"Probably they think it is some move of the other
side, and they are trying to run the thing down."
"Who owns the Mississippi Steel Company?" asked Montague.
"I don't know," said the Major. "I fancy that Wyman must have come
into it somehow. Didn't you notice in the papers the other day that
the contracts for furnishing rails for all his three transcontinental
railroads had gone to the Mississippi Steel
Company?"
"Sure enough!" exclaimed Montague.
"You see!" said the Major, with a chuckle. "You have jumped right
into the middle of the frog pond, and the Lord only knows what a
ruction you have stirred up! Just think of the situation for a
moment. The Steel Trust is over-capitalised two hundred per cent.
Because of the tariff it is able to sell its product at home for
fifty per cent more than it charges abroad; and even so, it has to
keep cutting its dividends! Its common stock is down to ten. It is
cutting expenses on every hand, and of course it's turning out a
rotten product. And now along comes Wyman, the one man in Wall
Street who dares to shake his fist at old Dan Waterman; and he gives
the newspapers all the facts about the bad steel rails that are
causing smash-ups on his roads; and he turns all his contracts over
to the Mississippi Steel Company, which is under-selling the Trust.
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