Page:The History of the Standard Oil Company Vol 2.djvu/383

 annoyances, and evinced a disposition to accept the offer, and we advised her to accept providing the payments were made secure. I did not see her again until the fall of 1878, more than two years later. Then at her urgent request I met her at her house, at which time she made reference to the conversation she had had with Mr. Jennings, and desired me to pursue negotiations with her with reference to the sale of her property, which I positively declined, stating to her that I knew nothing about her business or the mechanical appliances used in the same, and that I could not pursue any negotiations with her with reference to the same, but that if, after reflection, she yet desired to do so, some of our people familiar with the lubricating oil business would take up the question with her. She was very desirous to begin negotiations, but I declined to negotiate and advised her not to take any hasty action, as from her own statements there was no such change in the condition of the business as to discourage the expectation that she could do as well in the future as she had in the past. When she responded expressing her fears about the future of the business, stating that she could not get cars to transport sufficient oil, and other similar remarks, I stated to her that though we were using our cars and required them in our own business, yet we would loan her any number she required or do anything else in reason to assist her, and I saw no reason why she could not prosecute her business just as successfully in the future as in the past. This is the last interview I had with her.

Affiant thinks it is true that Mrs. B. stated in the course of the conversation in substance that "the B. Oil Company was entirely in the power of the Standard Oil Company, and that all she could do would be to appeal to affiant's honour as a gentleman and to his sympathy to do with her the best that he could do." To the statement that she was in the power of the Standard Oil Company, affiant made a positive denial, and stated to her there was no foundation for the fears she expressed, and in this connection made the offer to her to furnish her with cars. He cannot remember what was said by Mrs. B. at this interview in relation to an agreement upon the part of the Standard Oil Company not to touch the lubricating branch of the trade. It is true that the Standard Oil Company had a contract with the B. Oil Company, made early in 1873, terminable on sixty days' notice by either party, in reference to carbon oil only—which contract had been voluntarily assumed by the B. Oil Company—and it was entirely optional with the said B. Oil Company to discontinue said contract upon a notice of sixty days and thereby relieve itself from its obligations if it so desired; but said contract was continued in full force and effect up to the time of the sale by Mrs. B. of her interest in said B. Oil Company; but the Standard Oil Company had no contract with B. Oil Company by which it "agreed not to touch the lubricating branch of the trade," nor did it have any contract with the said B. Oil Company having reference in any particular to the lubricating oil business, nor did affiant have any such contract. While affiant declined to enter into a negotiation with the said Mrs. B., it may be true that during the interview alluded to he said to her that in case a sale were made