Part 67 (1/2)
”Good, but we must know beforehand how much you are to get. Your demands may be such that it would be better for him to stick to the Recquillarts.”
”Recquillart gets ten percent of the profits, besides a small commission as broker. I will take five.”
”It's a good deal.”
”I will not accept less; the arrangement might cost me my career.
Consult him....”
”If I could consult him! The truth is that there may not be time. We will accept five.”
”What does the Minister wish to speculate in? The same things as with Recquillart? Foreign Loans and Northerns?”
”Exactly. Just as before.”
”All right. The investment, as you can see, is safe,” Puchol continued.
”I would put my fortune in it, if I had one. There are a lot of newspapers bought; all the financial reviews are predicting a rise.”
The clerk took out a folded review and handed it to Caesar, who read:
”We are a.s.sured that the plan of the Spanish Minister of Finance must make foreign securities rise considerably. Northerns will follow the same path, and there are indications that their rise will be very rapid and will cover several points.”
”The field is going to be covered with corpses,” said Caesar.
Senor Puchol burst out laughing; Caesar invited him to dine with him, and gave him a sumptuous dinner with good wines.
Puchol was absolutely vain, and he boasted of his triumphs on the Bourse; it was he who guided Recquillart in the dealings he had with Spaniards, in which they had plucked various incautious persons.
”How much will the Minister's operation amount to?” Caesar asked him.
”n.o.body can prevent his making three hundred thousand, at the least.
With the increase he has ordered you to make, it will come to six hundred thousand. We will gobble up the two points it falls.”
”I don't know if there may have been some new order while I was in the train coming to Paris,” said Caesar.
”No, his operation is all arranged,” replied Puchol, and he got out a note-book and consulted it. ”It will be like giving away bread. We are going to sell ten millions of Foreigns and five hundred Northerns on the seventeenth, the eighteenth, and the twentieth.”
”And the scoop will take place?” asked Caesar.
”On the 27th.”
”So that on those days we shall sell just as much again?”
”And we shall sell much dearer.”
They dropped that point and talked of other things.
Senor Puchol was a literary man and was writing a symbolistic drama which he wanted to read to Caesar.