ALADDIN'S LAMP
THE morning after the hail storm dawned fair and sunshiny. David went
out and stood at the edge of his tobacco field. All about him the hail
had wrought its destruction. Where yesterday broad, thick leaves of
green tobacco had stood out strong and vigorous there hung only limp
shreds, punctured and torn into worthlessness.
"All wasted, my summer's work. I'll rub that magic lamp now. Fool that I
was, not to do it sooner!"
A little later, as he walked down the road to town, his lips were closed
in a resolute line, his shoulders squared in soldierly fashion. "I hope
Caleb Warner is in his office," he thought.
Caleb Warner was in; he greeted David cordially.
"Good-morning, Dave. How are things out your way? Hail do much damage?"
"Some damage," echoed the farmer. "It hailed just about four hundred
dollars' worth too much for me."
"What, you don't say so! That's the trouble with your farming."
Caleb Warner was an affable little man with a frank, almost innocent,
look on his smooth-shaven face. Spontaneous interest in his friends'
affairs made him an agreeable companion and helped materially to
increase his clientele--Caleb Warner dealt in real estate and,
incidentally, in oil stocks and gold stocks.
"That's just the trouble with your farming," he repeated. "You slave and
break your back and crops are fine and you hope to have a good return
for your labor, when along comes a hail storm and ruins your fruit or
tobacco or corn, or along comes a dry spell or a wet spell with the same
result. It sounds mighty fine to say the farmer is the most independent
person on the face of the earth--it's a different proposition when you
try it out. Not so?"
"I'm about convinced you speak the truth about it," said the farmer.
"I know I do. I used to be a farmer, but I have grown wiser. I think
there are too many other ways to make money with less risk."
"That is why I came----" David hesitated, but the other man waited
silently for the explanation. "Have you any more of the gold-mine stock
you offered me some time ago?"
"That Nevada mine?"
"Yes."
"Just one thousand dollars' worth; the rest is all cleaned out. I sold a
thousand yesterday. Listen, Dave, there's the chance of your life. You
know how I worked on that farm of mine, how my wife had to slave, how
even Mary had to work hard. Then one day a friend of mine who had gone
west came to me and offered me some stock in a western gold mine. My
wife was afraid of it, said I'd lose every cent I put in it and we'd
have to go to the poorhouse--women don't generally understand about
investments. But I went ahead and got the stock, and in a few years I
sold out part of it for a neat sum and drew big dividends on what I
kept. Then we moved to town; my wife keeps a maid, Mary goes to college,
and we're living instead of slaving our lives away on a farm. And it's
honestly made money, for the gold was put into the earth for us to use.
It is just a case of running a little risk, but no person loses money
because of your risk. Of course, there's lots of stock sold that's not
worth the paper it's written on, but I don't sell that kind."
"People trust you here," said David.
If the man winced or had reason to do so, he betrayed no sign of it. "I
hope so," he said. "You have known me all my life. If I ever want to
work any skin game I'll go out of the place where all my friends are.
This mine of which I speak is near the mine at Goldfield and some of the
veins struck recently are richer than those of the renowned Goldfield.
They are still striking deeper veins. I have sold stock in that mine to
fifteen people in this town."
He mentioned some of the residents of Greenwald; people who, in David's
opinion, were too shrewd to be entangled in any nefarious investment.
The names impressed David--if those fifteen put their money into it he
might as well be the sixteenth.
In a little while David Eby walked home with a paper representing the
ownership of a number of shares of a certain gold mine in Nevada, while
Caleb Warner patted musingly a check for five hundred dollars.
Mother Bab wondered at her boy's philosophical acceptance of his crop
failure. "I'm glad you take it this way," she said as he came in,
whistling, from his trip to Greenwald.
"What's the use of crying?" he answered gaily, though he felt far from
gay. Had he been too hasty? Doubts began to assail him. It was going to
be hard to deceive his mother, she was always so eager for his
confidence. But, then, he was doing it for her sake as much as for his
own. The war clouds were drawing nearer and nearer to this country; if
the time came when America would enter the war he would have to answer
the call for help. If the stock turned out to be what the other wise men
of the town felt confident it would be then the added money would be a
boon to his mother while he was away in the service of his country--and
yet--it was a great risk he was running. Why had he done it? The old
lines of the poem came back to him and burned into his soul,
"O what a tangled web we weave
When first we practice to deceive."
Then, again, swift upon that thought came the old proverb, "Nothing
venture, nothing gain." Thus he was torn between doubt and satisfaction,
but it was too late to undo the deed. He was the owner of the stock and
Caleb Warner had the five hundred dollars!