“Just as long as I do, Silas.” And then the engine came, and David and his charge were whirled away to the valley.
At the stop at the foot of the Inn ridge, David helped Virginia down from the engine cab, and together they climbed the hill path. The news had been passed to the tunnel that President Ford and his inspecting committee had arrived at Powder Gap an hour earlier and were quartered in the Alta Vista; wherefore David Vallory knew that his request had been granted and that his hour was come.
“You will go to your father at once, of course,” he said, as they were ascending the steps of the Inn entrance. Then: “You must stand to your guns, Vinnie, and do all the things you said you’d like to do when you thought we had to die. Mr. Ford is here, and after I’ve had a word with Dad and sister, I’m going to fight the good fight with the Short Line people, taking matters entirely into my own hands. If Mr. Ford doesn’t fire us bodily, this job shall be finished—and finished honestly. After that, your father may fire me if he wishes to; but he must be made to understand that if he does, he is firing his daughter’s husband.”
“Oh!” she said softly, “it’s such a precious thing to find that you are just as big and strong as I always believed you were, David! I’ll stand by, and after you are through with Mr. Ford, you must come straight to our suite.” Then, with exaggerated humility: “May I have your august permission to say good-by to Freddy Wishart and Cumberleigh?”
“You can’t—unless you do it by wire,” he grinned. “Plegg tells me they went East on the morning train, shortly after he had announced our engagement here at the hotel. We can send them cards a little later, if you wish.”
XXIX
As It Should Be
THE conference in the Alta Vista’s sun-parlor, which was isolated for the purpose, was rather long drawn out, as it was constrained to be, but in due time the large-bodied, shrewd-eyed man who had been doing practically all of the talking for the railroad company brought it to a conclusion.
“I have no more use for a welsher than you have, Mr. Vallory,” he said, referring pointedly to one James Lushing. “You have frankly admitted that there have been the usual contractor’s shavings and parings on the job, to the manifest detriment of the railroad company’s interest. I’ll be equally frank and say that Lushing was given his place with us largely because he knew of the little parings—having devised a good many of them himself, probably—and was therefore able to check and prevent them. But I wish it to be distinctly understood that we don’t stand for any highbinding methods; and your evidence of sheer criminality on Lushing’s part seems to be entirely conclusive. You say they have found the wrecked time-clock of the infernal machine in the tunnel digging?”
David nodded. “We have that, and the testimony of the young woman I speak of. Also, we have another witness in the person of a man named Dargin, who, my assistant tells me, is ready to testify that Lushing, the man Backus, and another named Runnels, deliberately plotted the blowing up of the tunnel, partly for the purpose of smashing our company, but principally—so Dargin says—to dispose of me in a manner which would appear to be entirely accidental.”
“Dargin?” said the president, with a faint smile. “Isn’t he the head and front of these Powder Can nuisances that you described in your letter to me, and wished to have us help you clean out?”