He had not been to camp for a week and therefore on this occasion examined the progress of work with care, studying the rate of excavation and calculating the result.
"You'll just about make it through, Bryant, if nothing happens to put a crimp in your advance," he stated when he was about to take his departure from the office, where he and Lee conferred.
"Yes," said Bryant.
"And if anything should happen, then good-bye canal." "That doesn't necessarily follow," said Lee, calmly.
Gretzinger ignored this reply.

He thrust an arm into his fur-lined overcoat and began to draw it on.

That evening he was leaving Kennard for New York, and now was desirous of returning to town by noon, where he had a luncheon engagement with Ruth Gardner.

He had casually mentioned to Bryant that the girls had gone the day before to the McDonnells for the holidays.
"My people were certainly handed a phony deal here," he remarked shortly, as he buttoned the coat collar about his throat.
"Questionable title to the water! Extravagance and poor management! Rotten project all through! If I had lined this thing up, I should have learned what I actually had before a cent was expended.

But of course if the thing goes smash, we in the East have to stand the loss; you're losing no cash, you have nothing in it but a shoestring.