th twenty, drill right at the inside corner, where all
the lines cross. If you pull a duster, you'll be out and injured, maybe
twenty-five thousand, but if it comes wet they'll have to protect those
three leases with three offsets. It ain't a bad-looking piece of
ground; you'll have about a one-to-three chance of making a well."

"How many companies have you gentlemen promoted?" Gray inquired.

"Twenty-two. And from a shoestring. Every well went down, or is going
down, and every dollar we got right here on the street."

"And all of them are dry, are they not?"

McWade spoke up, defensively: "Sure. They were all wildcats of the
wildest kind. But we don't deal in oil, we sell stock. Every issue
we've put out has gone above par at some time or other, and that's
playing the game square with our customers, ain't it? We see that they
have a chance to get out with a profit; if they hang on it's their own
fault. That's how we've built up a clienteel."

"It wouldn't hurt your reputation to bring in a wet well for a change,
would it?" Both partners agreed that it would not. "I'll buy this
twenty-acre lease, and you can promote a company to drill ten of it,
Stoner says it's a one-to-three shot."

McWade blazed with enthusiasm at the suggestion. "Take a piece of the
stock yourself, Mr. Gray, and we'll put it over in a day. With your
name at the top of the list it will bally-hoo itself."

"Not a share. Your amiable proposition brings me directly to another
point which has a bearing upon our main campaign. Law is a dry subject,
but I must bore you with a brief dissertation upon a provision of one
statute which has doubtless escaped your notice. It has escaped the
notice of most people, even of Henry Nelson, I believe. You realize
that all but a few Texas oil companies are not organized as
corporations, but as joint stock associations--in effect declarations
of trust."

"We oughta know it," Stoner said. "It saves paying a big corporation
tax and lets you sell all the full-paid, nonassessable stock you want
to issue, regardless of what the property is worth. Oh, we got wise to
that, _muy pronto!_ Why, these here Texas laws are the bunk! Them
fellows at Austin, if they had their way, would make it impossible to
promote a legitimate enterprise--on a paying basis. They'd make you
turn in cash or property the equivocal thereto every time you
organized. Wouldn't that be sweet? This joint-stock arrangement is the
only way to beat th