"Well," he said, "I heard that you were not so enthusiastic as you were
not long ago, which is why I came down; but I never expected this!
Anyway, after what we have done, you are bound to go on with the thing.
Our success with the first company will help the shares off."
"That's not certain." Herbert handed him a paper. "You haven't seen
Singleton's report."
The man read it hastily, his face changing. Then he looked up with signs of strong indignation.
"You let him give you a thing like this? Paid him for it?"
"What could I do? The man's honest. He declares the country's dangerous; he had two carriers killed. There's no prospect of our obtaining the needful native labor."
"Send somebody else out at once!"
"With the same result. Besides, it's expensive. Singleton's fee wasn't so big, because he shared the cost of his orchid collecting or something of the kind with us. Then he might talk, and there would always be the risk of somebody's challenging us with suppressing his report. If things went wrong, that would lead to trouble."
"Would there be any use in my seeing him?"
Herbert smiled. Singleton would not turn against him; Sylvia had made her influence felt.
"Not the slightest," he answered. "You can take that for granted."