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 fact of the matter is that he’s a sort of black-sheep— sent out on the remittance system, if the truth is known, and with letters of introduction to some big-bugs out here— that explains how he gets to know these wire-pullers behind the boom. His people have probably got the quarterly allowance business fixed hard and tight with a bank or a lawyer in Sydney; and there’ll have to be enquiries about the lost ‘draft’ (as he calls a cheque) and a letter or maybe a cable home to England; and it might take weeks.”

“Yes,” said Smith, hesitatingly. “That all sounds right enough. But”—with an inspiration—“why don’t he go to one of these big-bug boomsters he knows—that he got letters of introduction to— and get him to fix him up?”

“Oh, Lord!” exclaimed Steelman, hopelessly. “Listen to him! Can’t you see that they’re the last men he wants to let into his game? Why, he wants to use them! They’re the mugs as far as he is concerned!”

“Oh—I see!” said Smith, after hesitating, and rather slowly— as if he hadn’t quite finished seeing yet.

Steelman glanced furtively at the fern-screen, and nudged Smith again.

“He said if he had three hundred, he’d double it by Saturday?”

“That’s what he said,” replied Steelman, seeming by his tone to be losing interest in the conversation.

“And. . . well, if he had a hundred he could double that, I suppose.”

“Yes. What are you driving at now?”