"Bob an' I kinder thought we had," returned he modestly.
"Bob is helping you?"
"Oh, I'm only putting in an oar," the young man hastened to say. "The plan was entirely Mr. Spence's. I am simply working out some of the details."
"Bob knows a good deal more about boats than perhaps he'll own," Mr. Galbraith asserted to Willie. "I fancy you've found that out already. You are fortunate to have his aid."
"Almighty fortunate," Willie agreed; then, glancing narrowly at his visitor, he added: "Then you think there's some likelihood that a scheme such as this might work. 'Tain't a plumb crazy notion?"
"Not a bit of it. It isn't crazy at all. On the contrary, it should be perfectly workable, and if it proved so, there would be a mine of money in it."
"You don't say!"
It was plain that the comment contained less enthusiasm for the prospective fortune than for the indorsement of the idea.
The New Yorker, however, said nothing more about the invention. He browsed about the shop with unfeigned pleasure, poking in among the cans of paint, oil, and varnish, rattling the nails in the dingy cigar-boxes, and examining the tools and myriad primitive devices Willie had contrived to aid him in his work.
"I was brought up in a shop like this," he at length exclaimed, "and I haven't been inside such a place since. It carries me back to my boyhood."