“Exactly. That is to say, if I am right about my visitor.”
“But how did they—how could any one know about Tim Gorman’s invention?”
Ascher shrugged his shoulders.
“Surely,” I said, “Gorman can’t have been such a fool as to talk to newspaper reporters.”
“We need not suppose so,” said Ascher. “My experience is that anything worth knowing always is known. The world of business is a vast whispering gallery. There is no such thing as secrecy.”
“Well,” I said, “the main point is that this man did know. What did he want?”
“He wanted us to sell the patent rights,” said Ascher. “What he said was that he had a client—he posed as some kind of commission agent—who would pay a substantial sum for them.”
“That is just what Gorman said would happen once it was understood that your firm is behind the new company.”
“Gorman is—well, astute. But you understand, I am sure, that we cannot do that kind of business.”
“I always had a suspicion,” I said, “that Gorman’s scheme was fishy.”