“How are you, Mr. MacMorrogh?” he said; and without waiting for a reply:  “Go on in.  Mr. North is expecting you.”

The burly one returned the nod and passed on to the inner room.  The general manager, a sallow, heavy-visaged man who might have passed in a platform gathering for a retired manufacturer or a senator from the Middle West, swung in his pivot-chair to welcome the incomer.

“Glad to see you, MacMorrogh.  Sit down.  What’s the news from New York?”

The contractor found a chair; drew it close to the general manager’s desk, and filled it.

“I’m thinking you’ll know more about that than I will, Misther North,” he replied, in a voice that accorded perfectly with the burly figure and piratical beard.  “Ford’s fighting us with his fishtes.”

“Why?” asked the general manager, holding his chin in his hand—­a gesture known the entire length of the Pacific Southwestern as a signal of trouble brewing, for somebody.

“God knows, then; I don’t,” said the MacMorrogh.  “I wint to Chicago to see him when the bid was in, and d’ye think he would lave me talk it over with him?  Not him!  Wan day he’d be too busy; and the next, I’d have to call again.  ’Twas good for him I was not me brother Dan.  Dan would’ve kicked the dure in and t’rown him out av the windy.”

The wan ghost of a smile flitted across the impassive face of the big man at the desk.

“Let me tell you something, MacMorrogh.  If you, or your brother Dan, ever find it necessary to go after Ford, don’t give him notice by battering down doors.  You won’t, I know.  But about the contract:  you haven’t heard from the executive committee?”

“Not the half of wan wor-rd.”

“Have you any idea of what is causing the delay?”

“’Tis dommed well I know, Misther North.  Ford is keeping the wires hot against us.  If I could have Misther Colbrith here with you for wan five minutes—­”

The general manager broke in, following his own line of thought.

“Ford is in Denver; he came in from Chicago last night.  Why don’t you go up to the Brown and have it out with him?”

“Fight it out, d’ye mean?”

“Certainly not.  Make friends with him.”

The contractor sat back in his chair and plunged his stubby hands deep into his pockets.

“Give me the sthraight tip, Misther North.”

“It ought to suggest itself to you.  This is a big job, with a great deal of money passing.  Your profits, over and above what you will make out of the company, will be quite large.  Ford is an ambitious young man, and he is not building railroads for his health.”

The MacMorrogh was nodding slowly.  Nevertheless, he made difficulties.

“Me hand’s not light enough for that, Misther North.”

Again the general manager smiled.

“You require a deal of prompting, sometimes, Brian.  What’s the matter with a trusty go-between?”