One of 'em had just come from Felix Marchand and he was full of it.

What was it?
Why, the second night of the strike your new bridge over the river was to be blown up.

Marchand was to give these two toughs three hundred dollars each for doing it." "Blown up with what ?" Ingolby asked sharply.
"Dynamite." "Where would they get it ?" "Some left from blasting below the mills." "All right! Go on." "There wasn't much more.

Old Barbazon, the landlord, come in and they quit talking about it; but they said enough to send 'em to gaol for ten years." Ingolby blinked at Jowett reflectively, and his mouth gave a twist that lent to his face an almost droll look.
"What good would it do if they got ten years--or one year, if the bridge was blown up?
If they got skinned alive, and if Marchand was handed over to a barnful of hungry rats to be gnawed to death, it wouldn't help.
I've heard and seen a lot of hellish things, but there's nothing to equal that.

To blow up the bridge--for what?
To spite Lebanon, and to hurt me; to knock the spokes out of my wheel.