Part 10 (2/2)
Griffith looked down, his teeth clenching on the pipe stem. There was a moment's pause. Then he replied in a tone more than ever dry and emotionless: ”Guess my last letter didn't reach you. I lost her, a year ago--typhoid.”
”G.o.d!” murmured Blake. He bent forward and gripped his friend's listless hand.
Griffith winced under the sympathetic clasp, turned his face away, coughed, and rasped out: ”Work's the one thing in the world, Tommy.
Always believed it. I've proved it this year. Work! Beats whiskey any day for making you forget ... I've got rooms here. You'll bunk with me.
Pretty fair restaurant down around the corner.”
”It's a go,” said Blake. He nodded to Lord James. ”That lets you out, Jimmy.”
”Out in the cold,” complained his lords.h.i.+p.
”What! With Mamma Gantry waiting to present you to the upper crust?--I mean, present the crust to you.”
”Best part of the pie is under the crust.”
”Now, now, none of that, Jimmy boy. You're not the sort to take in the town with a made-in-France thing like that young Ashton.”
”Ashton?” queried Griffith. ”You don't mean Laffie Ashton?”
”He was down at the depot to give our party the glad hand.”
”Your party?” repeated Griffith. He saw Blake wink at Lord James, and thought he understood. ”I see. He knows Mr. Scarbridge, eh? It's like him, dropping his work and running down here, when he ought to stick by his bridge.”
”His bridge?” asked Blake. ”Say, he did blow about having landed the Michamac Bridge. But of course that's all hot air. He didn't even take part in the compet.i.tion. Besides, you needn't tell me he's anything more than a joke as an engineer.”
”Isn't he, though? After you pulled out the last time--after the compet.i.tion,--he put in plans and got the Michamac Bridge.”
”You're joking!” cried Blake. ”He got it?--that _gent!_”
”You'll remember that all who took part in the compet.i.tion failed on the long central span,” said Griffith.
”No!” contradicted Blake. ”_I_ didn't. I tell you, it was just as I wrote you I'd do. I worked out a new truss modification. I'd have sworn my cantilever was the only one that could span Michamac Strait.”
”And then to have your plans lost!” put in Griffith with keen sympathy beneath his dry croak. ”h.e.l.l! That bridge would have landed you at the top of the ladder in one jump.”
”Losing those plans landed me on a brake-beam, after my worst spree ever,” muttered Blake.
”Don't wonder,” said Griffith. ”What gets me, though, is the way this young Ashton, this lily-white lallapaloozer of a kid-glove C. E., came slipping in with his plans less than a month after the contest. I looked up the records.”
”What were you doing, digging into that proposition?” demanded Blake.
”What d' you suppose? Ashton was slick enough to get an ironclad contract as Resident Engineer. His bridge plans are a wonder, but he's proved himself N. G. on construction work. Has to be told how to build his own bridge. I'm on as Consulting Engineer.”
”You?” growled Blake. ”You, working again for H. V. Leslie!”
”Give the devil his due, Tommy. He's sharp as tacks, but if you've got his name to a straightforward contract--”
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