Just play the game as ye've been playin' it. Keep on bein' Sven
Larsen, the factor's clerk, heavy of wit, an' able with fool questions.
Ye've a fine faculty for actin'; for all durin' supper the lass never
suspected ye. Keep it up for a while; it won't be for long."
"But what's the good of it? We know as much as we'll ever know. Man,
do you know what you're asking? Loving Jean as I love her, I must
stand about and play the fool, while that damned thief basks in her
favor under my very eyes! If there were a good reason, it would be
different. But Wentworth and Orcutt can go no farther; they're
done----"
"Aye, but they're not done," interrupted McNabb. "Ye'll be knowin' me
well enough to know I always have a reason for the things that I do.
It's a hard thing I'm askin' of ye, an' in this case I'll show ye the
reason, though 'tis not my habit. D'ye mind I told ye that the Eureka
material was rollin' down the tote-road by the truck load? Thousands
of dollars worth of it every day is bein' delivered at the mill site.
Why? Because for some reason Orcutt has not yet found out that he does
not own the timber. The minute he does find out, not another pound
will be delivered."
"You mean----?"
"I mean that portland cement, an' the reinforcin' steel, an' plate an'
whatever else goes into the construction of a paper mill is bein' set
down on the Shamattawa, one hundred miles from a railway at Orcutt's
expense.
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