Meanwhile, Clement, with the aid of Wilhelm Müller, examined the state of affairs with a promptitude and sagacity that greatly edified the honest and intelligent clerk who initiated him into this new business. Seeing him so quick of comprehension, so firm in decision and prompt in action, he exclaimed with despair in the midst of their frightful discoveries:
“Alas! alas! if your unfortunate cousin had only had your head on his shoulders!”
“My head! It is not equal to his,” responded Clement to one of his companions. “No, no, it is not that, but something else, he lacks. Why have not I, on the contrary, his capacity and wit! Then I might be capable of retrieving our fortunes, whereas my only talent is that of knowing how to endure poverty. Oh! if it threatened me alone, how little I should dread it!”
“Poverty!” interrupted Wilhelm. “But do you not understand all I have explained to you?”
“With respect to my uncle’s creditors?”
“Yes. Do you not see that the principal creditor, the first of all on the list, is M. Ludwig Dornthal, whose whole fortune nearly can be saved from shipwreck?”
“Yes, on condition of the ruin of the remainder.”
“But their claims are not equal to his: he was not his brother’s partner. He had only entrusted his property to him, like so many others.”
Clement made no reply. After a short silence he observed: “The entire renunciation of my father’s property would enable us to repay all the creditors without exception, would it not?”
“Yes, all.”