He laughed. “Singular name, isn’t it? Very much like yours.”
“Now you mention it, so it is. But, of course, it isn’t my name;” and I smiled in my turn.
“Of course not. A strange story, though. Do you think your—friend would know anything about it?”
“I shouldn’t be in the least surprised. I’ll find out. By the way, your man seems to have been roughly handled. Don’t you think he ought to be promoted in some way?”
“Promotion is slow, you see. Do you think you could do anything for him?” he asked, as if the idea had just occurred to him; and smiled again slyly.
“I don’t see how it affects me. Wait, I have an idea. I can tell you how you can do it, and make a pile for yourself at the same time. This camp on the hills he speaks of must be the spot where my friend went prospecting about some mine deposits. He told me there was a fortune waiting there for the man who developed the thing; but he knows the difficulty which a foreigner would have in working it, and has given it up. Why not get hold of the concessions yourself; they can be had for a song; and put this man in charge to carry on the work?”
“It would take money.”
“Oh, there would be no difficulty about that if the thing had official influence behind it—such for instance as yours. The thing’s right. The ore’s there, I know that.”
“You know it?” he put in quickly.
“I’d trust my friend’s judgment as freely as my own.”