"Good!" was Brassfield's hearty response. "You'll do for an animated 'office tickler' if you continue to improve. You used to forget all these things."
They had now come to a certain turning, down which Brassfield gazed, to a place where the highway was torn up and excavated. A center line of bowed backs, fringed by flying dirt. Indicated that the work was still in progress.
"You may go on to the office," said Brassfield, "and I'll be up immediately. I'm going down to see Barney Conlon a moment."
He walked down among the men, nodding to the busy ones, and stopping for a handshake or a joke with others.
"Hello, Barney," he shouted to the man who seemed to be in charge. "How long are you going to keep people jumping sideways to prevent themselves from being buried alive? You old Fenian!"
Conlon looked at him for a moment with an air of distinct disfavor.
"Look out there!" he shouted to a teamster who was unloading pipe. "D'ye want to kill the min in the trinch? Ah, is thot you, Mr. Brassfield?"
"What's left of me," replied Brassfield, quickly aware of the coolness of the reception—the politician's sensitiveness to danger. "By the way, Conlon, can't you come up to the office soon? I've got some specifications I want you to see. Pipe-line. Can you do that sort of work?"
"Do it!" gushed Conlon, thawing. "Do it! Ah, Mr. Brassfield, d'ye ask me thot, whin ye mind 'twas me thot done the Rogers job!"
"Oh, yes, I remember now, you did have that," said Brassfield. "Well, that was fairly well done. Come up and figure with me, and I believe we can make a deal."