“They are wise and just rules,” commented the old man, “expensive to obey at times, but quite necessary.  We can obey and still be happy.  Objection overruled.”

“Well, then, since we must be a common carrier, we might as well carry our deception still further and incorporate for the purpose of building a road from Sequoia to Grant’s Pass, Oregon, there to connect with the Southern Pacific.”

John Cardigan smiled.  “The old dream revived, eh?  Well, the old jokes always bring a hearty laugh.  People will laugh at your company, because folks up this way realize that the construction cost of such a road is prohibitive, not to mention the cost of maintenance, which would be tremendous and out of all proportion to the freight area tapped.”

“Well, since we’re not going to build more than twelve miles of our road during the next year, and probably not more than ten miles additional during the present century, we won’t worry over it.  It doesn’t cost a cent more to procure a franchise to build a road from here to the moon.  If we fail to build to Grant’s Pass, our franchise to build the uncompleted portion of the road merely lapses and we hold only that portion which we have constructed.  That’s all we want to hold.”

“How about rights of way?”

“They will cost us very little, if anything.  Most or the landowners along the proposed route will give us rights of way free gratis and for nothing, just to encourage the lunatics.  Without a railroad the land is valueless; and as a common carrier they know we can condemn rights of way capriciously withheld—­something we cannot do as a private road.  Moreover, deeds to rights of way can be drawn with a time-limit, after which they revert to the original owners.”

“Good strategy, my son!  And certainly as a common carrier we will be welcomed by the farmers and cattlemen along our short line.  We can handle their freight without much annoyance and perhaps at a slight profit.”

“Well, that about completes the rough outline of our plan.  The next thing to do is to start and keep right on moving, for as old Omar has it, ‘The bird of time hath but a little way to flutter,’ and the birdshot is catching up with him.  We have a year in which to build our road; if we do not hurry, the mill will have to shut down for lack of logs, when our contract with Pennington expires.”

“You forget the manager for our new corporation—­the vice-president and general manager.  The man we engage must be the fastest and most convincing talker in California; not only must he be able to tell a lie with a straight face, but he must be able to believe his own lies.  And he must talk in millions, look millions, and act as if a million dollars were equivalent in value to a redwood stump.  In addition, he must be a man of real ability and a person you can trust implicitly.”

“I have the very man you mention.  His name is Buck Ogilvy and only this very day I received a letter from him begging me for a small loan.  I have Buck on ice in a fifth-class San Francisco hotel.”