“Jes’ so,” nodded the foreman. Then he drew his own conclusion. “I been knowin’ the C. C. & I. crowd, off an’ on, ever sence they took holt here in the Wehatchee. I reckon they’d rough-house you in a holy minute if they thought that was the easiest way to get the best o’ you in some business fight. I wouldn’t even put the dannymitin’ a-past ’em. But they wouldn’t go at it in no such a bunglesome way; n’r they wouldn’t put skulls in your fire-box, n’r any such fool monkeyshines as that. Them things don’t fit in.” Again Tregarvon bestowed the meed of praise where praise was due. “Tryon, you have a pretty level head. I am beginning to suspect that we made a mistake in not calling you in as chief detective in this muddle. But you still think that Thaxter and Sawyer worked the drill-dulling scheme, don’t you?” “Ez I say, that part of it proves up toler’ble plain. If there was ar’ reason, now, why they’d want to be holdin’ you back for a little spell----” “There is a reason. They are trying to buy me out.” “Now you’re talkin’!” said the foreman sagely. “Maybe you’ve got coal here under your feet, ’r maybe you hain’t. _You_ don’t know, yet, an’ maybe _they_ don’t know. But they’d just as soon you wouldn’t find out for sure whilst the dickerin’ ’s goin’ on. They’d like as not call it ‘good business’ to hold you up for a spell, wouldn’t they?” “Quite likely,” Tregarvon was glancing at his watch. The call upon Hartridge had now become a necessity, if only for apologetic and explanatory reasons. True, it was still possible that the professor had been in collusion with the planter of steel cubes on the night of surprises, but these later developments seemed to exonerate him handsomely. “I must go,” he told the foreman. “Rucker will relieve you here in time for you to go to your supper. If Sawyer should happen to turn up, just keep your own counsel about what we have discovered. We’ll deal with him--and his bosses--when the time comes.” A few minutes beyond this, Tregarvon was at Highmount, inquiring for Professor Hartridge. The young woman who answered his ring told him that the professor had gone over to the McNabb neighborhood to see a sick child. Not wishing to let his opportunity escape, Tregarvon set out to walk through the forest, taking a path leading in the general direction of the sunken mountain-top valley known locally as the “Pocket”; this on the chance of meeting Hartridge and walking back to the school with him.