able interest in the cement
lands. Things were coming on beautifully; and it seemed as if Elkins and
Cornish, working together, were invincible.

We still lived at the hotel, but our architect, "little Ed. Smith, who
lived over on the Hayes place" when we were boys, and who was once at
Garden City with Jim, was busy with plans for a mansion which we were to
build in the new Lynhurst Park Addition the next spring. Mr. Elkins was
preparing to erect a splendid house in the same neighborhood.

"Can I afford it?" said I, in discussing estimates.

"Afford it!" he replied, turning on me in astonishment. "My dear boy,
don't you see we are up against a situation that calls on us to bluff to
the limit, or lay down? In such a case, luxury becomes a duty, and
lavishness the truest economy. Not to spend is to go broke. Lay your
Poor Richard on the shelf, and put a weight on him. Stimulate the outgo,
and the income'll take care of itself. A thousand spent is five figures
to the good. No, while we've as many boom-irons in the fire as we're
heating now, to be modest is to be lost."

"Perhaps," said I, "you may be right, and no doubt are. We'll talk it
over again some time. And your remark about irons in the fire brings up
another matter which bothers me. It's something unusual when we don't
open up a set of books for some new corporation, during the working day.
Aren't we getting too many?"

"Do you remember Mule Jones, who lived down near Hickory Grove?" said
he, after a long pause. "Well, you know, in our old neighborhood, the
mule was regarded with a mixture of contempt, suspicion, and fear, the
folks not understanding him very well, and being especially uninformed
as to his merits. Therefore, Mule Jones, who dealt in mules, bought,
sold, and broke 'em, was a man of mark, and identified in name with his
trade, as most people used to be before our time. I was down there one
Sunday, and asked him how he managed to break the brutes. 'It's easy,'
said he, 'when you know how. I never hook up less'n six of 'em at a
time. Then they sort o' neutralize one another. Some on 'em'll be
r'arin' an' pitchin', an' some tryin' to run; but they'll be enough of
'em down an' a-draggin' all the time, to keep the enthusiastic ones kind
o' suppressed, and give me the castin' vote. It's the only right way to
git the bulge on mules.' Whenever you get to worrying about our various
companies, think of the Mule Jones system and be calm."

"I'm a little