“Bah!” ejaculated Milor, “I must have it. I will cover it with guineas.”
“It is impossible.”
“How impossible?” cried Milor, diving into the capacious pocket of the drab coat with the pearl buttons, and drawing forth a heavy roll of English bank-notes, “I’ll bet you anything you like that it is possible.”
You know, mein Lieber, that the English settle everything by a wager; indeed, betting and swearing is about all their language is fit for. For a fact, there were once two English noblemen, from Manchester or some such ancient place, who journeyed down the
Rhine on the steam-boat. They looked neither to the right nor to the left; neither at the vine-fields nor the old castles; but sat at a table, silent and occupied with nothing before them but two lumps of sugar, and two heaps of guineas. A little crowd gathered round them wondering what it might mean. Suddenly one of them cried out, “Goddam, it’s mine!” “What is yours?” inquired one who stood by, gaping with curiosity. “Don’t you see,” replied the other, “I bet twenty guineas level, that the first fly would alight upon my lump of sugar, and by God, I’ve won it!”
To return to Milor. “I’ll bet you anything you like that it is possible,” said he.
“Your grace,” replied the shopkeeper, “my Joan of Arc is beyond price to me. It draws all the town to my shop; not forgetting the foreigners.”
“I will buy your shop,” said the Englishman.
“Milor! Graf Schweinekopf von Pimplestein called only yesterday to see it, and Le Comte de Barbebiche.”
“A Frenchman!” shouted Milor.