“Mexican loan, fifty thousand; Guatemala, fifty thousand; and Venezuela bonds, fifty thousand.”
“He is quite lavish.”
“Oh, quite. That makes it so pleasant to do business with him.”
“Did you advance the money for this?”
“He did not ask it. He raised the money somehow, perhaps from our old advances, and bought them from the broker. The broker was of course myself. The beauty of all this is, that I send applicants for money, who give their notes; he gets money from me and gives his notes to me, and then advances the money to these applicants, who bring it back to me. It’s odd, isn’t it?”
Louis smiled.
“Has he no bona fide debtors in his own county?”
“Oh yes, plenty of them; but more than half of his advances have been made to my men.
“Did you hint any thing about issuing notes?”
“Oh yes, and the bait took wonderfully. He made his bank a bank of issue at once, and sent out a hundred and fifty thousand pounds in notes. I think it was in this way that he got the money for all that American stock. At any rate, it helped him. As he has only a small supply of gold in his vaults, you may very readily conjecture his peculiar position.”