Part 15

That was true enough. In Austria trade in tobacco is a government monopoly, and one buys the same brands at all the stores.

"I am not always in town," I explained.

I was to get my bringing-up supplemented presently. Those who know the Viennese will best understand what happened.

"You are a foreigner, sir," continued the woman, "and cannot be expected to know the ways of this country. May I give you a little advice?"

I said that I had never been above taking advice from anybody.

"You will get much better service from storekeepers in this country if you become a regular customer, and especially in these days. You see, that is the rule here. Smoking material, as you know, is already short, and I fear that in a little while there will not be enough to go around."

The tip was not lost on me, especially since I found that the woman really meant well. She had counted on me as one of those whom she intended to supply with smokes when the shortage became chronic, which it soon would be. And that she proposed doing because I was such a "pleasant fellow." After that I took pains to announce my departure whenever I had occasion to leave the city, and I found that, long after the "tobacco-line" was one of the facts of the time, the woman would lay aside for me every day ten cigarettes. My small trade had come to be one of the things which the woman counted upon--and she wanted no fickleness from me in return for the thought she gave my welfare.

What a food shortage would lead to under such conditions can be imagined. The storekeeper would look out for his regular customers, before any other person got from him so much as sight of the food.

The government regulations were less partial, however. The several food cards, with which would-be purchasers were provided, were intended to be honored on sight so long as the quota they stipulated was there.

The food "speak-easy" had its birth in this. The storekeeper would know that such and such customer needed sundry items and would reserve them. The customer might never get them if she stood in line, so she called afterward at the back door, or came late of nights when the sign "Everything Sold" hung in the window.

Had this illicit traffic stopped there and then things would have been well enough. But it did not. Before very long it degenerated into a wild scramble for food for hoarding purposes.

As yet the several governments were not greatly interested in distribution methods that really were of service. The avenue from wholesaler to retailer was still open. The food cards were issued to the public to limit consumption, and the law paragraph quoted on them called attention to the fact that infraction of the regulations would be punished no matter by whom committed.

Most of the little coupons were half the size of a postage stamp, and so many of them were collected by a storekeeper in the course of a week that an army of men would have been needed if the things were to be counted. So the governments took a chance with the honesty of the retailers. That was a mistake, of course, but it was the only way.

There was at first no control of any sort over the quantities bought by the retailer. In fact, he could buy as much as he liked so long as the wholesaler did not have another friend retailer to keep in mind. The other retailer was doing business along the same lines, and could not be overlooked; otherwise there would be the danger of losing him as soon as the war was over; in those days it was still "soon."

The wholesaler maintained the best of relations with the retailer, despite the fact that he was of a superior class. The two would meet now and then in the cafés, and there the somewhat unequal business friendship would be fostered over the marble-topped table.

The customer of the retailer was already hoarding food. The retailer tried to do all the business he could, of course, and in the pursuit of this policy bought from the wholesaler all he could possibly get for money or love.

STREET SCENE AT EISENBACH, SOUTHERN GERMANY

From the villages and small towns is recruited sixty per cent. of the German army.]

Commission-men were licensed by the government, and when food regulation became a little more stringent they were obliged to make some sort of a slovenly report on the quantities they handled. But the government food commissions did not have the necessary personnel to keep close tally of these reports. This led to partial returns by the middlemen, a practice which entailed no particular risk so long as the government did not actually control and direct the buying of foodstuffs in the country and at the mills.

Business moved smartly as the result of this combination of circumstances. The wholesaler bought twice as much from the commission-man, and the latter had to buy, accordingly, in the country.

The maximum prices which the government set upon foods about to enter into possession of the consumer were invariably accompanied by minimum prices which the producer was to get. Reversely, the arrangement meant that the customer could not offer less for food than the government had decided he should pay, nor could the farmer or other producer demand more.

That was well enough in a way. The farmer was to get for a kilogram (2.205 pounds) of wheat not less than four and one-half cents, and the middleman selling to the mill could not ask more than five and one-half cents. Labor and loss in milling taken into consideration, the mill was to be satisfied with seven cents, while the consumer, so said the regulations, was to get his flour for eight and one-quarter cents per kilogram.

That was all very well, but it came to mean little in the end.

The customer thought he would lay in two hundred pounds of wheat flour for the rainy day. The retailer could not see it in that way. That was just a little too much. There were other worthy customers who might have to go short of their regular quota if he sold in amounts of that size. But the customer wanted the flour and was willing to pay more than the regulation or maximum price for it. It took but little tempting to cause the fall of the retailer.

The wholesaler would do the same thing. The commission-man was willing, since part of, let us say, a 20-per-cent. increase was being handed along the line. The mill got a few crowns more per hundred kilograms, and a little of the extra price would get as far as the farmer.

That l'appétit vient en mangeant is a notorious fact. A dangerous practice had been launched, nor was it always inaugurated by the consumer. No class of dealers was averse to doing business that might be illicit, but which brought large profits.

A first result was that the farmer was spoiled, as the consumer and the government looked at it. While purchases from the farmer were bounded in price by a minimum, there was no prohibition of paying him as much more as he would take. The government's duty was to stimulate production, and that was the purpose of the minimum price.

The government, learning that a certain farmer had been getting six cents for his wheat, might wonder how much the consumer paid and get after the middlemen, but it could not hold the farmer responsible.