“Lucky man; I wish I could make the same confession. So times are bad in the city, are they?”
“Yes, they are.”
“Then why don’t you chuck the city, and come and live in the West End where life is easy?”
“A rich man may live where he pleases, my lord, but I have been a hard worker all my life.”
“Poor, but honest, eh? Still, when all’s said and done, Mr. Schwartzbrod, I really believe that you hard workers enjoy your money better when you get it than we leisurely people who have never known the lack of it. I believe in honesty myself, and if I were not of so indolent a nature, I think I might perhaps have become an honest man. But a busy laborer like yourself, Mr. Schwartzbrod, has not come to the West End to hear me talk platitudes about honesty. In America the man goes West who intends to work hard. In London a man comes west when he has made money.
“‘You miss a great deal of pleasure in life.’”
“He has his pile in the city, and expects to cease work. You have come west temporarily to see me about some matter which the telephone delighted in mixing up with buzzings and rattlings and intermittent chattering that made your theme difficult to comprehend. Perhaps you will be good enough to let me know in what way I may serve you.”
“At the time when I expected to operate the gold field, which you know of, my lord, I chartered a steamer, named the Rajah, at Southampton.”
“Oh, the Rajah!” interrupted his lordship, sitting up, a gleam of intelligent comprehension animating his face. “The Rajah was what you were trying to say? I thought you were speaking of a Jolly Roger. Roger was the word that came over to me, and ‘Jolly Roger’ means the flag of a pirate ship, or something pertaining to piracy, so I, recognizing your voice, thinks to myself: ‘What, in the name of Moses and the Prophets, can a respectable city personage mean by speaking of the Jolly Roger, as if he were a captain of buccaneers.’ Oh, yes, the Rajah! Now I understand. Proceed, Mr. Schwartzbrod.”
The personage seemed to turn a trifle more sallow than usual as the other went on enthusiastically talking of pirate ships and buccaneers, but he surmised that the young nobleman meant nothing in particular, as he sank back once more in his easy-chair, and again half closed his eyes, blowing the smoke of his cigar airily aloft. Presently, moistening his lips, Conrad Schwartzbrod found voice, convinced that the other’s allusion to marine pillage was a mere coincidence, and not a covert reference to Frowningshield and his merry men, or to the mission of the Rajah herself.