Llera's scheme had been punctually carried out. The Duke, after buying up a large number of shares, had set to work to produce a panic among the shareholders. For some months he had been employing secret agents to buy, and sell again immediately at a loss. Thanks to these tactics, the quotations had fallen very low. He was now almost ready for his great coup, buying up all he could get to throw them suddenly into the market, and then securing half the shares, plus one.
"Everything cannot turn out well," said the man who had addressed him, not without a smile of satisfaction. "You have always been so lucky."
"The Duke does not owe his success to luck," said a stock-broker bent on flattery, "but to his genius, his incomparable skill and acumen."
"No doubt, no doubt," the other hastened to put in, snatching the censer, as it were. "The Duke is the greatest financial genius of Spain. I cannot understand why he has not the entire management of the Treasury. If it is not placed in his hands, the country is past praying for."
"Well, if I tried to save it after the fashion of the Riosa Mining Company, it would be a bad look out for the Spaniards," said the Duke, in a sulky, mumbling voice.
"Why, is it such a rotten concern?"
"For the Government, no, damn it; but for me, after buying it at par, it does not seem to be much of a success."
And he cast all the blame of the transaction on his head clerk, that idiot Llera, who had insisted on having a finger in that pie, in spite of his, the Duke's, presentiments.
"Ah! a man like you should never trust anything but his instincts," they all declared. "When a man has a real genius for business—" And again the word genius was on the lips of every idolater of the golden calf.
Suddenly, at the door of the card-room, Clementina was seen, closely followed by Osorio, Mariana, and Calderón. All four looked disturbed and dismayed, and they all four fixed their eyes on Salabert, whom they eagerly approached.