375: On one of the ...
Herb ’n’ Lorna, Chapter 17 continues
On one of the Club evenings, divorced from Lorna’s cautious skepticism, Herb succumbed to the Piper failing. He let himself be convinced that the Spotters’ buying a few shares of stock was an undertaking free of risk, since they would only invest money that they had already lost. That was the essence of the argument advanced by Bob Schoop, who proposed the venture.
“Look,” Bob said, “it’ll be fun, we might make some money, and it’s a nothing-to-lose deal. Here’s what I say we do: we skim something off the top of the winnings every week and put it aside. We use that as a fund to buy some stock. What have we got to lose? The winners still win — not quite as much, but they still win — and the losers would have lost anyway, so what’s to lose?”
Poor Herb. He should have known better. He should have realized that this would lead to trouble. I think it may have been Lorna’s ruse, the story she used to convince Bert to accept the money for the house, that made Herb think that, perhaps, just possibly, the Piper curse had been lifted from him, that maybe he really could make some money by investing. Since there did seem to be nothing to lose, Herb and the others agreed to the plan.
From the start, the Spotters bought cautiously, and they made such small investments that they had, if not nothing to lose, next to nothing to lose. An aspect of their caution was their insistence on buying stock only if they had “inside information” about the company’s condition and its future. The folly of trusting inside information is discussed in Lucille Prang’s amusing little “nonbook” A Thousand and One Wrong-Headed Notions (great bathroom reading), under Number 842, “They know more than you do”:
Why do we think this? You’ve heard the argument: “The poop that you and I and the other schmoes can get our hands on isn’t the real poop. Only they have access to the real poop, so they know what’s what.” They have inside information. They know the business. They must know what they’re talking about. Well, let me tell you something: don’t bet on it.
The Spotters began following the stock quotations in the paper, and they pumped friends, family, and casual acquaintances for any bit of information that would give them the inside track on a good thing. When the first photographs and descriptions of the forthcoming Lark arrived at Babbington Studebaker, Herb decided at once that he had something important to pass along to the Spotters. He knew that the Lark was a car he could sell to people who had been turning him down for years. It was small but solid looking, inexpensive and economical, and, as Lorna had said at once when Herb showed her the first pictures of it, it was cute.
At the next gathering of the club, Herb could hardly contain himself. He delivered a thorough presentation. He passed the photos around. He displayed charts that compared the Lark and the Rambler, the only other small American car available at that time. He read a list of Babbingtonians whom he considered prime prospects for each Lark model, and he was able to explain exactly why a Lark was just the car for each person on the list. These were persuasive arguments for buying Studebaker stock, but more persuasive than any of those was the argument of Herb’s own conviction. That was what impressed the Spotters most. Herb had inside information. Herb knew the automobile business. He must know what he was talking about. He certainly seemed convinced. This was their chance. Not only did the Spotters Club decide, unanimously, to buy stock in Studebaker, but two of the members ordered Larks.
[to be continued on Friday, November 4, 2020]
In Topical Guide 375 Mark Dorset offers music to brighten the darkest day or night.
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