It was just as well that they did not adhere to their original plan, for when Ben explained to Master Spry the reason why they could not keep their engagement with him, he gruffly told them that it was just as well, for he had already made up his mind to go to Jersey City in search of the defaulter, Tim Dooley. Therefore they were not troubled with any pangs of conscience because they were leaving Dickey to mourn alone while they planned the transformation of the attic, and their dinner was eaten with a celerity that astonished their landlady. Johnny took upon himself the duties of architect, and, considering the difficulties in the way of such labor, the others were not unwilling that he should hold the office. Master Jones found that there was a vast deal of difference between thinking of what he would like to do in the way of making improvements, and actually planning how to make them. He knew that he wanted a stage at one end of the attic, but when the others waited to hear how he could go to work to build it with the limited amount of capital at his disposal, he was almost at a loss to know what to say or do. In order that they might set about their work understandingly, Nelly produced what had originally been a tape-measure one foot in length. It had seen such hard usage, however, that only about eight inches remained. With this the amateur architect set about a portion of his work, which was to him very painful. He decided first that it would be a useless waste of material to build a stage entirely across one end of the attic, since they would not be crowded from lack of room, owing to the small number of performers, and after a great amount of pacing back and forth, as well as mental calculation, he drew two chalk lines at supposed equal distances from the walls. Between these lines he measured with his fragment of a tape-measure, and found that it was exactly thirty times the length of the tape. Thirty times eight inches was, therefore, the length of his proposed stage, or, more properly speaking, his platform, and he seated himself, with a look of perplexity on his face and a remarkably small piece of lead-pencil in his mouth, to figure up the grand total of inches. He could multiply the cipher easily enough, for he was positive that the answer would be the same, however large the multiplier might be; but the question of how much eight times three was troubled him greatly. After trying in vain to arrive at the correct result by the process of multiplication, he, in his despair, was about to resort to the tiresome expedient of counting the number of inches on the tape-measure thirty times over, when Paul astonished him considerably by giving the result without even using the pencil and paper.