“Come, come!” said I, “don’t keep me here all day.  Hand me over the money, short, if you please!” for I was, you see, a little alarmed, and so determined to assume some extra bluster.

“Will you have the kindness to step into the parlor to the partners?” the clerk said, and I followed him.

“What, again?” shrieked a bald-headed, red-whiskered gentleman, whom I knew to be Mr. Manasseh.  “Mr. Salathiel, this is too bad!  Leave me with this gentleman, S.”  And the clerk disappeared.

“Sir,” he said, “I know how you came by this:  the Count de Pinto gave it you.  It is too bad!  I honor my parents; I honor their parents; I honor their bills!  But this one of grandma’s is too bad—­it is, upon my word, now!  She’ve been dead these five-and-thirty years.  And this last four months she has left her burial place and took to drawing on our ’ouse!  It’s too bad, grandma; it is too bad!” and he appealed to me, and tears actually trickled down his nose.

“Is it the Countess Sidonia’s check or not?” I asked, haughtily.

“But, I tell you, she’s dead!  It’s a shame!—­it’s a shame!—­it is, grandmamma!” and he cried, and wiped his great nose in his yellow pocket handkerchief.  “Look year—­will you take pounds instead of guineas?  She’s dead, I tell you!  It’s no go!  Take the pounds—­ one tausend pound!—­ten nice, neat, crisp hundred-pound notes, and go away vid you, do!”

“I will have my bond, sir, or nothing,” I said; and I put on an attitude of resolution which I confess surprised even myself.

“Wery veil,” he shrieked, with many oaths, “then you shall have noting—­ha, ha, ha!—­noting but a policeman!  Mr. Abednego, call a policeman!  Take that, you humbug and impostor!” and here with an abundance of frightful language which I dare not repeat, the wealthy banker abused and defied me.

Au bout du compte, what was I to do, if a banker did not choose to honor a check drawn by his dead grandmother?  I began to wish I had my snuff-box back.  I began to think I was a fool for changing that little old-fashioned gold for this slip of strange paper.

Meanwhile the banker had passed from his fit of anger to a paroxysm of despair.  He seemed to be addressing some person invisible, but in the room:  “Look here, ma’am, you’ve really been coming it too strong.  A hundred thousand in six months, and now a thousand more!  The ’ouse can’t stand it; it won’t stand it, I say!  What?  Oh! mercy, mercy!

As he uttered these words, A hand fluttered over the table in the air!  It was a female hand:  that which I had seen the night before.  That female hand took a pen from the green baize table, dipped it in a silver inkstand, and wrote on a quarter of a sheet of foolscap on the blotting book, “How about the diamond robbery?  If you do not pay, I will tell him where they are.”

What diamonds? what robbery? what was this mystery?  That will never be ascertained, for the wretched man’s demeanor instantly changed.  “Certainly, sir;—­oh, certainly,” he said, forcing a grin.  “How will you have the money, sir?  All right, Mr. Abednego.  This way out.”