“With pleasure,” agreed Ferris, and wrote the telegrams.
On the following morning Bobby received answers at his office to all but one of his telegrams, and the information was unanimous that the original plans had called for a building one hundred and ninety by one hundred and sixty feet.
“Now I begin to understand,” said Ferris. “This was the first set of important plans I ever saw in which the dimensions were not marked, but they were most accurately drawn to scale, one-fourth inch to the foot. They are probably using the same drawings with an altered scale, although it would be an absurdly clumsy trick. If that is the case it is easy to see how the Middle West Construction Company could under-bid us by more than a million dollars and still make more money than we figured on.”
Bobby reached for the telephone.
“Get me the mayor’s office,” he called to the girl at his private telephone exchange. “Will you ‘stick around’ to see the fuss?” he inquired with grim pleasure, as he hung up the receiver.
Ferris grinned as he noted the light of battle dawning in Bobby’s eyes.
“I don’t know,” he replied. “It depends on the size and duration of the fuss.”
“If you don’t stay I’ll have you subpœnaed. I may have to, anyhow. As for the size of the fuss, I can promise you a bully one if what you surmise is correct.”
His telephone bell rang and Bobby turned to it quickly.
“Hello, Chalmers!” he began, then laughed. “Beg pardon, Agnes; I thought it was the mayor’s office;” he apologized, then listened intently. There were a few eager queries, and when Bobby hung up the telephone receiver it was with great satisfaction. “I haven’t seen as much fun in sight since I began my fight on Stone,” he declared. “Miss Elliston, who has developed a marvelous new capacity for finding out other men’s business secrets through their women folk, has just telephoned me the results of her last night’s detective work. It seems that Silas Trimmer, one of the heavy backers of the Middle West Construction Company, has just negotiated a loan upon his stock in the mercantile establishment of Trimmer and Company, my share of which was known as the John Burnit Store until Trimmer beat me out of control. I understand that Trimmer has mortgaged everything to the hilt to go into this waterworks deal.”