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."