"Which of these b.u.t.tons calls one of the girls?" asked Wallingford.

"The third b.u.t.ton is Nellie," replied Mr. Daw gravely, and touched it.

The rosy-cheeked girl appeared instantly, on the point of giggling, as she had been from the moment Mr. Daw first engaged her.

"Bring in my grip from the hall," Mr. Wallingford directed; "the one with the labels on it."

This brought in, Mr. Wallingford extracted from it a huge bundle of doc.u.ments bound with rubber bands. Unfolded, they proved to be United States Government bonds, shares of railroad stocks and of particularly stable industrials, thousands of dollars worth of them. For Mr. Tinkle's inspection he pa.s.sed over his bank book, showing a balance of one hundred and fifty thousand.

"Wheat," cheerfully lied Mr. Wallingford, with a wave of his hand; "all wheat! Half a million dollars!"

"Speculation?" charged Mr. Tinkle, a trace of sternness in his voice.

"Investment," protested Wallingford. "I never sold; I bought, operating always upon margin sufficient for ample protection, and always upon absolute information gathered directly from the centers of production.

This farm is for the purpose of bringing me more thoroughly in touch with the actual conditions that make prices. So, as you see, Mr. Tinkle, the trifling profit or loss of this venture in a business way is a mere bagatelle."

Both Mr. Daw and Mr. Tinkle were regarding Mr. Wallingford with awe and admiration, but for somewhat different reasons. Mr. Tinkle, elated, went home to get his clothes and books, and on the way he put into breathless circulation the fact that the new proprietor of the old Spicer place was the greatest man on earth, with the possible exception of Theodore Roosevelt, and that he had already made half a million dollars in wheat!

He had seen the money!

"I pa.s.s," observed Mr. Daw to Mr. Wallingford. "I'm in the kindergarten cla.s.s, and I take off my lid to you as being the most valuable combination known to the history of plain or fancy robbery. You have them all beat twice around the track. You make an amateur of Ananias and a piker of Judas Iscariot."

CHAPTER XXIII

A CORNER IN FARMERS IS FORMED AND IT BEHOLDS A MOST WONDERFUL VISION

It was already high time for fall planting operations on the Wallingford estate, and Truscot County was a-quiver with what might be the result of the new-fangled test-tube farming that Ham Tinkle was to inaugurate.

From the first moment of his hiring that young enthusiast plunged into his work with a fervor that left him a scant six hours of sleep a night.

In the meantime J. Rufus took a flying trip to Chicago, where he visited one broker's office after another. Those places with fine polished woodwork and bra.s.s tr.i.m.m.i.n.gs and expensive leather furniture he left without even introducing himself--such stage settings were too much in his own line of business for him not to be suspicious of them--but, finally, he wandered into the office of Fox & Fleecer, a dingy, poorly lighted place, where gas was kept burning on old-fashioned fixtures all day long, where the woodwork was battered and blackened, where the furniture was scratched and hacked and bound together with wires to keep it intact, and where, on a cracked and splintered blackboard, one small and lazy boy posted, for a score or so of rusty men past middle age, the fluctuating figures of the Great Gamble. Mr. Fox, a slow-spoken and absolutely placid gentleman of benevolent appearance and silvery mutton-chop whiskers, delicately blended the impressions that while he was indeed flattered by this visit from so distinguished a gentleman, his habitual conservatism would not allow him to express his delight.

"How much money can you be trusted with?" asked Wallingford bluntly.

"I would not say, sir," rejoined Mr. Fox with no resentment whatever.

"We have been thirty years in these same offices, and we never yet have had enough in our hands to make it worth while for us to quit business.

Permit me to show you our books."

His ledger displayed accounts running as high as two hundred and fifty thousand dollars that had been intrusted to their care by single individuals. But thirty years in business at the same old stand! He insisted gently upon this point, and Wallingford nodded his head.

"Before I'm through I'll make all these bets look like cigar money," he a.s.serted, "but just now I'm going to put fifty thousand in your hands, and I want it placed in exactly this way: Monday morning, with ten thousand dollars buy me one hundred thousand bushels of December wheat on a ten-cent margin. No more money will be put up on this deal, so place a stop-loss order against it. If wheat drops enough to wipe out the ten thousand dollars, all right; say nothing and report the finish of the transaction to me. I'll do my own grinning. If wheat goes up enough to leave me five cents a bushel profit, clear of commissions, close the deal and remit. On the following Monday, if wheat has gone up from the quotations of to-day, sell one hundred thousand bushels more at ten cents margin and close at a sufficient drop to net me five cents clear. If it has gone down, buy. Do this on five successive Mondays and handle each deal separately. Get me one winning out of five. That's all I want."

Mr. Fox considered thoughtfully for a moment, carefully polishing his bald, pink scalp around and around with the palm of his hand. He gave the curious impression of being always engaged with some blandly interesting secret problem along with the business under consideration.

"Very well, sir," he observed. "Fox & Fleecer never makes any promises, but if you will put your instructions into writing I will place them in the hands of our Mr. Fleecer, who conducts our board operations. He will do the best he can for you."

Mr. Wallingford looked about him for a stenographer. There was none employed here, and, sitting down to the little writing table which was pointed out to him, he made out the instructions in long hand, while Mr.

Fox polished away at his already glistening pate, still working at that blandly interesting secret problem.

Ten days later, at the test-tube farm, arrived a report from Messrs. Fox & Fleecer, inclosing their check for fifteen thousand dollars. Wheat, in the week following Wallingford's purchase, had fortunately gone up nearly six cents. This check, and the accompanying statement of the transaction which had brought it forth, Wallingford showed to Ham Tinkle, quite incidentally, of course, and Ham, in awe and enthusiasm, confided the five-thousand-dollar winning to Hiram Hines, who spread the report through Truscot County that Judge Wallingford had already made fifteen thousand dollars in wheat since he had come among them. The savings of an ordinary lifetime! The amount was fifty thousand when it reached Mapes County. Two weeks later Messrs. Fox & Fleecer reported on the second of Wallingford's deals. Wheat sold at ninety-four had dropped to eighty-eight. Luck was distinctly with J. Rufus Wallingford.

"Why, oh, why, do cheap skates sell gold bricks and good come-on men waste their talents on Broadway!" wailed Blackie Daw. "But what's the joke, J. Rufus? I see your luck, but where do the surrounding farmers get in? Or where do you get in on the surrounding farmers? Show me. I'm an infant."

"You couldn't understand it, Blackie," said J. Rufus with condescending kindness. "The mere fact that you look on these pocket-change winnings as real money lets you out. Wait till I spring the big game. To-morrow night you shall attend this winter's opening meeting of the Philomathean Literary Society at the Willow Creek schoolhouse, and observe the methods of a real bread winner."

For the memorable occasion that he had mentioned, Wallingford wore a fur-lined overcoat and quadruple-woven blue silk sweater, and, being welcomed with great acclaim, proposed for debate that burning question: "Resolved: That the farmer is a failure as a business man."

With much stamping and pawing of the air that subject was thrashed out by Abe Johnson and Dan Price for the affirmative, and Cal Whorley and Ed Wiggin for the negative. The farmer as a gold-brick purchaser, as prey for every cla.s.s of tradesmen, as a producer who received less net profit than any other from the capital and labor invested, was presented to himself by men who knew their own grievances well, and the affirmative was carried almost unanimously. Flushed with pleasure, beaming with gratification, the most advanced farmer of them all arose in his place and requested of the worthy chairman the privilege to address the meeting, a privilege that was granted with pleasure and delight.

It was an eventful moment when J. Rufus Wallingford stalked up the middle aisle, pa.s.sed around the red-hot, cannon-ball stove and ascended the rostrum which had been the scene of so many impa.s.sioned addresses; and, as he turned to face them from that historic elevation, he seemed to fill the entire end of the schoolroom, to blot out not only the teacher's desk but the judges' seats, the blackboard and the four-colored map of the United States that hung upon the wall behind him. He was a fine-looking man, a solid-looking man, a gentleman of wealth and culture, who, unspoiled by good fortune, was still a brother to all men. Already he had gained that enviable reputation among them.

Friends and neighbors and fellow-farmers, it was startling to reflect that the agriculturist was the only producer in all the world who had no voice in the price which was put upon his product! The manufacturer turned out his goods and set a price upon them and the consumer had to pay that price. And how was this done? By the throttling of compet.i.tion.

And how had compet.i.tion been throttled? By consolidation of all the interests in any particular line of trade. Iron and steel were all controlled by one mighty corporation against which could stand no compet.i.tor except by sufferance; petroleum and all its by-products were in the hands of another, and each charged what it liked. The farmer alone, after months of weary, unending toil, of exposure in all sorts of weather, of struggle against the whims of nature and against an appalling list of possible disasters, himself hauled his output to market and meekly accepted whatever was offered him. Prices on every product of the soil were dictated by a clique of gamblers who, in all probability, had never seen wheat growing nor cattle grazing. Friends and neighbors and fellow-farmers, this woeful condition must end! They must cooperate! Once compacted the farmers could stand together as firm as a rock, could demand a fair and reasonable and just price for their output, and get it. To-day wheat was quoted at ninety-four cents on the Chicago Board of Trade. If the farmer, however, secured eighty-two at his delivery point in actual cash he was doing well. There was no reason why the farmers should not agree to establish a standing price of a dollar and a half a bushel for wheat; and that must be their slogan.

Wheat at a dollar and a half!

He was vitally interested in this project, and he was willing to spend his life and fortune for it; and, in the furtherance of it, he invited his friends and neighbors and fellow-farmers to a.s.semble at his house on the following Sat.u.r.day night and discuss ways and means to bring this enormous movement to a practical working basis. Incidentally he _might_ find a bite and a sup and a whiff of smoke to offer them. All those who would attend would please rise in their seats.

As one man they arose, and when J. Rufus Wallingford, glowing with the immensity of his n.o.ble project, stepped down from that platform, the walls of the Willow Creek schoolhouse echoed and reechoed with the cheers which followed his speech.

The Farmers' Commercial a.s.sociation! There had been farmers'

affiliations without number, with motives political, economical, educational; alliances for the purchasing of supplies at wholesale and for every other purpose under the sun, but nothing like this, for, to begin with, the Farmers' Commercial a.s.sociation had no initiation fee and no dues, and it had for its sole and only object the securing of a flat, uniform rate of a dollar and a half a bushel for wheat. The first meeting, attended by every able-bodied tiller of the soil in Truscot County and some even from Mapes County, was so large that there was no place in the Wallingford homestead to house it, and it had to be taken out to the great new barn, where, in the s.p.a.cious aisle between stalls and mows, enthusiasm had plenty of room to soar to the rafters. One feature had stilled all doubts: J. Rufus Wallingford alone was to pay!

With a whoop the a.s.sociation was organized, Judge Wallingford was made its president, and with great enthusiasm was authorized to go ahead and spend all of his own money that he cared to lay out for the benefit of the a.s.sociation. Only one trifling duty was laid upon the members.

President Wallingford introduced an endless chain letter. It was brief.

It was concise. It told in the fewest possible words just why the Farmers' Commercial a.s.sociation had been formed and what it was expected to do, laying especial stress upon the fact that there were to be no initiation fees and no dues, no money to be paid for anything! All that the members were to do was to join, and when enough were in, to demand one dollar and a half for their wheat. It was a glittering proposition, for there was no trouble and no expense and no risk, with much to gain.

Every one of the ninety-odd who gathered that night in Wallingford's barn was to write three or more of these letters to wheat-growing acquaintances, and each recipient of a letter was told that the only thing which need be done to enroll himself as a member of the order was to write three more such letters and send in his name to Horatio Raven, Secretary.

Horatio Raven himself was there. There was a barrel of good, hard cider on tap in the barn, and every few minutes Mr. Raven could be seen conducting one or two acquaintances quietly over to the cellar, where there were other things on tap. Cigars were pa.s.sed around, and the good cheer which was provided became so inextricably mingled with the enthusiasm which had been aroused, that no farmer could tell which was which. It only sufficed that when they went away each one was profoundly convinced that J. Rufus Wallingford was the Moses who should lead the farmers of America out of their financial Wilderness.

During the next two or three days nearly three hundred letters left Truscot and Mapes counties, inviting nearly three hundred farmers in the great wheat belt, extending from the Rockies to the Appalachians, to take full sixty per cent. more for their produce than the average price they had always been receiving, to invite others to receive like benefits, and all to accept this boon without money and without price.

It was personal solicitation from one man to another who knew him, and the first flood that went out reached every wheat-growing State in the Union. Within a week, names and requests for further information began pouring in upon Horatio Raven, Secretary, and the card index drawers in the filing cabinet, originally bought in jest, became of actual service.

One, then two, then three girls were installed. A pamphlet was printed explaining the purpose of the Farmers' Commercial a.s.sociation, and these were sent to all "members," J. Rufus Wallingford furnishing both the printing and the postage.

Through the long winter the president of that great a.s.sociation was constantly upon the road, always in his corduroy suit and his broad felt hat, with his trousers tucked neatly into his seal-leather boots. His range was from Pennsylvania to Nebraska and from Minnesota to Texas, and everywhere his destination was some branch nucleus of the Farmers'

Commercial a.s.sociation where meetings had been arranged for him. Each night he addressed some body of skeptical farmers who came wondering, who saw the impressive and instantly convincing "Judge" Wallingford; who, listening, caught a touch of that magnetic thrill with which he always imbued his auditors, and who went away enthusiastic to carry to still further reaches the great work that he had planned. By the holiday season he had visited a dozen States and had addressed nearly a hundred sub-organizations. In each of these he gave the chain letters a new start, and the December meeting of the central organization of the Farmers' Commercial a.s.sociation was also a Christmas celebration in the barn of that progressive and self-sacrificing and n.o.ble farmer, J. Rufus Wallingford.

It was a huge "family affair," held two nights before Christmas so as not to interfere with the Baptist Church at Three Roads or the Presbyterian Church at Miller's Crossing, and the great barn was trimmed with wreaths and festoons of holly from floor to rafters. At one end was a gigantic Christmas tree, from the branches of which glowed a myriad of electric lights and sparkled innumerable baubles of vivid coloring and metallic l.u.s.ter. Handsome presents had been provided for every man, woman and child, and down the extent of the wide center had been spread two enormous, long tables upon which was placed food enough to feed a small army; huge turkeys and all that went with them. At the head of the ladies' table sat Mrs. Wallingford, glittering in her diamonds, the first time she had worn them since coming into this environment, and at the head of the men's table, resplendent in a dinner coat and with huge diamond studs flashing from his wide, white shirt bosom, sat the giver of all these bounties, Judge J. Rufus Wallingford, president of the vast Farmers' Commercial a.s.sociation. He was flushed with triumph, and he told them so at the proper moment. Beyond his most sanguine hopes the Farmers' Commercial a.s.sociation had spread and flourished in every State, nay, in every community where wheat was grown, and the time was rapidly approaching when the farmer, now turned business man, would be able to get the full value of his investment of money, time and toil.

Moreover, they would destroy the birds of prey, feathers, bones and beaks, fledgelings, eggs and nests.

Around the table, at this point, Horatio Raven, Secretary, pa.s.sed a sheaf of reports upon the various successful deals that Wallingford had made, each one showing a profit of five thousand dollars on a ten-thousand-dollar investment. The secret facts of the case were that fortune had favored Wallingford tremendously. By one of those strange runs of luck which sometimes break the monotony of persistent gambling disasters, he had won not less than five out of every six of the continuous deals intrusted to Fox & Fleecer. The failures he kept to himself, and Ham Tinkle added to the furore that the proofs of this success created by rising in his place and advising them how, upon Wallingford's certain and sure advance information of the market, he himself had been able to turn his modest little two hundred dollars into seven hundred during the past three months, with the profits still piling up.

But J. Rufus Wallingford, resuming, saw such profits vanishing in the future, for by the aid of the Farmers' Commercial a.s.sociation he intended to wipe out the iniquitous grain and produce exchange, and, in fact, all gambling in food products throughout the United States. The scope of the Farmers' Commercial a.s.sociation was much broader, much more far-reaching than even he had imagined when he at first conceived it.

When they were ready they would not only establish a firm cash basis for wheat, but they would wipe this festering ma.s.s of corruption, called the Board of Trade, off the face of the earth by the simple process of taking all its money away from it. With their certain knowledge of what the price of wheat would be, when the time was ripe they would go into the market and, themselves, by their aggregate profits, would break every man who was in the business of manipulating prices on wheat, on oats and corn and live stock. Why, nearly one million names were now enrolled in the membership of the a.s.sociation, and to these million names circulars explaining in detail the plans of the organization had been mailed at a cost in postage alone of nearly ten thousand dollars.

This expense he had cheerfully borne himself, in his devotion to the great work of reformation. Not one penny had been paid by any other member of the organization for the furtherance of this project. He had spent nearly twenty thousand dollars in travel and other expenses, but the market had paid for it, and he was not one penny loser by his endeavors. Even if he were, that would not stop him. He would sell every government bond and every share of industrial and railroad stock that he owned, he would even mortgage his farm, if necessary, to complete this organization and make it the powerful and impregnable factor in agricultural commerce that he had intended it to be. It was his dream, his ambition, nay, his determined purpose, to leave behind him this vast organization as an evidence that his life had not been spent in vain; and if he could only see the wheat gamblers put out of that nefarious business, and the farmers of the United States coming, after all these toiling generations, into their just and honest dues, he would die with peace in his heart and a smile upon his lips, even though he went to a pauper's grave!

There were actual tears in his eyes as he closed with these words, and his voice quivered. From the foot of the table Blackie Daw was watching with a curious smile that was almost a sardonic grin. From the head of the parallel table Mrs. Wallingford was watching him with a pallor that deepened as he went on, but no one noticed these significant indications, and as J. Rufus Wallingford sat down a mighty cheer went up that made every branch of the glittering Christmas tree dance and quiver.