Arthur Mervyn - Or, Memoirs of the Year 1793 by Charles Brockden Brown
page 45 of 522 (08%)
page 45 of 522 (08%)
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"Impossible," exclaimed the other. "Mark how he lives. Have I not seen
his bank-account? His deposits, since he has been here, amount to no less than half a million." "Heaven grant that it be so!" said the lady, with a sigh. "I shall think with less aversion of your scheme. If poor Tom's fortune be made, and he not the worse, or but little the worse on that account, I shall think it on the whole best." "That," replied he, "is what reconciles me to the scheme. To him thirty thousand are nothing." "But will he not suspect you of some hand in it?" "How can he? Will I not appear to lose as well as himself? Tom is my brother, but who can be supposed to answer for a brother's integrity? but he cannot suspect either of us. Nothing less than a miracle can bring our plot to light. Besides, this man is not what he ought to be. He will, some time or other, come out to be a grand impostor. He makes money by other arts than bargain and sale. He has found his way, by some means, to the Portuguese treasury." Here the conversation took a new direction, and, after some time, the silence of sleep ensued. Who, thought I, is this nabob who counts his dollars by half-millions, and on whom it seems as if some fraud was intended to be practised? Amidst their wariness and subtlety, how little are they aware that their conversation has been overheard! By means as inscrutable as those which conducted me hither, I may hereafter be enabled to profit by this |
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