eferential
rate.

Blount broke him abruptly in the midst of the special plea. "I see you
have recently added one new name to this list: the name of Professor
Anners. How--"

"Yes," interrupted the Twin Buttes diplomatist hastily, fearing that
this legal-minded young man would presently be asking questions too hard
to be answered; "now there's a case in point: Mr. Anners is a good
example of our smaller stockholders. Men like Anners, college
professors, preachers, and so on, buy stocks, when they buy 'em at all,
for an investment--for the income--and they pay for 'em out of their
hard-earned savings."

"I know," said Blount, and, since he was the last man in the world to be
diverted from his purpose by any conversational dust-throwing, he
pressed the question cut off by the hasty interruption. "What I was
going to ask was how you happen to have added Professor Anners's name to
your list--recently, it seems?"

The lumberman was reduced to the necessity of inventing a ready lie. He
had obeyed his instructions blindly, on the supposition that young
Blount would know and understand.

"Anners? Oh, he knows a good thing when he sees it; and I guess maybe
your father put him on. He's a friend of the family, ain't he? Maybe the
senator found a little chunk of 'Twin Buttes' that he didn't want
himself, and passed it along."

Blount's blood ran cold at the sight of the cracking walls and crumbling
foundations on every hand. The proof that the railroad company's lawless
attitude was still unchanged was too strong to be doubted; and now there
was an added blow from the hand of his father. He wheeled short upon the
lumber-king.

"Who sent you to me, Mr. Hathaway?" he demanded.

The hawk-faced man laughed. "I guess you know just as well or better
than I do. But just to show you that I can keep my mouth shut, I ain't
going to tell you. It's all right and straight--and you might say it's
all in the family, counting the professor in on the side, as it were."

"I see," Blount said, and this time he was only too sure that he did
see. Then: "What is it you want me to do for you, Mr. Hathaway? You have
told me once, but I'm afraid I didn't grasp it fully."

"Fix it with Gantry, or somebody, so that we can put the company vote
where it's most needed and get our rate continued. It's simple enough."

"The simplicity is beyond question." Blount returned the list of
stockholders and fell back upon the pencil-sharpening. "It is quite