“Too late.”
“Eh?”
“Hours too late--nigh on to half a day too late.”
“Why do you say that?”
“Because it’s a fact.”
“In what way?”
The man screwed his eyes up shrewdly as if he enjoyed making a clever disclosure. Then he said:
“Dorsett has made an arrangement with a drunken justice of the peace in the next township to open office at one minute after twelve, midnight. The justice will issue an execution. Inside of an hour Dorsett and his men will be at the factory. They don’t have to wait for court time. They intend to levy on the machinery only. They won’t put a custodian in charge nor wait for redemption nor anything else. They’ll simply rip out all those valuable tank machines and piping that cost a fortune, bid the plunder in at old junk prices and gobble up everything else before Glidden or his lawyer are awake and out of bed.”
“My man,” spoke Ralph rapidly, and moved to indignation and excitement almost beyond control, “are you sure of what you say?”
“As I was, up to this morning, one of the men who was to help in wrecking the plant, I reckon I know what I’m talking about,” answered the man.