"Will you let me have those estimates again, Mr. Weston?" he asked.

Weston, who sat with a set face gazing at the papers in front of him,
handed several of them across the table. It was now some time since he
had left the mine, and in the meanwhile trouble after trouble had
crowded thick upon him. He realized also that he was rapidly losing
the confidence of his companions. They were not men of any great
account in that city, and it was significant that the Board Meeting
was held in Wannop's little back office, where there was scarcely room
for all of them.

"You have discussed those estimates at length already," he said. "I
should, however, like to point out that I consider them absurdly high.
In fact, I'd undertake to do the work at not more than two-thirds of
the cost."

"This company," said the first speaker, severely, "has no intention of
taking up road-making and the building of flumes and dams. It has, as
I think you will admit, gentlemen, quite enough already on its hands."

There was some show of agreement from all but Wannop, and Weston set
his lips. There had been a time when they had listened to his
suggestions, but now it was becoming evident that they regarded him
with suspicion.

"This," said his colleague, "is a little list of our requirements and
expenditures before we can expect to get to work. Tools,
drilling-machines and labor on the heading." He read out the cost of
each item. "Then we have to provide a stamp-mill, turbines, flumes and
dam; and, though Mr. Weston suggests a wood-burning engine to supply
the crushing power, the saving effected would be no great matter. The
point is that we now discover that the cost of these things will in
one way or another be nearly double what we stated in our prospectus."

"That," said Wannop, dryly, "isn't altogether unusual."

"What is more to the purpose is that it will approximately absorb our
whole available capital," said the first speaker, who took up another
paper. "Then we have as an alternative scheme several leagues of road
and trail cutting, including wooden bridges and a strip that must be
dug out of an impassable mountainside. You have to add to it the cost
and maintenance of pack-horses and the rates you'd have to pay the
owners of the nearest crushing-plant to do your reducing. Gentlemen, I
can only move that these estimates stand over, and that in the
meanwhile we merely proceed with the heading."

They agreed to this. Then another o