lord, all right!" he gasped as soon as he could get
breath. "No need to smuggle it! Ha-ha! May I be damned! Ten per
cent. they'll give us! Ha-ha! Generous! By whip and wheel! they're
lucky if we give them five per cent.! I'd like to see any government
take away from Georges Coutlass ninety per cent. of anything without a
fight! No, gentlemen! No, my Lord! The Belgian Congo government is
corrupt. Let us spend twenty-five per cent.--even thirty-forty-fifty
per cent. of the value of it to bribe the Congo officials. Hand over
ninety per cent. to the Germans or the British without a fight?--Never!
Never while my name is Georges Coutlass! I have fought too often! I
have been robbed by governments too often! This last time I will put
it over all the governments, and be rich at last, and go home to Greece
to live like a gentleman! Believe me!"

He patted himself on the breast, and if flashing eye and frothing lip
went for anything, then all the governments were as good as defeated
already.

"You are the lord, are you not?" he demanded, looking straight at Fred.

"My name is Oakes," Fred answered.

"Oh, then you? I beg pardon!" He looked at me with surprise that he
made no attempt to conceal. Fred could pass for a king with that
pointed beard of his (provided he were behaving himself seemly at the
time) but for all my staid demeanor I have never been mistaken for any
kind of personage. I disillusioned Coutlass promptly.

"Then you are neither of you lords?"

"Pish! We're obviously ladies!" answered Fred.

"Then you have fooled me?" The Greek rose to his feet. "You have
deceived me? You have accepted my hospitality and confidence under
false pretense?"

I think there would have been a fight, for Fred was never the man to
accept brow-beating from chance-met strangers, and the Greek's fiery
eye was rolling in fine frenzy; but just at that moment Yerkes
strolled in, cheerful and brisk.

"Hullo, fellers! This is some thirsty burg. Do they sell soft drinks
in this joint?" he inquired.

"By Brooklyn Bridge!" exclaimed Coutlass. "An American! I, too, am an
American! Fellow-citizen, these men have treated me badly! They have
tricked me!"

"You must be dead easy!" said Yerkes genially. "If those two wanted to
live at the con game, they'd have to practise on the junior
kindergarten grades. They're the mildest men I know. I let that one
with the beard hold my shirt and pants when I go swimmin