"Ah! don't do that. What would the world say if an eminent Hungarian nobleman were to blow his brains out for a matter of a paltry hundred thousand francs or two?"
"And what would it say if they clapped him in gaol for these same paltry francs?"
The banker smiled, and laid his hand on the young dandy's shoulder; then, in a confidential tone, he added—
"Now we will try what we can do to save you."
This smile, this condescending tap on the shoulder, revealed the parvenu most completely.
The banker now took a seat beside him on the ample sofa, and thus obliged him to sit straight.
"You require three hundred thousand francs," continued Monsieur Griffard, in a gentle, soothing voice, "and I suppose you will not be alarmed at the idea of paying me back six hundred thousand instead of that amount when you come into your property?"
"Fi donc!" said Kárpáthy, contemptuously. A feeling of noble pride awoke within him for an instant, and he coldly withdrew his arm from the banker's hand. "You are only a usurer, after all," he added.
The banker pocketed the affront with a smile, and tried to smooth the matter over with a jest.