Logan, with limited capital and an alert mind, operated a petty loan business. He traded for what-have-you. In the early twenties, he exchanged his chips and whetstones for single shares of bank stock. Arriving at a favorable status, he persuaded the bank directors to enlarge the capital to absorb his petty loan business. In 1924, he quit the "street" to accept a cushioned chair in the rear room of the bank. His experience would add caution and prudence. For, just now, the cattle business was slipping; prices were falling below the cost of production. Home folks were not buying; the rescued European nations forgot, as usual, their benefactor and dickered for meager supplies of meats and grains at other marts. America's foreign trade sank to a new low. Her thousands of merchant craft rocked listlessly and rusted quickly in stagnant waters while the false prophets of Mammon urged idle capital to pyramid a luring stock market to a glorious peak and final crash. The banks of America were the first to feel the pinch. Some waited too long--waited to dole out to a frenzied public all available cash and close the doors too late for solvency. But not so with the Bank of Adot. Aaron Logan got his order for receivership before his public went frantic and while cash was yet available. Under court order he was proceeding to thaw out the frozen items of assets, and planned to open the institution to those who would limit their withdrawals to stated amounts. He made progress in these endeavors until he bumped into the stone wall of the Barrow loan. Really, it wasn't a giant sum, as such sums are rated in banking circles, but in the present instance it represented the difference between opening a bank or keeping it closed. Aaron Logan had given the matter of this Bar-O affair much thought. He had canvassed every available prospect. In all the community there wasn't a person that would give a thin dime for a property with a defiant oldster thereon, who would certainly kill or be killed if possession was to be gained. And a killing was bad advertisement, a poor prelude to opening a bank. But in the very hour he planned to execute this last resort, a rank outsider, an unknown and uncanvassed source, a little runt of a man with more confidence and assurance than his size would warrant, was offering to take over the ranch and assume the problem. Aaron Logan regarded it as a slender chance--could not believe that one so small could have earned so much--but he would take the chance. He headed his car up Willow Street to stop at the bank's rear door. He waved Adine to a favorable parking space. "I will call Mr. Limeledge, my lawyer, to draw up a contract," he said as the party of five were seated in the back room.