The Birmingham age-herald., 1907-05-19
Me Race .@ Number 70

sold to anybody else, he might bring Tn some capital and some brains, and you might succeed Running it alone, you'll bust. Lord, but I'll be glad to see that! A business corpse, am I? We'll see It's worth less than nothing, but you can have it for five hundred, a thousand two thousand whatever you pleaseN
 Two thousand, then" said Morgan. He touched a button and immediately a stenographer appeared Mir Peck looked glowering on while Morgan dictated a bill of sale the consideration being a note for 5000. Perhaps he was not wholly pleased; perhaps, for all his buster, he had not expected to be snapped up in this wise. But he grimly signed the docu- ment when it was presented him, and grimly slipped Morgan's note into his wallet.
 He rose and put on his hat.
 "One fact, of course you understand, , Miss Peck. We'll no daughter of mine is going to have anything to do with a fool and a failure You set that down!'
 Morgan preserved a show of indiffer- ence, but there was sudden consterna- ton within. In the outburst of wrath against the father he had completely for gotten fthe daughter.
 When Morgan had declared to MT. Peck that he was going to build a racer he Ildu SDOkGH out or lDe DTdNdQO OI lut IJO- ment but as he sat at his desk looking his new situation over his cool reason told him that to try for the American cup was his only chance of snatching success from failure. He considered his resources for such an effort. If he were to mort gage to it's limit the factory equipment (the building was rented one) and bor- row and beg dollars wherever dollars could be begged and borrowed he could mn tba Of running the factory for thfee months longer and could build car for the race. The odds against success were neavy. But Nor gan was the sort that fights to the last hope. and past it. He would take the chance.
 All the while that Morgan was study ing this side and that of his slender busi- ness chance part of his mind was en- gagged upon his chance in a very differ ent enterprise. By the end of the after noon it was the second alone that he was considering. He knew that MT. Peck would tell, doubtless had told, his daugh- ter of the quarrel, and if he wanted Miss Peck to continue thinking of him the way he hoped she was beginning to think he must clear himself in her eyes. So, with inward trembling at his daring, he called her up just before leaving the office and asked if he might see her that evening.
 The voice that came to him over the wire was chilly, very chilly: "I have an engagement"
 Morgan was dumb for several seconds Tomorrow evening, then?"
 q shall be busy then, too."
 He filled with dizzy sickness. Her ex- cuse was as plain in it's meaning as plain words would have been. But he wanted the plain words. ''Then you don't want to see me-"
 There was brief silence. "I don't think do," said the chilly voice.
 Morgan hung up the receiver. He was both angry and heartsick He decided with the wise philosophy of the disap- pointed lover to put her out of his head, but he was to find. in the days to come, that he evicted her only to have her watch till he was off his guard and then slip back again
 The following two days Morgan spent in New York He returned with $o0O0, and with his honor pawned to his friends and with the next five years of his life sold to the money lenders. When he entered the office there was Mir. Peck at his desk. Morgan gave his old partner cold look, but said not a word. Just came down to see about my mail" MT. Peck muttered, somewhat abashed, but gruffly. Morgan did not answer.
 That day the building Of the racer be- ganI The big race was at the end Of September. this was the enu ol Juhe- three months in which to build the ma chine, tune it up and become its master. The frame and many other parts of their hfty-horsepower touring car could be used; but the engine-Morgan had de- cided it should be ninety-horsepower-h to be made entirely new, and likewise all the parts of the driving gear. There was work a-plenty for the half dozen most skillful men he had selected to help him, for every part had to be made with in- finite care tested with infinite care, and fitted to it's place with the infinite care Of a surgeon working in the brain. For all the heartache in him. Morgan enjoyed these days of the cars growing. It was a long untasted pleasure to work in free- dom of the domineering methods of Mir Peck-though that gentleman continued coming to the factory daily.
 By the first of September it was done long, squat. dingy creature, whose lean lines suggested the athlete trained to supremest fitness. At the very break of each morning Morgan was on the roads about Milford testing his creation He did not care to let it show it's speed upon the public highways. even though at dawn they were deserted, but at forty miles an hour every part worked easily and the car boomed along without the