"I am glad I did it," answered Ralph simply.
The foreman sank into a chair, started to speak, arose, paced the floor restlessly, finally halted in front of Ralph, and looked him squarely in the face.
"Fairbanks," he said, "I believe I have done you an injustice. Don't answer. Let me speak while the mood is on me. I am a proud man, and it's hard for me to root out my settled suspicions. I won't say they are all gone yet, but after what has happened it would be wrong and churlish for me to hold back what is on my lips. When you came here this morning, I was satisfied that you came here as a spy upon my actions."
"Oh, Mr. Forgan!" explained Ralph involuntarily.
"And I prepared to treat you as a spy. I have had trouble with the master mechanic, off and on--that is, we are rivals in the race for the presidency of the local labor council, and Ike Slump's father, when I told him about your card from the master mechanic, scented a plot at once."
"Why, Mr. Forgan!" exclaimed Ralph in amazement, "I never saw the master mechanic until night before last, then only for less than two minutes, and my meeting with him was purely accidental."
The roundhouse foreman looked Ralph through and through.
"I believe you, Fairbanks," he said, at length. "You don't look like the lying, sneaking sort, and Denny says he'd bank his soul on you. He says I've got bad, crafty advisers. Maybe so, maybe so," went on Forgan, half to himself. "I wish I'd kept out of the labor ring. It makes one fancy half his friends enemies. Drop that, though. I've made my confession, and I believe you're square. I've sent for you to exonerate you from all part in the smash-up, and to tell you that I owe you a debt I can never pay. I'll try to square some of it, though. Fairbanks, you shall stay here, and I shall give you more than a chance to forge ahead."
"I thank you, Mr. Forgan," said Ralph gratefully.
The foreman strode over to the window again. Ralph studied this strange make-up of real force, dark suspicions and ungovernable impulses, but did not appear to watch him. In a covert way, with a sidelong glance at Ralph, the foreman opened the door of a little closet, took out a dark bottle, and Ralph could hear the gurgling dispatch of a long, deep draught.