Debit and Credit Part 60

He wiped and polished up the chair for his visitor. "Now, sir, allow me to sit opposite you. You bring me tidings of my little fellow?"

"Only," replied Eugene, "that he is well in health, and that my father much values his services."

"Indeed!" cried Sturm, smiling all over, and rapping on the table so as to create a small earthquake in the room. "I knew, sir, that your father the baron would be satisfied with him; I would have given him a bond for that on stamped paper. He was a clever lad, even when he was that high,"

indicating with his hand a degree of smallness that belongs to no human being, even in the earliest days of its visible life.

"But can he do any thing?" he anxiously inquired, "in spite of--you know what." He held out his great fingers, and made confidential signs with them. "First and middle finger--it was a great misfortune, sir."

Eugene now called to mind the unlucky accident. "He has got over it,"

said he, rather embarra.s.sed at the part the paternal affections of the giant made him play. "I came here to ask a favor."

"A favor?" laughed Sturm; "ask away, young baron; that is a simple matter. Any one from the house where my Karl is bailiff has a right to ask a favor from old Sturm. That is my view of the case."

"Well, then, Mr. Sturm, to make a long story short, I am called upon to make a heavy payment to-morrow, and I want the money for it. The debt has come upon me suddenly, and I have no time to communicate with my father. I know no one in this town to whom I can turn with so much confidence as to the father of our bailiff."

Sturm bent forward, and in his delight clapped the officer on the knee.

"That was n.o.bly said. You are a gentleman, who keeps to his own house, and does not go to strangers for what he can have from his own people.

You want money? My Karl is bailiff at your father the baron's; my Karl has some money, so it is all right. How much do you want? A hundred dollars? Two hundred dollars? The money is there."

"I can hardly take courage, Mr. Sturm, to tell you the amount of the sum," said Eugene, embarra.s.sed; "it is nineteen hundred dollars."

"Nineteen hundred dollars!" repeated the giant, in amazement; "that's a capital; that's a firm; that's what people call a fortune."

"So it is, Mr. Sturm," said Eugene, sadly. "And since you are so friendly toward me, I must own to you that I am heartily grieved that it should be so much. I am ready to give you a note of hand for it, and to pay any interest you may like."

"Do you know what," said Sturm, after some cogitation, "we will say nothing about the interest; you can settle that with my Karl; but as to the note of hand, that was a good thought of yours. A note of hand is pleasant, on account of the chances of life and death. You and I would have no need of such a thing; but I may die before my time. That would not matter, for you, who know of the transaction, would still be there.

But then you might die, which, however, I have no fear of--quite the contrary; but still such a thing might be, and then my Karl ought to have your signature, so that he might come forward and say, 'My poor young master has written this, therefore pay.'"

"You will then have the kindness to lend me the money?"

"There is no kindness in it," said Sturm; "it is but my duty, as the thing is done regularly, and my dwarf is your bailiff."

Eugene was moved as he looked at the giant's laughing face. "But, Mr.

Sturm, I want the money to-morrow."

"Of course," replied Sturm, "that is just what suits me. Come, baron, this way." He took up the candle, and led him into his bed-room. "Excuse things being so disorderly; but I am a lone man, and at my work all day long. Look here, this is my money-box." He drew out the iron chest. "It is safe from thieves," said he, with self-complacency, "for no one in the town can stir it but I, and no one can open it, for the lock is the masterpiece of the father of my dear departed wife. Few besides me can lift the lid, and even if many of them came, they would find it too tough a job for them; so you may believe that the money is safe here from rogues, and swindlers, and the like," said he, triumphantly. He was about to put the key into the lock. "Stop," he suddenly cried; "one word more. I trust you, baron, as I do my Karl--that of course; but just answer me this question: You really are the young baron?"

Now it was Eugene's turn to smile, and, putting his hand into his pocket, he said, "Here is my patent."

"Ah! many thanks," cried Sturm, carefully looking through the paper, and reverentially reading the names, then bowing, and giving it back with two fingers in the most respectful manner possible.

"And here," continued Eugene, "I happen to have a letter of Wohlfart's in my pocket."

"Of course," cried Sturm, looking at the address, "that is his living hand."

"And here is his signature."

"Your devoted Wohlfart," read the giant; "and if he writes that, you may be sure that it is true. So now the business is settled," said he, opening the box. "Here is the money. So, then, nineteen hundred dollars!" He took five great rolls out of the chest, held them comfortably in one hand, and gave them to Eugene. "Here are a thousand."

Eugene tried in vain to hold them.

"Just so," said the porter; "I will bring them down to the carriage. The rest I must give you in promissory notes. These are worth a little less than a hundred dollars, as of course you know."

"It does not signify," said Eugene.

"No," said the giant. "It can be mentioned in the note of hand. And now the matter is all settled." He closed the chest, and pushed it under the bed.

Eugene re-entered the little parlor with a lightened heart.

"Now, then, I will carry the money to the carriage," cried Sturm.

"The note of hand has yet to be written."

"True," nodded the giant; "we must do things in order. Just see, sir, whether you can write with my coa.r.s.e pen. If I had known that I should have such a visitor, I would have brought a better one with me from Mr.

Schroter's."

Eugene wrote out an acknowledgment, while Sturm sat by his can of beer, and looked at him in admiration. Then he accompanied him to the carriage, and said at leave-taking, "Greet my little lad heartily, and Mr. Wohlfart too. I have promised Karl to come to him at Christmas, on account of the Christmas-tree; but my health is no longer as good as it should be. I am forty-nine past."

A short time afterward, Eugene, writing to Anton, casually mentioned that he had borrowed nineteen hundred dollars from father Sturm on a note of hand. "Try to arrange the matter for me," said the letter; "of course my father must know nothing of it. A good-hearted, foolish fellow, that old Sturm. Think of something nice for his son the hussar--something that I can bring him when I pay you a visit."

Anton flung down the letter indignantly. "There is no helping them; the princ.i.p.al was right," said he. "He has squandered the money in golden bracelets for a mercenary danseuse, or at dice with his lawless comrades, and he now pays his usurer's bills with the hard earnings of an honest working-man."

He called Karl into his room. "I have often been sorry to have brought you into this confusion, but to-day I deeply feel how wrong it was. I am ashamed to tell you what has happened. Young Rothsattel has taken advantage of your father's good-heartedness to borrow from him nineteen hundred dollars!"

"Nineteen hundred dollars from my governor!" cried Karl. "Had my Goliath so much money to lend! He always pretended that he did not know how to economize."

"Part of your inheritance is given away in return for a worthless note of hand, and what makes it still more aggravating is the coolness of the thoughtless borrower. Have you, then, not heard of it from your father?"

"From him!" cried Karl; "I should think not. I am only sorry that you should be so vexed. I implore you not to make any disturbance about it.

You best know how many clouds hang over this house; do not increase the anxiety of these parents on my account."

"To be silent in a case like this," replied Anton, "would be to make one's self an accomplice in an unfair transaction. You must immediately write and tell your father not to be so obliging in future; the young gentleman is capable of going to him again."

Anton's next step was to write Eugene a letter of serious remonstrance, in which he pointed out to him that the only way of giving Sturm tolerably good security would be the procuring the baron's acknowledgment of his son's debt, and begged that he would lose no time in doing this.

This letter written, Anton said to Karl, "If he does not confess to his parents, I shall state the whole affair to the baron in his presence the very next day after his arrival. Don't try to dissuade me; you are just like your father."

The consequence of this communication was, that Eugene left off writing to Anton, and that his next letter to his father contained a rather unintelligible clause: "Wohlfart," he said, "was a man to whom he certainly had obligations; only the worst of that kind of people was, that they took advantage of these to adopt a dictatorial tone that was unbearable; therefore it was best civilly to shake them off."

This opinion was quite after the baron's own heart, and he warmly applauded it. "Eugene always takes the right view of the case," said he; "and I too earnestly long for the day when I shall be able to superintend the property, and to dismiss our Mr. Wohlfart."

The baroness, who had read the letter out to her husband, merely replied, "You would miss Wohlfart very much if he were to leave you."

Lenore, however, was unable to suppress her displeasure; and, leaving the room in silence, she went to look for Anton out of doors.

"What are you and Eugene differing about?" she cried, as soon as she saw him.

"Has he been complaining of me to you?" inquired Anton, in return.