"ON ALL SIDES THE HOP-PICKERS WERE MAKING MERRY"
"Will this do, or shall I telephone the cashier to assure its payment?"
"It's good," said Lamson.
"Very well. But if you are so sure about the price of hops, Mr. Two Lies, why don't you make it two to one that I can't get seventeen cents?"
"That's my money!" and Lamson began counting out another hundred.
"Or three to one that I can't get eighteen cents?"
"It goes!"
"Or four to one that I can't get nineteen cents?"
"Yes; or five to one that you can't get twenty," roared the exasperated planter.
"Five to one," replied Kitsap. "And if I win, I will throw your money in silver from the steps of the reservation school to the Indian children."
Kitsap noted the effect on the Indians in the room as the money was placed in the hands of the town marshal. He knew how every red man on the reservation would work for twenty-cent hops now.
But the Indian was not through with the white man. He turned on him again.
"If you think the bank lied when it said eighteen cents, there is a telephone. Call up the cashier at his home. He sent me here to tell the white men and Indians who are our clients. Ask him for yourself."
Lamson and the three buyers noted the words "Our clients." To Lamson it brought identification of the Indian as Johnny Kitsap, the clerk; to the buyers it was just mysterious enough to be alarming.
"Confound the cashier! All he knows is what somebody else has told him."
"Mr. Lamson, do you yourself think that fourteen cents for hops to-day is a fair price?" asked Kitsap, suddenly taking a conciliatory tone.
"Certainly I do. But if I want to buy hops at fourteen cents now and hold them on a speculation, it's my own business."
"Entirely," said the Indian. "But I believe your conduct with the ranchers who have agreed to sell is based on your statement that you had already sold your own hops to these buyers from St. Louis for fourteen cents."
"That's right," said Lamson boldly. "I can sell my hops for what I like."
"Liar," said Kitsap, "you have not sold your hops."
Lamson sprang to his feet, but the big rancher put out a big hand and shoved him back.
"Sit down," said the big man. "Can't you see this here Kitsap's got the floor?"
"As I understand it," continued Kitsap, turning to the men who had signed the contract to sell to the raiders, "unless Mr. Lamson has already delivered his hops to the buyers under his contract, the very agreement is void, and you are all released."
"You bet your life that's right," said the big man with the gun, and from all parts of the crowd came words of confirmation.
Lamson, for the first time during the encounter, felt uneasy. He looked blankly at the three buyers. One of the gentlemen from St. Louis drew the contract from his pocket.
"The young man is right," said the gentleman from St. Louis, in a conciliatory tone. "Here is the contract, and I can safely assure our friends that Mr. Lamson has carried out his part of the agreement."
"You bet," shouted Lamson, recognizing a very pretty bluff on the part of the buyer.
"May I see the contract?" asked Kitsap.
The buyer passed it to him. Kitsap read the contract aloud, and then tossed it over his head into the hands of the men who had signed it. The buyers and Lamson came to their feet.
"Worthless paper," said Kitsap. "Lamson has not delivered his hop receipts and therefore there is no contract."
A yell of delight went up from the crowd, and a shower of tiny bits of white papers showed the fate of the instrument. Kitsap pointed his finger at the enraged Lamson, and as the shower of paper fell about him fairly shouted his denunciation:
"I, Kitsap, the clerk, am a representative of the Elliott Bay National Bank. I come here by the orders of the tyee—the president. Your hop receipts are in the bank's treasure-chest, and here is your letter received at the bank last Monday." Kitsap opened the letter that had come to him by express and read:
Picking is progressing well, and the valley will yield a big crop. A few hungry ranchers are selling at fourteen cents cash at the warehouse, but I look for better prices later. I hope you will be willing to carry my receipts till November, when I look for a price close to twenty cents.
As Kitsap read, his voice rose, and, as he ended, there was absolute silence for an instant. Then the ranchers took their spellbound eyes from the quivering Indian and looked at the pale face of the speechless Lamson. The store-keeper looked with the others, and it was his groan that broke the spell:
"Thunder! I stood to make a thousand on the deal."
Then the overjoyed ranchers found their voices in a wild laugh, and laid enthusiastic hands on Kitsap. Lamson and the buyers slipped away, beaten and humiliated, to lament the failure of the fourteen-cent raid, and to spend a few bitter hours in planning a new offer next morning at a better price, for there was need to cover promises made to Eastern houses.
The ranchers quickly formed themselves into a meeting and sent couriers out to notify all signers of the contract that the deal was off. Then they appointed a committee to go to the bank next day with Kitsap and be witnesses to his report to his superiors.
Before another day passed, the spirit of the valley had changed from a desire to sell quickly for cash into a determination to hold the crop for a twenty-cent market. The Elliott Bay National secured daily bulletins from inside sources and kept the world's markets before the entire valley. Picking progressed to an end, and the Indians held their last feast and departed. Then buyers came from other markets, inspected the crop, and made offers. Gradually the valley ranchers joined the lead of the reservation Indians and placed their receipts with the Elliott Bay National, to be held for a rise and sold as near twenty cents as possible. The cashier sent East for a prominent broker, who replied that he would arrive by the Sound in mid-October. Then the other buyers began bulling the market, hoping to induce a rancher here and there to sell and, by thus breaking the ranks, run prices down. But Kitsap, on the ground, and the cashier, in the bank, were able to hold them together till the new broker arrived.
Copyrighted by E. S. Curtis, Seattle