ted, and being cleared up.'"

"Which is to say?" she queried.

"They want to know how much I would ask for a million bushels. They
find it hard to get the stuff over there--just as I said they would."

"Will you sell it to them?"

"Maybe. I'll talk to Sam about it."

"And now the last one."

"It's from Liverpool, and Liverpool, you must understand, is the great
buyer of wheat. It's a tremendously influential place."

He began once more to consult the key book, one finger following the
successive code words of the despatch.

Laura, watching him, saw his eyes suddenly contract. "By George," he
muttered, all at once, "by George, what's this?"

"What is it?" she demanded. "Is it important?"

But all-absorbed, Jadwin neither heard nor responded. Three times he
verified the same word.

"Oh, please tell me," she begged.

Jadwin shook his head impatiently and held up a warning hand.

"Wait, wait," he said. "Wait a minute."

Word for word he wrote out the translation of the cablegram, and then
studied it intently.

"That's it," he said, at last. Then he got to his feet. "I guess I've
had enough breakfast," he declared. He looked at his watch, touched the
call bell, and when the maid appeared said:

"Tell Jarvis to bring the buggy around right away."

"But, dear, what is it?" repeated Laura. "You said you would tell me.
You see," she cried, "it's just as I said. You've forgotten my very
existence. When it's a question of wheat I count for nothing. And just
now, when you read the despatch to yourself, you were all different;
such a look came into your face, so cruelly eager, and triumphant and
keen."

"You'd be eager, too," he exclaimed, "if you understood. Look; read it
for yourself."

He thrust the cable into her hands. Over each code word he had written
its translation, and his wife read:

"Large firms here short and in embarrassing position, owing to
curtailment in Argentine shipments. Can negotiate for five million
wheat if price satisfactory."

"Well?" she asked.

"Well, don't you see what that means? It's the 'European demand' at
last. They must have wheat, and I've got it to give 'em--wheat that I
bought, oh! at seventy cents, some of it, and they'll pay the market
that is, eighty cents, for it. Oh, they'll pay more. They'll pay
eighty-two if I want 'em to. France is after the stuff, too. Remember
that cable from Paris I just read. They'd bid against each other. Why,
if I pull this off, if thi