“If you need to be told. It’s a ‘second,’ all right enough; it sets unevenly, and is otherwise off color; but nobody will ever know the difference after it’s in place in the bottom of the river.” For a moment the air of the small bunk shack became stifling and David Vallory got up and went to stand in the doorway. When he turned back to Shubrick it was to say: “Then the whole thing was a frame-up, was it?--to enable us to work off a cheaper grade of Portland in a place where it couldn’t show up?” “Of course it was. We have to play even when we can.” “But I had that shipment analyzed myself. I sent samples of it to the university.” “Then you took your samples from the wrong sacks, that’s all. I’m using the stuff in the caisson, and I guess I know what I’m talking about. It’s punk.” “If that is so, why haven’t the railroad people found it out in a second test?” “That’s easy. This time Congdon was right on the job and saw to it that they got the proper kind of samples. You needn’t look so horrified; the bridge isn’t going to tumble down.” But more important things than bridges were tumbling down in David Vallory’s heart and mind at that moment. When a young man has grown up in an ethical atmosphere the first broad step toward the unethical is apt to be subversive of a good many preconceived ideas and standards. After a time he said: “Shubrick, the frame-up wasn’t altogether on the railroad people. Part of it was on me.” “That’s easy, too,” said the older man. “Grimsby was merely trying to provide you with a good, stout _alibi_; to leave you a nice, respectable hole to crawl out of in case there should be any future to the thing. But if you’re really stirred up about it, you are foolish. Things like that are done every day. We are fighting for our own hand. The Golden Rule is pretty to look at, but it doesn’t hold water in business.” “You’re taking the ground that we are dealing with a condition and not with principles of right and wrong?” “Precisely. A man has got to be loyal to something, Vallory: I’m loyal to my bread and butter; so, too, in the long run, are you, and ninety-nine other men out of a hundred. Possibly it digs a little deeper with you. Haven’t I heard you say that you’d willingly go a mile or so out of your way where Mr. Grillage’s interests are concerned?--that it was up to you to take long shifts or hard ones, or anything else that came up?” “You have.”