It was, he said, in reality
to be the coaling station of a certain European power which he did
not name but which the younger man seemed to understand. They talked
of wharves and tracts of land, of sovereignty and blue prints, the
Monroe Doctrine, value in case of war, and a lot of other things.
Then they talked of money, and though Charley was most assiduous at
the time all he overheard was something about 'ten thousand francs'
and 'buying her off,' and finally a whispered confidence of which
he caught the words, 'just a blind to get her over here, away from
Paris.' Finally the dark man in an apparent burst of confidence
said something about 'the other plans being the real thing after
all,' and that the whole affair would bring him in fifty thousand
francs, with which he could afford to be liberal. Charley could
get no inkling about what that other thing was.
"But I felt sure that he had heard enough to warrant the belief
that some kind of confidence game was being discussed. To tell the
truth I didn't care much what it was, at the time. It might have
been an attempt of the dark-visaged fellow to sell the Canal to a
come-on. What I wanted was to have it known that the Vanderveer
was not to be a resort of such gentry as this.
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