It was a difference, he said, which destroyed their business.
He went to the officials of the Erie and of the New York Central to try to get freight rates that would permit him to continue in business. "I got no satisfaction at all," he said; "I am too good a friend of yours," said the representative of the New York Central, "to advise you to have anything further to do with this oil trade."
"Do you pretend that you won't carry for me at as cheap a rate as you will carry for anybody else?"
"I am but human," the freight agent replied.
He saw the man who was then busily organizing the South Improvement Company. He was non-committal. "I got no satisfaction, except 'You better sell, you better get clear.' Kind of sub rosa: 'Better sell out, no help for it.'"
His firm was outside the charmed circle, and had to choose between selling and dying. Last of all, he had an interview with the president of the all-conquering oil company, in relation to the purchase of their works. "He was the only party that would buy. He offered me fifty cents on the dollar, on the construction account, and we sold out.... He made this expression, I remember: 'I have ways of making money that you know nothing of.'"
For the works, which were producing $30,000 to $45,000 a year profit, and which they considered worth $150,000, they received $65,000.
"Did you ascertain in the trade," he was asked, "what was the average rate that was paid for refineries?"
"That was about the figure.... Fifty cents on the dollar."