der of the loft, and even wanted to go up with him herself.

"No, no, stay down below, Mrs. Muencz. What would the world say, if we
two were to go up to the loft together?" said Gyuri jokingly.

Old Rosalia chuckled.

"Oh, dear heart alive!" she said, "there's no danger with me. Why, your
father didn't even remember me in his will, though once upon a time ...
(and here she complacently smoothed her gray hair). Well, my dear,
please go up."

Gyuri Wibra searched about among the rubbish on the loft for quite half
an hour, during which time the old woman came twice to the foot of the
ladder to see if he were coming down. She was anxious about the fifty
florins.

"Well?" she asked, as he appeared at last empty-handed.

"I have looked through everything," he said, in a discouraged tone, "but
the umbrella I want is not among the others."

The old Jewess looked disappointed.

"What can that tiresome Jonas have done with it?" she exclaimed. "Fifty
florins! Dreadful! But he never had a reason for anything he did."

"In all probability your husband used that umbrella himself. Mr.
Sztolarik of Besztercebanya says he distinctly remembers seeing him with
it once."

"What was it like?"

"The stuff was red, with patches of all sorts on it, and it had a pale
green border. The stick was of black wood, with a bone handle."

"May I never go to heaven!" exclaimed Rosalia, "if that was not the very
umbrella he took with him last time he left home! Yes, I know he took
that one!"

"It was a great pity he took just that one."

Rosalia felt bound to defend her husband.

"How was he to know that?" she said. "He never had a reason for anything
he did."

"Well, there's no help for it now," sighed Gyuri, as he stood on the
last rung of the ladder, wondering what he was to do next, and feeling
like Marius among the ruins of Carthage, only there were not even ruins
to his Carthage; all hopes had returned to the clouds from which they
had been taken.

Slowly he walked through the shop to his dog-cart, which was waiting
outside, and the old woman waddled after him, like a fat goose. But once
out in the street, she suddenly seemed to wake up, and seized hold of
the lawyer's coat.

"Wait a bit. I had nearly forgotten it, but my son Moricz, who is a
butcher in Ipolysag, was here at the time; he had come to buy oxen, I
remember. My son Moricz knows everything, and may I never go to heaven
(Rosalia evidently had a strong objection to