded.

There was no contest, Jane Hicks suddenly became Sarah-Jayne Meyer, I guess the church service changed the Meyer but where in the hell Sarah and the Y in Jayne came from I never knew.

So there I was, luckily they didn’t live in town, or come by too often but Meyer had this old plantation house where he brought his swanky friends, they came overnight by Pullman train, it turned out Sarah Jayne had done some waitressing out there and old Meyer who was between wives at the time took a shine to her, anyway within six months her education was over and she was very much Meyer’s girl.

I guess she spent her time far away, New York, California, Europe maybe, but every now and again they came back to the plantation house and just after a whole sack load of cash arrived at the bank from the Meyers big bucks and half the time I ended up counting it.

Trouble was I never shook off the notion that she, Jane, Mrs Meyer, was my girl, and I saved my money and bit by bit I saved and borrowed and like Mr Gray said I started to make some serious gains, except it was all paper gains, you try to sell some stock and the price comes down.

It set me thinking, what if everybody wants to sell at one time, anyway old Gray trusted me and pretty soon I was ripping him off big time, loans see, borrow a few dollars, make a few dollars trading pay them back, a hundred or so to start with, then a thousand, pretty soon I had enough to start trading accounts off my own bat, and faked some new accounts, no body queried anything, stocks were on the up and then in the fall of 27 things started to unravel, it’s ok paying ten cents on the dollar and selling before settlement day when prices are going up but I had a serious scare that fall, hell if I hadn’t stole twenty thousand dollars I’d have been broke but I weathered the scare and made a profit overall but that’s when I knew I had to get out.

I even paid everything off, squared everything, although how in the hell I was never caught I never knew.

“I have to see Mr Gray,” Sarah-Jayne said as she walked across to the Bank, “Tell him I’m here would you?”

“Yes Mrs Meyer.” I said, and I saw them girls on that chain gang all filthy with dust in their hair and filthy hands and fithy bare feet and chained together with irons on their ankles just staring at her.

“Don’t you dare stare at me you filthy imbecile,” she snapped, “Get to work!” she said and she turned to me and said, “They really should lock them up and throw away the key!”

“They’re just regular folks fell on hard times,” I said, but she ignored me, and stormed into the bank.

I scurried after her, “Mr Gray, Mrs Meyer wants to see you,” I said.

“Ok, send her in and boy,” he said, “You sit in boy.”

“Mr Gray will see you right away Ma’am.” I said.

“Thank you,” she said and she went right into Silas Gray’s dusty old office.

“Sit yourself down my dear,” he says, “And what can I do for you?”

“Does he have to be here?” she said meaning me.

“No, what you standing there for boy, ain’t you got work to do?” he says like I was nothing so I just slunk away.

He came to find me pretty quick, “Say they want’s a million dollar loan on the place of theirs,” he said.

“Yeah well, that’s maybe what it’s worth,” I said, “Offer em a quarter million.” but he never did, he lent a million dollars at eight per cent.

“Eight per cent boy!” he said, like he was a big shot or something, “Heh think of that eight per cent on a million.”

I thought who the hell would actually pay even half that if they defaulted, but then again I saw a girl from down town not the flashy clothes draped over her.


Friday 25th October 1929

I knew things were bad at Wall Street yesterday, stocks crashing everywhere, guys losing fortunes on paper, but only on paper, not real money, I knew it was a readjustment, it would bounce back, give it a month, I had the hatches battened down for months, waiting for this to happen, most of my cash was in gold, or gold mining shares, rock solid investments.

Silas came round my place around 6 am, “It’s bad boy,” he said and shoved a copy of the newspaper at me, “I went down the depot to get it,” he says “They’re calling yesterday Black Thursday,” he says, “Biggest fall of stock prices ever!” he says “October twenty four will go down in history,” he said like he was about to crap himself..

“I know,” I told him, “I only just got to bed,”

“You’re wiped out I guess?” he asked.

“Damaged,” I said, “Damaged, come in sit down,” and he just sat at the table.