The stake was placed. Bill drove another at his feet, set the transit over it, peeped through it both ways and at his direction, after stretching the steel tape, Gus drove a third stake exactly sixty feet from the transit at an angle of ninety degrees from a line to the field stake.
"Now, folks," explained Bill, "the stake out yonder is A, this one is B and the one at the other end of the sixty-foot base line is C. Please remember that."
The transit was then placed exactly over the stake C and, peeping again, Bill found the angle from the base line to the stake B and the line to stake A to be 78 degrees. Thereupon Gus produced a long board, held up one end and rested the other on a stake, while Bill went to work with a six-foot rule, a straight edge and a draughtsman's degree scale. Bill elucidated:
"Now, then, to get out of figuring, which is always hard to understand, we'll just lay the triangulation out by scale, which is easily understood. One-eighth of an inch equals one foot. This point is stake B and the base line to C is this line at right angles, or square across the board. C stake is 7-1/2 inches from B which is equal to sixty feet on the scale, that is sixty one-eighth inches. Now, this line, parallel to the edge of the board, is the exact direction of your stake A. Do you all follow that?
"The direction to your stake was 78 degrees from the base line at C. This degree scale will give us that." Bill carefully centered the latter instrument, sharpened his pencil and marked the angle; then placing the straight edge on the point C and the degree mark he extended the line until it crossed the other outward line. At this crossing he marked a letter A and turned to his auditors.
"This is your stake out yonder. The rule shows it to be a little over 34-5/8 inches from the base line at B. That is, by the scale, a few inches over 277 feet and that is the distance from here to where Grace stuck it into the ground. Our hundred-foot steel tape line is at your service, Mr. Hooper."
Mr. Hooper merely glanced at Bill. He took up the tape line and spoke to his nephew. "Git a holt o' this thing, Thad, an' let's see if—"
Grace interrupted him. "No, Dad; never let Thad do it! He'd make some mistake accidentally on purpose. I'll help you."
There was utter silence from all while Grace carried out the end of the tape and placed her sticks, Mr. Hooper following after. Skeets borrowed a pencil and a bit of paper from Gus and went along with Grace to keep tally, but she dropped the pencil in the grass, stepped on and broke it, was suffused with embarrassment and before she could really become useful, the father and daughter had made the count mentally and they came back to the base line, still without saying a word, a glad smile on the girl's face and something between wonder and surprise on the old man's features.
Still without a word Mr. Hooper came straight to Bill, thrust out his big hand to grasp that of the smiling boy and in the other hand was held the bills of the wager, which he extended toward Gus.