Wilson went to his desk, hovered over it like a dark, human cloud, and then reluctantly turned to the big iron safe against the wall, obviously to get the note. His disappointment was too great for concealment. With his fat, pink hand on the silver-plated combination-bolt he turned to Miller again. “Would you mind sitting down till I telephone one or two of the directors?” “Not at all,” said Miller, “if you 'll get me a cigar and the _Constitution_. The Atlanta baseball team played Mobile yesterday, and I was wondering--” “I don't keep track of such things,” said Wilson, coming back to his desk, with an impatient frown, to ring his call-bell for the office-boy. “Oh yes, I believe football is your national sport,” said Miller, with a dry smile. “Well, it's only a difference between arms and legs--whole bones and casualties.” Wilson ordered the cigar and paper when the boy appeared, and, leaving the lawyer suddenly, he went into the room containing the telephone, closing the door after him. In a few minutes he reappeared, standing before Miller, who was chewing a cold cigar and attentively reading. He looked up at Wilson abstractedly. “Bully for Atlanta!” he said. “The boys made ten runs before the Mobiles had scored--” “Oh, come down to business!” said the New-Eng-lander, with a ready-made smile. “Honestly, I don't believe you drowsy Southerners ever will get over your habit of sleeping during business hours. It seems to be bred in the bone.” Miller laughed misleadingly. “Try to down us at a horse-race and we 'll beat you in the middle of the night. Hang it all, man, you don't know human nature, that's all! How can you expect me, on my measly fees, to dance a breakdown over business I am transacting for other people?” “Well, that may account for it,” admitted Wilson, who seemed bent on being more agreeable in the light of some fresh hopes he had absorbed from the telephone-wires. “See here, I've got a rock-bottom proposal to make to your people. Now listen, and drop that damned paper for a minute. By Jove! if I had to send a man from your State to attend to legal business I'd pick one not full of mental morphine.” “Oh, you wouldn't?” Miller laid down the paper and assumed a posture indicative of attention roused from deep sleep. “Fire away. I'm listening.” “I already had authority to act for the company, but I thought it best to telephone some of the directors.” Wilson sat down in his chair and leaned towards the lawyer. “Here's what we will do. The whole truth is, we are willing to plank down the required one hundred thousand for that property, provided we can lay our road there without incurring the expense of purchasing the right of way. Now if the citizens along the proposed line want their country developed bad enough to donate the right of way through their lands, we can trade.”