When I reached the hotel, I was so full of my plan that I sent for the landlord, and asked him to convert all my goods and chattels, live and dead, into ready cash. After a brief and rather hot discussion the scoundrel agreed to give me two hundred "Naps." for what would have been cheap at twelve. No matter, thought I, I 'll make an end of Baden, and if ever I set foot in it again—
"Come, out with the cash, Master Müller," cried I, impatient to be off; "I 'm sick of this place, and hope never to set eyes on 't more!"
"Ah, the 'Herr Graf' is going away then?" said he, in some surprise. "And the ladies, are they, too, about to leave?"
"I know nothing about their intentions, nor have you any business to make the inquiry," replied I; "pay this money, and make an end of it."
He muttered something about doing the thing regularly, not having "so much gold by him," and so on, ending with a promise that in half an hour I should have the cash sent to my room.
I accordingly hurried upstairs to put away my traps. My mother and the girls had already gone out for the evening, so that I wrote a few lines to say that I was off for a week's fishing, but would be back by Wednesday. I had just finished my short despatch, when the landlord entered with a slip of paper in one hand and a canvas bag of money in the other.
"This is the inventory of the goods, Herr Graf, which you will please assign over to me, by affixing your signature."
I wrote it at once.
"This is my little account for your expenses at the hotel," said he, presenting a hateful-looking strip of a foot and a half long.
"Another time,—no leisure for looking over that now!" said I, angrily.