"I think our fortune is gone up," answered Julian; and then he leaned his elbows on his knees and looked down at the floor.
Jack laughed as loudly as the German did a few moments before. Julian straightened up and looked at him in surprise.
"What do you mean by that?" he exclaimed. "Is a hundred thousand dollars such a sum in your eyes that you can afford to be merry over it?"
"No; but you will never lose it through that man. His name is not Haberstro any more than mine is."
"Jack, what do you mean?"
"You were so busy with your own thoughts that you didn't see how I was pumping him, did you? In the first place he told us that Winkleman was sick in St. Louis; and yet Winkleman says in his letter that they were so poor that they could not raise enough to buy a halter for a mule. Now, he would not have used such an expression as that if he had been here in the city, would he?"
"No, I don't think he would," said Julian, reflectively. "He used the words of the country in which he lived."
"That is what I think. In the next place, he said that he was engaged in a paying business here, and consequently did not go with Winkleman to the mines; and then, almost in the same breath, he said he could not refer me to anybody here because his home was in Chicago. You didn't see those little errors, did you?"
Julian began to brighten up. He remembered all the German had said to Jack, but somehow he did not think of it. The box was not lost, after all.
"Now, he must have had somebody to post him in regard to these matters," said Jack. "Who do you think it was?"