“Bet I will, old man, I’d like to see you make a go of it. I gotta show up at Bertha’s, then I’ll run right out and look ’em over and report this evenin’.”
Jennings kept his word and when Bruce saw him cross the office with a spray of lilies-of-the-valley in his buttonhole and stepping like an English cob he guessed that he either had been successful or his call upon Bertha had been eminently satisfactory. He was correct, it proved, in both surmises.
“They’re there yet” he announced with elation, “in good shape, too. The motors need re-winding and there’s some other little tinkerin’, but aside from that—say, my boy, you’re lucky—nearly as lucky as I am. I tell you I’m goin’ to git a great little woman!”
“Glad to hear it, Jennings. But about this machinery, what’s it going to weigh? I don’t know that I told you but I mean to take it down the river.”
“Bad water?”
“It’s no mill-pond,” Bruce answered dryly, “full of rapids.” Jennings looked a little startled, and Bruce added:
“The weight is a mighty important feature.”
Jennings hesitated.
“The dynamos will weigh close to 22,000 pounds, and the whole 55,000 pounds approximately.”
“They weigh a-plenty,” Bruce looked thoughtful, “but I reckon I can bring them if I must. And there’s no doubt about the must, as a wagon road in there would cost $20,000.”