Two days later the three men were aboard a fruit and passenger steamer at Port Antonio, bound for Philadelphia. Beneath the mattress of each man's bunk were twenty cans of opium.
"All you have to do," elaborated the smuggler, "is to open up your baggage for inspection as you approach the port. The inspectors go through it, but never do such a thing as look beneath the mattress. When they have gone you take the opium out from its hiding place and put it into your baggage, which had already been inspected. Then it goes ashore."
"But," insisted the special agent, "is not your stuff examined again on the wharf?"
"This system would not work," Peterson explained, "if you were landing at New York. There the baggage is examined in the staterooms and again on the pier, as the passengers come ashore. But in Philadelphia there is but the one examination, which takes place in the stateroom."
"But is there not a pretty good chance that the inspector may sometime look under the mattress?" Gard asked.
"There is the barest possibility," assented the smuggler. "We have been taking it in this way for years, and it has never been found. But if it is discovered, we have but to look innocent. It cannot be proved that we are responsible for its presence. It might be the steward."
The three came into Philadelphia, and passed the customs officials as the smugglers had prophesied, without a hitch. They went to their hotel, and there found themselves each the possessor of twenty cans of opium, for which they had paid five dollars and for which, Peterson said, they were to receive $27.50. This was the part of the transaction that was yet to be demonstrated.
"We will do but a little business in Philadelphia," said Peterson, "just to show that it can be done."
They took ten cans of the opium to a Chinaman in Arch street, with whom Peterson was acquainted. Yes, this man would buy opium. The price for the same grade was the same as before, $27.50. He could use all he could get. He would be glad to take ten cans. The profit on these ten cans was $225.
"We could have sold him a hundred cans as easily, with ten times the profit," said Peterson.