The Man on Horseback/Chapter 5
CHAPTER V
THE OFFER
"What do these hieroglyphics mean?" asked Tom of Martin Wedekind the next afternoon, pointing at the signature of the cablegram.
"G.M.B.H.?"
"Yes."
"It's an abbreviation for ‘Gesellschaft mit beschränkter Haftung.’"
"Sounds like a he-clam singing through his nose," came Tom's observation. "What's the answer?"
"The English for it? Company with limited responsibility.' 'Johannes Hirschfeld & Co., Ltd.,' as the English would have it. By the way, some little offer that, Tom! Half a million cold cash … Whew!"
"I guess it's some sort of a con game."
"No!" Wedekind laughed. "In Germany the name of Johannes Hirschfeld stands for nickel-plated, harveyized-steel, all-wool respectability. The Hirschfelds are hand in glove with the Deutsche Bank, and the Deutsche Bank people are as thick as thieves with the German Government."
"In other words, that offer is O. K.?"
"Sure, Tom. If you want to sell."
Tom Graves shook his bristly, red head. "What knocks me is how that Berlin gang knows about the Yankee Doodle Glory. Why, man, everybody used to poke fun at that particular prospect hole in the Hoodoos. There wasn't a day in the last twenty years when you couldn't have picked up the Yankee Doodle for a grin and a handful of peanuts, and now … Wait!"
They were sitting in the little red-and-gold poker room of the Club and just then Newson Garrett was passing by on his way to the library. Tom hailed him through the open door:
"Say, Garrett! Step in here a moment." He showed him the cable. "What'd you make of it? Half a million chilly ducats for the Yankee Doodle Glory!"
"For a controlling interest in it," rectified the exact assayist. Then he shook his head. "Steep price. Too steep. Those Dutchmen are loco. Brand them before they escape."
"Yes, yes," put in Martin Wedekind. "But the Hirschfeld people are not exactly fools. They have mining interests all over the world, and agents, and correspondents. There must be a reason …"
"And they seem to be in a devil of a hurry," said Tom. "Old Man Truex struck the vein on the first, and to-day is the fifteenth. Let me figure back."
"You got to the Hoodoos on the third."
"Yes. Back in Spokane on the fifth, and gave you the ore sample the same day."
"Yes," Garrett inclined his head. "I made my assay tests on the sixth, while you went back to the Killicott ranch and asked me to hold my report until your return …"
"Which was on the eighth. Of course the news of the strike spread," added Tom.
Wedekind looked up suddenly.
"Garrett," he asked, "Tom told me you sent some of the Yankee Doodle Glory ore samples to New York, to a friend of yours who has a great chemical laboratory?"
"I did. There was that unknown metal which I was unable to separate."
"When did you send it?"
"On the seventh."
"And it reached New York on the eleventh …"
"Or the twelfth, Wedekind."
"Let's call it the twelfth." Wedekind cupped his chin in his hands. He was thinking deeply. "To-day is the fifteenth," he went on. "Three days difference. What's the name of your New York friend?"
"The chemist? Oh, Sturtzel. Conrad Sturtzel."
"A German?"
"Yes. We studied together in Freiburg where I took a post-graduate course. First-rate fellow. Very clever. The right sort to find out all about that unknown ingredient." He rose. "Sorry I have to leave you, gentlemen. And—Tom! Take that half-million offer! By all means!"
"Don't you do anything of the sort!" Wedekind said when Garrett had disappeared.
"Why not?" Tom was frankly astonished.
"Because … I'll be frank with you. Because Sturtzel is a German, and because that very respectable and very honest firm of Johannes Hirschfeld & Co… ."
"You think they'd welsh?"
"No. They'd pay you spot cash in good, minted gold coin of the realm. It's because"—instinctively he lowered his voice—"they are hand in glove with the Deutsche Bank, with the German Government …"
"You don't trust the Germans any too much, do you, Wedekind?"
"I don't!" There was veiled bitterness in the older man's voice. "I know them. My brother Heinrich, he writes to me—he asks me to … Never mind never mind! But I tell you I know them. I know their virtues. But I also know—the other side. Tom," he went on very insistingly, "don't you sell that mine. If it's worth half a million to them, as a gamble, a gamble, mind you …"
"It's worth that same to me. I'm on. Sure. And I'll have all the joy of developing the property, of working it, of seeing my fortune grow. Why, Wedekind," he went on enthusiastically, "it's bully, perfectly bully! It makes me feel strong, and powerful, and …"
Wedekind made a hurried, anxious gesture. "You don't own control, do you?"
"No. It's an even fifty-fifty split with Old Man Truex."
"And he told you he wanted nothing more to do with the mine." He rose. "All right. I'll talk to him. Where does he stay?"
"Up at Eslick's."
"Wait for me here. I'll fix it up for you."
And when Wedekind, ten minutes later, reached the old prospector's dusty, bare room in the Eslick, he found him in the act of lighting his pipe with something that looked suspiciously like a twisted-up cablegram.
He looked up when Wedekind entered.
"Hullo," he said hospitably; "sit down and reach on the shelf yonder. You'll find some liquor there that ain't so bad." He laughed. "Say, Wedekind, some damn fool's tryin' to play a joke on me. Sends me a telegram from one of them furrin' places an asks me to sell him control of the Yankee Doodle Glory for half a million …"
"Who?"
"Don't know. Didn't look at the signature." Truex rammed the paper spill deeper into his blackened pipe bowl. "An' I don't give two whoops in hell. I'm through with the Yankee Doodle. I'm scared of it."
"That's just what I came here to talk to you about," said Wedekind, leaning across the table. "Listen …"