I fixed in consultation with this man the future arrangements of my house.  He recommended for the services about my person a certain Bendel, whose honest and intelligent physiognomy immediately captivated me.  He it was whose attachment has since accompanied me consolingly through the wretchedness of life, and has helped me to support my gloomy lot.  I spent the whole day in my room among masterless servants, shoemakers, tailors, and tradespeople.  I fitted myself out, and purchased besides a great many jewels and valuables for the sake of getting rid of some of the vast heap of hoarded-up gold; but it seemed to me as if it were impossible to diminish it.

In the meantime I brooded over my situation in the most agonizing doubts.  I dared not venture a step out of my doors, and at evening I caused forty waxlights to be lit in my room before I issued from the shade.  I thought with horror on the terrible scene with the schoolboys, yet I resolved, much courage as it demanded, once more to make a trial of public opinion.  The nights were then moonlight.  Late in the evening I threw on a wide cloak, pressed my hat over my eyes, and stole, trembling like a criminal, out of the house.  I stepped first out of the shade in whose protection I had arrived so far, in a remote square, into the full moonlight, determined to learn my fate out of the mouths of the passers-by.

Spare me, dear friend, the painful repetition of all that I had to endure.  The women often testified the deepest compassion with which I inspired them, declarations which no less transpierced me than the mockery of the youth and the proud contempt of the men, especially of those fat, well fed fellows, who themselves cast a broad shadow.  A lovely and sweet girl, who, as it seemed, accompanied her parents, while these discreetly only looked before their feet, turned by chance her flashing eyes upon me.  She was obviously terrified; she observed my want of a shadow, let fall her veil over her beautiful countenance, and dropping her head, passed in silence.

I could bear it no longer.  Briny streams started from my eyes, and, cut to the heart, I staggered back into the shade.  I was obliged to support myself against the houses to steady my steps and wearily and late reached my dwelling.

I spent a sleepless night.  The next morning it was my first care to have the man in the gray coat everywhere sought after.  Possibly I might succeed in finding him again, and how joyful if he repented of the foolish bargain as heartily as I did!  I ordered Bendel to me, for he appeared to possess address and tact; I described to him exactly the man in whose possession lay a treasure without which my life was only a misery.  I told him the time, the place in which I had seen him; I described to him all who had been present, and added, moreover, this token:  he should particularly inquire after a Dollond’s telescope; after a gold interwoven Turkish carpet; after a splendid pleasure-tent; and, finally, after the black chargers, whose story, we knew not how, was connected with that of the mysterious man, who seemed of no consideration amongst them, and whose appearance had destroyed the quiet and happiness of my life.