"If that price is to be gained only by the means you have adopted, I do most decidedly dispute the right you speak of. Should the company receive the railway under such conditions, its bankruptcy will be certain. Even if the road be employed to the fullest extent it cannot bring in a sufficient income to indemnify it approximately for the amount of loss sustained; the entire enterprise must either go to ruin, or fall into the hands of some unprincipled schemer."
"And how does that concern us?" Nordheim asked, calmly.
"How does it concern us?" Elmhorst broke forth, indignantly. "To have the work which you devised, to which I have devoted my best energies, at the head of which stand our united names, go miserably to ruin or be an instrument in the hands of swindlers? It concerns me deeply, as I trust I shall be able to show you."
The president arose with an impatient wave of his hand: "Pray spare me such bursts of declamation, Wolfgang. They really are out of place in a business discussion."
The young man drew himself up; all emotion vanished from his face, giving place to an expression of cool contempt, and his voice was every whit as cold as the president's own as he replied, "I shall not content myself with mere declamation, as you will find, sir. Let me ask once for all, calmly and briefly, who furnished the figures upon which the estimates you sent me are based?"
"And you expected me to approve them and put my name to them?"
"I expect every thing of my future son-in-law," Nordheim declared, with sharp emphasis.
"Then you have misunderstood me. I cannot sign the estimates."
"Wolfgang!" There was an evident menace in Nordheim's tone.
"I will not sign them, I say. I never will lend my name to a falsehood."
"You dare to use such language to me?" the president exclaimed, angrily.
"What other language could be used if I should sanction estimates which I know to be false?" Wolfgang asked, with bitterness. "I am the engineer-in-chief, my word is decisive for the company and for the stockholders, who are utterly ignorant in the matter. The responsibility is mine alone."
"Your word could never be questioned," Nordheim interposed. "I had no idea you were such a martinet. You know nothing of business, or you would see that I, in my position, could not possibly venture what I do were there any danger. The figures are so combined that it is impossible to prove an--error from them, and I have explanations prepared for every emergency. No one can blame either you or myself."