Kenneth was sitting up for him when he reached his hotel, and the usually impassive face of the general counsel reflected trouble.

“Out with it,” said Ford wearily; and suddenly the new million of indebtedness became a mountain weight to grind him to powder.

“We’re blocked,” was the brief announcement.  “Two of the grain trains are in, and the Transcontinental lawyers have won the toss.  We’re enjoined by the court from using the service tracks to the elevators.  Didn’t your local people tell you?”

“No,” said Ford.  “I had given orders that I was not to be disturbed.  But what of it?  You expected something of the sort, didn’t you?”

“Yes; and I provided for it.  The injunction will be dissolved when we have our final hearing; but long before that time the mischief will be irreparable, I’m afraid.”

“How?”

“It will be blazoned far and wide that we can’t deliver the goods—­that the opposition has done us up.  I’ve tried to keep it out of the newspapers, or, rather, to persuade them not to make too much of it.  But it wouldn’t go.  The Transcontinental has all the pull in this town, it appears.”

“And you think it will affect the price of the stock?”

“It is bound to, temporarily, at least.  And coming upon the heels of to-day’s sudden tumble—­”

“What’s that?” demanded Ford, dry-lipped, adding:  “I haven’t seen a paper since morning.”

Kenneth wagged his head gloomily.  “It’s pretty bad.  P. S-W. closed at thirty-three—­five points off yesterday’s market.”

“Good Lord!” Ford’s groan was that of a man smitten down in the heat of the fight.  “Say, Kenneth, within a single sweep of the clock-hands I have contracted for more than a million dollars’ worth of material for the western extension—­more than a million dollars’ worth!”

“Well, I’m afraid you have sinned in haste to repent at leisure,” said the lawyer, with a weary man’s disregard for the amenities.  Then he added:  “I’m going to bed.  I’ve had about all I can stand for one day.”

Ford went to the room clerk for his key; reeled would be the better word, since his brain was whirling.  There was a telegram in his box, and he tore it open with fresh and sharper misgivings.  It was from Adair.

The sick man’s getting sicker.  What is the matter with your prescription?  Stock gone off five points, and the bears are squeezing us to beat the band.  Stories flying on the Street that we are a kite without an effective tail; that the courts will keep us out of the elevators.  What do you say?

Ford consulted his watch.  There was barely time to catch the midnight train for New York, and his determination was taken on the spur of the moment.  It was all or nothing, now.