Then, if you would sign
that, I would take it over to Melville and make terms with him. Of
course, if he knows that he has the mine there will not be much chance of
coming to any arrangement with him.'
'You can make no arrangements with me, Mr. Longworth, that involve
sacrifice of the truth.'
'Ah, well, I suspected as much; but I thought it was worth trying.
However, my dear sir, I may make terms with Melville yet, and then, I
imagine, you won't have much to do with the mine.'
'I shall not have anything to do with it if you and Melville have a share
in it; and if, as you suspect, Melville has the mine, I consider you are
in a bad way. My opinion is that, when one rascal gets advantage over
another rascal, the other rascal will be, as you say, "left."'
Longworth mused over this for a moment, and said:
'Yes, I fear you are right--in fact, I am certain of it. Well, that is
all I wanted to know. I will bid you good-bye. I shan't see you again in
Ottawa, as I shall sail very shortly for England. Have you any messages
you would like given to your friends over there?'
'None, thank you.'
'Well, ta-ta!' And John was left to his packing. That necessary operation
concluded, Kenyon sat down and thought over what young Longworth had told
him. His triumph, after all, had been short-lived. The choice between the
two scoundrels was so small that he felt he didn't care which of them
owned the mine. Meditating on this disagreeable subject, he suddenly
remembered a request he had asked Wentworth to place before the new owner
of the mine.
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