Meanwhile Ehrenthal had been spending a troubled morning. He began to suspect that some other, too, was speculating against the baron. He sent for Pinkus, overwhelmed him with reproaches, and tried in every sort of way to discover whence he had got his capital; but Pinkus had been well schooled: he was bold, rude, and silent. Then Ehrenthal sent for Itzig. Itzig was nowhere to be found.
Consequently, Ehrenthal was in a very bad temper when the baron returned, and he told him dryly that the day had come when his payments must cease. A painful scene ensued; the baron left the office in bitter mood, and determined to pay a last visit to an early comrade, who was known to be a rich man.
It was past four when he returned hopeless to his lodgings. A thin figure was leaning against the steps, and bowed low to the baron as he hurried past. His strength was exhausted; he sat on the sofa as he had done the day before, and blindly stared before him. He knew there was no rescue but that which waited on the steps below. Prostrate, powerless, he heard the clock strike the quarter to five; his pulses beat like hammers, and each throb brought the moment nearer that was to decide his fate. The last stroke of the hour was over. The ante-room bell rang; the baron rose. Itzig opened the door, holding the two papers in his hand.
"I can not pay," the baron cried, in a hoarse voice.
Itzig bowed again and offered him the other paper: "Here is the sketch of a contract."
The baron took up his hat, and said, without looking at him, "Come to an attorney."
It was evening when the baron returned to the castle of his forefathers. The pale moonlight shone on the turrets, the lake was black as ink, and colorless as they was the face of the man who leaned back in the carriage, with close compressed lips, like one who, after a long struggle, had come to an irrevocable decision. He looked apathetically on the water and on the cool moonshine on the roof, and yet he was glad that the sun did not shine, and that he did not see his father's house in its golden light. He tried to think of the future he had insured; he pondered over all the advantages to accrue from his factory; he looked forward to the time when his son would dwell here, rich, secure, free from the cares that had involved his father with vulgar traders, and prematurely blanched his hair. He thought of all this, but his favorite thoughts had become indifferent to him. He entered the house, felt for his full pocket-book before he gave his hand to his wife, and nodded significantly to Lenore. He spoke cheerfully to the ladies, and even contrived to joke about his busy day; but he felt that something had come between him and his dearest ones—even they seemed estranged. If they leaned over him or took his hand, his impulse was to withdraw from the caress. And when his wife looked lovingly at him, there was a something in her eyes, where once he was wont to turn for comfort in every extremity, that he could no longer bear to meet.
He went to his factory, where he was again received with huzza after huzza by the workmen, and with merry tunes by the village band. They played the very air to which he had often marched with his regiment by the side of his old general, whom he loved as a father. He thought of the scarred face of the old warrior, and thought too of a court of honor that he and his brother officers had once held upon an unhappy youth who had lightly given and broken his word of honor. He went into his bed-room, and rejoiced that it had become dark, and that he could no longer see his castle, his factory, or his wife's searching glance. And again he heard hour after hour strike, and at the stroke of each the thought was forced in upon him, "There is now another of that regiment who has, when gray-haired, done the very deed that led a youth to blow out his brains: here lies the man, and can not sleep because he has broken his word of honor."