grouped
themselves round the big box stove that was stuffed with blazing
hardwood.

"Lived here long, Mr. Manson?" hazarded Riggs, stretching his thin
fingers to the heat.

"All my life, gentlemen, and I don't want anything else."

"You haven't been in jail for that time?" put in the irrepressible
Stoughton.

The big man relaxed to a smile. "I've been in charge here for the last
twenty-five years, and I like it."

The three glanced at him with a sudden and genuine interest. The man
was so massive; his hair so black, and, at the age of fifty, still
unstreaked with gray. His face was large and strong, with a certain
Jovian quality in cheek, ear, and chin. He suggested latent physical
powers that, if aroused, would be tremendous.

"Find it pretty quiet?" went on Stoughton.

"Yes, but that's what I like."

"Then you don't entirely approve of our plans up at the rapids? At
least, so Mr. Clark tells me."

Manson's glance lifted and went straight into Clark's gray eyes.

"No, I don't believe in them, if," he added, "I can say so without
offense."

Riggs stripped off his heavy fur coat, and turned his back to the stove.

"Just why, may I ask?"

"Well, I have a feeling you'll spoil St. Marys. It's just right as it
is. We haven't much excitement and I reckon we don't want it. We're
comfortable, so why can't you let us alone? I like the life as it is."

"You'll live faster after we get going," chuckled Wimperley.

"Perhaps, but we won't live so long. I've had a lot of men through my
hands who tried to live faster, and it didn't agree with them--not that
I'm meaning--" The rest was lost in a riot of laughter, out of which
Wimperley's voice became audible.

"If things go as we propose and expect, the people of St. Marys will
profit very considerably,--there will be remarkable opportunities."

"Meaning that,--" a new light flickered in Manson's black eyes for a
fraction of a second and disappeared.

"Meaning that during the transformation of a village into a city a
number of interesting changes take place."

"Maybe, but such things can't affect me very much."

"Well, possibly not, but I've an idea they will. I'm afraid we can't
let St. Marys alone, Mr. Manson, and a little later on you'll
understand why. This land, for instance, between us and the river, is
vacant."

Manson's eye slowly traversed the two hundred yard width of the open
field that lay just south of the road. It was perhaps half