“He did not ask it. He raised the money somehow, perhaps from our old advances, and bought them from the broker. The broker was of course myself. The beauty of all this is, that I send applicants for money, who give their notes; he gets money from me and gives his notes to me, and then advances the money to these applicants, who bring it back to me. It’s odd, isn’t it?” Louis smiled. “Has he no _bona fide_ debtors in his own county?” “Oh yes, plenty of them; but more than half of his advances have been made to my men. “Did you hint any thing about issuing notes?” “Oh yes, and the bait took wonderfully. He made his bank a bank of issue at once, and sent out a hundred and fifty thousand pounds in notes. I think it was in this way that he got the money for all that American stock. At any rate, it helped him. As he has only a small supply of gold in his vaults, you may very readily conjecture his peculiar position.” Louis was silent for a time. “You have managed admirably, Frank,” said he at last. “Oh,” rejoined Frank, “Potts is very small game, financially. There is no skill needed in playing with him. He is such a clumsy bungler that he does whatever one wishes. There is not even excitement. Whatever I tell him to do he does. Now if I were anxious to crush the Rothschilds, it would be very different. There would then be a chance for skill.” “You have had the chance.” “I did not wish to ruin them,” said Frank. “Too many innocent people would have suffered. I only wished to alarm them. I rather think, from what I hear, that they were a little disturbed on that day when they had to pay four millions. Yet I could have crushed them if I had chosen, and I managed things so as to let them see this.” “How?” “I controlled other engagements of theirs, and on the same day I magnanimously wrote them a letter, saying that I would not press for payment, as their notes were as good to me as money. Had I pressed they would have gone down. Nothing could have saved them. But I did not wish that. The fact is they have locked up their means very much, and have been rather careless of late. They have learned a lesson now.” Louis relapsed into his reflections, and Frank began to answer his letters. CHAPTER XXXVII THE “PROMETHEUS.”