Meanwhile four men sat about the square polished table in Mr. McNally's new office and anxiously discussed ways and means. The scrappy memoranda and what appeared to be problems in addition and subtraction littered about, made it appear that some ground had been pretty thoroughly gone over. There was a momentary lull in the conversation, and the silence was broken only by the tapping of Mr. Wing's pencil as he balanced it between his fingers and let the point rebound on the top of the table. There really seemed to be nothing to say. The alliance between C. & S.C. and Thompson's faction of the M. & T. directors had been arranged some days before. They had met to-day to see how they stood. McNally told what he had done, and it was not so much as they had hoped he would be able to do. The combination was not yet strong enough to take the field. For the past twenty minutes Thompson had been leaning over the table making suggestions in his thick voice, and McNally had sat back and quietly annihilated them by demonstrating their impracticability, or by stating that they had been unsuccessfully tried. Beyond asking one or two incisive questions of McNally, Porter had said nothing, but had stared straight out of the window. For the past ten minutes he had been waiting for Thompson to run down. It was he who broke the silence. “We're stuck fast”--he was speaking very slowly--“unless we can get control of that Tillman City stock.” McNally shook his head doubtfully. “I'm afraid it's no good,” he said. “Look what we've offered them already. They think the stock is going to go on booming clear up to the sky, and they won't sell. We couldn't get it at par.” Porter's chair shot back suddenly. He walked over to the empty fireplace, the other men watching him curiously. He spread his hands behind him mechanically as if to warm them. Then he said:-- “I think we could get it if we were to offer par.” “Offer par!” thundered Thompson. “We could get Jim Weeks's holdings by paying par.” Porter smiled indulgently. “I didn't say we'd _pay_ par for anything. But I think if Mr. McNally were to sign a contract to pay par the day after the M. and T. election, that he could vote the stock on election day.” McNally's plump hand came down softly on the table. “Good!” he said under his breath. But Mr. Thompson failed to understand. “But the contract?” he said. “Such a contract would be a little less valuable than that waste paper,” Porter replied politely, indicating the crumpled sheets on the table. Then he turned to McNally and asked, “How many men will it take to swing it?” “Three, if we get the right ones. Yes, I know the men we want. I can get them all right,” he added, in response to the unspoken question. “It will need a little--oil, though, for the wheels.”