Franz Bopp was skeptical. For some reason he mistrusted Van Koolbergen. He produced a map of British Columbia and asked him to describe what he had accomplished. Van Koolbergen, confused for a moment, suggested that he would be unwise to go into detail before three witnesses (Bopp, von Brincken, and von Schack, the vice-consul). Bopp rose indignantly and said that his secret was safe with three who had been sworn to serve the Vaterland. So Van Koolbergen invented and related the story of The Dynamiting That Never Was, supporting it with copies of the Vancouver newspapers. Bopp wanted more proof; at Van Koolbergen's suggestion, he wrote one Van Roggenen, the Dutch vice-consul at Vancouver, asking him to "inquire of the General Superintendent of the Canadian Pacific Railway Company why a car of freight which I expected from the East had not arrived yet, and to kindly wire me at my expense." Van Roggenen happened to be a friend of Van Koolbergen's, and of course any inquiry made of the railroad for Van Koolbergen's car of freight would have been tactfully construed and properly answered. But to make assurance doubly sure, Van Koolbergen wired Orchard in Vancouver to send him the following telegram:
"Superintendent refuses information. Found out however that freight has been delayed eleven days on account of accident. Signed V. R."
Armed with this fictitious reply, which Orchard soon sent him, Van Koolbergen called at the consulate, and was paid $300 more in cash. In order to get as much money as possible as soon as possible, the "destroying agent" agreed to cut his price from $3,000 to $1,750, and was promised the money the next day. The next day came, but no money. Van Koolbergen sent a sharp note to the Consul, suggesting blackmail, and the German Empire in San Francisco capitulated; von Brincken met Van Koolbergen at the Palace Hotel and paid him $1,750, (of which he extracted $250 as commission!). He made Koolbergen sign a receipt for $700, as he said a payment of $1,750 would look bad on the books, was much too high--even seven hundred was high, but could be justified if any one higher up complained. "And," concluded the thrifty Van Koolbergen in his affidavit written August 27, "I have some of the greenbacks given me by von Brincken now in my possession."