Winston took up a journal, and laid it down again twenty minutes later. "Well," he said, "you think it's too big a thing?"
"No," said Graham. "It depends upon the man, and it might be done. Knowing the business goes a good way, and so does having dollars in hand, but there's something that's born in one man in a thousand that goes a long way further still. I can't tell you what it is, but I know it when I see it."
"Then," said Winston, "you have seen this thing in me?"
Graham nodded gravely. "Yes, sir, but you don't want to get proud. You had nothing to do with the getting of it. It was given you. Now, we're going to have a year that will not be forgotten by those who handle wheat and flour, and the men with the long heads will roll the money in. Well, I've no use for another clerk, and my salesman's good enough for me, but if we can agree on the items I'll take you for a partner."
The offer was made and accepted quietly, and when a rough draft of the arrangement had been agreed upon, Graham nodded as he lighted another cigar.
"You may as well take hold at once, and there's work ready now," he said. "You've heard of the old St. Louis mills back on the edge of the bush country. Never did any good. Folks who had them were short of money, and didn't know how they should be run. Well, I and two other men have bought them for a song, and, while the place is tumbling in, the plant seems good. Now, I can get hold of orders for flour when I want them, and everybody with dollars to spare will plank them right into any concern handling food-stuffs this year. You go down to-morrow with an engineer, and, when you've got the mills running and orders coming in we'll sell out to a company, if we don't want them."
Winston sat silent a space turning over a big bundle of plans and estimates. Then he said, "You'll have to lay out a pile of money."
Graham laughed. "That's going to be your affair. When you want them the dollars will be ready, and there's only one condition. Every dollar we put down has got to bring another in."
"But," said Winston, "I don't know anything about milling."
"Then," said Graham dryly, "You have got to learn. A good many men have got quite rich in this country running things they didn't know much about when they took hold of them."