"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