The afternoon was only half advanced and there were numberless tasks to do.  He decided he could think and plan while he worked.  As he was about to turn away he espied another automobile, this one coming from the opposite direction to that Anderson had taken.  The sight of it reminded Dorn of the I.W.W. trick of throwing phosphorus cakes into the wheat.  He was suspicious of that car.  It slowed down in front of the Dorn homestead, turned into the yard, and stopped near where Dorn stood.  The dust had caked in layers upon it.  Someone hailed him and asked if this was the Dorn farm.  Kurt answered in the affirmative, whereupon a tall man, wearing a long linen coat, opened the car door to step out.  In the car remained the driver and another man.

“My name is Hall,” announced the stranger, with a pleasant manner.  “I’m from Washington, D.C.  I represent the government and am in the Northwest in the interest of the Conservation Commission.  Your name has been recommended to me as one of the progressive young wheat-growers of the Bend; particularly that you are an American, located in a country exceedingly important to the United States just now—­a country where foreign-born people predominate.”

Kurt, somewhat startled and awed, managed to give a courteous greeting to his visitor, and asked him into the house.  But Mr. Hall preferred to sit outdoors on the porch.  He threw off hat and coat, and, taking an easy chair, he produced some cigars.

“Will you smoke?” he asked, offering one.

Kurt declined with thanks.  He was aware of this man’s penetrating, yet kindly scrutiny of him, and he had begun to wonder.  This was no ordinary visitor.

“Have you been drafted?” abruptly queried Mr. Hall.

“Yes, sir.  Mine was the first number,” replied Kurt, with a little pride.

“Do you want exemption?” swiftly came the second query.

It shocked Dorn, then stung him.

“No,” he said, forcibly.

“Your father’s sympathy is with Germany, I understand.”

“Well, sir, I don’t know how you understand that, but it’s true—­to my regret and shame.”

“You want to fight?” went on the official.

“I hate the idea of war.  But I—­I guess I want to fight.  Maybe that’s because I’m feeling scrappy over these I.W.W. tricks.”

“Dorn, the I.W.W. is only one of the many phases of war that we must meet,” returned Mr. Hall, and then for a moment he thoughtfully drew upon his cigar.

“Young man, I like your talk.  And I’ll tell you a secret.  My name’s not Hall.  Never mind my name.  For you it’s Uncle Sam!”

Whereupon, with a winning and fascinating manner that seemed to Kurt at once intimate and flattering, he began to talk fluently of the meaning of his visit, and of its cardinal importance.  The government was looking far ahead, preparing for a tremendous, and perhaps a lengthy, war.  The food of the country must be conserved.  Wheat was one of the most vital things in the whole world, and the wheat of America was incalculably precious—­only the government knew how precious.  If the war was short a wheat famine would come afterward; if it was long, the famine would come before the war ended.  But it was inevitable.  The very outcome of the war itself depended upon wheat.