om such an idea
crossing his mind, he believed that this man was making game of him.

"Oh, sir," he said, "thirty gulden exchange is too much. I can give
you a thousand Bondavara shares at five-and-twenty."

These words caused such a tumult as hardly ever had been heard on
'change. Every one crowded round Csanta; he was set upon from all
sides--behind, before, at his side, on his back--he was fairly mobbed.
People fought with one another over his head, and flourished their
fists in his face.

"Who is he? Who is he? A bear, a conspirator, a thief, an agent! Out
with him! Bonnet him! Pitch him out! Twenty-five, will he take? Give
him twenty-five blows on his back and tear his coat in pieces!"

Spitzhase could hardly manage to get him out. He was in a deplorable
condition when he issued forth, his hat smashed, his clothes all awry,
his face pale, his breath short. Once in the open air his rescuer
began to scold him.

"What the devil did you do that for? Just at the moment when the cabal
was silenced and trampled in the dust, to come forward as one of them
to run down your own shares!"

"I did not want to run them down; I only wanted to ascertain if it was
really the case that such an advance on the price could be realized."

"Oh, that's the way with you," returned Spitzhase, in an aggrieved
tone. "Well, I can tell you the exchange is not a good place to try
jokes in. It was all quite authentic. The Bondavara scrip is as sound
as ready-money. To-day it is thirty for scrip, eight-and-twenty for
gold; to-morrow it will be thirty-two, and so on--always getting
higher. If I had the money I would put in my last farthing. I know
what I know, and I have studied the weather on 'change, but what I
have learned from Kaulmann I cannot tell; my lips are sealed."

Upon this Csanta pressed the clerk very hard. "You can tell me," he
said; "I am already in the boat. What have you heard?"

"Well," said Spitzhase, lowering his voice and looking round
cautiously, "what you say is true; you are a large holder of stock, so
perhaps I may give you this hint. _Puntafar has not reached its
highest point yet._ Oho! they are very tricky who hold over. I am in
the secret, and there is a plan, the details of which I durst not
reveal, which will give such an impulse as will drive the shares still
higher. In six months one impulse will be given, in another six months
another. Oh, the world will open its eyes and its ears; but what I say
to you