ed Winn, "that we want to make this a home industry,
and to get all those here who have means to take stock in it and share
in the profits."

Jess made no immediate answer, evidently thinking. "Wal, we'll see 'bout
that bimeby," he said finally. "It's a matter as won't do ter hurry.
Folks here are mighty keerful, 'n' none on 'em's likely ter do much
bakin' till their oven's hot. 'Sides, there ain't many as own more'n the
roof that shelters 'em, and not over well shingled, at that. Money's
skeercer'n hen's teeth here, Mr. Hardy."

"I shall be guided by your opinion," answered Winn, realizing the truth
of what Jess had said, "and we will let that matter rest for the
present. Now if you will show me the quarry, I will look it over and let
you see what can be done in the way of getting men to work it. Whatever
you do for us we shall insist on paying you for."

"Queer old fellow," mused Winn to himself two hours later, after he had
parted from Jess, "but I doubt if he buys much of this quarry stock." It
is likely that surmise would have been a positive certainty if Jess
Hutton, with horse sense as hard as this granite ledge and wits as keen
as the briars that grew on top of it, had known that the quarry he had
sold for two thousand dollars and considered it well paid for, was the
sole basis for a stock company capitalized at one million dollars. But
he did not, and neither does many another blind fool who buys
"gilt-edged" stock in gold mines, oil wells, and schemes of all sorts,
know that his investment rests on as insecure and trifling a basis; for
the world is full of sharpers who continually set traps for the unwary
and always catch them, and, although their name is legion, their dupes
are as the sands of the sea.

But of Winn Hardy, who had come to Rockhaven, as he honestly believed
and felt, to carry out a legitimate business enterprise, it must not be
thought that he for one moment understood the deep-laid schemes of J.
Malcolm Weston, for he did not. While the ratio of value between the
capitalization of the Rockhaven Granite Company and the original cost of
the quarry seemed absurd, it did not follow but that Weston & Hill might
not intend actually to put capital into it sufficient to warrant such an
issue of stock. All of which would go to show that Winn Hardy had not as
yet entirely escaped the trammels of his inherited honesty and bringing
up, which insensibly led him to judge others by himself.

And that af