ght express on a fast line for
Chicago. Kenneth was waiting for him at the hotel; and after breakfast
there was another telegram from Adair. Matters were still progressing
favorably, and President Colbrith, traveling in his private car,
"Nadia," _via_ the Lake Shore, would be in Chicago the following
morning to take final action in the stock purchases.

Ford gave the message to Kenneth, and the attorney drummed softly on the
table with his finger-tips when he read the announcement.

"We are in for it now," he said with a grimace of dismay. "If Mr.
Colbrith doesn't manage to queer the whole deal, it will be because he
has suffered a complete change of heart."

Ford answered the grimace with a scowl, and the masterful side of him
came uppermost.

"What in the name of common sense were they thinking of to send him out
here?" he gritted.

The general counsel laughed.

"You don't know Mr. Colbrith as well as I do, I fancy," he suggested.
"He is rather hard to suppress. He'll be president until his successor
is elected--or he'll know all the reasons why."

"Well, I hope you've got everything straight in the option business,"
said Ford. "If there is so much as a hair displaced, he will be sure to
find it."

"It is all straight enough," was the confident rejoinder. "Only I had to
bid five points over the market on odd lots of the stock. I'm not sure,
but I think the Transcontinental people got wind of us during the last
day or two and bid against us."

"But you have safe majorities?"

"Oh, yes; we are all in."

"Good," said Ford. "That puts it up to Mr. Colbrith, at all events. And
now, while we have a clear day before us, I want to go over these
C. P. & D. terminal contracts with you. Right here in Chicago is where
the Transcontinental will try hardest to balk us. The C. P. & D. has
trackage rights to the elevators; but I want to be sure that the
contracts will hold water under a transfer of ownership."

Subjected to legal scrutiny, the contracts promised to be defensible,
and Ford came through the day with his apprehensive burdens considerably
lightened. After dinner he took his papers to Kenneth's room, and
together they went carefully over all the legal points involved in the
welding of the three local lines into the Pacific Southwestern system,
Ford furnishing the data gathered by him during the four days.

Kenneth was shrewdly inquisitive, as his responsibilities constrained
him to be, and it was deep in