"I'm next," says I. "Pass a Jones, and then set the block."

If he thought he could mesmerize me by any such simple motions as that
he had another guess. Why, even if it had been my first day on the
job, I'd have been hep that it wa'n't any common weekday Jones he was
expectin' to stray in accidental. Besides, the minute I spots that
long, thin nose, the close-cropped, grizzly mustache, and the tired
gray eyes with the heavy bags underneath, I knew it was George Wesley
himself. Ain't his pictures been printed often enough lately?

He looks the part too, and no wonder! If I'd been hammered the way he
has, with seventeen varieties of Rube Legislatures shootin' my past
career as full of holes as a Swiss cheese, grand juries handin' down
new indictments every week end, four thousand grouchy share-holders
howlin' about pared dividends, and twice as many editorial pens
proddin' 'em along----well, take it from me, I'd be on my way towards
the tall trees with my tongue hangin' out!

Here he is, though, with his shoulders back and a sketchy, sarcastic
smile flickerin' in his mouth corners as he shows up for a hand-to-hand
set-to with Old Hickory Ellins. Course it's news to me that the
Corrugated interests and the P., B. & R. road are mixed up anywhere
along the line; but it ain't surprisin'.

Besides mines and rollin' mills, we do a wholesale grocery business,
run a few banks, own a lot of steam freighters, and have all kinds of
queer ginks on our payroll, from welfare workers to would-be statesmen.
We're always ready to slip one of our directors onto a railroad board
too; so I takes it that the way P., B. & R. has been juggled lately was