“Surely I expressed myself in a manner you could understand,” said he, with the slightest emphasis on the “you.”  “Aureataland will meet her obligations.  You will receive all your due, Mr. Martin.  That is so, gentlemen?”

Don Antonio acquiesced at once.  Johnny Carr, I noticed, said nothing, and fidgeted rather uneasily in his chair.  I knew what the President meant.  He meant, “If we don’t pay, pay it out of your reserve fund.”  Alas, the reserve fund was considerably diminished; I had enough, and just enough, left to pay the next installment if I paid none of my own debts.  I felt very vicious as I saw his Excellency taking keen pleasure in the consciousness of my difficulties (for he had a shrewd notion of how the land lay), but of course I could say nothing.  So I rose and bowed myself out, feeling I had gained nothing, except a very clear conviction that I should not see the color of the President’s money on the next interest day.  True, I could just pay myself.  But what would happen next time?  And if he wouldn’t pay, and I couldn’t pay, the game would be up.  As to the original loan, it is true I had no responsibility; but then, if no interest were paid, the fact that I had applied the second loan, my loan, in a different manner from what I was authorized to do, and had represented myself to have done, would be inevitably discovered.  And my acceptance of the bonus, my dealings with the reserve fund, my furnishing inaccurate returns of investments, all this would, I knew, look rather queer to people who didn’t know the circumstances.

When I went back to the bank, revolving these things in my mind, I found Jones employed in arranging the correspondence.  It was part of his duty to see to the preservation and filing of all letters arriving from Europe, and, strange to say, he delighted in the task.  It was part of my duty to see he did his; so I sat down and began to turn over the pile of letters and messages which he had put on my desk; they dated back two years; this surprised me, and I said: 

“Rather behindhand, aren’t you.  Jones?”

“Yes, sir, rather.  Fact is, I’ve done ’em before, but as you’ve never initialed ’em, I thought I ought to bring ’em to your notice.”

“Quite right—­very neglectful of me.  I suppose they’re all right?”

“Yes, sir, all right.”

“Then I won’t trouble to go through them.”

“They’re all there, sir, except, of course, the cable about the second loan, sir.”

“Except what?” I said.

“The cable about the second loan,” he repeated.

I was glad to be reminded of this, for of course I wished to remove that document before the bundle finally took its place among the archives.  Indeed, I thought I had done so.  But why had Jones removed it?  Surely Jones was not as skeptical as that?

“Ah, and where have you put that?”

“Why, sir, his Excellency took that.”