“Let’s play something better than this,” said he. “Did you know I was rich?”
“No,” said Jones.
“Well, I’m very rich—Look here,” he took five sovereigns from his pocket and shewed them with pride. “I play pitch and toss with these,” said he. “Hoover doesn’t mind so long as I don’t lose them. Pitch and toss with sovereigns is fine fun, let’s have a game?”
Jones agreed.
They sat on the divan and played pitch and toss. At the end of ten minutes, Jones had won twenty pounds.
“I think I will stop now,” said Smithers. “Give me back that sovereign I lent you to toss with.”
“But you owe me twenty pounds,” said Jones.
“I’ll pay you that to-morrow,” said Smithers; “these sovereigns are not to be spent, they are only for playing with.”
“Oh, that doesn’t matter,” said Jones, handing back the coin, and recognising that, penniless as he was, here was a small fund to be drawn upon by cunning, should he find a means of escape. “I’m rich. I’m worth ten millions.”
“Ten million sovereigns?”