his brother or his wife's brother or because he likes him or because he is afraid of him or because he has something on him; so you've got to become closer than a brother, or a wife's brother, or you've got to make him more afraid of you or you've got to get more on him than the other fellow has—then you'll get the business. I'm working around to it, but it takes time; and it doesn't look like we had a lot of time, does it?"
"No."
He held out his hand. "Good-by," he said to her. To-morrow morning, he would see her again here in the office, but to-morrow they would not be together at the end of the day. It was good-by to this intimacy, he meant. She took his hand and looked up at him and slowly a hot flush crept up to the roots of her hair.
He left at noon on the morrow; and on the next day, when he was in New York, the Soo was open! The ice, even in Superior, was conquered. Day before yesterday the ice-breakers, plunging and charging, had cleared a channel through White Fish Bay where, at the outlet of the greatest of lakes, the west winds of April had rallied the last bulwarks of winter. St. Mary's River and the canals of the Soo were clear; the freighters, heavy with iron, were coming through!
There in the north (as Ellen gazed from the office window) hung a spot above the clear, blue horizon. It was sunny and mild on Lake Michigan; spring securely stood. So the spot in the north was smoke. Now appeared a prow with a pilothouse and mast above it; a long, lean hull lay low abaft it, and there was the after mast and funnel!
