It was nearly eight o'clock when the two gentlemen came hurrying around the corner into Sickle street, piloted by Alf Reesling, the town drunkard.
A long, important-looking cigar propitiated Mr. Crow, and after Mr. Reesling and other citizens had been given to understand that the strangers were figuring on buying all the timber on Crow's Mountain, the three principals set forth in Anderson's buckboard.
In due time they arrived at the top of the "Mountain." Now Crow's Mountain was no mountain at all. It was a thickly wooded hill that had achieved eminence by happening to be a scant fifty feet higher than the knolls surrounding it. From the low-lying pastures and grain-fields to the top of the outstanding pine that reared its blasted storm-stripped tip far above its fellows, the elevation was not more than three hundred feet. Nevertheless, it was the loftiest hill in all that region and capped Anderson Crow's agricultural possessions.
Just before the Boggs City National Bank at the county seat closed that afternoon Mr. Crow appeared at the receiving-teller's window. He deposited two hundred dollars in currency. Mr. Bacon had decided that a draft on New York might excite undue curiosity.
"If people were to get wise to what we are really after up here on this mountain, Mr. Crow," said he, "it would play hob with everything. If it gets out that we are after gold—why, the price of land would be so high we couldn't—"
"Lot of these hayseeds been wantin' to sell fer years, the derned rubes," broke in Anderson, pityingly.
"Well, you get me, don't you? Keep our eyes open and our mouths closed, and we will be millionaires inside of a year—or two, at the outside."
"Mum's the word, as the feller said," agreed Mr. Crow.
"And of course you see the advisability of having our articles of incorporation filed secretly in New Jersey. This contract we have signed will be ratified by our employers in New York, and the regular articles drawn up at once. Wait till you see the names of the men who are behind this enterprise. The first meeting of the board of directors will bring together a dozen of the greatest—"
"Where will the meetin' be held?" broke in Anderson, somewhat anxiously.