Onslow shrugged his shoulders. “Some, naturally, or I shouldn’t have come to you. If I’d seen any way to pouching all the plunder single-handed you may bet your life, Mr. Theodore Shelf, I shouldn’t have invited you into partnership.”
“Returns, too, would be very slow.”
“Not necessarily. Float the company, and then turn it over to another company for cash down.”
“Moreover, when the—er—the young men you spoke about, found that the orange-groves did not produce at once in paying quantities, they would write home, and their parents would denounce me as a swindler in the newspapers.”
“No, not you; the other company—the one you sold it to. But then apologists would arise to show that the Jugginses—don’t shy at the word, sir—were lazy and ignorant, and also that they absorbed the corn whisky of the country in excessive quantities. And then that company could grin smugly, and pose as a misunderstood benefactor. So its profits wouldn’t be smirched in the least. Grasp that?”
“Yes, yes: I dare say you have worked it all out to yourself, and thought over the details so many times that the whole scheme seems entirely plausible. But looking at it from the view of a business man, I cannot say that it appears to be an enterprise I should care to embark in. You see it is so very much beyond the scope of my general operations that I—er—hesitate—er—you understand, I hesitate——”
“Yes,” said Patrick Onslow, quietly, “you hesitate because you’ve got something ten times more profitable up your sleeve.”
Shelf started, and shivered slightly.
“You may as well be candid and open with me,” Onslow continued, “and tell me what you are driving at. If it suits me, I’ll say so; and if it doesn’t, I’ll let you know with surprising promptness. And again, if we don’t trade, you may rely on me not to gossip about your suggestion. I’m not the stone-throwing variety of animal. You see I live in a sort of semi-greenhouse myself.”
There was a minute’s pause, during which Theodore Shelf shifted about as though his chair was uneven rock beneath him. Then he jerked out his tale sentence by sentence, squinting sideways at his companion between each period.