"We are not going to cut very deeply into your time this morning, Mr. Kinzie," he began when the eye-appraisal had given him his cue. "You know the history of Timanyoni Ditch up to the present, and you have no doubt had your own misgivings about the wisdom of its financing on such a small scale, and as a purely local enterprise. Others have had the same misgivings, and—well, to cut out the details, there is to be a complete reorganization of the company on a new basis, and we are here to offer to take your personal allotment of the stock off your hands at par for cash. Colonel Baldwin has stipulated that his friends in the original deal must be protected, and——"
"Here, here—hold on," interrupted the bank president; "you're hitting it up a little bit too fast for me, Mr. Smith. Before we get down to any talk of buying and selling, suppose you tell me something about yourself and your new company. Who are you? and whereabouts do you hold forth when you are at home?"
Smith laughed easily. "If we were trying to borrow money of you, we might have to go into preliminaries and particulars, Mr. Kinzie. As it is, I'm sure you are not going to press for the answers to these very natural questions of yours. Further than that, we shall have to ask you to hold anything that may be said here in strict confidence—as between a banker and his customer. We are not alone in the fight for the water-rights on the other side of the river, as you know, and until we are safely fortified we shall have to be prudently cautious. But that is another matter. What we want to know now is this: will you let us protect you by taking your Timanyoni Ditch stock at par? That's the principal question at issue just now."
Kinzie met the issue fairly. "I don't know you yet, Mr. Smith; but I do know Colonel Baldwin, here, and I guess I'll take a chance on things as they stand. I'll keep my stock."
The new secretary's smile was rather patronizing than grateful.
"As you please, Mr. Kinzie, of course," he said smoothly. "But I'm going to tell you frankly that you'll keep it at your own risk. I am not sure what plan will be adopted, but I assume it will be amortization and a retirement of the stock of the original company. All that we need to enable us to bring this about is the voting control of the old stock, and we already have that, as you know."
The banker pursed his lips until the stubbly gray mustache stood out stiffly. Then he cut straight to the heart of the matter.
"You mean that there will be a majority pool of the old stock, and that the pool will ignore those stockholders who don't come in?"
"Something like that," said Smith pleasantly. And then: "We're going to be generously liberal, Mr. Kinzie; we are giving Colonel Baldwin's friends a fair chance to come in out of the wet. Of course, if they refuse to come in—if they prefer to stay out——"
Kinzie was smiling sourly.