"Stick at
trifles indeed! I should think not. This is Providential--just when we
couldn't quite make up our minds what to do next."
"You're not complimentary to Providence," said Stephen. "Seems to me a
horrid sort of thing to do, though I'm not prepared to say I won't do
it. _She_ doesn't approve, her sister says, you see----"
"Who knows the man better, his wife or the girl?"
"That goes without saying. Well, I'm swallowing my scruples as fast as I
can get them down, though they're a lump in my throat. However, we
wouldn't hurt the little chap, and if the father adores him, as she
says, we'd have Ben Halim pretty well under our thumbs, to squeeze him
as we chose. Knowing his secret as we do, he wouldn't dare apply to the
French for help, for fear we'd give him away. We must make it clear that
we well know who he is, and that if he squeals, the fat's in the fire!"
"That's the right spirit. We'll make him shake in his boots for fear we
give not only the secret, but the boy, over to the tender mercies of the
authorities. For it's perfectly true that if the Government knew what a
trick had been played on them, they'd oust the false marabout in favour
of the rightful man, whoever he may be, clap the usurper into prison,
and make the child a kind of--er--ward in chancery, or whatever the
equivalent is in France. Oh, I can tell you, my boy, this idea is the
inspiration of a genius! The man will see we're making no idle threat,
that we can't carry out.
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