Jacob Worse is
good for two thousand dollars, and a little more besides."

"No doubt, no doubt," answered the Consul. "But now we have demands
upon us for money from all sides, there seems no end to them; it is
really more than we can do these bad times."

Jacob Worse was beginning to be pleased with the success of his
little comedy, and now proceeded farther with it.

"It is very sad," said he, "that I should have to turn elsewhere.
People will say that I have quarrelled with the firm, or, perhaps,
they will believe some of the lies concerning C. F. Garman which are
going about."

"What do you mean? What do they say about the firm?" asked the
Consul, quickly.

"Ah! well, for example, it was reported in the club yesterday that a
certain person had gone to Bergen in order to borrow money for
certain people."

Consul Garman turned his face away and looked out into the garden,
where the first yellow leaves of autumn were beginning to fall.

Never before had he seen danger so imminent; his easy disposition and
his pride had never permitted him to realize that the firm C. F.
Garman, the old Sandsgaard house, was hanging by a thread, and that
it was possible for it to collapse in a vulgar insolvency.

"Yes," he muttered, "it was a mistake, sending Kruse to Bergen;
but--" And then all of a sudden, as if weary of bearing his burden
alone, he turned full round upon Worse, and said: "Things are not so
prosperous with C. F. Garman as you suppose, Jacob."

He called him Jacob, as in the old days when Jacob Worse was a sailor
lad, and he, Morten Garman, a schoolboy.

The cunning Skipper Worse had now reached the decisive point. He tore
open his coat, produced a bundle of banknotes from his breast pocket,
threw them on the table in front of the Consul, and said: "Five
thousand dollars to begin with, Herr Consul, and twice as much more
if necessary, when I have had time to scrape it together."

His face beamed with pleasure, and he laughed with an internal
chuckling sound; his joy, however, was suddenly damped when the
Consul pushed the notes from him, and inquired in his iciest manner:

"What does all this mean? What do you wish me to do with this money?"

"Use it, borrow it, keep it as long as you will, Herr Consul."

"Oh! that is what I am to understand, is it? You have allowed
yourself a little diversion at our expense; very fine, indeed, Herr
Captain Worse. Things are not come to such a pass with the firm that
i