Before he had time to think Jack said:
"A dollar and a half? Well, if you knew anything about potatoes, you wouldn't have let them go for a dollar and a half a barrel!"
"What do you know about potatoes?" growled the tall man, leaning an inch lower, and frowning at Jack's interruption.
"More than you or Mr. Gifford seems to," said Jack desperately. "The crop's going to be short. I know how it is up our way."
"Tell us what you know!" said the tall man sharply; and Mr. Gifford drew nearer with an expression of keen interest upon his face.
"They're all poor," said Jack, and then he remembered and repeated, better than he could have done if he had made ready beforehand, all he had heard the two men say in the Hotel Dantzic reading-room, and all he had heard in Crofield and Mertonville. He had heard the two men call each other by name, and he ended with:
"Didn't you sell your lot to Murphy & Scales? They're buying everywhere."
"That's just what I did," said the tall man. "I wish I hadn't; I'll go right out and buy!" and away he went.
"Buy some on my account," said Mr. Gifford, as the other man left the store. "See here, my boy, I don't want to hire anybody. But you seem to know about potatoes. Probably you're just from a farm. What else do you know? What can you do?"
"A good many things," said Jack, and to his own astonishment he spoke out clearly and confidently.