At the top of his speed, as he had come, the stranger departed. Moses Amschel unrolled the handkerchief, glanced at its contents, again carefully wrapped it up, and stole swiftly and cautiously to the park-door, which he hastily unlocked, and as hastily relocked behind him. But, as he turned to regain the carriage, his movements were arrested by the iron arm of Geigenfritz, who rose, like an apparition, from a ditch at his side. "How you frighten me!--I am not going to run away." "Because you can't. Now, comrade, halves!" "Are you mad?" "Not I, but you, if you think you are not in my power." Moses Amschel looked around him, but help there was none, and the brown man held him so tightly that he could not stir. The carriage, certainly, was near at hand, but the horses were as skittish as they were good, and the driver must not leave them. "Show it me," said Geigenfritz. Resistance was impossible. Tardily and unwillingly the Jew untied the handkerchief, and revealed a diamond diadem of extraordinary magnificence. Notwithstanding his alarm, his eyes sparkled at the sight. "Old rogue! who stole that?" "Stole! Nonsense." "What is it worth?" "Worth?--a couple of hundred dollars." "Do you take me for a child?" "Well, perhaps a couple of thousand." "More than a million." "You frighten me." "No matter--halves!" "But I must sell it first; you shall have your share of the price." "Of the price? You don't take _me_ in. We will divide at once." "How is that possible?" "Very easy. I break the crown into two halves; you take one, I the other. Give it here." Moses Amschel shook with terror, and clutched the glittering ornament convulsively with both bands. It was in vain: the iron hand of Geigenfritz detached his fingers, one after the other, like those of a child. With the last remains of his exhausted strength, the Jew still clung to his treasure, which, in another second, would have been wrested from him, when suddenly a broad knife, thrust over the shoulder of Geigenfritz, inflicted a swift deep cut across the back of the hand with which he grasped the diadem. Involuntarily, Geigenfritz relaxed his hold both of Jew and jewels. Moses Amschel and the coachman Abraham, who, having seen from his box his brother's peril, had thus opportunely come to his aid, ran away laughing. The one jumped into the carriage, the other resumed the reins, and they drove off at a gallop.