After a perceptible pause, he asked in a tone that was very low and quiet and deliberate: "Would you mind telling me if this blueprint was made direct from your originals—from the original drawings used in ordering the structural steel?"
"Yes, of course," answered Ashton. "Why?"
"You are sure?"
"I'm certain. You don't think I'd let any one with a pen fool around my drawings, do you?"
"Lord, no! Might correct your damn errors!" cried Blake, all his stony calm fluxing to lava before an outflare of volcanic excitement. "You fool!—Lord! Wasting time! Sit down—scratch off an order. That cantilever must be relieved P.D.Q.—every ounce skinned off it!"
"What—what's that?" asked Ashton, staring blankly. He had never before seen Blake agitated.
"You fool!" shouted Blake. "You've got that outer arm loaded down with material 'way beyond the margin of safety. You damned fool, you made an error here in the figures—over the bottom-chords and posts. They'll hold anything, once the suspension span is completed, but now! Lord! McGraw is a mule—he'll insist on a written order. Weather report says wind. And another train loading to run out on the overhang, when we ought to be hauling steel off!"
"Oh, we ought, ought we?" blustered Ashton, venturing bravado in view of Blake's agitation. "Who d' you think is running this bridge, you barrel-house bum? I'll give you to understand I'm the engineer in charge here. You're my Assistant—my Assistant! D'you hear?"
"Yes, yes!" urged Blake. "Only scratch off an order! There's no time to lose! I'll do the work. For God's sake, hurry! You've a hundred men out there on that deadfall—a million dollars' worth of steel-work! Those bottom-chords may buckle any second!"
From eager pleading, Blake burst out in an angry roar: "Damn you! Get busy! Write that order!"