Dean stared at him in silent amazement.
"£300 a year is good salary for a young man. If I pay it, I want it earned. Now understand this: what I want in my men is absolute loyalty, absolute obedience to orders, and absolute truthfulness to me. Lie to others if you like—that's no concern of mine—but not to me. Further, understand what orders mean. If I tell you to do a thing, I am wholly responsible for its outcome. The responsibility is not yours—it's mine. Got that?"
"It's very generous of you to give me such a chance, sir. It's much more than I have the right to expect. You can count on my loyalty and obedience to the utmost—of course, provided that——"
"The men I want to raise in my employ, and the men I have raised, leave fine scruples to me. That's my end. Your end is to carry out orders. If you're going to set store on niceties of truthfulness when business interests demand otherwise, you'll remain a two-pound-a-week clerk all your life."
Dean's weakness of moral fibre had been shrewdly weighed up by Larssen. The young man was plastic clay to be moulded by a firm grasp. £300 a year opened out to him a vista of roseate possibilities. £300 a year was his price.
The colour came and went in his face as he thought out the meaning of what his employer had just said. At length he answered: "I owe you many thanks, sir. What do you want me to do?"
"Understand this: £300 a year is your starting salary. If I find you after trial to be the man I think you are, you can look forward to bigger money.... Now my point lies here; Mr Matheson was engaged with me in a large-scale enterprise. Alive, he would have been useful to me. I intend to keep him alive!"
CHAPTER V
THE FIRST MOVE IN THE GAME
At the great Leadenhall Street office of the shipowner, an office which bore outside the simple sign—ostentatious in its simplicity—of "Lars Larssen—Shipping," Arthur Dean had looked upon his employer from afar as some demi-god raised above other business men by mysterious gifts from heaven. A modern Midas with the power of turning what he touched to gold.