eitel, shrugging his shoulders.

"A money-matter!" repeated Hippus, with tender approbation of his
associate. "Ay, you are great in them--an accomplished swindler. Truly
he who gets money from you is lost; it were better for him to jump into
the water at once, though water is a despicable element, you confounded
little swindler you!" And, raising his head, he fixed his swimming eyes
affectionately on Veitel.

"And yet you yourself are come to get money from me," replied Veitel,
with a forced smile.

"Yes, I am determined," said Hippus, stammering. "I am not flesh and
blood! I am Hippus! I am Death!" and he tried to laugh intelligently.

The door-bell rang. Veitel desired him to keep quiet, shut the door upon
him, took up his amber pipe, and awaited his visitor.

A sword was heard to clatter in the lobby--a hussar officer came in.
Eugene Rothsattel had become a little older since the last winter, his
fine face was more haggard, and he had a blue ring round his eyes. He
put on an appearance of indifference, which did not deceive Mr. Itzig
for a single second, for behind that mask his experienced glance
detected the fever peculiar to hard-pressed debtors.

"Mr. Itzig?" inquired the officer <i>de haut en bas</i>.

"Such is my name," said Veitel, rising carelessly from the sofa. Eugene
looked at him uneasily. This was the very man against whom his father
had been warned, and now fate had driven him into the same snare. "I
have to pay a debt in the course of the next few days to certain
agents," began the lieutenant, "gentlemen of your acquaintance. When I
proposed to hold a consultation with them, I was informed by both that
they had sold their claims to you."

"I bought them unwillingly," replied Itzig. "I am not fond of having any
thing to do with military men. Here are two notes of hand, one for
eleven hundred, and the other for eight hundred, making a total of
nineteen hundred dollars. Do you recognize these signatures as yours?"
he coldly inquired, producing the documents; "and do you acknowledge
nineteen hundred to be the sum borrowed by you?"

"I suppose it must be about that," said the lieutenant, reluctantly.

"I ask whether you acknowledge that to be the sum that you have to pay
me on these notes of hand?"

"In the devil's name, yes," cried the lieutenant. "I own the debt,
though I did not receive the half of it in cash."

Veitel locked up the papers in his desk, and, with a shrug of his
shoulders, sa