"What is that?" asked the prince, pointing to a roll of paper.
It was the unsigned document which Eveline had returned.
Kaulmann wrote on a slip of paper, "Another hitch in that damned railway."
The prince said to himself, "Then his wife has again escaped." Then he bent over Kaulmann, and, laying his hand upon his shoulder, whispered to him:
"My dear friend, one doesn't get everything by a pair of black eyes."
Spitzhase was the secretary of the meeting. After this little scene he wrote upon a piece of paper, and, twisting it up, handed it to Kaulmann. Kaulmann read it; then tore it in small pieces and shrugged his shoulders.
"I know all that," he said, sulkily. "I don't want any advice."
The committee went away in bad humor with one another. The expense of bringing the deputation from Bondathal had been two thousand gulden, and this comedy had been of no use. The last stake should now be played. Csanta had determined not to pay the third instalment. He would sell all his shares at the price quoted and refill his casks with silver. On the day of the Proclamation, however, he received a letter from Spitzhase, which ran as follows:
"Sir,—To-morrow Herr Kaulmann is going to you to offer to buy all your shares at forty-five florins exchange. Be on your guard. I can assure you that the government has signed a grant for the Bondavara Railway, and so soon as this is public the shares will rise another twenty per cent."
Csanta believed in Spitzhase as in an oracle, and with reason. All happened as he said. Immediately upon the issue of the Proclamation, and when the shares were a little flat, Kaulmann appeared in X——, and offered him forty-five florins exchange upon his shares. But the old Greek was firm, not one would he part with; he would rather take his last cask to Vienna and empty its contents than part with one share.