I have not got three hundred and seventy-seven thousand dollars. I
have only got twenty-seven thousand dollars!"

"But we counted three hundred and seventy-seven thousand dollars."

"When?"

"Yesterday."

"Yesterday--yes. But not this morning."

"Great God!" cried Stuart, thrusting himself forward, "what!--" He fixed
his feeble eyes upon Fields, but could speak no further. His arms fell
down by his sides, and he began to tremble. He did not have sufficient
courage to ask the question. Somebody else did.

"What has become of it?"

"That I shall not tell you!" returned Fields, looking defiantly at one
director after another.

"But is it gone?" cried the chorus. Many of the faces that confronted
Fields had become waxen. The little group was permeated with a tremor.

"Yes, it is gone; I have taken it."

"You have _taken_ it!" "_You_ have taken it!" "_You have taken it!_"

The directors, overwhelmed and confounded, retreated from Fields as if
they were in personal danger from him.

"In Heaven's name, Fields!" exclaimed the president, "speak out! Tell
us! What!--where!--the money! Come, man!"

"You had better lock the door," said the teller; "some one will be
coming in."

One of the most feeble and aged of the board turned around and
hastened, as fast as his infirm limbs would permit him, and threw the
bolt with feverish haste, and then ran back again to hear.

"Yes," said Fields, with deliberation, "I have taken the money. I have
carried it away and hidden it where no one can lay hands upon it but
myself."

"Then--then, sir, you have stolen it!"

Fields bowed. "I have stolen it."

"But you have ruined us!"

"Possibly."

"And you have ruined yourself!"

"I am not so sure of that."

"Stop this useless talk!" cried a gentleman, who had heretofore been
silent. He bent upon Fields a look of great dignity. "Make it clear,
sir, what you have done."

"Certainly. When I left the bank last night I put into my pockets one
hundred and fifty thousand dollars in greenbacks of the
one-thousand-dollar denomination, one hundred thousand dollars in
national-currency notes of the one-hundred-dollar denomination, and one
hundred thousand dollars in gold certificates. I left to the credit of
my account twenty-seven thousand eight hundred and sixty-two dollars and
some odd cents. Eight thousand of these have been already drawn this
morning. It is not unlikely that the whole of what is left may be drawn
within the