"I am the cow-punching princess of Arcadia, and Mr. Pelham's natural enemy, you must remember," she countered, with a laugh that sounded entirely care-free. "I could tell you more about the stock affair. Mr. Pelham has been very liberal with his friends in the floating of this great and glorious undertaking—to borrow one of his pet phrases. He has placed considerable quantities of the Arcadia Company's stock among them at merely nominal prices, asking only that they sign a 'gentlemen's agreement' not to resell any of it, so that my father could get it. But there is a wheel within that wheel, too. Something more than half of the nominal capitalisation has been reserved as 'treasury stock.' When the enthusiasm reaches the proper height, this reserved stock will be put upon the market. People will be eager to buy it—won't they?—with the work all done, and everything in readiness to tap the stream of sudden wealth?"
"Probably: that would be the natural inference."
"I thought so. And, as the company's chief engineer, you could doubtless get in on the 'ground floor' that Mr. Pelham is always talking about, couldn't you?"
The question was one to prick an honest man in his tenderest part. Ballard was hurt, and his face advertised it.
"See here, little girl," he said, flinging the formalities to the winds; "I am the company's hired man at the present moment, but that is entirely without prejudice to my convictions, or to the fact that some day I am going to marry you. I hope that defines my attitude. As matters stand, Mr. Pelham couldn't hand me out any of his stock on a silver platter!"
"And Mr. Bromley?"
"You needn't fear for Loudon; he isn't going to invest, either. You know very well that he is in precisely the same boat that I am."
"How shocking!" she exclaimed, with an embarrassed little laugh. "Is Mr. Bromley to marry your widow? Or are you to figure as the consolation prize for his widow? Doubtless you have arranged it amicably between you."
Having said the incendiary thing, he brazened it out like a man and a lover.
"It's no joke. I suppose I might sidestep, but I sha'n't. You know very well that Bromley is in love with you—up to his chin, and I'm afraid you have been too kind to him. That is a little hard on Loudon, you know—when you are going to marry some one else. But let that rest, and tell me a little more about this stock deal. Why should there be a 'gentlemen's agreement' to exclude your father? To a rank outsider like myself, Arcadia Irrigation would seem to be about the last thing in the world Colonel Adam Craigmiles would want to buy."