In his embarrassment Fritz applied to Schneller, and asked whether he knew of any more profitable investment for money than Austrian government bonds? Whereupon the banker's indolent son replied that he himself always invested upon principle in mortgages, but if Fritz wanted to know, he would ask his brother, who was at the head of his father's banking-firm. The next day he came, in his good-natured way, to see Fritz, bringing a list of 'safe stocks,' which were just then paying enormous dividends, and saying "My brother sends his regards, and begs you to consider him entirely at your service in any financial operation." With characteristic carelessness, Fritz delivered over his property to the banker, and the banker protested that it was an honour to oblige the young gentleman. After this Fritz felt free to spend three times as much as before. His property swelled and swelled without his comprehending the mysterious reasons for its increase. At last it began to assume the most unexpected dimensions. This lasted for some time. One day the banker informed the young Count that he was a millionaire, and asked him at the same time if he did not wish to realize. "Where is the use?" said Fritz, "there is no hurry,--er--I'll have a talk with you about it one of these days. I have no time just now." He had promised the children to take them to the circus; of course he had no time for business. He was dining with Schneller, when he suddenly heard a young government official, who did not belong exactly to financial circles, say. "A sorry prospect--the evening papers say that the Sternfeld-Lonsbergs are shaky." Fritz was startled. Little as he troubled himself about business affairs, he knew that the greatest part of his property was invested in Sternfeld-Lonsbergs. He looked fixedly at his host, who, however, only shrugged his shoulders, and remarking, "merely an insignificant depression," scraped a piece of turbot from the half-denuded vertebrae of the fish which the servant was handing him. Fritz continued to talk to his fair neighbour with the self-possession of a thoroughly well-bred man, while the Japanese dinner-service, with the cut glass, and flowers on the table danced wildly before his eyes. After dinner, his eye-glass in his eye, and a pleasant smile on his lips, he took occasion to glance furtively at a paper, lying on a little table. His blood fairly ran cold; suddenly Baron Schneller stood beside him. "You are entirely wrong to be worried," he asserted, and Fritz laughed and shrugged his shoulders as if the affair in question were a mere bagatelle. But the next day he wrote a note to the banker begging him to dispose of his stock for him. The banker dissuaded him from selling, the market was unfavourable; for the present he insisted the only thing to do was to wait.