“At nine in the evening.”
“For whom shall he ask?”
“For Señor Pérez Cuesta.”
“At what hotel?”
“The one in the Quai d’Orsay station.”
“Very good indeed.”
Cæsar bowed; and after he had sent Yarza a telephone message, making an appointment for after the Bourse at the Café Riche, he took an automobile and went to hunt for the great financier Dupont de Sarthe, who lived on the other bank of the Seine, near the Montparnasse station.
He had a large, sumptuous office, with an enormous library. Two secretaries were at work at small tables placed in front of the balconies, and the master wrote at a big Ministerial table full of books. When Cæsar introduced himself, the great economist rose, offered his hand, and in a sharp voice with a Parisian accent, asked what he desired.
Cæsar told him the Minister’s request, and the great economist became indignant.
“Does that gentleman imagine that I am at his bidding, to begin a piece of work and stop it according as it suits him, and take it up again when he orders? No, tell him no. Tell him the scheme he asked me for is not done, not finished; that I cannot give him any data or any information at all.”