CHAPTER XXIV

THE BATTLE OF WITS

Ralph instantly arose to his feet and unlocked the office door. He was about to open it when it was forcibly burst inwards in his grasp.

"We want to get in here," vociferated a strident voice, and a consequential-looking little fellow, wearing his coat open so that a constable's badge showed on his vest, swept over the threshold as if he was leading an army to an attack.

"Certainly," said Ralph, with great politeness. "Come in, gentlemen--there's a good fire and enough chairs, I guess."

He was interested in quickly casting his eye over the marauding group.

Six men had followed the constable in hot haste. One of them, who kept close to the officer, seemed to be his a.s.sistant. Four men, rough looking and with fiery breaths and faces, Ralph recognized as the group he had seen in the town that afternoon, two of whom had followed him to the lawyer's house.

The real leader of the party, however, was a man whom Ralph had never seen before. He at once surmised that this was Dorsett. The latter pushed the others aside and stepped up to Ralph insolently.

"Who are you?" he demanded, with a scowl of suspicion and dislike.

"I represent the brother of Mr. Glidden."

"Oh, you do?" sneered Dorsett. "I thought you was the office boy."

"Representative, hey?" snapped out the constable quickly. "Stand aside, Mr. Dorsett. This is the very person I wish to see."

The official made a great ado getting a bundle of papers out of his pocket. He selected one, flopped it open and fixed an imperious eye on Ralph.

"As agent de facto, ex officio, essettery, I present a demand against Henry William Glidden in the penal sum of four thousand one hundred and twenty-seven dollars and ninety-eight cents. Are you authorized to pay the same, deprosedendum, or forever hold your peace."

"I have one thousand dollars at the home of the lawyer," explained Ralph.

"Cash?" demanded the constable, licking his chops and blinking his eyes like a ravenous wolf at the mention of money.

"Yes, sir, and the balance will be here in Derby before court sits in the morning."

"Court don't sit any more in this case," growled out Dorsett, who all along had regarded Ralph with a leery eye. "Here's the court."

"I say, Dorsett, the lad talks business. One thousand dollars ain't to be sneezed at. So much on account, see? Just an appetizer. We'll gobble the whole outfit finally. Um-m-m--" and his voice died away into a drone into the ear of Dorsett only, who shook his head with the forcible words:

"No. I won't lose a minute. Get at your job instantly."

"Ha-hum," observed the constable, flapping the doc.u.ment in his hand importantly and again approaching Ralph. "Ipse dixit de profundis--you refuse to pay this just claim?"

"It will be paid within the legal limit of time," answered Ralph.

"The legal limit of time has elapsed," declared the constable, "as witness this doc.u.ment."

"Then I suppose you take possession?" said Ralph. "That is all right. As soon as Mr. Glidden's brother arrives he will put up the cash or a bond and redeem the plant."

"That can't be done," observed the constable. "Practically we are already in possession. The plaintiff, however, has sued out a writ extraordinary. As a.s.signee of the original seller of the melting tanks, which were purchased, not on open account but on contract, and the same held delinquent, he has here in this doc.u.ment a writ of replevin. We want those tanks. The balance will come later."

"Very well, gentlemen," said Ralph coolly, "if you are sure you are within your legal rights, go ahead."

The constable's a.s.sistant made a rush for the iron door.

"Only," continued Ralph impressively, "don't try it through that room."

"Hey--why not?" demanded the constable, p.r.i.c.king up his ears.

"Because the corroding vats are in action, and one minute in that poisonous air would smother the last one of you."

"Hah!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed the constable, "we shall see."

He advanced to the iron door and lifted its hasped bar.

"Whew!" he gurgled, slamming it shut again, one whiff sending him reeling back as though he had been hit with a club.

"Tricked us, have you," gritted Dorsett, darting a malevolent look at Ralph. "Get around to the rear, you four. Smash out those barred windows."

"I submit," interposed Ralph calmly, "that won't do any good. The tanks are red hot and will remain so for many hours."

"Baffled!" hissed the constable dramatically. "Dorsett, they've got the drop on you. No, no," continued the official, lifting his hand as the infuriated Dorsett seemed about to dash out of the office bent on any destruction, so long as he carried out his evil designs, "law is law."

"And you've got a writ to execute it, haven't you?" yelled Dorsett.

"Not with violence, my dear sir--not with violence," mildly intimated the constable. "I fear we have proceeded with undue haste. I a.s.sumed that the plant would be inactive."

"It was, up to last evening."

"On that hypothesis we took out a writ for immediate seizure of certain specified chattels. You may enter, seize, and distrain. You may stretch a point and force a door or smash a window, but you have no warrant to batter down a wall. If you did--red hot, see?" and with a rather sickly smile the speaker went through a pantomime of seizing and briskly dropping an overheated object.

"Then take possession," commanded Dorsett stormily. "Get this young marplot out of here and let no more of his ilk in again."

"Sorry," retorted the constable, "but there again we have checkmated ourselves. Relying to your statements we took extreme measures to tear out the tanks and later put a custodian in charge. We cannot now legally enter here or remain here except on a new writ of possession."

Now was Ralph's hour of triumph and he could not refrain from smiling to himself. Dorsett noticed it and thrashed about like a madman. He did not a.s.sault the quiet unpretentious lad who held him and his scowling myrmidons at bay, but he looked as if he would like to have done so.

Finally Dorsett quieted down. He drew the constable to one side of the room and they held a rapid consultation. Then the constable's a.s.sistant was beckoned to join them, and later two of Dorsett's allies.

This trio left the office instructed by the constable to hasten to the magistrate in the next township who had issued the replevin writ, and secure a broader doc.u.ment for possession of the premises.

Calm fell over the place at their departure. Meantime the furnaces at the rear of the plant roared on merrily, and Ralph mentally calculated how long it would be before they cooled down and Dorsett got his itching fingers in play to cripple and destroy.

Perhaps an hour went by. The marauding party was lounging and dozing.

Ralph bent his ear to listen as a locomotive whistle in the distance told of the pa.s.sage of a train from the north.

The young dispatcher knew the schedule like a book. No train was due till daybreak. A second outburst of tooting signals informed and electrified him.