"You stand by the bond?"
"To the letter."
"That is well, as far as it goes; but a speculation carries risk with it. How if yours should turn out bad?"
I made a gesture of despair, clasped my hand to my forehead, and said, dolefully,
"I should be ruined! Yet, no; you are my friend; you would never take my goods from me; you would give me time to repair my losses."
His eyes travelled round my shop; there was a malicious expression in his weazen face.
"The devil is never so black as he is painted, is he, Master Fink?" be said, with a wicked grin.
Thereafter he would ask me, whenever he saw me, "And how is the famous speculation getting on, eh?"
"Don't ask me, don't ask me," I would sigh. "How fortunate for me that I am in the hands of a man like yourself--in the hands of a friend! Never have I beheld your money since the day on which you lent it to me."
Which was as true as anything I ever spoke in my life. His money did not trouble me; it was safe enough in the State Bank.