“What possible difference can that make?” asked Ed, indignantly. “You’re a thief. We have caught you with hundreds of thousands of dollars’ worth of other people’s property in your possession. We have only one thing to do. We must deliver you to the officers of the law. We should do that if not a cent of reward was offered. We should do it simply because we’re ordinarily honest persons who think that thieves ought to be punished and that stolen property ought to be returned to its owners. What has the reward to do with it?” “I’m glad you look at it in that way,” said the prisoner. “At most the reward is a trifle, as you say. Five thousand dollars to five of you means only a thousand dollars apiece. Now I’ve a business proposition to make. Suppose you let me slip ashore somewhere down here, I’ll leave behind me--I’ll put into your hands all the coupon bonds. They’re better than cash--they are good for their face and a good deal more anywhere. You boys can sink the old flatboat down the river somewhere, sell out the bonds to any banker, and go ashore rich--worth more than anybody in Vevay’s got, or ever will have.” The man spoke eagerly, but not excitedly, and he watched closely to see the effect of his words. Ed preserved his self-control. Indeed, it was his habit always to grow cool, or at least to seem so, in precise proportion to the occasion for growing hot. He waited awhile before he spoke. Then he said:-- “Jim Hughes,--or whatever your name is--well, I’ll simply call you Thief, for that name belongs to you even if nothing else that you possess does,--you thief, if you had made such a proposition as that to my father, he would have--well, he was said to be hot-headed. I’m not hot-headed--” “No. You’re reasonable. You’re--” “Stop!” shouted Ed. “If you weren’t tied up there and helpless, you’d make me hot-headed, too, like my father, and I’d do to you what he would have done. As it is, I’m cool-headed. I’ll ‘talk business’ with you; and the business I have to talk is just this: I forbid you from this moment to open your mouth again, except to ask for water, while you are on this flatboat. If you say one other word to me or to any of my companions I’ll forget that I am not my hot-headed father, and--well, it will be very greatly the worst for you. Now not a word!” seeing that the fellow was about to speak. “Not a word, except the word ‘water,’ till my brother turns you over to the officers of the law. I’m not captain, but this particular order of mine ‘goes.’ I’m going to ask my brother to pass it on to the others, and it will be enforced, be very sure. They are not cool-headed as I am, particularly Phil. He’s like my father sometimes. Remember, you are not to speak any word except ‘water’ till you pass from our custody.”