onsider this thing closed?"

"One million," replied Purdy, looking sternly at the ceiling. "Very
well, Mr. Purdy," replied Cowperwood. "I'm very sorry. It's plain to
me that we can't do business as I had hoped. I'm willing to pay you a
reasonable sum; but what you ask is far too much--preposterous! Don't
you think you'd better reconsider? We might move the tunnel even yet."

"One million dollars," said Purdy.

"It can't be done, Mr. Purdy. It isn't worth it. Why won't you be
fair? Call it three hundred and twenty-five thousand dollars cash, and
my check to-night."

"I wouldn't take five or six hundred thousand dollars if you were to
offer it to me, Mr. Cowperwood, to-night or any other time. I know my
rights."

"Very well, then," replied Cowperwood, "that's all I can say. If you
won't sell, you won't sell. Perhaps you'll change your mind later."

Mr. Purdy went out, and Cowperwood called in his lawyers and his
engineers. One Saturday afternoon, a week or two later, when the
building in question had been vacated for the day, a company of three
hundred laborers, with wagons, picks, shovels, and dynamite sticks,
arrived. By sundown of the next day (which, being Sunday, was a legal
holiday, with no courts open or sitting to issue injunctions) this
comely structure, the private property of Mr. Redmond Purdy, was
completely razed and a large excavation substituted in its stead. The
gentleman of the celluloid cuffs and collars, when informed about nine
o'clock of this same Sunday morning that his building had been almost
completely removed, was naturally greatly perturbed. A portion of the
wall was still standing when he arrived, hot and excited, and the
police were appealed to.

But, strange to say, this was of little avail, for they were shown a
writ of injunction issued by the court of highest jurisdiction,
presided over by the Hon. Nahum Dickensheets, which restrained all and
sundry from interfering. (Subsequently on demand of another court this
remarkable document was discovered to have disappeared; the contention
was that it had never really existed or been produced at all.)

The demolition and digging proceeded. Then began a scurrying of
lawyers to the door of one friendly judge after another. There were
apoplectic cheeks, blazing eyes, and gasps for breath while the
enormity of the offense was being noised abroad. Law is law, however.
Procedure is procedure, and no writ of injunction was either