The Great Game Read Online Free PDF Page B

when they're trying to borrow money. They smile and nod and it's, 'Good evening, Herr Davoud, how good of you to come by.' And then I leave and it's, 'That fat old Jew will have his pound of flesh. His kind loves nothing but money!' As though it were I who was pledging ancient family heirlooms to pay gambling debts!"
     
                  "You're not fat," Paul said.
     
                  "Strangely enough, neither am I a Hebrew," Davoud told him. "They all assume that because I'm a moneylender, I must be Jewish."
     
                  "And you're not?"
     
                  "Look at me. Am I wearing a skull cap?"
     
                  "Sometimes you wear a little knitted cap."
     
                  "It keeps my head warm. It covers a spot where my hair, for some unaccountable reason, seems to be getting thin. But I do not wear it all the time. A Jew, I believe, must keep his head covered all the time."
     
                  "That is so," Paul agreed.
     
                  "Actually my family comes from eastern Persia," Davoud told Paul. "I am a Persian by heritage and a Zoroastrian by religion." He refilled Paul's tea cup and then his own. "Not that I am a particularly religious man. I do not, if it comes to that, care what they call me, but their arrogance and hypocrisy does not endear them to me."
     
                  " 'I count religion but a childish toy,' " Paul quoted, " 'And hold there is no sin but ignorance.' "
     
                  Davoud thought it over for a second. "Yes," he agreed. "That's very good."
     
                  "Christopher Marlowe said it first," Paul said. "An English playwright."
     
                  Davoud nodded. "I know of him," he said.
     
                  "You wish to know what use I'm making of the names you pass on to me? " Paul asked. "I arrange to make the acquaintance of some of them. In return for supplying them with sums of money, I attempt to induce them to supply me with what I am most interested in—information."
     
                  "Ah!" Davoud said. "Information. I see."
     
                  "Do you disapprove?"
     
                  He thought it over. "Not necessarily. How do you go about doing this? One can't just walk up to a stranger and say, 'I understand you need money. Tell me a secret.' "
     
                  "Not quite so, ah, bold," Paul said. "I might approach my subject at the opera, or at the racetrack and talk to him briefly about this and that. And then I will get up and say, 'My patron understands that you are in need. Please don't be insulted, but he asked me to give you this.' And then I will hand him an envelope and walk away."
     
                  "And in the envelope?"
     
                  "A sum of money, the amount depending on who the person is and what his needs are. It is a delicate decision; too small a sum might insult the subject, too great a sum might frighten him."
     
                  "Your patron?"
     
                  Paul smiled. "I am too modest to take the credit for myself. Besides, having an invisible patron adds an air of mystery."
     
                  "Aren't you afraid that your, um, subject will throw the money in your face or, perhaps, call the police?"
     
                  "That's why I rapidly walk away. I don't want to be standing there smirking at them when they open the envelope. I don't want to have to answer any questions, and I don't want the subject to have to make an instant decision. Let him have time to think it over, to feel the weight of the money in his wallet."
     
                  Davoud slowly and methodically cracked the knuckles of his right hand with his left, while staring into his cup of tea. "Perhaps we should not discuss this any further," he