BOBBY'S MONEY IS ELECTROCUTED AND JOHN BURNIT'S SON WAKES UP Bobby, jubilant, went to see Chalmers next day. The lawyer listened gravely, but shook his head. "I'm bound to tell you, Mr. Burnit, that you have no case. You must have more proof than this to bring a charge of conspiracy. Ripley had a perfect right to talk with Sharpe or to telephone to some one, and mere hot-headedness could explain his shutting off the lights. Your over-enthusiastic friend Bates has ruined whatever prospect you might have had. Your suspicions once aroused, you should have let your man do as he liked, but should have watched him and caught him in a trap of some sort. Now it is too late. Moreover, I have bad news for you. Your contract for city lighting is ironclad, and can not be broken, but I saw to-day a paper signed by an overwhelming majority of your private consumers that the service is not even 'reasonably satisfactory,' and that they wish the field open to competition. With this paper to back them, Stone's council granted the right to the Consolidated Company to erect poles, string wires and supply current. We can bring suit if you say so, but you will lose it." "Bring suit, then!" ordered Bobby vehemently. "Why, Chalmers, the contract for the city lighting alone would cost the Brightlight money every year. The profit has all been made from private consumers." "That's why you're losing it," said Chalmers dryly. "The whole project is very plain to me now. The Consumers and the United Companies never cared to enter that field, because their controlling stock-holders were also the Brightlight controlling stock-holders, and they could get more money through the Brightlight than they could through the other companies; and so they led the public to believe that there was no breaking the monopoly the Brightlight held upon their service. Now, however, they want to gain another stock-jobbing advertisement by driving you out of the field. They planned from the first to wreck you for just that purpose--to make Consolidated stock seem more desirable when the stock sales began to dwindle--and they are perfectly willing to furnish the consumers in your twelve blocks with current at their present ridiculously low rate, because, with them, any possible profits to be derived from the business are insignificant compared to the profits to be derived from the sale of their watered stock. The price of illumination and power, later, will _soar_! Watch it. They're a very bright crowd," and Mr. Chalmers paused to admire them. "In other words," said Bobby glumly. "I am what Biff Bates told me I would be--the goat." "Precisely," agreed Chalmers. "Begin suit anyhow," directed Bobby, "and we'll see what comes of it." "By the way," called Chalmers with a curious smile as Bobby opened the door; "I've just learned that one of the foremost enthusiasts in this whole manipulation has been quiet and conservative Silas Trimmer." Bobby did not swear. He simply slammed the door.