“Of course, so far as the right-of-way is concerned, but that doesn’t touch the asbestos. What I’m getting at is this. Bascomb apparently controls the directors. He’s an engineer and they leave the fine points to him. Now he can easily swing the road to the second survey and—bang! There goes the market for the asbestos. It won’t pay to cart it five miles to the road.”
“Does the second survey cover accessible territory for road building?” asked the Doctor.
“No,” replied David. “It’s one of the worst pieces of swamp-land I ever saw.”
“I see. So Bascomb is using that to bluff you into selling?”
“That’s about it.”
“And the stockholders pay for his little idiosyncrasies, hey?”
“They will if he has his way.”
The Doctor studied the sketch closely for a moment. “You’ve got this thing correct?” he asked finally.
“Not to a scale—but approximately correct,” replied David.
“Hu-m-m!” The Doctor leaned back and looked at his companion, but there was no gleam of recognition in his expression. Presently he arose. “Will you let me have this sketch for a few days?”