"Hold on!" thundered a tremendous bass voice. "That don't work."
A greasy paw closed around the immaculate coat-sleeve of the inspector, who turned with a brow as dark as a thunder cloud.
"Drop my arm--what do you mean!" breathed Bardon, with a glance at the husky freight engineer as if he would annihilate him.
"Just this, Mr. Inspector Bardon," said the engineer, with a never-quailing eye and the zest of extreme satisfaction in words and bearing, "you can't lay anybody off."
"I represent the Great Northern Railway Company," announced Bardon grandiloquently.
"Read your rules, then," retorted the engineer, "and see how far it will sustain you in exceeding your duties. I tell you they won't uphold you, and I speak with the voice of eighty-six thousand men and their auxiliaries behind me--the International Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers."
Bardon stood nonplussed. He fidgeted and turned ghastly with vexation.
"I'll see that the proper official carries out my instructions just the same," he said in a kind of a vicious hiss.
"There's just one man to help you, then," coolly announced the engineer, "and that's Tim Forgan."
The inspector moved hastily away.