"Certainly," Tommy responded promptly. "And we'd be suckers if we weren't."
He took a puff or two at his cigar and rose.
"Run over to the plant on the North Shore with me to-morrow if you have the time. We'll give it the once over, and take a look at the Wallace yard too. They're starting on steel tramps there now. I'm going over about two o'clock. Will you?"
"Sure. I'll take time," Thompson agreed.
"Come down to MacFee's wharf and go over with me on the Alert," Tommy went on. "That's the quickest and easiest way to cross the Inlet. Two o'clock. Well, I'm off to bed. Good night, old man."
"Good night."
The hall door clicked behind Ashe. Thompson sat deep in thought for a long time. Then he fished a note pad out of a drawer and began pencilling figures.
Ten times three hundred thousand was three million. Ten per cent. on three million was three hundred thousand dollars. And no chance to lose. The ten per cent. on construction cost was guaranteed by the Imperial Munitions Board, behind which stood the British Empire.
Didn't Tommy say the ten schooners were to be completed in eight months? Then in eight months Tommy Ashe was going to be approximately one hundred and fifty thousand dollars richer.
Thompson wondered if that was why Sam Carr looked at Tommy with that ambiguous expression when Tommy was chanting his work or fight philosophy. Carr knew the ins and outs of the deal if he were loaning money on it.