The rich carriage-builder, who had bought Gregorics's house in Vienna, gave him valuable information.
"Your father," he said, "once told me when I paid him for the house, that he should put the money in some bank, and asked me which would be the best and safest way to set to work about it."
Gyuri wandered then from one bank to another, but without success. Thoroughly worn out he returned to Besztercebánya with the full intention of not thinking any more about the subject.
"I am not going on making a fool of myself," he said. "I won't let the Golden Calf go on lowing in my ears forever. I will not take another step in the affair, and shall imagine I dreamed it all."
But it was easier said than done. You can throw ashes on a smouldering fire—it will put it out, but not prevent it smoking.
Sometimes one friend referred to it, sometimes another. His mother, who now walked on crutches, often spoke of the good old times, sitting in her arm-chair by the fire. And at length she owned that old Gregorics had wanted to telegraph for Gyuri on his deathbed.
"He seemed as though he could not die till he had seen you," she said. "But it was my fault you came too late."
"And why did he so much want to see me?"
"He said he wanted to give you something."
A light broke in upon Gyuri's brain. The Vienna carriage-builder had given him to understand that his father's fortune was represented by a receipt for money placed in a bank, and from the information his mother now gave him, he concluded that the old gentleman had intended giving him the receipt before his death. So he must always have kept it by him. But what had become of it? In which bank was the money deposited? Could he, knowing what he did, give up the idea of finding it?