“We got mixed up in a shady business,” explained Jackwell, with a look of misery on his face. “But we didn’t know there was anything wrong about it till it went up with a bang. You see, Mr. Matson, this is the way it came about. Last winter, Ben and I were rather up against it--short of ready money. You know what poor salaries they pay in the league we came from. We were down in Dallas, Texas, and the oil boom was on. We saw an ad for men to sell oil stocks, and we answered it. The fellow at the head of it--Bromley was his name--was a smooth sort of chap and could talk any one into anything. From his description, we thought his oil well was an honest-to-goodness well, and we sold a lot of stock for him. Then came the blow-up, and it turned out that his well was just a dry hole in the ground. He got out from under just before the crash came, and I heard he went to Mexico. The federal officers got after him and all connected with it. We heard that warrants were out for us, and we skipped North. But until the company broke we thought they were straight as a string. We wouldn’t have had anything to do with it if we had thought it was crooked. We were just roped into it. That’s as true as that we’re sitting here this moment. All that either of us got out of it was part of our salaries and part of the commissions that were promised.”