yourself into trouble by
interfering and any small theft you stopped probably wouldn't pay for the
time you'd have to spend on the job. Leave it alone, and take matters as
you find them, is my advice."

Dick talked about something else, but when he went back to his shack he
knew what he meant to do.

CHAPTER VIII

AN INFORMAL COURT

One morning, soon after Fuller and his daughter had gone home, Dick stood
at a table in the testing house behind the mixing sheds. The small,
galvanized iron building shook with the throb of engines and rattle of
machinery, and now and then a shower of cinders pattered upon the roof;
for the big mill that ground up the concrete was working across the road.
The lattice shutters were closed, for the sake of privacy, and kept out
the glare, though they could not keep out the heat, which soaked through
the thin, iron walls, and Dick's face was wet with perspiration as he
arranged a number of small concrete blocks. Some of these were broken,
and some partly crushed. Delicate scales and glass measures occupied a
neighboring shelf, and a big steel apparatus that looked rather like a
lever weighing machine stood in the shadow.

Where the draught that came through the lattices flowed across the room,
Bethune lounged in a canvas chair, and another man, with a quiet,
sunburned face, sat behind him. This was Stuyvesant, whose authority was
only second to Fuller's.

"Brandon seems to have taken a good deal of trouble, but this kind of
investigation needs the strictest accuracy, and we haven't the best of
testing apparatus," Bethune remarked. "I expect he'll allow that the
results he has got may be to some extent misleading, and I doubt if it's
worth while to go on with the matter. Are you sure you have made no
mistakes, Dick?"

Dick pondered for a few moments. If he were right, as he thought he was,
the statements he had to make would lead to the discharge of the
sub-contractor. Remembering his own disgrace, he shrank from condemning
another. He knew what he had suffered, and the man might be innocent
although his guilt seemed plain. It was a hateful situation, but his duty
was to protect his master's interests and he could not see him robbed.

"You can check my calculations," he answered quietly.

"That's so," agreed Stuyvesant, who added with a dry smile as he noted
Bethune's disapproving look: "We can decide about going on with the thing
when we have heard Brandon."

"Very well,"