"It wouldn't hurt your reputation to bring in a wet well for a change, would it?" Both partners agreed that it would not. "I'll buy this twenty-acre lease, and you can promote a company to drill ten of it, Stoner says it's a one-to-three shot." McWade blazed with enthusiasm at the suggestion. "Take a piece of the stock yourself, Mr. Gray, and we'll put it over in a day. With your name at the top of the list it will bally-hoo itself." "Not a share. Your amiable proposition brings me directly to another point which has a bearing upon our main campaign. Law is a dry subject, but I must bore you with a brief dissertation upon a provision of one statute which has doubtless escaped your notice. It has escaped the notice of most people, even of Henry Nelson, I believe. You realize that all but a few Texas oil companies are not organized as corporations, but as joint stock associations--in effect declarations of trust." "We oughta know it," Stoner said. "It saves paying a big corporation tax and lets you sell all the full-paid, nonassessable stock you want to issue, regardless of what the property is worth. Oh, we got wise to that, _muy pronto!_ Why, these here Texas laws are the bunk! Them fellows at Austin, if they had their way, would make it impossible to promote a legitimate enterprise--on a paying basis. They'd make you turn in cash or property the equivocal thereto every time you organized. Wouldn't that be sweet? This joint-stock arrangement is the only way to beat the game. It's a shrewd device, and my hat's off to the guy that invented it." "Very true. Very well expressed. But in the statute governing the procedure there is wrapped up a bundle of bad news, for it is provided that any officer or stockholder may become personally liable for the entire debt of the association. There is going to be a lot of sleep lost over that fact when the truth becomes known." "You mean if I got stock in a company that's blowed up, and I'm living in Oshkosh, all pretty, that I can be hooked for the debts some crook runs up here in Texas?" "Precisely." This intelligence brought no consternation to the partners; on the contrary, McWade, the optimist, grinned widely. "Goes to show you we have been playing the game along safe and legitimate lines," said he. "We don't own a share in any of our own enterprises, and if we have to pick up a few now and then to boost the market, we drop them again as if they were hot. It's a pretty thought, though. Why, I can see years of activity ahead of Brick and me, buying up the debts of defunct oil companies and collecting in full from prosperous strangers hither and yon. For Heaven's sake, don't let it get out!" "I won't, at least until after I have accumulated a number of potential judgments against Henry Nelson. He has had his share of cats and dogs, of course, and some day I hope to lead them back to his doorstep. If they return at the right moment, they may prove an embarrassment. Who knows?"