"
"Oh, no doubt!" said the President.
"Well, we will agree, then, not to let the shares fall below ninety,
say. It would be suspicious, I think, to hold them higher than that,
when money is two and a half per cent. a month."
"Very well. You will see to this? Be careful what men you speak to."
Mr. Sandford, being left alone, bethought him of Monroe. He did not
wish to give him a statement of affairs; he had put him off once, and
must find some way to satisfy him. How was it to be done? The financier
meditated. "I have it," said he; "I'll send him a quarter's interest in
advance. That's as much as I can spare in these times, when interest
grows like those miraculous pumpkin-vines out West." He drew a check
for two hundred dollars, and dispatched it to Monroe by letter.
So Mr. Sandford had all things snug. The Vortex was going on under
close-reefed topsails. If the notes he held were paid as they matured,
he would have money for new operations; if not, he had arranged that
the debtors should be piloted over the bar and anchored in safely till
the storm should blow over. Everything was secured, as far as human
foresight could anticipate.
Mr. Sandford had now but little use for Fletcher's services, except to
look after his debtors,--to know who was "shinning" in the street, or
"kite-flying" with accommodation-paper.
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