SIMPSON: You answer it, Carter.
[CARTER goes to the telephone and picks it up in a somewhat gingerly way.]
CARTER: Hello!… Yes…. Yes, it's The Gibson Upright…. No, he ain't here…. What? Wait a minute. [Puts his hand over the mouthpiece.] He wants to know who it is talking.
FRANKEL: My goodness! Can't you tell him it's you?
CARTER: He wouldn't know who that was.
MIFFLIN: Tell him it's one of the owners of the company.
CARTER [looks at MIFFLIN solemnly; then in a hushed voice]: It's one of the owners of the company…. Wait a minute; let me get that. "The Central Associated Lumber Companies?" I hear you. Wait a minute. [Looks round.] This here company says they want to lower their bid for a couple hundred thousand feet o' lumber to forty-seven dollars a thousand. They say that's a dollar lower than they offered yesterday and a half a dollar lower than they offered this morning—says got to know now.
FRANKEL: Says they come down to forty-seven, do they?
CARTER: Yes; says so!
SIMPSON: Well, tell 'em that's good; we'll take it.