He had promised the children to take them to the circus; of course he had no time for business.
He was dining with Schneller, when he suddenly heard a young government official, who did not belong exactly to financial circles, say. "A sorry prospect--the evening papers say that the Sternfeld-Lonsbergs are shaky."
Fritz was startled. Little as he troubled himself about business affairs, he knew that the greatest part of his property was invested in Sternfeld-Lonsbergs. He looked fixedly at his host, who, however, only shrugged his shoulders, and remarking, "merely an insignificant depression," scraped a piece of turbot from the half-denuded vertebrae of the fish which the servant was handing him.
Fritz continued to talk to his fair neighbour with the self-possession of a thoroughly well-bred man, while the Japanese dinner-service, with the cut glass, and flowers on the table danced wildly before his eyes.
After dinner, his eye-glass in his eye, and a pleasant smile on his lips, he took occasion to glance furtively at a paper, lying on a little table. His blood fairly ran cold; suddenly Baron Schneller stood beside him. "You are entirely wrong to be worried," he asserted, and Fritz laughed and shrugged his shoulders as if the affair in question were a mere bagatelle. But the next day he wrote a note to the banker begging him to dispose of his stock for him. The banker dissuaded him from selling, the market was unfavourable; for the present he insisted the only thing to do was to wait.
Fritz complied; shortly afterwards the banker advised him to take part in a complicated transaction which Fritz took no pains to understand, but which Schneller assured him positively would result in enormous profits.
It was simply a reckless piece of stock-gambling.
Fritz agreed to everything--what did he know about it? His financial affairs began to inconvenience him more and more. He wanted to be rich.
Just at this time he had to pay a couple of large bills, which had not been presented for three years. He thought of his father. Good Heavens! The old Count could not be angry still. But, after years of alienation he could not in a financial difficulty make up his mind to appeal to him without further preface.
"No, no, that will not do," he said to his small confidant, Siegi. "We must first see whether grandpapa cares for us, and if he does then we will make our confession; if not--vogue la galère."