"A warship. I saw it from Maintop."
"British or French?"
"I don't know. I only knew it was a warship because it was so much bigger than the 'Harlaw' and had tall masts."
"Well, it don't make any difference," growled White, "one is just as bad as another, and our business is ruined anyway. Why couldn't they have kept away for three days longer?"
"What will they do?" inquired Cabot, curiously.
"I don't know," replied White, bitterly. "Either destroy or seize the whole plant and leave us to starve at our leisure. Now, I suppose we might as well go up to the house and tell mother. There's no use doing any more work under the circumstances."
"I don't see why not," objected Cabot, who was not accustomed to throwing up a fight before it was begun. "There is a possibility that the vessel may not be a warship after all, and another that she is not coming to this place. Even if she does, you don't know that she has any warrant for interfering with your business. So, if I were you, I'd go right on with the work and keep at it until some one compelled me to stop. I say, though, speaking of warrants gives me an idea. All you want is three days' delay, isn't it?"
"That is what I want most just now," replied White.
"Well, then, why not place this property in the name of some friend—David Gidge, for instance—and when those men-of-war people begin to make trouble let him ask them whose factory it is they are after. They will say yours, or your mother's, of course. Then he'll speak up and say in that case they've come to the wrong place, since this is the property of Mr. David Gidge, while their warrant only mentions that of Mrs. Whiteway Baldwin. It'll be a big bluff, of course, and won't work for very long, but it may puzzle 'em a bit and give the delay of proceedings that you require."
"I believe you are right about keeping on with the work," replied White, thoughtfully; "though I am not so sure about the other part of your scheme. Anyway, I must run to the house for a little talk with mother, and if you'll just set things going in the factory I shall be much obliged."