almost hysterical with excitement. A
gentleman, by name "Mr. Francis Delas," called upon Lapierre and offered
him twenty-five million dollars spot cash for his wife's share in the
Tessier inheritance. This person also claimed that he had a power of
attorney from all the other heirs, with the exception of Pettit and
Rozier, and asserted that he was on the point of embarking for New York
in their interest. He urged Lapierre to substitute him for Moreno. But
Lapierre, now convinced that everything was as the General had claimed
it to be, indignantly rejected any such proposition aimed at his old
friend, and sent Mr. Francis Delas packing about his business.

"This is what my answer has been to him: 'Sir, we have already an
agent with whom we can only have cause to be satisfied, so that your
services are not acceptable or needed.' He left me most dissatisfied
and scolding."

The sending of this confederate on the part of the wily General had
precisely the effect hoped for. Lapierre and his friends were now
convinced that the inheritance Tessier was a reality, and that powerful
personages were not only exerting their influence to prevent the
rightful heirs from obtaining their property, but had also in some way
secured the cooperation of government officials. It was agreed, on all
hands, that the worthy landowner, accompanied by Madame Reddon, had
better proceed at once to the scene of operations and unite with the
General in their common purpose. Once on the ground Lapierre could
assume direction of his own campaign.

Lapierre and Madame Reddon accordingly sailed for America and arrived in
New York on the fourth of December, 1904, where they were met on the
dock by the General, who, freshly barbered, and with a rose in his
buttonhole, invited them, as soon as they had recovered from the fatigue
of landing, to make a personal inspection of their properties.

These heirs to hundreds of millions of dollars were conducted by the
"Marquis de la d'Essa and Count de Tinoco" to the Battery, where he
gallantly seated them in an electric surface car, and proceeded to show
them the inheritance. He pointed out successively Number 100 Broadway,
the "Flatiron" Building, the Fifth Avenue Hotel and the Holland House,
the Waldorf-Astoria, the Vanderbilt mansion at Fifty-seventh Street and
Fifth Avenue, the Hotel Savoy and the Hotel Netherland, incidentally
taking a cross-town trip to the ferry station at East Twenty-thir