“Is there going to be a war?”
“I don’t know; but this I do know, that the wheat crop of the entire West is practically a failure—that is to say, late frosts this spring, and the wet weeks we have had since, will knock off anywhere from thirty to forty per cent, of the output. The Chicago wheat-pit is a pretty big thing, but it isn’t the Almighty, neither is it the great and growing West. It can do many things, but it can’t buck up against nature. Wheat now we’ll say, is seventy-five cents a bushel, because of the belief that there’s going to be an abundant crop; but if twenty-five per cent, of that crop fails, it means that twenty-five per cent, is going to be added to the present price of wheat. It means dollar wheat, that’s what it means, and a man who knows this fact to-day can make unlimited millions of money if he’s got the capital behind him. Of course, my mistake was in biting off more than I could chew. If I had gone in modestly, I could have carried it, and would have made a moderate profit; but I was too greedy, and too much afraid Chicago would learn the real state of the crops. I expected the news to be out long before now; but instead of that the papers are blowing about full crops, which either shows that they don’t know what they are talking about, or there’s a nigger in the fence somewhere.”
“What makes you so very sure the crop’s a partial failure?”
“Because it’s my business to know, for one thing. I have travelled from Chicago clear through to the Pacific coast; south as far as wheat is grown; and up north into Canada. I don’t need to ask a farmer what crop he expects; I can see with my own eyes the state of affairs. I was brought up on wheat; I ploughed the fields and sowed the grain, and I may say I was cradled in wheat, if you’ll forgive a farmer’s pun. Wheat? Why, I know all about wheat on the field, even if I don’t recognise it in the Chicago pit. You see, my business is looking after freight, and the chief freight of our road is wheat. Therefore, wherever wheat grows I must visit that spot, and I have done so. I give you my oath that wheat is bound to be a dollar a bushel before two months are past. It’s under seventy-five cents now, and it doesn’t take much figuring to show the possibilities of the situation. Three things are wanted: knowledge, courage, money. I have given you the knowledge; do you possess the other two requisites?”
“Tom, I esteem you very much—more so now than when you came in; but, after all’s said and done, I’d be simply banking on one man’s word. Suppose I go in half a million dollars? You say that knowledge is the first requisite. Have I got that knowledge? I have not. I have merely your word that you have the knowledge.”
“Yes, that’s a good point to make,” said Tom imperturbably. “You don’t know me well enough to risk it. That’s all right. Now, I see on your wall the big map of our road, which I suppose you have kept as a relic of your connection with the Wheat Belt Line. It’s a lovely map, with the Wheat Belt Line in heavy black as the great thing, and the United States sort of hung around it as a background. There,” continued Tom, waving his hand towards the huge map on the wall, “coloured yellow by Rand, McNally and Co., are the wheat-producing districts of the United States and Canada. Now, I’ve been all over that yellow ground. I assert that in no part of it is the wheat crop normal. You pick out at random five or six spots in that yellow ground, and I’ll tell you just what percentage of failure there’ll be in those places you select. Then get on the train and visit them, question the farmers, and find out if they corroborate my statement. If they do, the chances are strong I am right about every other district.”
John Steele got up and began pacing the floor, his hands thrust in his trousers pockets, his forehead wrinkled with a frown.
“Tom, that’s pretty straight talk,” he said at last. “I haven’t been following the wheat-market—it’s out of my line; but I dimly remember seeing in the papers not very long ago an estimate that we were going to have the most profitable wheat crop of recent years. Of course, that may be newspaper talk; but if recollection serves, it was backed up by telegrams from all over the West. How do you account for that?”
“I don’t account for it. I am merely stating what I know. If the papers made such an estimate they were wrong, that’s all.”
Steele stopped in his walk and touched an electric button on his desk. A young man appeared in response.