"I wish," Daniel finally concluded, "to begin work on the place at once to make it marketable. Can you give me the names and addresses of any reliable contractors of Charleston?"
"Plenty of them."
"Good," said Daniel, taking from his pocket a notebook and pencil. "Well?"
"But it is quite useless for you to write to a contractor," said Walter, blowing a long line of smoke from his mouth: "first, because Mrs. Eastman would not consent to mortgage away her half of Berkeley Hill; secondly, neither Margaret nor my wife would consent to such alterations as you propose, which would indeed quite ruin the place; thirdly, Margaret wishes her sister to continue to live at Berkeley Hill."
The cool effrontery of this latter made Daniel stare.
"And you," he sharply demanded, "wouldn't you feel a little more comfortable if you paid rent for the house you live in?"
"But why," smiled Walter, "should my 'feeling' in the matter interest you?"
"Bluff and impudence won't carry you through when I'm on the job, Eastman! You'll have to come to terms or get into trouble. We'll seize your wife's half of the estate for back rent, and then you'll have nothing, whereas as I propose to work this thing——"
"Your methods of 'working' business deals, Leitzel, are perfectly familiar to me and I prefer to have nothing to do with them."
"You prefer to continue to live in Margaret's house without in any way compensating her? Well, I warn you, I don't intend to stand for it. Since you take the stand you do, I'll make you pay rent for the past year and a half!"