Part 2 (1/2)
”That's all,” Ford replied laconically.
Mr. Richard Frisbie got up and walked twice the length of the little room before he said:
”This Denver gentleman is going to knock your little scheme into a c.o.c.ked hat, if he can, Stuart.”
”I am very much afraid we'll have to reckon upon that. As a matter of fact, I've been reckoning upon it, all along.”
”How much of a pull has he with the New York money-people?”
”I don't know that: I wish I did. It would simplify matters somewhat.”
Frisbie took another turn up and down the room, with his head down and his hands in his pockets.
”Stuart, I believe, if I were in your place, I'd enlist Mr. North, if I had to make it an object for him,” he said, at length.
”Certainly, I mean to go to him first,” said Ford. ”That is his due. But I am counting upon opposition rather than help. Wait a minute”--he jerked the door open suddenly and made sure that the chief clerk's chair was unoccupied. ”The worst of it is that I don't trust North,” he went on. ”He is a grafter in small ways, and he'd sell me out in a minute if he felt like it and could see any chance of making capital for himself.”
”Then don't go to him with your scheme,” urged Frisbie. ”If you enlist him, you won't be sure of him; and if you don't, you'll merely leave an active opponent behind you instead of a pa.s.sive one.”
”I guess you're right, d.i.c.k; but I'll have to be governed by conditions as I find them. Aside from North's influence with Mr. Colbrith, which is considerable, I believe, he can't do much to help. But he can do a tremendous lot to hinder. I think I shall try to choke him with b.u.t.ter, if I can.”
Notwithstanding the general manager's letter, Ford took the train for Denver the following morning, and the chief clerk remarked that he checked a small steamer trunk in addition to his hand baggage.
”Going to be gone some time, Mr. Ford?” he asked, when he brought the night mail down for the superintendent to look over.
”Yes,” said Ford absently.
”You'll let me know where to reach you from time to time, I suppose?”
ventured Penfield.
Ford looked up quickly.
”It won't be necessary. You can handle the office work, as you have heretofore, and Mr. Frisbie will have full charge out of doors.”
Penfield looked a little crestfallen.
”Am I to take orders from Mr. Frisbie?” he asked, as one determined to know the worst.
”Just the same as you would from me,” said the superintendent, swinging up to the step of the moving car. And the chief clerk went back to his office busily concocting another cipher message to the general manager.
On the way down the canyon Ford was saying to himself that he was now fairly committed to the scheme over which he had spent so many toilful days and sleepless nights, and that he would have it out with Mr. North to a fighting conclusion before he slept.
But a freight wreck got in the way while the down pa.s.senger train was measuring the final third of the distance, and it was long after office hours in the Pacific Southwestern headquarters when Ford reached Denver.
By consequence, the crucial interview with the general manager had to be postponed; and the enthusiast was chafing at his ill luck when he went to his hotel--chafing and saying hard words, for the waiting had been long, and now that the psychologic moment had arrived, delays were intolerable.
Now it sometimes happens that seeming misfortunes are only blessings in disguise. When Ford entered the hotel cafe to eat his belated dinner, he saw Evans, the P. S-W. auditor, sitting alone at a table-for-two. He crossed the room quickly and shook hands with the man he had meant to interview either before or after the meeting with North.
It was after they had chatted comfortably through to the coffee that the auditor said, blandly: ”What are you down for, Ford?--anything special?”