"You are a busy man. You have not come here to pass a morning in idle
conversation with your father's assistant. You want something of me,
sir. Speak out plainly. If I can do what you wish, I will do it. If I
cannot, I will tell you so, frankly."
Giovanni was a little disconcerted by this speech. Excepting where money
was concerned directly, his intelligence was of the sort that easily
wastes its energy in futile cunning. He had not meant to reach the point
for a long time, if he had expected to reach it at all at a first
attempt.
"I like your straightforwardness," he said evasively. "But I do not
think your conversation idle. On the contrary, I find it highly
instructive."
"Indeed?" Zorzi laughed. "You do me much honour, sir! What have you
learned from me this morning?"
"What I wished to know," answered Giovanni with a change of tone, and
looking at him keenly.
Zorzi returned the glance, and the two men faced each other in silence
for a moment. Zorzi knew what Giovanni meant, as soon as the other had
spoken. The quick movement of surprise, which was the only indiscretion
of which Zorzi had been guilty, would have betrayed to any one that he
knew where the manuscript was, even if it were not in his immediate
keeping. His instinct was to take the offensive and accuse his visitor
of having laid a trap for him, but his caution prevailed.
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