“So I would suggest that all of you--or some of you--go and call upon Mr. Betts and endeavor to buy the gasworks from him outright. If you can get the plant for anything like its real value you may include the amount in the terms of the proposition you have today made me and I will take over all of the properties together. “However, remember this, gentlemen--there is need of haste. Within forty-eight hours I should be in Memphis, where I am to confer with certain of my associates--Eastern men like myself, but who, unlike me, are keeping under cover--to confer with them concerning our rights-of-way through the cotton-raising country. I repeat, then, that there is pressing need for immediate action. May I offer you gentlemen fresh cigars?” and he reached for a well-stuffed, silver-mounted case of dull leather. But they were already going--going in a body to see Mr. Henry Betts, late of somewhere up North. Mr. J. Hayden Witherbee's haste, great though it might be, could be no greater than theirs. On their way down Market Street to the gashouse it was decided that, unless the exigencies of the situation demanded a chorus of argument, Major Covington should do the talking. Indeed it was Major Covington who suggested this. Talking, with financial subjects at the back of the talk, was one of the things at which the major fancied himself a success. Mr. Betts sat in the clutter of his small, untidy office like an elderly and reserved gray rat in a paper nest behind a wainscoting. His feet, in square-toed congress gaiters, rested on the fender of a stove that was almost small enough to be an inkstand, and his shoulders were jammed back against a window-ledge. By merely turning his head he commanded a view of his entire property, with the engine house in the near distance and the round tunlike belly of the gas tank rising just beyond it. He was alone. As it happened, he knew all of his callers, having met them in the way of business--which was the only way he ever met anybody. To each man entering he vouchsafed the same greeting--namely, “How-do?”--spoken without emotion and mechanically. Major Covington had intended to shake hands with Mr. Betts, but something about Mr. Betts' manner made him change his mind. He cleared his throat impressively; the major did nearly everything impressively. “A fine day, sir,” said the major. Mr. Betts turned his head slightly to the left and peered out through a smudged pane as if seeking visual confirmation of the statement before committing himself. A look seemed to satisfy him. “It is,” he agreed, and waited, boring his company with his geologic gaze. “Ahem!” sparred Major Covington--“think I will take a chair.”