“One hundred and ten thousand francs, my dear friend!... Yes, there is no need for you to open your eyes so wide.... I said it: one hundred and ten thousand francs!... At the last settlement, on the 15th, I had only lost fifty thousand francs.... Thanks to the help of M. de Meuze, who had written to his friend M. Pums, the father of your pupil, I made arrangements with Talloire, my stockbroker—for I have a stockbroker, is it comical enough, eh! I, a stockbroker!—I made arrangements with Talloire, I say, for him to carry me over; in other words, an operation which allowed me a delay for settling up and permitted me to gamble again.... You know?... Good!... I gambled again.... The smash came, more terrible than ever, organized by the whole Black Band.... I was stubborn; I gave orders right and left.... Result: sixty thousand francs added to my losses!”
“Oh, my poor Raindal, my poor friend!” the Galician murmured, shaking his head.
“That is not all!” Uncle Cyprien added. “I have asked to be carried over again.... Nothing doing! Pums did not receive me, and Talloire kicked me out.... I wrote to the Marquis, who is holidaying at Deauville; no reply!... Therefore, this afternoon, unless I have paid up, I shall be ‘executed’ at the Bourse, and, this evening, I shall execute myself at home!... Tell me, Schleifmann, am I done for or am I not?”
The Galician took a turn round the room, with his usual dragging gait, grumbling:
“Devilish idiot! Devilish idiot!” Then he asked brusquely. “What about your pension, Raindal?... You could perhaps borrow on that?”
“Child!” exclaimed M. Raindal, the younger, paternally. “Do you think that I have waited for you to think of that? Guess what I have been offered for my pension by the usurers: fifteen thousand francs, fifteen paltry thousand francs, not a damned sou more!”
The Galician thought. Then after a time he said:
“Listen, Raindal!... I have put five thousand francs by.... With your fifteen thousand, that would give you twenty.... Do you want them?”
Cyprien came over to press his hand.
“You are a very good friend, Schleifmann,” he said.... “I am very grateful to you.... That would give me twenty, yes, that is to say, a little less than twenty per cent, enough to make arrangements which would cause some men to call me an honest man, and others—a thief. But after that, my friend! After that, how should I exist? I would not have a penny, not a sou.... I would need to look for a job and, what is more difficult, to find one.... No, you see, I would never have the patience.... I prefer to end it at once!”