“All right!” assented Shadursky.  “That will amount to—­” he went on, knitting his brows, “forty-five pounds at two hundred rubles a pound——­”

“It will make exactly nine thousand, your excellency.  Just exactly nine,” Escrocevitch obsequiously helped him out.  The prince, cutting the matter short, immediately gave him a check, and taking the trunk with the coveted bags, drove with the Siberian employee to his father’s house, where the elder Prince Shadursky, at his son’s pressing demand, though very unwillingly, exchanged the check for nine thousand rubles in bills, for which Ivan Ivanovitch Valyajnikoff forthwith gave a receipt.  The prince was delighted with his purchase, and he did not utter a syllable about it to anyone except Kovroff.

Sergei Antonovitch gave him a friendly counsel not to waste any time, but to go abroad at once, as, according to the Exchange Gazette, gold was at that moment very high, so that he had an admirable opportunity to get rid of his wares on very favorable terms.

The prince, in fact, without wasting time got his traveling passport, concealed his purchase with the utmost care, and set out for the frontier, announcing that he was on his way to his mother, whose health imperatively demanded his presence.

The success of the whole business depended on the fact that brass filings, which bear a strong external resemblance to gold dust, are dissipated in the strong heat of the blow-pipe.  The charcoal was prepared beforehand, a slight hollow being cut in it with a penknife, in the bottom of which is placed a globule of pure gold, the top of which is just below the level of the charcoal, and the hollow is filled up with powdered charcoal mixed with a little bees-wax.  The “chemist” who makes the experiments must make himself familiar with the distinctive appearance of the charcoal, so as to pick it out from among several pieces, and must remember exactly where the crevice is.

On this first occasion, Escrocevitch had prepared all four pieces of charcoal, which were brought by the servant in the passage.  He chose as his temporary abode a hotel whose proprietor was an old ally of his, and the servant was also a confederate.

Thus was founded the famous “Gold Products Company,” which is still in very successful operation, and is constantly widening its sphere of activity.

XVII

THE DELUGE

Count Kallash finally decided on his course of action.  It was too late to seek justice for his sister, but not too late for a tardy reparation.  The gang had prospered greatly, and the share of Baroness von Doering and Bodlevski already amounted to a very large figure.  Count Kallash determined to demand for his sister a sum equal to that of the securities in her name which Natasha had stolen, calculating that this would be enough to maintain his sister in peace and comfort to the end of her days.  His own life was too stormy, too full of risks for him to allow his sister’s fate to depend on his, so he had decided to settle her in some quiet nook where, free from danger, she might dream away her few remaining years.