The Quest of the Silver Fleece: A Novel

by W. E. B. Du Bois

  _Eighteen_

  THE COTTON CORNER

  All over the land the cotton had foamed in great white flakes under thewinter sun. The Silver Fleece lay like a mighty mantle across the earth.Black men and mules had staggered beneath its burden, while deep songswelled in the hearts of men; for the Fleece was goodly and gleaming andsoft, and men dreamed of the gold it would buy. All the roads in thecountry had been lined with wagons--a million wagons speeding to and frowith straining mules and laughing black men, bearing bubbling masses ofpiled white Fleece. The gins were still roaring and spitting flames andsmoke--fifty thousand of them in town and vale. Then hoarse iron throatswere filled with fifteen billion pounds of white-fleeced, black-speckedcotton, for the whirling saws to tear out the seed and fling fivethousand million pounds of the silken fibre to the press.

  And there again the black men sang, like dark earth-spirits flitting intwilight; the presses creaked and groaned; closer and closer theypressed the silken fleece. It quivered, trembled, and then lay cramped,dead, and still, in massive, hard, square bundles, tied with ironstrings. Out fell the heavy bales, thousand upon thousand, million uponmillion, until they settled over the South like some vast dull-whiteswarm of birds. Colonel Cresswell and his son, in these days, had a longand earnest conversation perforated here and there by explosions of theColonel's wrath. The Colonel could not understand some things.

  "They want us to revive the Farmers' League?" he fiercely demanded.

  "Yes," Harry calmly replied.

  "And throw the rest of our capital after the fifty thousand dollarswe've already lost?"

  "Yes."

  "And you were fool enough to consent--"

  "Wait, Father--and don't get excited. Listen. Cotton is going up--"

  "Of course it's going up! Short crop and big demand--"

  "Cotton is going up, and then it's going to fall."

  "I don't believe it."

  "I know it; the trust has got money and credit enough to force it down."

  "Well, what then?" The Colonel glared.

  "Then somebody will corner it."

  "The Farmers' League won't stand--"

  "Precisely. The Farmers' League can do the cornering and hold it forhigher prices."

  "Lord, son! if we only could!" groaned the Colonel.

  "We can; we'll have unlimited credit."

  "But--but--" stuttered the bewildered Colonel, "I don't understand. Whyshould the trust--"

  "Nonsense, Father--what's the use of understanding. Our advantage isplain, and John Taylor guarantees the thing."

  "Who's John Taylor?" snorted the Colonel. "Why should we trust him?"

  "Well," said Harry slowly, "he wants to marry Helen--"

  His father grew apopletic.

  "I'm not saying he will, Father; I'm only saying that he wants to,"Harry made haste to placate the rising tide of wrath.

  "No Southern gentleman--" began the Colonel. But Harry shrugged hisshoulders.

  "Which is better, to be crushed by the trust or to escape at theirexpense, even if that escape involves unwarranted assumptions on thepart of one of them? I tell you, Father, the code of the Southerngentleman won't work in Wall Street."

  "And I'll tell you why--there _are_ no Southern gentlemen," growled hisfather.

  The Silver Fleece was golden, for its prices were flying aloft. Mr.Caldwell told Colonel Cresswell that he confidently expected twelve-centcotton.

  "The crop is excellent and small, scarcely ten million bales," hedeclared. "The price is bound to go up."

  Colonel Cresswell was hesitant, even doubtful; the demand for cotton athigh prices usually fell off rapidly and he had heard rumors ofcurtailed mill production. While, then, he hoped for high prices headvised the Farmers' League to be on guard.

  Mr. Caldwell seemed to be right, for cotton rose to ten cents apound--ten and a half--eleven--and then the South began to see visionsand to dream dreams.

  "Yes, my dear," said Mr. Maxwell, whose lands lay next to theCresswells' on the northwest, "yes, if cotton goes to twelve or thirteencents as seems probable, I think we can begin the New House"--for Mrs.Maxwell's cherished dream was a pillared mansion like the Cresswells'.

  Mr. Tolliver looked at his house and barns. "Well, daughter, if thiscrop sells at twelve cents, I'll be on my feet again, and I won't haveto sell that land to the nigger school after all. Once out of theclutch of the Cresswells--well, I think we can have a coat of paint."And he laughed as he had not laughed in ten years.

  Down in the bottoms west of the swamp a man and woman were figuringpainfully on an old slate. He was light brown and she was yellow.

  "Honey," he said tremblingly, "I b'lieve we can do it--if cotton goes totwelve cents, we can pay the mortgage."

  Two miles north of the school an old black woman was shouting and wavingher arms. "If cotton goes to twelve cents we can pay out and be free!"and she threw her apron over her head and wept, gathering her childrenin her arms.

  But even as she cried a flash and tremor shook the South. Far away tothe north a great spider sat weaving his web. The office looked downfrom the clouds on lower Broadway, and was soft with velvet and leather.Swift, silent messengers hurried in and out, and Mr. Easterly, decidingthe time was ripe, called his henchman to him.

  "Taylor, we're ready--go South."

  And John Taylor rose, shook hands silently, and went.

  As he entered Cresswell's plantation store three days later, a coloredwoman with a little boy turned sadly away from the counter.

  "No, aunty," the clerk was telling her, "calico is too high; can't letyou have any till we see how your cotton comes out."

  "I just wanted a bit; I promised the boy--"

  "Go on, go on--Why, Mr. Taylor!" And the little boy burst into tearswhile he was hurried out.

  "Tightening up on the tenants?" asked Taylor.

  "Yes; these niggers are mighty extravagant. Besides, cotton fell alittle today--eleven to ten and three-fourths; just a flurry, I reckon.Had you heard?"

  Mr. Taylor said he had heard, and he hurried on. Next morning the longshining wires of that great Broadway web trembled and flashed again andcotton went to ten cents.

  "No house this year, I fear," quoth Mr. Maxwell, bitterly.

  The next day nine and a half was the quotation, and men began to look ateach other and asked questions.

  "Paper says the crop is larger than the government estimate," saidTolliver, and added, "There'll be no painting this year." He lookedtoward the Smith School and thought of the five thousand dollarswaiting; but he hesitated. John Taylor had carefully mentioned seventhousand dollars as a price he was willing to pay and "perhaps more."Was Cresswell back of Taylor? Tolliver was suspicious and moved to delaymatters.

  "It's manipulation and speculation in New York," said Colonel Cresswell,"and the Farmers' League must begin operations."

  The local paper soon had an editorial on "our distinguished fellowcitizen, Colonel Cresswell," and his efforts to revive the Farmers'League. It was understood that Colonel Cresswell was risking his wholeprivate fortune to hold the price of cotton, and some effort seemed tobe needed, for cotton dropped to nine cents within a week. Swiftnegotiations ensued, and a meeting of the executive committee of theFarmers' League was held in Montgomery. A system of warehouses andwarehouse certificates was proposed.

  "But that will cost money," responded each of the dozen big landlordswho composed the committee; whereupon Harry Cresswell introduced JohnTaylor, who represented thirty millions of Southern bank stock.

  "I promise you credit to any reasonable amount," said Mr. Taylor, "Ibelieve in cotton--the present price is abnormal." And Mr. Taylor knewwhereof he spoke, for when he sent a cipher despatch North, cottondropped to eight and a half. The Farmers' League leased three warehousesat Savannah, Montgomery, and New Orleans.

  Then silently the South gripped itself and prepared for battle. Menstopped spending, business grew dull, and millions of eyes were gluedto the blackboards of the cotton-exchange. Tighter
and tighter thereins grew on the backs of the black tenants.

  "Miss Smith, is yo' got just a drap of coffee to lend me? Mr. Cresswellwon't give me none at the store and I'se just starving for some," saidAunt Rachel from over the hill. "We won't git free this year, MissSmith, not this year," she concluded plaintively.

  Cotton fell to seven and a half cents and the muttered protest becameangry denunciation. Why was it? Who was doing it?

  Harry Cresswell went to Montgomery. He was getting nervous. The thingwas too vast. He could not grasp it. It set his head in a whirl. HarryCresswell was not a bad man--are there any bad men? He was a man whofrom the day he first wheedled his black mammy into submission, down tohis thirty-sixth year, had seldom known what it was voluntarily to denyhimself or curb a desire. To rise when he would, eat what he craved, anddo what the passing fancy suggested had long been his day's programme.Such emptiness of life and aim had to be filled, and it was filled; hehelped his father sometimes with the plantations, but he helpedspasmodically and played at work.

  The unregulated fire of energy and delicacy of nervous poise within himcontinually hounded him to the verge of excess and sometimes beyond.Cool, quiet, and gentlemanly as he was by rule of his clan, the ice wasthin and underneath raged unappeased fires. He craved the madness ofalcohol in his veins till his delicate hands trembled of mornings. Thewomen whom he bent above in languid, veiled-eyed homage, feared lestthey love him, and what work was to others gambling was to him.

  The Cotton Combine, then, appealed to him overpoweringly--to his passionfor wealth, to his passion for gambling. But once entered upon the gameit drove him to fear and frenzy: first, it was a long game and HarryCresswell was not trained to waiting, and, secondly, it was a game whoseintricacies he did not know. In vain did he try to study the matterthrough. He ordered books from the North, he subscribed for financialjournals, he received special telegraphic reports only to toss themaway, curse his valet, and call for another brandy. After all, he keptsaying to himself, what guarantee, what knowledge had he that this wasnot a "damned Yankee trick"?

  Now that the web was weaving its last mesh in early January he hauntedMontgomery, and on this day when it seemed that things must culminate orhe would go mad, he hastened again down to the Planters' Hotel and wasquickly ushered to John Taylor's room. The place was filled with tobaccosmoke. An electric ticker was drumming away in one corner, a telephoneringing on the desk, and messenger boys hovered outside the door andraced to and fro.

  "Well," asked Cresswell, maintaining his composure by an effort, "howare things?"

  "Great!" returned Taylor. "League holds three million bales and controlsfive. It's the biggest corner in years."

  "But how's cotton?"

  "Ticker says six and three-fourths."

  Cresswell sat down abruptly opposite Taylor, looking at him fixedly.

  "That last drop means liabilities of a hundred thousand to us," he saidslowly.

  "Exactly," Taylor blandly admitted.

  Beads of sweat gathered on Cresswell's forehead. He looked at thescrawny iron man opposite, who had already forgotten his presence. Heordered whiskey, and taking paper and pencil began to figure, drinkingas he figured. Slowly the blood crept out of his white face leaving itwhiter, and went surging and pounding in his heart. Poverty--that waswhat those figures spelled. Poverty--unclothed, wineless poverty, to digand toil like a "nigger" from morning until night, and to give up horsesand carriages and women; that was what they spelled.

  "How much--farther will it drop?" he asked harshly.

  Taylor did not look up.

  "Can't tell," he said, "'fraid not much though." He glanced through atelegram. "No--damn it!--outside mills are low; they'll stampede soon.Meantime we'll buy."

  "But, Taylor--"

  "Here are one hundred thousand offered at six and three-fourths."

  "I tell you, Taylor--" Cresswell half arose.

  "Done!" cried Taylor. "Six and one-half," clicked the machine.

  Cresswell arose from his chair by the window and came slowly to the wideflat desk where Taylor was working feverishly. He sat down heavily inthe chair opposite and tried quietly to regain his self-control. Theliabilities of the Cresswells already amounted to half the value oftheir property, at a fair market valuation. The cotton for which theyhad made debts was still falling in value. Every fourth of a cent fallmeant--he figured it again tremblingly--meant one hundred thousand moreof liabilities. If cotton fell to six he hadn't a cent on earth. If itstayed there--"My God!" He felt a faintness stealing over him but hebeat it back and gulped down another glass of fiery liquor.

  Then the one protecting instinct of his clan gripped him. Slowly,quietly his hand moved back until it grasped the hilt of the big Colt'srevolver that was ever with him--his thin white hand became suddenlysteady as it slipped the weapon beneath the shadow of the desk.

  "If it goes to six," he kept murmuring, "we're ruined--if it goes tosix--if--"

  "Tick," sounded the wheel and the sound reverberated like sudden thunderin his ears. His hand was iron, and he raised it slightly. "Six," saidthe wheel--his finger quivered--"and a half."

  "Hell!" yelled Taylor. "She's turned--there'll be the devil to pay now."A messenger burst in and Taylor scowled.

  "She's loose in New York--a regular mob in New Orleans--and--hark!--ByGod! there's something doing here. Damn it--I wish we'd got anothermillion bales. Let's see, we've got--" He figured while the wheelwhirred--"7--7-1/2--8--8-1/2."

  Cresswell listened, staggered to his feet, his face crimson and his hairwild.

  "My God, Taylor," he gasped. "I'm--I'm a half a million ahead--greatheavens!"

  The ticker whirred, "8-3/4--9--9-1/2--10." Then it stopped dead.

  "Exchange closed," said Taylor. "We've cornered the market allright--cornered it--d'ye hear, Cresswell? We got over half the crop andwe can send prices to the North Star--you--why, I figure it youCresswells are worth at least seven hundred and fifty thousand aboveliabilities this minute," and John Taylor leaned back and lighted a bigblack cigar.

  "I've made a million or so myself," he added reflectively.

  Cresswell leaned back in his chair, his face had gone white again, andhe spoke slowly to still the tremor in his voice.

  "I've gambled--before; I've gambled on cards and on horses; I'vegambled--for money--and--women--but--"

  "But not on cotton, hey? Well, I don't know about cards and such; butthey can't beat cotton."

  "And say, John Taylor, you're my friend." Cresswell stretched his handacross the desk, and as he bent forward the pistol crashed to the floor.