Jones had been looking out through an open window, watching the law-makers of Kansas going up the wide steps of the State House. The fellows from the farm climbed, the town fellows ran up the steps.
"Spur!" said Jones, wheeling around from the window and walking toward the President's desk, "I don't want no spur; I want a side track that'll hold fifty cars, and I want it this week,—see?"
"Now look here, Mr. Jones, this is sheer nonsense. We get wind at Wakefield and water at Turner's Tank; now, what excuse is there for putting in a siding half-way between these places?"
Again Mr. Jones, rubbing the point of his chin with the ball of his thumb, gave the President a pitying glance.
"Say!" said Jones, resting the points of his long fingers on the table, "I'm goin' to build a town. You're goin' to build a side track. I've already set aside ten acres of land for you, for depot and yards. This land will cost you fifty dollars per, now. If I have to come back about this side track, it'll cost you a hundred. Now, Mr. President, I wish you good-mornin'."
At the door Jones paused and looked back. "Any time this week will do; good-mornin'."
The President smiled and turned to his desk. Presently he smiled again; then he forgot all about Mr. Jones and the new town, and went on with his work.
Mr. Jones went down and out and over to the House to watch the men make laws.
In nearly every community, about every capital, State or National, you will find men who are capable of being influenced. This is especially true of new communities through which a railway is being built. It has always been so, and will be, so long as time expires. I mean the time of an annual pass. It is not surprising, then, that in Kansas at that time, the Grasshopper period,—before prohibition, Mrs. Nation, and religious dailies,—the company had its friends, and that Mr. Jones, an honest farmer with money to spend, had his.