“I'll be wanting some cars of you people before the summer is out,” observed Dyke to the clerk as he folded up and put away the order that the other had handed him. He remembered perfectly well that he had arranged the matter of transporting his crop some months before, but his role of proprietor amused him and he liked to busy himself again and again with the details of his undertaking.
“I suppose,” he added, “you'll be able to give 'em to me. There'll be a big wheat crop to move this year and I don't want to be caught in any car famine.”
“Oh, you'll get your cars,” murmured the other.
“I'll be the means of bringing business your way,” Dyke went on; “I've done so well with my hops that there are a lot of others going into the business next season. Suppose,” he continued, struck with an idea, “suppose we went into some sort of pool, a sort of shippers' organisation, could you give us special rates, cheaper rates—say a cent and a half?”
The other looked up.
“A cent and a half! Say FOUR cents and a half and maybe I'll talk business with you.”
“Four cents and a half,” returned Dyke, “I don't see it. Why, the regular rate is only two cents.”
“No, it isn't,” answered the clerk, looking him gravely in the eye, “it's five cents.”
“Well, there's where you are wrong, m'son,” Dyke retorted, genially. “You look it up. You'll find the freight on hops from Bonneville to 'Frisco is two cents a pound for car load lots. You told me that yourself last fall.”
“That was last fall,” observed the clerk. There was a silence. Dyke shot a glance of suspicion at the other. Then, reassured, he remarked: