Fielding swiveled his chair to face the large picture window filled by the Rockies, the new playground of the mindless. The Rockies had killed men since the Indians came down across the Bering Strait. Froze them like flies in the winter, let them thaw out and stink in the summer. White men came, built their little protected nests, briefly stuck their fur-wrapped faces into the air, and said how beautiful nature was. Beautiful? Nature killed.
Fielding looked at the Rockies and remembered the first meeting with Feldman, O'Connor, and Jordan nearly eight months before. Everything had been so Christmassy in December. The commodities market had taken that dip and there was less whiter wheat growing under the snows of America's plains than at any time since the Thirties.
Feldman and O'Connor and Jordan had greeted him personally for their presentation. Lights of red and green and blue hung from palm trees. A ceramic Santa Claus which dispensed scotch from its groin leaned against a bookcase. Feldman nervously explained it was left over from the office Christmas party. He had a smooth tan with manicured gray hair and a pinky ring with a diamond big enough to send sun signals half way across the country. O'Connor was pale with freckles and large bony hands that worked themselves together. His blue striped tie was knotted tight enough for a penance. And then there was Jordan, even-capped white teeth, black hair so neatly billowing it looked as if it had come from a cheap plastic mold. Eyes like black immies. He wore a dark striped suit with too-wide shoulders and too-flaring lapels and, of all things, a buckle in the back. The buckle was silver.
Fielding entered the room like a modest lord among gaudy servants.
"It is truly an honor to have you here, sir," said Feldman. "And I might add, a pleasure."
"A real pleasure," said O'Connor.
"A deep pleasure," said Jordan.
"There is no pleasure for me, gentlemen," said Fielding as Feldman took his coat and O'Connor his brief-case. "I am in mourning for a beautiful person. You may never have heard of him. No history books will carry his name to future generations, no songs will praise his deeds. Yet truly this person was a man among men."
"I'm sorry to hear that," Feldman had said.
"The good die young," said O'Connor.
"Most distressing," said Jordan.
"His name was Oliver. He was my manservant," said Fielding.
"A good manservant is better than a rotten scientist," Feldman had allowed. O'Connor thought so too.
"A good manservant is the closest thing to Christ on earth," said Jordan. Feldman had to agree with that. O'Connor noted that in his faith it was the highest honor to be called handmaiden of the Lord.
"I am determined that his name will be remembered. I am determined that men will say Oliver with respect, reverence, and yes, even joy. That is why I am here."
"We can set it to music," said Feldman and he began to hum a Negro spiritual and then created the words to the music. "Anybody here see my old friend, Oliver?"
Fielding shook his head. "No," he said.
"You're not focusing for prime thrust," said Jordan to Feldman.
"Not at all," said O'Connor.
"I have a better idea," said Fielding.
"I like it," said Feldman.
"I have set up a foundation with an original endowment of my entire fortune, fifty million dollars."
"Beautiful," said Feldman.
"Solid," said O'Connor.
"Beautifully solid base," said Jordan.
"It's more than a base, gentlemen," said Fielding and he signaled for his briefcase. "As you gentlemen know, I have been involved in industry, successfully involved, except for a few minor tax losses in the southwest."
"And a leader of the Denver community," said Feldman.
"A solid leader," said O'Connor. "As were your parents and grandparents."
"The sort of client we would be proud to represent," said Jordan.
Fielding opened the briefcase. Carefully he took from it four plastic boxes with metal latches. The boxes were clear plastic and contained grain of white and brown and golden colors. One was labeled "soybean," another "wheat," another "rice," and another "barley."
"These are the basic grains of man's sustenance," said Fielding.
"They have a natural beauty," said Jordan,
"I feel better since I've started eating granola," said Feldman.
"The staff of life," said O'Connor.
"First I have a small request. Please refrain from comments until I ask for them," said Fielding. "You are looking at four miracles. You are looking at the answer, the final answer to man's problems with famine. These grains were grown in a single month's time."
There was silence in the room. Fielding paused. When he saw the three partners' eyes start to wander uncomfortably, he went on.
"I don't think you are aware of what a month-grown grain is. It is more than a faster process. It's twelve crops a year where a farmer had only one or two before. Through my process, we can increase the food yield a minimum of six times on earth. In all weather and in all conditions. I need only one thing now. A demonstration, well-publicized, to commit the world-especially the underdeveloped world-to this process. It is important, vitally important now, because I hear the winter wheat crop this year will be a small one."
"Who owns the patent?" asked O'Connor.
"It is not patented. It is a secret process I intend to give to all mankind," said Fielding.
"But for your protection, don't you think it would be wise to have some sort of patent? We could arrange it."
Fielding shook his head. "No. But what I will do for your services is give your firm 20 percent of the profit on every soybean, every grain of rice, grain of wheat, or barley grown in the world."
O'Connor's tie knot bobbed, Feldman salivated, and Jordan, his eyes glowing, breathed heavily.
"The entire world is going to use what I call the Oliver method, in tribute to my noble servant."
The three men bowed their heads and Fielding passed out pictures of Oliver, taken by a sheriff's office after the air accident. He said he would appreciate it if they would keep those pictures in their offices. They agreed. But it was when they saw the demonstration that they vowed ultimate fidelity to the memory of Oliver.
In Rocky Mountain winter, they saw a twenty-yard patch of snowy mountainside planted with wheat treated by the Oliver method, as Fielding had called it. Saw workmen pickax into the soil and cover the seed with rock-hard pieces of ground and returned thirty days later to see stalks of wheat growing in the sub-zero wind.
"The weather is only a slight hindrance to the Oliver method," Fielding yelled above the wind. O'Connor pocketed a stalk with his gloved hand. Back in Los Angeles, they got the verdict from a biologist.
"Yep. This is wheat all right."
Could it have been grown on a mountainside in winter?"
"No way."
If it could be, grown full in just one month, what would you say?
"Whoever knew how to do it would be the richest man in the world."
That report from the biologist had come seven months before. Fielding had waited two days for them to get the biologist's report, as he knew they would, and then he had brought his little problem to Jordan. In an effort to make the market more receptive to fast-grown grains, Fielding had sold winter wheat futures massively with funds from the Oliver Foundation. He was troubled by this. A couple of commodities brokers suspected something. Some were trying to blackmail him. A third might be considering telling the government. There was nothing else to do but confess all and give the formula for Wondergrains-Feldman, O'Connor and Jordan had changed what they called the packaging concept from the Oliver method to Wondergrains-to the public. Just announce it and give it away. Free.