back in his big chair and rolled the huge cigar in his thick lips and listened, giving me now and again a quick glance from his keen eyes, which were almost hid under the down-drawn bushy eyebrows and folds of leathery skin.
Only at the start did he make the slightest sign of emotion, and that was when I told him frankly that I was an ex-cracksman. This information he received with a sudden opening of his eyes, then closing them again. Rosenthal had previously regarded me as a sort of gentleman adventurer, not over-scrupulous, perhaps, in the matter of business, but a gentleman born, well-bred, and not fudamentally dishonest. He himself was absolutely honest in his personal affairs, but had a wide margin of ethics when it came to a really big commercial deal. His world-wide reputation was that a man would be safe in placing any amount of cold cash in his hands without asking for a receipt, but if anybody sat in a game of high finance with him, he needed to play mighty close to his belt. Rosenthal would plunder the coffers of a country with the same ruthlessness that a cracksman would go through a safe. I remarked a little while ago that for men there were no half-measures of honesty; that a man was either honest or dishonest. Perhaps I should amend that statement by adding, "with himself." Rosenthal was absolutely honest with himself. He had his own peculiar code and he was true to it. Moreover, the Jew was a big man and a man of heart. He was generous and liberal, and his motto was, "live and let live." I knew that my story was as safe with him as though sealed in a leaden casket and dropped into the sea.
