“I been thinking, George,” said Jimmy one evening, when they had been working on his idea about a month. “I told Mr. Hope all about this plan of ours that first day. He’s never said a word about it since, except to tell me Mr. Wentworth said it was rotten. It worries me sometimes to think he’s in the secret. I used to think I liked him. But I don’t. I’m afraid of him, somehow. Do you like him?” “No, I don’t,” said Mr. Cooper decidedly. “I’ve been wondering,” Jimmy went on, “suppose he wanted to use the idea for his own. It’s good—we know that now. And anybody who knows about it could use it. That’s what worries me—to think Hope knows all about it, too.” The office manager deliberated on this. “What could he do if he wanted to?” he asked finally. “I don’t know; what could he?” “Nothing that I know of. He told the boss about it—the boss knows it’s your idea. You can trust R. G., Jimmy; he’s as square as they come.” “I believe you,” said Jimmy. “But just the same—” “Just the same, Hope will bear watching. You’re right on that. I’ll watch him. But I don’t see what he could do. Probably he’s forgotten all about it by now.” “I hope so,” said Jimmy fervently. With the office manager to help him, Jimmy progressed rapidly with his big idea. It hadn’t taken them more than a few days to discover that the scheme of piping up heat from a fire in the ground was impractical. Then, when they came to study the company’s furnaces, about which Mr. Cooper, being entirely an office man, was almost as ignorant as Jimmy, they found that it was the unconsumed coal gases that could be piped up, not the actual heat—a conclusion that to Isaac Merkle had been immediately obvious. At this point in their investigations they were jubilant, for they realized that the idea _was_ feasible. Mr. Cooper was for an immediate consultation with one of the technical men of the company, but Jimmy absolutely refused. There were too many who knew about it already. Something might happen. And so the office manager had to give up that plan, and they went ahead, studying the thing out alone. “I’d rather it took longer,” said Jimmy. “When we get it ready ourselves we’ll put it up to Mr. Wentworth. After that, we can talk to everybody all we want.” It was just after this—early in November—that Jimmy met Estelle Wentworth socially. And the way it came about was this: Estelle Wentworth was typically a daughter of the rich, aptly described by that familiar alliteration: pretty, proud and petulant. In all her twenty-one years she had been cared for with that care that only a misguided, adoring mother, a father weak enough to desire peace above all else, and the character-enervating luxuries that unlimited money can give.