There has been no time for arranging the machinery of
operations on our property in Mexico. It's still there;
it's all right. But for the time being, the operations
in London are so much more important. We should have nothing
to tell our shareholders, if we brought them together,
except that their one-pound shares are worth fifteen pounds,
and they know that already."
The Marquis had listened with a shrewdly attentive eye
upon the speaker's face. The nervous affection of his
eyelids gave him now a minute of blinking leisure in which
to frame his comment. "I have not heard that my shares
are worth fifteen pounds," he said then, with a direct,
meaning little smile.
"No," Thorpe laughed, leaning comfortably back in his chair.
"That's what I want to talk to you about. You see,
when the Company was started, it was impossible to foresee
that this dealing in our ordinary shares would swamp
everything else. If things had taken their usual course,
and we had paid our attention to Mexico instead of to
the London Stock Exchange, my deferred vendor's shares,
two thousand of which you hold, would by this time be worth
a good bit. As it is, unfortunately, they are outside
of the deal. They have nothing to do with the movement
of the ordinary shares. But of course you understand
all that.
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