epeatedly questioned me on the score of your own
morality, Stocmar, expressing great misgivings about theatrical folk
generally."

"Take my word for it, then, the lady is a fast one herself," said
Stocmar; "for, like the virtuous Pangloss, she knows what wickedness
is."

"It is deuced hard to say what she is," broke in Trover. "My partner,
Twist, declares she must have been a stockbroker or a notary public.
She knows the whole share-list of Europe, and can quote you the 'price
current' of every security in the Old World or the New; not to say that
she is deeply versed in all the wily relations between the course of
politics and the exchanges, and can surmise, to a nicety, how every
spoken word of a minister can react upon the money-market."

"She cannot have much to do with such interests, I take it," said Paten,
in assumed indifference.

"Not upon her own account, certainly," replied Trover; "but such is
her influence over this old Baronet, that she persuades him to sell out
here, and buy in there, just as the mood inclines her."

"And is he so very rich?" asked Stocmar.

"Twist thinks not; he suspects that the money all belongs to a certain
Miss Leslie, the ward of Sir William, but who came of age a short time
back."

"Now, what may her fortune be?" said Stocmar, in a careless tone; "in
round numbers, I mean, and not caring for a few thousands more or less."

"I have no means of knowing. I can only guess it must be very large. It
was only on Tuesday last she bought in about seven-and-twenty thousand
'Arkansas New Bonds,' and we have an order this morning to transfer
thirty-two thousand more into Illinois 'Sevens.'"

"All going to America!" cried Paten. "Why does she select investment
there?"

"That's the widow's doing. She says that the Old World is going in for
a grand smash. That Louis Napoleon will soon have to throw off the
mask, and either avow himself the head of the democracy, or brave its
vengeance, and that either declaration will be the signal for a great
war. Then she assumes that Austria, pushed hard for means to carry on
the struggle, will lay hands on the Church property of the empire, and
in this way outrage all the nobles whose families were pensioned off on
these resources, thus of necessity throwing herself on the side of
the people. In a word, she looks for revolution, convulsion, and a
wide-spread ruin, and says the Yankees are the only people who will
escape. I know little or nothing