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The Strange Story of Rab Ráby

by Mór Jókai · English · Gutenberg #36739 · 495,542 chars · public domain (US)

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Title: The Strange Story of Rab Ráby

Author: Mór Jókai

Translator: Emil Reich


        
Release date: July 15, 2011 [eBook #36739]

Language: English

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THE STRANGE STORY OF RAB RABY




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[Illustration: portrait of Mor Jokai]




THE STRANGE STORY OF RAB RABY

BY MAURUS JOKAI

[Illustration: SANS PEUR ET SANS REPROCHE.]

THIRD EDITION

LONDON
JARROLD & SONS, 10 & 11, WARWICK LANE, E.C.

[All Rights Reserved.]




PREFACE

TO JOKAI'S "RAB RABY," IN ENGLISH,

By Dr. Emil Reich.


In "Rab Raby," the famous Hungarian novelist gives us, in a manner quite
his own, a picture of the "old regime" in Hungary in the times of
Emperor Joseph II., 1780-1790. The novel, as to its plot and principal
persons, is based on facts, and the then manners and institutions of
Hungary are faithfully reflected in the various scenes from private,
judicial, and political life as it developed under the erroneous policy
of Joseph II.

Briefly speaking, "Rab Raby" is the story of one of those frightful
miscarriages of justice which at all times cropped up under the
influence of political motives. In our own time we have seen the Dreyfus
case, another instance of appalling injustice set in motion for
political reasons. "Rab Raby" is thus very likely to give the English
reader a wrong idea of the backward and savage character of Hungarian
civilisation towards the end of the eighteenth century, unless he
carefully considers the peculiar circumstances of the case. I think I
can do the novel no better service than setting it in its right
historic frame, which Jokai, writing as he did for Hungarians, did not
feel induced to dwell upon.

The Hungarians, alone of all Continental nations, have a political
Constitution of their own, the origin of which goes back to an age prior
to Magna Charta in England. Outside Hungary, it is generally believed
that Hungary is a mere annex of "Austria"; and the average Englishman in
particular is much surprised to hear that "Austria" is considerably
smaller than Hungary. In fact, "Austria" is merely a conventional
phrase. There is no Austria, in technical language. What is
conventionally called Austria has in reality a much longer name by which
alone it is technically recognised to exist. This name is, "The
countries represented in the _Reichsrath_." On the other hand, there is,
conventionally and technically, a Hungary, which has no "home-rule"
whatever from Austria, any more than Australia has "home-rule" from
England. In fact, Hungary is the equal partner of Austria; and no
Austrian official whatever can officially perform the slightest function
in Hungary. The person whom the people of "Austria" call "Emperor," the
Hungarians accept only as their King. There is not even a common
citizenship between Hungarians and Austrians; and a Hungarian to be
fully recognised in Austria as, say a lawyer, must first acquire the
Austrian rights of naturalisation, just as an Englishman would.

The preceding remarks will enable the reader to see clearly that Hungary
never accepted, nor can ever accept Austrian rule in any shape
whatever; and that the entire business of political, judicial, and
administrative government in Hungary must legally be done by Hungarian
citizens only. The King alone happens to be an official in Austria as
well as in Hungary; but according to Hungarian constitutional law he
cannot command, nor reform things in Hungary except with the formal
consent of the Hungarian authorities, in Parliament and County. In
Austria indeed, the "Emperor" was, previous to 1867, quite autocratic;
and even at present he has a very large share of autocratic power.

Now, Emperor Joseph II. desired to melt down Hungarian and Austrian
manners, laws, and institutions into one homogeneous mass of a
Germanised body-politic. With this view he commanded the Hungarians to
practically give up their own language, their ancient national
constitution, and old County institutions, thinking as he did, that such
an unification of the Austro-Hungarian peoples would make the Danubian
Monarchy much more powerful and prosperous than it had ever been before.
He sincerely believed that his scheme of unification would greatly
benefit his peoples; nor did he doubt that they would readily obey his
behests to that effect.

However, the Emperor was quite mistaken as to the effect of his imperial
policy upon the Hungarians. Far from acquiescing in his plans, the
Hungarians at once showed fight in every possible form of passive
resistance, rebellion, scorn, or threats. To them their Constitution
was, as it still is, dearer by far than all material prosperity.

The Emperor's ordinances were coolly shelved, not even read, and with a
few exceptions, all his commands proved abortive. Many Hungarians
admitted then, as others do now, that Joseph's reforms were in more than
one respect such as to benefit Hungary. Yet no Hungarian wanted to
purchase these reforms at the expense of the hoary and holy Constitution
of the country. Joseph, in commanding all those reforms, without so much
as asking for the consent of the Estates, violated the very fundamental
principle of the Hungarian Constitution. This the Hungarians were
determined to resist to the uttermost. In the end they vanquished the
ruler, who shortly before his death withdrew nearly all his ordinances,
and so confessed himself beaten.

It is in the midst of these historic and psychological circumstances
that Jokai laid his fascinating novel. A young Hungarian nobleman,
indignant at the illegality and injustice of public officials of his
native town, who shamefully exploit the poor of the district, approaches
the Emperor with a view to get his authorisation for measures destined
to put an end to the criminal encroachments of the said officials. The
Emperor gives him that authority. But far from strengthening young
Raby's case, the Emperor thereby exposes him to the unforgiving rancour
of both guilty and innocent officials who desperately resent the
Emperor's unconstitutional procedure.

The novel is the story of the conflict between the young noble and the
Emperor on the one hand, and the wretched, but in the nature of the
case, more patriotic officials, on the other. As in all such cases,
where virtue appears either at the wrong time, or in the wrong shape,
the ruin of the virtuous is almost inevitable, while no student of human
nature can wholly condemn his otherwise corrupt and despicable enemies.
In that conflict lies both the charm of the novel and its tragic
character.

As in all his stories, Jokai fills each page with a novel interest, and
his inexhaustible good humour and exuberant powers of description throw
even over the dark scenes of the story something of the soothing light
of mellow hilarity.

EMIL REICH.

_London, Nov. 1st, 1909._




CONTENTS.

                      PAGE
 CHAPTER I.              1
 CHAPTER II.             6
 CHAPTER III.           11
 CHAPTER IV.            16
 CHAPTER V.             27
 CHAPTER VI.            37
 CHAPTER VII.           46
 CHAPTER VIII.          50
 CHAPTER IX.            58
 CHAPTER X.             64
 CHAPTER XI.            70
 CHAPTER XII.           82
 CHAPTER XIII.          86
 CHAPTER XIV.           96
 CHAPTER XV.           104
 CHAPTER XVI.          112
 CHAPTER XVII.         130
 CHAPTER XVIII.        141
 CHAPTER XIX.          150
 CHAPTER XX.           159
 CHAPTER XXI.          173
 CHAPTER XXII.         178
 CHAPTER XXIII.        188
 CHAPTER XXIV.         197
 CHAPTER XXV.          204
 CHAPTER XXVI.         219
 CHAPTER XXVII.        224
 CHAPTER XXVIII.       234
 CHAPTER XXIX.         237
 CHAPTER XXX.          249
 CHAPTER XXXI.         255
 CHAPTER XXXII.        259
 CHAPTER XXXIII.       268
 CHAPTER XXXIV.        278
 CHAPTER XXXV.         286
 CHAPTER XXXVI.        289
 CHAPTER XXXVII.       296
 CHAPTER XXXVIII.      301
 CHAPTER XXXIX.        308
 CHAPTER XL.           317
 CHAPTER XLI.          324
 CHAPTER XLII.         328
 CHAPTER XLIII.        335
 CHAPTER XLIV.         339
 CHAPTER XLV.          345
 CHAPTER XLVI.         349
 CHAPTER XLVII.        352
 CHAPTER XLVIII.       357
 CHAPTER XLIX.         360
 CHAPTER L.            364




INTRODUCTION.


Now it is not because the double name of "Rab Raby" is merely a pretty
bit of alliteration that the author chose it for the title of his story,
but rather because the hero of it was, according to contemporary
witnesses of his doings, named Raby, and in consequence of these same
doings, earned the epithet "Rab" ("culprit"). How he deserved the
appellation will be duly shown in what follows.

A hundred years ago, there was no such thing as a lawyer, in the modern
sense, in the city of Buda-Pesth. Attorneys indeed there were, of all
sorts, but a lawyer who was at the public service was not to be found,
and when a country cousin came to town, to look for someone who should
"lie for money," he sought in vain.

Why this demand for lawyers could not be supplied in Buda-Pesth a
hundred years back may best be explained by briefly describing the two
cities at that epoch.

For two cities they really were, with their respective jurisdictions.
The Austrian magistrate persistently called Pesth "Old Buda," and the
Rascian city of Buda itself, "Pesth," but the Hungarians recognised
"Pestinum Antiqua" as Pesth, and for them, Buda was "the new city."

Pesth itself reaches from the Hatvan to the Waitz Gate. Where Hungary
Street now stretches was then to be seen the remains of the old city
wall, under which still nestled a few mud dwellings. The ancient Turkish
cemetery, to-day displaced by the National Theatre, was yet standing,
and further out still, lay kitchen gardens. On the other side, at the
end of what is now Franz-Deak Street, on the banks of the Danube, stood
the massive Rondell bastion, wherein, as a first sign of civilisation, a
theatrical company had pitched its abode, though, needless to say, it
was an Austrian one. At that epoch, it was prohibited by statute to
elect an Hungarian magistrate, and the law allowed no Hungarians but
tailors and boot-makers to be householders.

Of the Leopold City, there was at that time no trace, and the spot where
now the Bank stands, was then the haunt of wild-ducks. Where Franz-Deak
Street now stretches, ran a marshy dyke, which was surmounted by a
rampart of mud. In the Joseph quarter only was there any sign of
planning out the area of building-plots and streets; to be sure, the
rough outline of the Theresa city was just beginning to show itself in a
cluster of houses huddled closely together, and the narrow street which
they were then building was called "The Jewry." In this same street, and
in this only, was it permitted to the Jews, on one day every week, by an
order of the magistrate, to expose for sale those articles which
remained in their possession as forfeited pledges. Within the city they
were not allowed to have shops, and when outside the Jews' quarter, they
were obliged to don a red mantle, with a yellow lappet attached, and any
Jew who failed to wear this distinctive garb was fined four deniers.
There was little scope for trade. Merchants, shop-keepers and brokers
bought and sold for ready-money only; no one might incur debt save in
pawning; and if the customer failed to pay up, the pledge was forfeited.
Thus there was no call for legal aid. If the citizens had a quarrel,
they carried their difference to the magistrate to be adjusted, and both
parties had to be satisfied with his decision, no counsel being
necessary. Affairs of honour and criminal cases however were referred to
the exchequer, with a principal attorney and a vice-attorney for the
prosecution and for the defence.

At that time, there was in what is now Grenadier Street, a
single-storied house opposite the "hop-garden." This house was the
County Assembly House whence the provincial jurisdiction was exercised.
It had been the Austrian barracks, till finally, Maria Theresa promoted
it to the dignity of a law-court, and caused a huge double eagle with
the Hungarian escutcheon in the middle, to be painted thereon; from
which time, no soldier dare set foot in its precincts. Here it was only
permitted to the civilians and the prisoners confined there to enter.
Only the part of the building which faced east was then standing: this
wing comprised the officials' rooms and the subterranean dungeons.

The magnates carried on their petty local dissensions, aided by their
own legal wisdom alone, yet every Hungarian nobleman was an expert in
jurisprudence in his own fashion. There were even women who had proved
themselves quite adepts in arranging legal difficulties. The Hungarian
constitution allowed the right to the magnate who did not wish the law
to take its course, of forcibly staying its execution, and the same
prerogative was extended to a woman land-owner. The commonweal also
demanded that each one should strive to make as rapid an end as possible
to lawsuits. Long legal processes were adjusted so that there should be
time for the judge as well as the contending parties to look after
building and harvest operations, as well as the vintage and pig-killing.
On these occasions lawsuits would be laid aside so as not to interfere
with such important business.

But if the tax-paying peasant was at variance with his fellow-toiler,
the local magistrate, and the lord of the manor, were arbitrators. So
here likewise there was no room for a lawyer.

But when the peasant had ground of complaint against his betters, he had
none to take his part. There was, however, one man willing to fill the
breach, although he had been up to this time little noticed, and that
man was Rab Raby--or to give him his full title of honour, "Mathias Raby
of Raba and Mura."

He it was who was the first to realise the ambition of becoming on his
own account the people's lawyer in the city of Pesth--and this without
local suffrages or the active support of powerful patrons--but only at
the humble entreaty of those whose individual complaints are unheard,
but in unison, become as the noise of thunder.

The representative of this new profession did Raby aim at being. It was
for this men called him "Rab Raby," though he had, as we shall see, to
expiate his boldness most bitterly.

In what follows, the reader will find for the most part, a true history
of eighteenth century Pesth. It will be worth his while to read it, in
order to understand how the world wagged in the days when there was no
lawyer in Pesth and Buda. Moreover, it will perhaps reconcile him to the
fact that we have so many of them to-day!




CHAPTER I.


They sit, the worshipful government authorities of Pesth, at the
ink-bespattered green table in the council room of the Assembly House,
the president himself in the chair; close beside him, the prefect, whom
his neighbour, the "overseer of granaries," was doing his best to
confuse by his talking. On his left is an empty chair, beside which sits
the auditor, busy sketching hussars with a red pencil on the back of a
bill. Opposite is the official tax-collector whose neck is already quite
stiff with looking up at the clock to see how far it is from
dinner-time. The rest of the party are consequential officials who
divide their time between discussing fine distinctions in Latinity, and
cutting toothpicks for the approaching mid-day meal.

The eighth seat, which remains empty, is destined for the magistrate.
But empty it won't be for long.

And indeed it is not empty because its owner is too lazy to fill it, but
because he is on official affairs intent in the actual court room,
whereof the door stands ajar, so that although he cannot hear all that
is going forward, he can have a voice in the discussion when the vote is
taken.

From the court itself rises a malodorous steam from the damp sheepskin
cloaks, the reek of dirty boots and the pungent fumes of garlic--a
combined stench so thick that you could have cut it with a knife.
Peasants there are too there in plenty, Magyars, Rascians, and Swabians:
all of whom must get their "viginti solidos," otherwise their "twenty
strokes with the lash."

For to-day is the fourth session of the local court of criminal appeal.
On this day, the serious cases are taken first, and after the
death-sentences have been passed, come a succession of lesser peasant
offenders for judgment.

Some have broken open granaries, others have been guilty of assaults,
but there are three main groups. To one of these belong the settlers
from Izbegh who have been convicted of gathering wood in the forests of
the nobles. The second section embraces those culprits who were artful
enough during the vintage to cover the ripe grapes over with earth, (so
that the magnates should be cheated out of their tithes), and to evade
the heydukes who kept watch and ward over the vintagers. Thirdly, there
were the offenders who had formed a deputation to the chancery court,
and dared to pray for a revision of the public accounts for the past
twenty-five years, a request at once temerarious and stupid, for
twenty-five years is a long time--long enough indeed for accounts to
become rotten and worm-eaten. But that they were in sufficiently good
order, the revenue for this particular year, 1783, testified, seeing it
amounted to sixty thousand gulden, of which six thousand were paid to
the ground landlord, and two thousand towards the internal expenses of
the province, with a balance in hand of fifty-two thousand gulden--not
an extravagant outlay, surely!

But what remains for the peasant?

Why just those twenty strokes with the lash. These solve the question of
"plus" and "minus."

The presiding judge, Mr. Peter Petray, only records his vote through the
door, but he himself is doing his official part, for from the window of
the adjoining room he superintends the sentences carried out in the
improvised court below. There are the prisoners in the dock on whom the
vials of justice are being poured forth. They are by no means a
contemptible study either for the psychologist or the ethnographer. The
Rascians are the defaulters against the vintage rights, and loudly they
shriek and curse as the blows are administered, whilst the outragers of
the forestry laws are mostly Swabians, who take advantage of the pauses
between the lashes roundly to abuse the overseer. But there are many
other delinquents besides in that motley crowd, who simply clench their
teeth and await their chastisement.

But the eye of the law must itself watch over the execution of judgment,
so that nothing in the shape of an understanding between the heyduke
and the culprit, tending to mollify the punishment, may be arrived at.
Much depends on how the blows are laid on. Not only does the sentence
provide that the due number of lashes may be fulfilled, but likewise
that the strokes should be heavy. It is for this that the judge, if he
sees the heyduke falter in his work, urges him on to harder blows, by
calling out "Fortius!"

But Judge Petray knows how to combine duty and pleasure. For Fraulein
Fruzsinka, the niece of the prefect, is also in the room, and their
whispered confidences and languishing glances show that the judge and
the young lady have not met here to discuss simply official questions.

Whilst the notary in the next room is reading the indictment in a loud
enough tone for Petray to be able to follow him, this dignitary manages
to interpolate various interesting "asides" to his companion amid the
fire of cross questions, and only calls out his vote when asked for it.

Only the prefect cannot just now leave his post as assessor, and it is
impossible for him to see all that goes on. In the pauses therefore
between the blows, the flirtation between these two goes on merrily.

It was just then that Fraulein Fruzsinka whispered something to her
lover.

"Willingly," he answers, "but while I do it the Fraulein must take my
place at the window, and count the strokes in my stead."

"And remember the heyduke's name is 'Fortius,'" added the judge to his
representative.

Fraulein Fruzsinka leaned out of the window still laughing heartily, and
began to count as if she were noting a scale of music. The culprit,
seeing a girl's smiling face looking down on him, appealed to her for
mercy. And the young lady, who was by no means hard-hearted, called out
to the heyduke: "Don't beat the poor fellow so pitilessly, Fortius." But
that official only flogged all the harder.

At the twelfth stroke, Petray came back and slipped something into the
hand of the girl as she leaned out of the window.

This something she pressed to her lips as she withdrew again behind the
curtain, hiding it in the great locket she wore on her breast. The judge
counted on.

Now it was the turn of a gipsy band, six of whose number had stolen a
goose, and were to receive half a dozen lashes apiece in consequence.
Later on they will provide the music at dinner, at the command of their
prosecutors: "Now we fiddle to you, then you will play to us!"

Fraulein Fruzsinka, with a parting hand-clasp, hastens away to see to
the setting of the table, for the silver and glass and table-linen are
her special care. The judge raised her hand to his lips as she left.




CHAPTER II.


It was now time for dinner, whereat we may have the honour of making a
closer acquaintance with the host and hostess and their four guests.

The prefect, Mr. John Zabvary, with his jaundiced complexion and bleared
eyes, is an excellent specimen of the perfect egoist. Whosoever it is
that comes to him, whether to ask, or to give something, is equally an
enemy in disguise. Does he ask a favour? what is it he wants? Does he
bring something? why is there not more of it? With that perpetual dry
cough of his, he always seems to be calling attention to the faults of
someone or other. He does not even dress like anyone else, but sits at
the end of the table in loose shirt-sleeves, his head nearly
extinguished by a huge red velvet cap, from which dangles an enormous
red tassel, that seems to mock at received Magyar modes. He is a
shocking speaker, and when he gets angry, words fail him, and he begins
to stammer. He is, however, the uncle and guardian of Fraulein
Fruzsinka, which fact perhaps accounts for his short temper.

For Fraulein Fruzsinka, with her pretty face and arch ways, her bright
eyes and alluring smile, is none the less a domestic affliction in her
way. How the prefect longs for someone to rid him of her! How willingly
would he not give her to the first comer.

But it is her own fault that no one marries her, for she flirts
desperately with each admirer in turn. You see it even as she sits at
the table, keeping up a cross-fire of bread-pellets with the judge in a
way that is anything but ladylike. The prefect coughs disapproval and
shakes his head each time he glances at his wayward niece, who, on her
part, only shrugs her shoulders defiantly.

Yet is Judge Peter Petray a highly distinguished man. The dark Hungarian
dolman that he wears suits him admirably. His black curly hair is not
powdered in the Austrian mode, nor twisted into a cue, but curls over
his forehead in a most attractive fashion, and his short moustache
proclaims him a cavalier of the best type.

His neighbour, the president of the court, Mr. Valentine Laskoy, is a
good specimen of the Magyar of the old school, with his squat little
rotund figure, short red dolman, variegated Hungarian hose, bright
yellow belt, and tan boots. The long fair moustache that droops either
side of his mouth, seems to vie with the bushy eyebrows half defiantly.
Yet it is a face that is always smiling, and the owner has a powerful
voice wherewith to express his feelings.

The dinner lasted well into the twilight. How describe it? Everyone
knows what an Hungarian dinner implies. With other people, eating is a
pleasure, with the Magyar it is a veritable _cultus_.

The meal was enlivened by anecdotes, and those of the most racy kind,
whilst the fragrant fumes of tobacco wrapped the company in a cloud of
smoke.

When they at last rose from the table, the judge drew from under his
dolman a little note that Fraulein Fruzsinka had slipped into his hand
under the table--a missive that an onlooker might have taken perhaps for
a love-letter. The judge, however, pushed it over to the president,
exclaiming as he did so, "Worshipful friend, will you please verify this
little account?"

"What is it? I can't see to read by candle-light." And with that the
president pushed the document over to the prefect.

"It's only the statement of accounts," grumbled the host, as he thrust
the paper from him, while he growled: "That is my niece's affair and has
nothing to do with me!"

"I can't see by candle-light," repeated the president. "I can't make out
the letters." For a good Hungarian never puts on spectacles. Whoever has
good eyes may read if he will.

His worship, the judge, had good eyes as it happened. But Fraulein
Fruzsinka kicked his foot under the table, a hint her admirer well
understood.

"Let us hear how much we four have eaten and drunk in four days." Here
it is:

  12 pounds of coffee.
  24 pounds of fine sugar.
  626 loaves of wheaten bread.
  534 decanters of wine.
  154 pounds of beef.
  4 sucking pigs.
  107 pairs of fowls, turkeys, and geese.
  54 1/2 gallons of Obers beer.
  174 1/2 pounds of fish.
  24 1/2 pounds of almonds.
  18 1/4 pounds of raisins.
  422 eggs.
  3 hundred weight of finest wheat flour.

Each item was greeted with a roar of laughter from the company. What was
here set forth could not have been consumed. Moreover the expenditure
was the affair of Fraulein Fruzsinka, who superintended these payments.

It was the judge's cue to be polite under the circumstances. Fraulein
Fruzsinka held her table-napkin before her face while it was being read,
in order to hide her blushes. Behind her stood the heyduke with the
inkstand, so that the document might be duly signed by the authorities.
Happily the item of the ink wherewith it was signed was not put down,
else, doubtless, it had amounted to a bucketful! Then they all
exchanged the greeting customary at the close of a meal. If anyone had
anything further to say, it was about the gipsy musicians who were just
beginning to play.




CHAPTER III.


A genuinely welcome guest does not take his leave at nightfall; the
prefect's visitors therefore put off their departure till the next day,
for the evening before they had sat long at the card-table, whereat the
prefect had won back from his guests, and that to the last kreutzer, all
that it had cost to entertain them.

Fraulein Fruzsinka had played cards till daylight. She had at first no
luck whatever, willing as she was by some slight cheating, to bring it,
but since her fellow-players were ready to let a pretty girl have her
way, she won at last ten ducats. Mr. Laskoy, however, lost the whole of
his salary. But the money would at least be restored to him, for it was
the custom that whoever won most must refund the president his lost
money, in view of the possible wrath of that important official. The
master of the house smuggled the ten ducats through Fraulein Fruzsinka,
into the president's hand.

"Take care," laughed the girl, "Gyongyom Miska does not rob you on the
way."

"I shall hide it where no one can find it, in the lining of my cap.
There it will be safe enough. Besides, Gyongyom Miska is just now
prowling about the county of Somogy. Captain Lievenkopp himself, with
all his dragoons, would hardly succeed in driving him into our
neighbourhood."

"Ah, well, I only say, look after your gold pieces!"

The president laughed contemptuously. Lievenkopp was, it was well known,
one of Fraulein Fruzsinka's admirers.

The president and the judge drove together as far as the next post
station, where their ways parted, and meantime chatted amicably.

"Isn't our hostess a charming person?" began the president as they left
the inn.

"I don't say she isn't."

"I must admit you certainly show your good taste in that quarter."

"Surely only like any other?"

"Come, come, what avails evasion? When I look into the fair lady's eyes
I don't see the expression there, you do. Can you deny it?"

"Well, and if I have looked into her eyes, what of it?"

"Oh, we know all about that. Everyone knows that you and the lady of the
house were carrying on a flirtation whilst the sessions were going on."

"Did I flirt?"

"Most emphatically you did. I know everything. Last night, when I went
to my room, I heard voices through the door of our hostess' boudoir. I
waited in order to listen, and sure enough it was the prefect who was
holding forth angrily about you against a shrill high-pitched voice,
which was obviously that of your Fraulein Fruzsinka. Thereupon, the lady
retorted that there was an understanding between you, and that the
affair was quite serious."

"Bah! As if I meant to marry every girl to whom I have made a
declaration," laughed the judge.

"Aha, that would be quite as difficult to bring about as if Fraulein
Fruzsinka wished to marry all those who had courted her. It cuts both
ways. Yet she is a charming girl! If she could only find some good man
who would marry her. Why not you, eh?"

"Most certainly not. For if someone else marries her, I am certain that
she will be true to me. But if I, and not anyone else, wed her, then
sure enough she'll deceive me every day."

"But if you don't mean to, then it were surely a great mistake, besides
a mere quibble of words, to leave in the fair lady's hands a pledge that
could be legally produced as argument for the plaintiff."

"What do you mean?"

"Tut, tut. I haven't presided twenty years for nothing in criminal law;
I understand what tokens mean. What happened in the little ante-room?
What has the defendant to urge on his behalf?"

"Why, I only superintended the carrying out of the law from the window."

"And in the intervals taught your hostess how to conjugate the verb
_amo_, to love, eh?"

"Stated but not proven--but if it were so?"

"Consequently, the lady may be justified in urging: 'If he really and
truly loves me, let him give me a love token, a lock of his hair.'"

"Why not?"

"Exactly--now you stand convicted! Need I remind you that you only
sought a pair of scissors to cut off a curl of your hair, and while you
did that, your lady-love registered the blows for you as your _locum
tenens_. Yet you were giving the most dangerous blow of all to the
guileless loving heart which beat under your gift, for Fraulein
Fruzsinka hid the curl in her locket, and when we came away, I noted how
she leaned out of the window and kissed the locket over and over again.
Is the impeachment sufficient?"

"No, I won't admit it is. It's based on a false premise. Up to the time
when I went for the scissors, I grant you it was a sound one, but here
the facts alter. As I stood before the looking-glass, with the scissors
in my hand, who should come in but the Fraulein's' little black poodle,
and as usual he put out his fore paws caressingly. Thereupon, a
brilliant idea struck me. The hair curled as well round the poodle's
neck as it did on my head. No sooner said than done. The Fraulein wasn't
looking; she was too busy with the sessions, so quickly nipping off a
superfluous curl from the dog's neck, I slipped it into my lady's soft
hand; into her locket it goes forthwith. But don't betray me! For if the
Fraulein knew it, she would poison us all at the next dinner."

Mr. Valentine Laskoy was not given to groundless merriment, but he
could not fail to see the point of this jest; first that one of the
dog's curly locks had been transferred to the locket, and secondly, that
it had been kissed with transport by the owner. And thereupon he burst
into such a guffaw of laughter that the horses thought it was a volcanic
eruption, and began to shy and rear accordingly, so that the coachman
and the heyduke with him could not bring them to a standstill on the
bridge before the post-house, and the passengers were all but sent
flying from their seats. But at this point Mr. Laskoy had to get out to
await the companions he had left behind, who were coming on in the
coach.

"But don't say a word to anyone," was the judge's parting injunction to
his companion.

"Trust me! But, all the same, whenever I see a black poodle I shall
laugh at the thought."

And off went the judge, for his time was up.

At the bridge, where the roads branched off, Laskoy waited for the coach
to come up.

But what a time the coach was coming, to be sure! He could not imagine
what had happened to it. It was past mid-day, his ever-growing hunger
made the delay of the diligence all the more wearisome. But in spite of
it all, he waited patiently.

At last the famous vehicle came in sight, but only slowly, although the
road was quite good. What could have happened?




CHAPTER IV.


Now what had really happened to the coach was that it had lost one of
the big screws out of the hind wheel, so that the latter had come off.
For a whole hour had they hunted for the screw without success, and then
they tried to get on without it, but that was a difficult business. If a
peasant loses a wheel-nail, he can easily find a substitute; the screw
of a coach, however, is not so easily replaced. What straps and ropes
they had to hand were knotted and wound round the axle, but the quickly
rotating nave had in a few minutes torn all to shreds, and would not go
round properly, much to the detriment of the horses who now had to drag
the lumbering conveyance with a wheel that would not work, through the
tough, sticky morass, which made the way much more toilsome.

Not that this affected the merry mood of the president as he took his
place inside. Every now and again he whistled for sheer lightness of
heart.

"Fire away, there!" he cried to the driver.

But the driver was not equal to the task, as he urged his steeds over
the morass through which the four slow old hacks dragged the rickety
vehicle with its broken-down wheel.

Meanwhile, on a hillock which rose tolerably steep from the roadside,
waited a horseman mounted on a strong wiry beast, that stood with his
muzzle snuffing the ground like a setter scenting the trail, with
watchful eyes and pricked ears, but so still that he did not even brush
off the flies that settled on his withers and flanks. The man himself in
the saddle was equally motionless; he was dark and hawk-eyed, with curly
hair, and a tapering pointed moustache. He wore a peasant's garb that
was scrupulously fine of its kind, his countryman's cloak being richly
embroidered, and his sleeves frilled with wide lace. In his cap he wore
a cluster of locks of women's hair and a knot of artificial flowers; at
his girdle gleamed a pair of silver inlaid Turkish pistols, while from
the pommel of his saddle hung another, double-barrelled, and in his
right hand he carried an axe. An alder-bush had hidden the stranger up
till now, so that he could not be seen by the coaching party till he
himself hailed them.

"Now you traitor, you knave, are you going to stop or not?"

Was the coachman going to stop? Yes indeed, he sprang down from his box
in terror, promptly crawled under the coach, and whimpered, "Alack, your
honour, it's Gyongyom Miska himself, it is indeed!"

The mounted cavalier pranced up to the coach, the noble charger tossing
his proud head to and fro, so that the harness-fringe flew round him.

"Now we've got something to laugh at and no mistake," growled the
coachman. Yet he laughed too in spite of himself.

The highwayman himself began to laugh as he accosted the president.

"So you've recognised me, have you, for the celebrated Gyongyom Miska?"

"How pray did you become Gyongyom Miska?"

"Don't you remember me by that name? You yourself gave it me. Have you
forgotten how when, years ago, in the County Assembly, I had begun a
speech, you called out to me in the middle of it, 'Ay, Gyongyom (my
jewel), hold your peace; you understand no more of these things than
half a dozen oxen put together,' so that I could not get any 'forrader,'
for people laughing at me. Since those days the name has stuck to me.
Everywhere I go I am received with the greeting, 'Here's Gyongyom Miska,
worse luck!' So then, I say to myself, 'I'll be a Gyongyom Miska,' and
show them such things as no one else can. And people talk about me,
don't they?"

"But you won't rob me, will you?" implored his victim. "Do you want my
horses?"

"Make your mind easy. I rob nobody. I only take what is given me, and
carry off what the possessor does not value, and as for such wretched
nags as you drive, I tell you plainly I wouldn't have them at a gift. I
am pretty hard to please in horseflesh, I can tell you. So don't let's
waste time in talking. I ask for nothing that people have not got. I
know too that you are in a hurry. So just give me ten gold pieces, and
then you can drive on."

The president did not wish to understand the hint, as he said sulkily,
"What do you mean?"

"Only those ten Kremnitz ducats that you drew as salary for your work on
the Bench."

"True enough, friend, that I have received them, but the prefect won
them from me at cards last night, and I haven't one left. He did not
give me back the money he had won. Turn out my pockets, search me if you
will, and if you find there anything but a bad groschen, it shall be
yours. Here's my sword-pouch. See, there's nothing inside. And if you
like, you can take my boots off, but you'll find no gold there, I warn
you."

The highwayman pressed his axe between his fingers, and tapped quite
gently with the butt end of it on the crown of the president's head,
where the velvet lining of his fur cap hung out. What was jingling
inside?

The smile vanished from the lips of his victim. His round face became
suddenly square with astonishment.

Now there must be something wrong about that. Who had betrayed him? No
man knew it but one.

Gyongyom Miska did not let him waste time in further consideration. With
a pickpocket's dexterity he drew from under his cloak his hunting knife
from its sheath, ripped out the velvet lining, and possessed himself of
the ducats in a trice. Then, with a pressure of his knees, he turned
his horse round, and in the twinkling of an eye, horse and rider were
over the marsh. Only then did he turn round to utter as a parting
greeting the formula of the law courts: "I commend to you, my lord, my
official services," and disappeared through the poplar-trees.

"It is a stupid business," grumbled the president, whose good humour had
been torn away with that cut into his cap-lining.

And a stupid, not to say absurd business it certainly was.

But Gyongyom Miska, cracking his hunting whip merrily, bounded away over
the sedge.

It was already evening. The autumn sun cast long shadows over the level
plain. At the edge of a wood burned a herdsman's fire. By it sat a girl
in riding-gear, her head supported on her hands, at her feet two
greyhounds lay stretched out, her horse was tethered to the stem of a
poplar. At the cracking of the whip she sprang from her resting-place,
threw a bundle of dry faggots on the fire, mounted her horse, snatched
up her whip, and cracked it as a counter signal. Across the plain,
starred with wild anemones, the two met; bending down from the saddle,
they embraced and kissed each other, and were off once more, the one
eastwards, the other to the west.

       *       *       *       *       *

Meanwhile, scarcely had the guests withdrawn from the Assembly House
than an official courier rode up the Old Buda Street into Pesth. A
courier of this kind was so unusual a sight, that everyone hastened to
his front door to see him. He wore a red frock coat, leather gaiters
over his boots which reached up to the knee, and a cocked hat with a
tuft of red feathers. Every postmaster is bound to provide him with a
fresh mount does he need it, and a blast from his horn will compel every
peasant to hold at his service as many oxen or horses as he possesses.
The sound of his horn is a well-known one, and as the courier gallops up
the street, the children, blowing through their hands, mimic the blast,
and the elders crane their necks to see what may be his errand. It was
for the prefecture he was bound.

"Tres-humble serviteur, Mamselle Oefrosine!" Thus the courier greeted
Fraulein Fruzsinka de Zabvary. "Postage not paid, but I ask three
kronen, because I've ridden well, to say nothing of having to go back!
There are a thousand gulden inside."

It was the courier's way to recommend the letters he handed in as
containing a thousand gulden. So he was paid the fee; but there was
nothing like a thousand gulden in the letter thus sent to Fraulein
Fruzsinka, for it was from the captain of dragoons, Heinrich Lievenkopp,
and why there was nothing of the kind in the letter, may now be told.

Fraulein Fruzsinka paid the courier, but ordered him to wait at the
prefecture so that she might give him the answer to take back. It was
likewise to the interest of the postman to urge the despatching of a
reply. Then she broke the seal and read the letter in question, written
in the stilted affected style just then so much in vogue, with
mythological phraseology mixed up with barrack slang. It ran as follows:

      "My most adored Lady,

      "By the winged feet of Mercury himself, do I address a
      message, surely very agreeable to your grace. God Mars
      has taken it into his head to complete the heroic
      labours of Hercules. That scoundrel of a highwayman,
      'Gyongyom Miska,' has, after escaping our annihilating
      force on this side of the river, retreated across the
      Danube, and has taken refuge in the Raczkeve
      Island--protected by Neptune and Hermes, those
      divinities of the robber. Meantime, must we patiently
      wait on the shore till we get a ferry to carry us
      across. The wretched fellow was playing us off, since
      he swam across the other arm of the Danube and reached
      the farther side. Thereupon, the Viennese civilians
      who were with us, declared, forsooth, that we might
      not pursue him, because it would be crossing the
      border of another county!

      "So we had to return to Pesth till the county of Pesth
      should supersede the county of Weissenburg in its
      strategic co-operation. But rumour has it that the
      redoubtable robber has come back from Weissenburg
      county to that of Pesth, and is haunting the Vorosvar
      woods. Therefore have I received new marching orders
      from the commander-in-chief to march with my squadron
      on to Vorosvar. To-morrow, at the first streak of dawn
      shall we start on an expedition which brings me on the
      wings of the Hours to the charmed circle of my
      adorable Calypso in the beauteous Vorosvar Vale of
      Tempe.

      "There is, however, a small but fatal incident that
      must be recorded, that has much disquieted me, which I
      will set forth to the Fraulein. Last week I was
      amusing myself with Mr. Justice Petray (a good fellow
      by the way), in dallying with Fortune's painted cards,
      on which occasion a thousand dancing sprites turned
      the wheel very unluckily for me, so that I lost twenty
      ducats to the justice, and had to give him my _parole_
      as an officer that I would pay him to-morrow. Item, he
      insists on my redeeming my word, because to-morrow
      there is to be an enquiry into the accounts, and among
      other things will be missing the twenty ducats from
      the treasury. But owing to the incredibly bad state of
      the roads the allowance my aunt sends me has not
      arrived, nor do I know how I can settle the affair.
      And so for me there remains nothing but to take my
      leave of the world with a pistol-shot, and embark in
      the boat of Charon, or else to take refuge under the
      protection of my good genius, and call her to my aid.
      I humbly suggest that she might, for just this once,
      be an intermediary with her rich uncle for me, and
      borrow the above-mentioned sum on my behalf, which I
      pledge my word, as a cavalier, gratefully to reimburse
      directly I get my aunt's allowance.

      "May the Fraulein accept the most humble homage of
      Heinrich von Lievenkopp."

Off went Fraulein Fruzsinka, when she had read this letter, to her
uncle, the prefect.

"I say, uncle, dear, will you advance me ten ducats out of my
allowance?"

"Oho, my dear," answered Mr. Zabvary in a tone which suggested the
melancholy whine of a dog. "What's the matter? I really can't advance
any more money, for my account at the bank is already in danger of being
overdrawn. But what did you so suddenly want ducats for? Is the captain
of dragoons in difficulties? That seems to be a chronic ailment with
him. Yes, indeed, I know, he wants more pecuniary aid, that's it!
Otherwise he'll blow his brains out? Heaven grant he may! If he'd only
do it once for all! What does a dragoon captain matter to me? A man who
never means to marry, but just scares away the eligible suitors. I wish
the devil had taken him to Silesia. And, pray, if he means to marry, am
I to keep him? I should think not, indeed, considering he's got his old
aunt. But even if he has, it will fall upon me in the end. Just write
him the right sort of answer in proper Latin: 'Centurio'=Captain,
'pecunia'=money, 'non est'=is there none; 'si valves valeas'=if there's
no wine, then drink water!"

"Very good, if you won't give me any, I'll ask someone else," said
Fraulein Fruzsinka defiantly, banging the door after her as she went
out.

Mr. Zabvary did not think much of that, for it was quite customary for
Fraulein Fruzsinka to raise loans on all sides; from the overseer, from
the chief herdsman, nay, from the shepherd's man she would borrow, and
they never dared to ask the prefect for repayment, but probably then and
there reckoned--as the saying goes--that "discretion was the better part
of valour" in such a case (which is a wise conclusion if you can but
come thereto). Fraulein Fruzsinka, however, left all these possible
creditors unexploited, and calling for her horse, and her riding whip,
and two pet dogs, she went off on a hunting expedition into the open
country.

She did not, certainly, appear to be troubling about game, but seemed
much more concerned to reach the wood; once there, she paced along the
side of the brook till she came to the thicket.

There she took a path which led through it, till she reached a
picturesque circular glade on whose edge six armed men in their coloured
cloaks, lay encamped by a herdsman's fire. When the most gorgeously
garbed one among them perceived the Fraulein, he sprang forward to meet
her, and as she approached he hastened up to her, lifted the young lady
from her horse, and kissed her on both cheeks. Both the dogs appeared to
recognise the cavalier, for they sniffed at him in a decidedly friendly
way. Then, with their arms round each other's necks, they paced along
the flower-decked turf, speaking together in a low voice. And the end of
it was that the lordly cavalier, after whispering to the Fraulein,
mounted his horse, shouldered his weapons, and trotted off, with all
his accoutrements, in company with the young lady herself in the
direction of the high road.

What then happened we have already seen.

Fraulein Fruzsinka had her ducats when she came back. She put them with
the other ten, enclosed them in an envelope, gave them to the waiting
postman, and the red-coated courier was before nightfall on his return
journey, blowing the while the lustiest blast on his horn.

And thus had Fraulein Fruzsinka, at one blow, accomplished three, to
her, eminently desirable ends.

First she had made her adorer, Gyongyom Miska, aware on what side danger
threatened him; at the same time she had procured the ten ducats which
her other admirer needed to redeem his word and avoid the fatal shot; in
the third place, she had helped her third suitor, the judge, to verify
the municipal accounts and make them balance.

But those ten ducats must have truly been bewitched, since they were
fated, in twenty-four hours, to pass through many pairs of hands, to
disappear, be stolen, disappear again, and again be stolen, and only
then to come to a stand-still.

That Fraulein Fruzsinka had put all her admirers in a good temper,
however, and benefited all three, can we duly testify.




CHAPTER V.


In the Szent-Endre and the adjoining Izbegh vineyards the vintage was in
full swing. It was an excellent harvest, the wine promised to be
unusually good, and all the vineyards were filled with joyous labourers.

But from the vineyards the new wine was conveyed away by one road only,
in great casks, while heydukes, armed with pikes and muskets, guarded
the route. For all that grows in the vineyard must first pay the
requisite tithes.

At the entrance of the one open road four huts were erected, and before
each stood a huge vat. The first belonged to the Bishop of the diocese.
As the cart, laden with the casks of "must," or new wine, passes, the
episcopal steward takes out his tithe. Then the cart proceeds to the
second hut, where the court chamberlain deducts his share. Thence it
arrives in front of the two huts which, facing each other, bound the
narrow road, so none may pass unchallenged. No matter whether the owner
is hailed in German or Magyar, the sacristan of the parish acting for
the Catholic priest, appropriates his own tithe from the cask, or if he
speaks Rascian, it is for the Greek "pope," he takes his share.

Only then can the convoy proceed. Yes, indeed, so it might, if there
were not a fifth hut in the way, where two heydukes seize the horses'
bridles, and on right and left the owner is hailed by officials who want
to know why he has broken the "portion" rule. (For thus in their
simplicity have the peasants abbreviated the word "proportion.")

Such is the method in which the taxes are extorted.

Whoever is in a position to do it, holds himself in readiness to
compound for the "Haracs," as it was called in Hungary, from a Turkish
word, by opening his purse and paying up the arrears of the tithe in
groschen, which settled the matter, for to pay the tax in silver was
illegal. Consequently, on the table of the fifth hut fell many a
well-stuffed bag of copper coins, which the officials had squeezed out
of the vintagers. There were, however, many who were not well enough
provided with small change to satisfy this crowd of creditors, and so
had to pay up the arrears in kind. That is why the great vats stand
there in the road.

But the "red Jew" carries his casks into the small Slovak carts that
take it down to the Danube, and ships it to Vienna, and pays, too, his
tax of two Rhenish gulden for his wine.

It can well be imagined how to the overtaxed peasant wine-grower who
has run out of money, this same "red Jew" is a friend in need, quite
ready to help him out of his difficulty, for he will pay for his wine at
the rate of two gulden a kilderkin. But this did not happen in
well-regulated communities. Only the municipality had the privilege of
selling wine, and to it the citizen only dare retail his vintage. And
the price which he received for it was fixed by the law at one gulden.

So the wine-grower pours likewise into the great vat his "deputy-tax,"
wherein he reckons a gulden for a kilderkin, and the "red Jew" draws it
out again at two gulden a kilderkin.

Thus it befalls that the owner of the vineyard brings the bottles which
he has brought with him empty to the vineyard, empty home again. And yet
that is called a first-rate vintage! But it was hard for the good man
himself to esteem it so, and no wonder he was doubtful!

And thus the vintage went on till nightfall. Then the gates of the
vineyards were shut, and the judicial vintagers paused in their work,
yet not to betake themselves to rest, but to carry on further business
within doors.

The judge and his deputy, the notary and the jurymen, all conferred
together, the notary being auditor and controller in one, whereby it may
be gathered that he was a very clever fellow.

The Jew Abraham was likewise called into the council, in order to assist
in the money-changing.

For at that epoch all kinds of money were current in the country, which
only came into evidence as they passed in daily exchange. To dispose of
them was not easy, so the Jew was bidden to give proper money in
exchange for them. When he got back to Vienna he could in his turn get
rid of it.

During the money-reckoning transaction, Abraham appeared with the
accounts giving the amount of money taken over, the price of the wine,
and the bad money left behind.

"Can't you buy this bad money too, father Abraham?" queried the notary.

"No indeed, my lord, for if I change false money they will lock me up,
but you will quietly put it away in the cash-box, and pay out with it,
your servants' wages, your heydukes, messengers, and foresters. In due
time, these coins will again be in circulation at the tradesman's stall,
or the inn, and the public will be fingering it once more for fees and
fines, and so the bad money comes round again, just as the sun goes
round the earth, for it is not by any means lost."

Everyone laughed at the Jew's explanation.

Then Abraham stated how much he would give in gold for the small change
he had taken, and the business was settled without further ado.

"But now, Mr. notary," proceeded the Jew, "just make me out a receipt to
attest that I have changed the money, and that we are quits, but write
it in Latin, not Rascian."

"All right, Rothesel."

"Also, I would ask you not to write my name 'Rothesel,' but 'Rotheisel,'
with an 'i' if it is just as easy to you."

"But everybody calls you 'Rothesel'?"

"You may call me what you like, but in writing at any rate, I am
'Rotheisel.' I had this favour granted me in Vienna, from the Kaiser
himself--that I might write it with an 'i.'"

"And a nice round sum that very 'i' cost you in Vienna, Abraham, or I'm
much mistaken! Confess frankly, it did!"

"Pray why should I confess anything about it? What does it matter
whether this 'i' cost me but a single heller, or a hundred thousand
gulden--you, not I, pay them, after all is said."

When the Jew had gone, the notary packed up the ducats in stacks, and
placed them beside him round the inkstand, while the president began:
"Well, now the outsiders are off home, only the privileged councillors
and the members of the council remain, in order to be present at the
opening of the great coffer."

Now it is not permitted to every official to glance at the contents of
the mysterious coffer. As the privy council alone remained, the notary
fetched out from the cupboard, as many night-caps as there were men, and
each one drew the covering thus provided over his head, so that only the
tip of his nose was visible. This was done so that none might see where
he was going. When all were thus blindfolded, the notary alone
excepted, the latter took a light from the table, and gave the end of
his stick into the judge's hand; the judge in his turn reaching the end
of his to the juryman behind him, and so on, till the chain of
blindfolded men were ready to start. Where? Ah, that was the notary's
secret, for he it was who directed their progress.

"Now there come steps," he cried, "one, two, three," and so on, till he
had counted ten. Then a key creaked in an iron lock. "Stoop down so you
don't hurt your heads," came the word of command, and they passed
through a low door. "Here we are," cried their leader, "now you can
look."

The jurymen had often been in this place before. It was a low-pitched
cellar, with a massive, vaulted arched roof, and in a corner of it,
there stood an iron coffer made fast to the wall.

Beside this iron chest stood a Rascian "pope," whose hand they could
reverentially kiss if they wished. How he came there no one knew.

The "pope" produced a large, curiously wrought key, and the notary a
second one like it.

"These are the keys, open it who can!"

Three or four times some jurymen made the attempt, yet without success;
in vain did the keys press right and left in the wards, but it opened
not.

"We are wasting time," cried the "pope." "Do you try, Mr. notary, you
understand it."

Whereupon the notary turned the keys, and the coffer was opened.

Everyone wanted to see inside.

There were nothing but ducats there: ducats, indeed, by hundreds, in
fine transparent bladder bags, through which the yellow metal gleamed
seductively. The sacks stood as in battle array, like so many soldiers
close to each other. There must be a fabulous lot of gold there! Now
another row was to be added to it. Then from a side compartment of the
chest, a small book was fetched out wherein the notary entered all kinds
of accounts. And strange entries might those be, judging from the
frequent exclamations of the jurymen, which showed that the budget he
examined was a notable one.

"Tut, tut," cried the notary interrupting, "you don't want it published
to all the world."

"But if it has to be, eh?"

After which, certain accounts were duly registered in the little book,
and the great coffer was again closed. Then the "pope" spoke.

"I see well enough that you have again husbanded your funds carefully,
and that the money has increased, but where does the blessing of Heaven
come in? You never give a thought to the Church! You promised to buy a
new church bell, to gild the church roof, and to build a house for the
parish priest. There's no money for all these things, but the coffer
gets fuller and fuller."

"Make yourself easy, your reverence," answered the notary, "all that may
come next year, if we are spared. For that the small cash-box will
suffice."

"So you think it will, do you? What has ruined the hospital? The poor
sick folk nearly perish of hunger in summer, and are nigh frozen in
winter, whilst you carry off the timber by cart-loads as presents to
Pesth, and then think of the amount of smoked sturgeon and caviare and
wine you send thither, and all for the magnates, but nothing for the
sick and needy!"

"Let it be, your reverence, there's nothing so advantageous for the sick
as fresh air, and nothing so harmful as overloading their stomachs. But
it's far better that we should give firing for the magnates, than that
they should make it hot for us!"

"And the poor-house which our revered Queen, Maria Theresa, endowed, is
it not still empty? What are we about that we do not find inmates for
it? But you find none."

"The devil we do! Don't the blind and the lame stand each Sunday before
the church door, but if we want to befriend them, we've only to say:
'Come you, poor wretches, we'll show you the way into the poor-house,'
and off they run in a fright, so great a horror have they of the bread
of the State."

"You children of the devil! And what of the poor Izbeghers whose forty
houses were burned down? The Emperor allowed them as much from the
treasury as the worth of the houses amounted to, but you raised the
rents of the remaining houses and then dunned them for the money."

"That's natural enough, seeing the Emperor let the State annex the
burned part in order to pay so much the less to the ground-landlord. If
Peter has nothing, then pay Paul, that is the rule."

"A godless rule too! Amend your ways, I say, for if next year as many
complaints reach my ear as have this, I'll denounce your coffer to the
Treasury."

These words only provoked laughter.

"Your reverence is not such a bad sort," ventured the judge in a
conciliatory tone.

Thereupon, the keys were withdrawn, the night-caps again donned, and the
notary led his blind men again to the ground-floor of the council
chamber, where they congratulated one another on the risks run.

"Only yon priest should not have it all his own way with his
maledictions," grumbled the judge. "But they are all like that. Each one
of them thinks that hardly earned money should be wasted on churches and
hospitals."

"I also think, my lord, that it would be better that such an
unreasonably big sum of money should be divided to each one as he has
need," suggested a juryman bolder than the rest.

The speaker might, from the assenting murmur which greeted his speech,
take it for granted that he had a good many on his side, but the
eloquence of the notary soon crushed such sympathy.

"Ay, my dear friend, that would kill the goose which lays the golden
eggs. This coffer is our pledge of power, our shield of protection, our
bond of union. As long as it exists are we rulers in this city and in
all its dependencies. As long as this coffer answers for us, so long can
we get the laws made in our favour. As long as we have our money, they
won't take our sons for military service, or ask us for accounts, and if
a meadow or a plot of land is to be divided, we look after the
allotment. It is we who direct public works. It is we who fell the
timber in the forest, who cast the net into the Danube, and limit the
vintage; we buy and sell; and fix the tithes. As long as the key of that
coffer is in our hands, we must needs be great powers in the city, like
Kaiser Joseph in his palace at Vienna. At the end of that key we whistle
a tune to which all men must dance."

"Quite right, quite right!" shouted the whole assembly.

And who could contradict them?




CHAPTER VI.


The Jew Abraham was the father of twelve children, all sons, and all
red-haired. And each one equally resembled his father.

Yet it will be well to explain matters from the beginning.

Up till the Emperor Joseph's time, the Jews had been devoid of any
family names, as once in the Promised Land.

But when Joseph II. admitted the Jews to the rights of citizens, he
stipulated that they should render military service if called upon, and
that they should choose a surname--and that a German one.

To this end, royal commissions were despatched on all sides which should
provide the Jews with surnames. And a nice business it was! Whoever had
a well-filled purse had a free choice, if it so pleased him, but woe to
him who set about it empty handed, for the nickname wherewith his
mocking neighbours had christened him, stuck to him pitilessly.

Because Abraham had not sufficiently opened his purse-strings, he still
had to go by his nickname of "Rothesel," wherewith he was known among
his neighbours.

The epithet "roth" (red), he had received from the colour of his beard,
but he had been qualified as "esel" (ass), because he had done nothing
more enterprising with his wife's dowry of two hundred thalers, than buy
up wine with it. On this account everyone had decided he must be an ass.
And everyone, on the face of it, was right. For what could a Jew want
with wine? He dared not retail it, for the trading rights belonged only
to the communes, to say nothing of the difficulty of transporting it
over the frontier. Whence could he carry it? for in Hungary the law
forbade any Jew to trade in such wares.

So that when his neighbours called Abraham an ass for laying out his
money in wine when he began life, they were not far out, for he hardly
earned salt to his bread by such a business.

But Abraham was in his way a student of the times. Looking ahead, he saw
under the rule of the later Hapsburgs that many ancient laws, though
still unrepealed, had nevertheless fallen into desuetude, and
consequently that the statute forbidding Jews the commerce in wine,
might follow suit. Consequently, Abraham found means of transporting his
Hungarian vintages to Vienna. And as he was the first in the field his
enterprise was crowned with success. Nor did he deceive the customer as
to the difficulties of the Hungarian wine trade.

In spite of all this, he did not part with his wealth too readily. The
commission had expected that he would come out with ducats by the
thousand, but he produced nothing more than a cellar full of wine. In
retaliation for this they left him his nickname of "Rothesel."

What did it matter to him, for what is a name after all? The name of the
creditor is always a good one, that of the debtor as surely a
disgraceful one.

But his own family did not share his views on the subject. If it was
indifferent to the father what men called him, his wife and children
took a different view of "Rothesel," and, owing to their urgent
representations, Abraham determined to rid himself of this incubus, yet
without paying too dearly for it.

He reckoned two hundred ducats would cover it, and with this sum off he
went to Vienna, ostensibly, on a question of his wine trade.

Arrived there, he began to think out how best he could forward the
affair without getting too much fleeced in the process.

He began at the beginning, that is to say, at the chancery court, where
all such problems have to be conciliated. And a long list it was! The
expediting of such business is a serious matter.

But to the Jew there suddenly came a brilliant idea. He bethought him of
an acquaintance at Court. The title of this acquaintance was doubtful,
for he was only a young man, and whether to address him as a chancery
clerk or as chancellor, he knew not. He was the nephew of the
postmaster of Szent-Endre, Mr. John Leanyfalvy. This worthy had adopted
the orphan son of his sister, while yet a child, and had sent him to
Vienna that he might carve out a career for himself in the imperial
city. Each time that Abraham had made his business visits there, he had
spoken to the postmaster and asked him if he had any message for "young
Matyi." And when the uncle had taken this opportunity of sending his
nephew a gift of country produce, Abraham always carried out these
commissions faithfully, and was duly welcomed by "Mr. Matyi."

The latter was quite at home at Court, and had employment in the palace
itself. What he did there, whether he had a voice in the Kaiser's
councils, or brushed his coat, Abraham did not know, perhaps the latter
was the likeliest supposition; in this case, he would be a patron to be
prized, for servants are worth propitiating.

Consequently, the crafty Jew had determined to seek out the postmaster's
nephew at headquarters. And in order he might not appear empty-handed,
he took a pear with him. At that time there was a rage for pears carved
out of wood, whereof one half formed a musical box, being filled with a
mechanism which enabled him who put it to his mouth to produce quite a
respectable tune. Such a pear did Abraham buy in a shop at Nurnberg, but
he stuffed the hollow half of the pear with two hundred ducats. This
pear he had destined for the young man if he prospered his petition with
the Emperor. The said petition was drawn up neither by agent nor
attorney, but as concocted by Abraham, ran thus: "Your Imperial Majesty,
the high commissioners insisted on calling me 'Rothesel,' I only beg
permission to insert a humble little 'i' in the middle of my name."

Furnished with this formula, Abraham set out for the palace. The
_entree_ there proved much easier than he had imagined. For was there
not a standing order that no petitioner should be denied admittance? So
he was allowed to enter the great corridor, where already many people
were assembled.

Abraham had what you might call prodigious luck at the very outset. The
first person he met in the ante-chamber was "Mr. Matyi" himself. His
appearance was that of a refined handsome youth of about
four-and-twenty, with a red and white complexion like a girl's; he wore
his hair powdered, a pea-green silk coat turned up with red, an
embroidered waistcoat, a lace-frilled vest, with knee-breeches of
cherry-coloured velvet, silk stockings, and buckled shoes. At his side
hung an Italian rapier, and from his waistcoat pocket dangled a
watch-chain laden with all kinds of trinkets. Under his arm he carried
the tri-cornered hat of the period.

Moreover, this elegant young dandy was not ashamed to recognise his old
acquaintance in the crowd; no sooner had he caught sight of his red
mantle than he went up to him, asked him how he fared, and how it was
with his uncle, and when he heard Abraham's errand, exclaimed, "Why
that's a mere trifle." Thereupon, taking his hand, he led the Jew
through three or four rooms in succession, which they traversed without
knocking, till they came to a fifth, where he hung his hat up on a peg,
as a sign that they had reached the presence-chamber, and told the Jew
to wait while he should announce him to the Emperor. Abraham's knees
nearly failed under him when he knew that only those folding doors
divided him from the Kaiser. Yet his friend could enter freely; he must
then be some kind of chamberlain.

In half a minute the latter was back again.

"You can enter, Abraham."

And thereupon he pushed the Jew, with his petition in his hand, through
the door.

Abraham saw indeed little more of the Emperor than his boots, but these,
he noted, had not certainly been blacked for a week; if "Mr. Matyi" was
really his servant, he didn't know his duties that was plain.

Back came Abraham again into the ante-room.

"Mr. Matyi" was busy at a writing-table; he seemed to have some
important correspondence to transact there.

The Jew was radiant with delight; he hardly knew where to begin: "It's
right enough; the Emperor himself has countersigned the petition with
his 'fiat.' Here is his name! He himself has put in the 'i,' praised be
the Lord!"

But suddenly he broke off in his thanksgiving as he regarded the
document. "Ay, woe's me!"

"What is the matter, friend?"

"Why, his Majesty has clean forgotten to put the dot over the 'i,' and
without this, the 'i' looks exactly like an 'e,' and it only means from
being a short ass, I shall now be but a long one! Alas, I am a dead man.
I beseech you to be so very kind as to put the necessary little dot in
for me, so that it may be done with the same ink. You have the pen in
your hand ready."

"What are you thinking of?" cried "Mr. Matyi" indignantly, "to correct
the imperial hand-writing, why, it would be a rank forgery! Give me the
petition, I'll take it back to the Emperor, so he may put it in."

And thereupon, off he went through the folding doors with the paper.

Abraham breathed freely, he had attained his end, and this without
laying out thousands of ducats; he had managed it for two hundred. He
fumbled in the money compartment of the musical pear, and laid the
ducats on the writing-table of "Mr. Matyi," so that the latter should
not fail to see them when he returned to his correspondence.

The young man was soon back again.

"Here you are! God be with you! Greet my uncle for me, and tell him I
have much to do, that I want for nothing, and send my good wishes, and a
happy journey to you!"

Abraham put the petition in his pocket, crying over it like a child.

"Mr. Matyi" accompanied his _protege_ to the next room, thence he
trusted him to find his way out.

While the Jew was struggling with the door-handle, back came "Mr.
Matyi," red with rage, seized Abraham by the collar of his mantle, and
with the other thrust the pear under his nose, asking angrily: "What do
you mean by leaving this on my table?"

Abraham took it as a jest.

"Well now, I have only brought you some pears as usual."

"But the ducats?"

"They were for the gracious favour which the young gentleman has been so
kind as to show me."

"I have shown you no kind of favour. You wanted justice and you have
obtained it. Take back your gold!"

"Why should I take it back? Hasn't the young gentleman deserved it for
all his trouble? Did he not get the dot put on the 'i'?"

"I will not accept a handful of gold for a dot over an 'i.'"

"But it's worth it to me? It's not a bit too much. The young gentleman
needn't take offence. He can pay his debts with it."

"I have no debts."

"Oh, you have no debts, do you say? Don't tell me a Viennese dandy has
no debts. You owe neither the tailor nor the host anything? What, don't
you want to make your sweetheart a present?"

"I have none."

"Who could ever believe it? How you blush. Well, take it, make merry
with it, gamble it away with good comrades. For I won't have it back."

"I drink no wine, I don't gamble, I have no good comrades; this money
you will take, for it hurts me to receive it. Those I serve pay me for
what I do. He who does such work as mine asks for no reward but his
master's, and can take no bribe from another. Take your gold back."

"As you will, Mr. Raby," said the Jew, and he put the ducats in his
pocket.




CHAPTER VII.


"Very good then, Mr. Raby," pursued the Jew. (He no longer thought of
him as "young Mr. Matyi.") "But before I leave this place, nay, before
you send me packing, I must needs have three words with you."

"All right, out with them!"

"Now the first is this: since I first weathered winter's snow and
summer's dust on this good Mother Earth of ours, I never before met a
man who was frightened at money. I see him for the first time to-day.
You were positively averse to keeping my gold. Nay, I believe that you
wanted to break my head on account of it. And now I find you have no
sweetheart, you neither drink nor gamble; you fraternise with no one.
That again is something quite unheard-of. And finally, a man will not
dot the 'i' of another person's writing, that also is something out of
the common, let me tell you."

"Well for one word I think that is long enough--what else?"

"The second concerns myself. As truly as that I yesterday was
'Rothesel,' and to-day am 'Rotheisel,' so surely is it that Rotheisel
won't neglect a treasure which Rothesel has discovered. I know of a
treasure, in fine, for the carrying off of which, as in the fairy tales,
only clean hands can avail."

"I don't understand what you are talking about."

"Well, I do. There is a treasure lying buried in a certain place, a
solid heap of more than a hundred thousand ducats, on the track of which
I would set a champion."

"I still do not understand. To whom does this goodly hoard belong?"

"This money has been wrung from the sweat and blood of the poor and the
oppressed, nay, squeezed out of ragged and hunger-bitten wretches,
moistened by the tears of widows and orphans, purloined, and concealed
from the Crown. It is the people of your native town, good sir, whose
misery has augmented this treasure, and who starve and complain for the
lack of it, while beggars swarm throughout the country. If this sort of
thing goes on, the whole State must go to the dogs. I know what I am
talking about, and will gladly lead you to the hoard. When you are in a
position to rescue it from the dragon's clutches, two-thirds of it will
go back to the poor wretched folk it was wrung from, and a third to
enrich the man who restores it."

"But if you know all this, why not do it yourself?" questioned his
listener.

"Tut, tut, my most respected sir, have you then studied to such little
purpose as not to know the laws of your native land? Does it not stand
written that the plaintiff must be a Christian? The Jew can do nothing.
And, moreover, were I as good a Christian as the zealous old sacristan
who opens the church every morning single-handed and shuts it at
nightfall, I should not be the man for this business. For it is just
such a man as you is wanted, my respected sir, a man who, once he has
set his hand to the work, will not allow himself to be beaten out of the
field. For as long as the seven-headed dragon that guards the treasure
sees that no one attempts to raise it, he'll wag his seven heads more
boldly than ever. As soon as the delegates who are told off to take
charge of it, notice that by chance ten or twenty heaps of ducats have
been left perhaps on the table, they go back and verify that all is in
good order. They will resent the adventurous knight's interference, and
will give him his _quietus_ if he is not wary. He must press on against
all foes, even if help fail him. How should a poor insignificant mortal
like myself be fitted for such an undertaking? For such a quest, a
powerful chivalrous man is needed, who has the _entree_ at Court, who is
likewise a noble himself, and can wield the pen as well as the sword, in
fine, one who has a heart open to the cry of the poor and oppressed, and
the faculty of sympathising with the people. They are not my people--I
am only a foreigner here, but it goes to my heart when I see how the
harrow tears and the clods are broken, how for others is the sowing that
these may reap. Then I thank God that He has not given me a portion in
this land, but that I am a stranger here. Believe me, Mr. Raby, the
nobles always know how to oppress the vassals. The Turkish pacha at
most, has shorn his subjects: the Magyar landlord has fairly plucked
his, but the Szent-Endre council flay their victims of hide and hair
alike. So that's my third word!"

"All right, just give me more precise details over all this, and come
and look me up at my lodgings; there we can talk it over; I shall be at
home the whole evening."

So at the appointed time, Abraham went to discuss matters with Raby, and
did not get home till morning. He literally talked the whole night long.

Yet when he at last took leave, he bound his friend on his honour:

"That you never betray how you knew all these things. The Spanish
Inquisition was mere child's play compared to what those good people
would do to me, if they knew that it was I who had made it so hot for
them."




CHAPTER VIII.


Mr. John Leanyfalvy was a narrow-minded man. He was the postmaster of
Szent-Endre. He neither paid nor received visits; he had but one hobby,
and that was gardening. This he rode with a persistency worthy of a
Dutchman. He grew flowers of which no one had ever heard before--exotic
blooms almost extinct, but for the fostering shelter his garden walls
afforded.

He was specially celebrated for his melons. At the time of the
melon-harvest, two great mastiffs guarded the melon-plot over which his
bedroom window looked. In this garden all his spare time was spent. He
was so busy one afternoon over his melon-beds, that he did not observe
how his mastiff, who by day was chained up, was growling at a man who
stood before the garden gate. He only became aware of the new-comer when
the latter wished him good day. He looked round and saw a stranger
dressed in the latest modish costume of Vienna, and finally, he
recognised in the apparition his nephew, young Matyi.

"Why bless me if it isn't my nephew Matyi. I hardly recognised you in
this fashionable coat, I declare. But very welcome you are all the
same."

And the old man embraced his nephew heartily.

"Ay, but you've become a man since I saw you last. You only want a
moustache," and he looked at Raby's smooth-shaven face critically. "But
you are not in a hurry to be back in Vienna, I hope?"

"Well, unless you want to send me away, I needn't be in a hurry to go
back, as I could stay here all the winter," answered Raby.

"Well, don't talk to me about sending you off. I know well enough you
are under someone else's orders."

"Yes, uncle, under orders to stay here for some time."

"Oh! I take it, you are here then for the taxation commission?"

It was an office which had at that time but an unenviable reputation in
Hungary.

"More pressing business still," answered the young man with a smile, as
he whispered something in the old gentleman's ear, which was evidently
an important disclosure.

The features of the old man relaxed.

"Now that's something like; that's capital! Now I can reckon you a man.
Only don't neglect the work."

"Trust me!"

"And then don't begin among the lesser folk, but get hold of the great
people. Go straight to the prefect himself; he's the one to tackle. Ay,
I could give you some good advice. Hear all, see all, and hold your
tongue, as the saying goes. But you know all about that, and have no
need of a plaster over your mouth."

"Yet if I find the guilty, I shall not spare them, I warn you, whoever
they be."

"You will see, my boy," said the old gentleman, rubbing his hands, "if
you tackle the prefect properly, you will be court judge of Visegrad,
year in and year out." And he clapped his nephew on the shoulder.

"What kind of a berth is it in Visegrad?"

"Ay, my boy, that's the fattest plum in the neighbourhood; it's worth
more than a hundred county court magistracies, and it happens to be just
vacant."

"How could I hope to get it?"

"What a stiff-necked man it is to be sure! Didn't you get to Vienna? You
don't surely reckon yourself among those people who let themselves be
cajoled by the gift of a fine horse or a roll of ducats: a man like you
is worthy a bigger bribe."

The young man became suddenly crimson.

"But, my uncle, I don't come for that--for the sake of a horse or money,
or even a court magistracy, not to be bribed by the great, but rather to
redress the grievances of the folk who are oppressed, and to rectify
abuses."

At this speech Mr. Leanyfalvy shifted his zouave from the left to the
right shoulder.

"Don't you know, my dear boy, that out of the mouth of the poor,
complaints are not heard. There must be a God who hears them,
nevertheless. Yet the government is a power against which one man can
avail nothing. How can you protect the sown fields from the marmots? Man
is just such a marmot. Dismiss him who is now in office, and put another
in his place; you only change for the worse. As long as there are fools
and knaves in the world, so long will the one always rob the other."

"Now if you reckon abuses of office among social ills, I can but tell
you that if you have a will, you can amend them. And this will have I."

"Yes, but have you likewise the power? 'Whoso is wanting in strength is
powerless in wrath.' Besides, who stands behind you?"

"The Emperor himself."

"And who else?"

"Isn't he enough?"

"That doesn't suffice; you must have the presiding judge as a patron, or
the lord chancellor, or at least the district commissioner. If you can
only ensure the Emperor's favour, that doesn't go far. What can you say
to our Emperor, except 'May it please his Majesty,' and that he is
lampooned daily. Every day there come some such scurrilous pamphlets to
my notice."

"The Kaiser believes in unlimited freedom of opinion."

"Hang freedom of opinion! If I were Emperor, and anyone printed such
things about me, I would take my axe and play such a tune on the
writer's head with it, that he would not ask for a second one. And then
if the Hungarians see that the Austrians dare thus to insult the Kaiser,
what liberties will the Hungarian not allow himself?"

"Yes, indeed. All those who are shocked at his novelties, murmur against
him. They abuse him because the freedom hitherto only accorded to a
certain class and creed, will now be extended to all his subjects
indiscriminately."

"Let us talk about the melons, my dear boy. Look at this one with the
mottled rind. When it's ready you can eat it without harm. But take a
bite, before it is ripe, and you get a horribly sore mouth. Now it's
just the same with liberty. When it is ripe, the grower can present it
to the people on a pewter plate. But cut it before it is ready, and the
melon and he who eats it, alike are done for. I know you will maintain
that one can force the melon to get ripe, if you have hot-beds and
green-houses. Now you and your friends, the philosophers and
philanthropists, are just such growers at the present time. Who could
get enough hot-beds and forcing-houses for the whole world? Wait till
the dog-days come, and the heat of the sun will let each one ripen in
its proper measure."

"Good, uncle. I accept the melon allegory, and will answer you in your
own gardening terms: If you want melons, you must sow the seeds. Some
sprout, others lay dormant. Then comes the worm to devour them, and the
mildew and the frosts to blast the young shoots, yet, in spite of all,
your true gardener tends them to the end. Such a sower am I, who plant
what is entrusted to me in the ground, that others may reap the
harvest."

The simile pleased the old gentleman much; he stroked his moustache
thoughtfully.

"You are the right sort, my boy. And if you feel equal to the task,
undertake it. But I fear you won't succeed! But you have not come here
to stir up a hornet's nest, have you?"

"No, uncle. First of all, I shall procure the actual facts of the case,
and till I get them, I shall not say a word to anyone."

"That's well and good. But how will you get those facts?"

"I have reckoned for all that. I mean to settle down and buy myself a
house, with a field and vineyard. As an inhabitant of the city, I shall
have the right to mix myself up in local affairs."

"That sounds like business. For that matter, I can recommend you a house
that belonged to the notary's brother. It's a fine property, with
garden, vineyard, and meadow attached. The owner is a drunken
good-for-nothing, and over head and ears in debt, but can, by realising
the property, pay his debts, and still have something left. Leave the
contract to me."

"Agreed then, uncle. The money question can soon be settled, as I have
what will be necessary."

"So far, so good. But after, when you have your facts, who is going to
be prosecutor?"

"I myself will be."

The old gentleman stroked his moustache doubtfully.

"Oho, my boy, that's a dangerous game. Do you know that the law won't
allow you to do it anonymously? The prosecutor must act in his own
name."

"I shall lodge my complaint openly so that the guilty can recognise me."

"Then be sure they will try and get rid of you."

"That is the fortune of war."

The old man smiled slily.

"It has just occurred to me you can't be prosecutor."

"Why not?"

"Why, pray, have you not studied law in Vienna? Docs not the decree of
St. Stephen lay it down that the prosecutor must be a married man? If
you are single, you are not qualified to make the depositions."

"All right, I'll marry."

His hearer fairly shook with laughter.

"My boy, I've heard many motives suggested for matrimony, but never one
like yours. You are going to marry to help the people to their rights!
Remember that--

    "'He who takes himself a wife,
    Does but heap up care and strife.'"

"But, uncle, what can you, who were never married, have to urge against
matrimony?"

"Oh, I've nothing against your marrying. Leave that also to me. I have
found you a house; now I'll find you a wife."

"It is very good of you, I'm sure."

"I'm not joking. I know of a right suitable maiden for you. You remember
when you were still a lawyer's clerk, pretty little Mariska, the
notary's daughter. Well, she has become a fine girl. Since her mother's
death she manages the household entirely, and nowhere is there one so
well ordered as Tarhalmy's. She spends no money beyond what she gives to
the poor, and knows how to save as well. She's none of your frilled and
furbelowed fine ladies, and does not frizz her hair in the latest
fashion, but just dresses like a modest Magyar maid; and when you talk
to her, you hardly know what colour her eyes are, so modestly are they
cast down. Nor does she waste time in chatter, but gives you a plain
answer to a plain question, with the prettiest blush imaginable. That's
the wife for you, my boy, and a right comely one, I promise you."

"All right, uncle. When I've bought the house, and had time to look
round a little, I'll go and see her."

And with that, Raby took his leave.




CHAPTER IX.


The postmaster did exactly as he had promised, and he did it promptly.

"Now I have got the house, you've got to set up housekeeping, but don't
buy much furniture, the wife will see to that. Till you get a wife, I'll
lend you my maid-servant to keep house; she's also a good hand at
milking, for a cow you must have; and your cooking will have to be done
at home, for there is no cafe or hotel here, as at Vienna. And don't
trust your wine-cellar key to anyone else!"

Mathias Raby took this good advice, and arranged his new house as if he
were settling down for good in it. He had his fields sown with crops,
his vineyards overhauled, and laid in a stock of winter provisions. But
he encouraged no gossips, took no interest in outsiders, and was
reserved with acquaintances to the verge of taciturnity.

But general rumour had it that the gentleman who had thus settled among
them, had been sent by the Kaiser himself to investigate matters of
state in Szent-Endre.

Soon after this, Raby made an excuse for going to Pesth so as to call on
the Tarhalmys.

Tarhalmy was the county notary, and lived in the Assembly House assigned
him. Raby knew it well, for when he was a clerk, he used to go there
every day. When he reached the door, the heyduke who stood sentry,
barred his way, with his musket under his arm, one foot crossed over the
other, and his shoulder against the door.

"Tell me, my friend," for thus did Raby accost the old heyduke, "is the
worshipful pronotary at home?"

The man answered, his worship had just gone out, but his lady-daughter
was within, and would be delighted to see the honourable gentleman.

Raby hastened up the familiar wooden stairs, that were so well worn down
the middle.

Our hero needed no guide through these rooms. He knew all the nooks and
corners of the house, and likewise the time at which callers might
come--between the hours of three and four in the afternoon. First he
betook himself to the ante-room, where he laid aside his sword and hat.
But there was no lackey there to announce him, he had to knock therefore
at the first door, to hear a "come in," before he ventured to enter
without further preamble.

It was the familiar dining-room, where the women-folk were used to
betake themselves to their spinning-wheels.

They sat there now, the Fraulein and the two maids. The spinning-wheel
was to our grandmothers what the cycle is to the women of to-day; nay,
it took also the place of the pianoforte itself.

Mariska had certainly grown very pretty since Raby had last seen her,
although, as Mr. Leanyfalvy had remarked, she was quite simply dressed,
and did not curl her hair. He was also quite right about her blushing
when she was spoken to. In this instance, words indeed were not needed
to bring the colour into her cheeks, she no sooner saw the visitor, than
she crimsoned to the roots of her hair. The young girl rose respectfully
from the spinning-wheel, glanced shyly at the intruder, and ere he could
forbid it, had made him a childish curtsey and kissed his hand.

Raby was very nearly being angry.

"But, Mariska, do you not recognise me?"

"How should I help recognising you, Matyi?"

"Why then do you kiss my hand?"

"Ah, you have become a great man since those days."

"Were I ever so great a man, I would not allow my hand to be kissed by a
lady."

"But I am no lady, you see."

"Nor am I a great man. And now please give me your hands that I may kiss
them."

But the girl put both hands behind her back.

"No, for then should I be a lady indeed. Please be seated."

She motioned Raby to the leather-covered sofa, and sat down again by the
spinning-wheel, as she deftly began afresh to twist the flax into fine
silky threads, so that they could talk if they wanted to.

The two maid-servants did not leave the room, but just listened to all
that their mistress and her visitor said; it was but proper, they
thought.

Raby was meanwhile thinking how to baffle the maids. To this end he
asked in German what she was doing?

The young girl gazed at him with her great blue eyes full of sorrowful
amazement. Fancy expecting that in the household of the pronotary of
Pesth, that stronghold of Magyar freedom, that anyone, much more the
daughter of the house, should speak German! She lowered her eyes, and
whispered timidly, "I do not understand German."

"You do not understand German? Why, whatever would you do if you went to
a ball here in Pesth, and could not speak to your partners?"

"I never go to any balls; I can't even dance," murmured the girl.

"You mean to say, you don't dance? Well then, however do you amuse
yourself?"

"When I have time for it, I read."

"And what in the world do you read, if you only know Hungarian?" asked
Raby.

"Father has a fine library, and so he chooses books for me."

"And how do you spend the whole day?"

"Oh! I have a small garden in the courtyard; I love flowers!"

Tho two were silent, and Raby looked around him.

The whole room was eloquent to him of the past. There, by the
work-table, was still the little box containing thread, scissors, and
thimble, which he himself had made when he was a clerk. There over the
couch, hung a withered wreath of dried flowers which he recognised.
Nothing was lost; all had been carefully preserved, even the pen which
he had used for the last time in the office, rested still behind the
mirror with his name inscribed upon the holder.

And yet they had not expected him; all these souvenirs had not been
spread out at the news of his coming. They were, everyone, abiding
witnesses to the way in which his memory was cherished in a guileless
maiden's heart which loves, while it yet hardly knows what love is.

Mathias Raby was surely strangely ungrateful to the fate which had
preserved such a treasure for him. But it is the way of youth, so
unregardful is it of the treasures true love spreads for its unheeding
eyes, to be its own for the asking.

But his meditations were interrupted by the entrance of Miska, the
heyduke, who came to announce that his worship, the notary, was ready to
see Mr. Raby if he would wait upon him in the bureau.

Raby rose from his seat, and took leave of his hostess, who accompanied
him to the door.

There they exchanged the usual farewell greetings, and she laid her
little hand in his shyly, as if fearing the ceremonial kiss. As Raby
took the small soft fingers in his, a magnetic shock, as it were,
thrilled his being, so that he would fain have asked the question which
was on his lips, the question the girl would have seen in his eyes, had
she but raised her own.

And Mariska, too, yearned to ask him, "How long do you stay?" How gladly
would she have heard the answer that it was for some time, how naturally
would the invitation have risen to her lips to Raby to come again often
and see them.

But instead of all this, they did but hold each other's hands a moment
half-fearfully, as if each were afraid of the other's kiss.

This once, at any rate, did Raby have the chance of grasping that
invisible golden thread which runs once through the life of every
mortal. Well for him who seizes it, for it will lead him safely through
all perils, but woe to him who lets it go! He cannot pick it up again.

Raby did not seize the thread.

"Good-bye!" they murmured. And a right good word it is this "God be with
you!" Yet what if man refuses the blessing the good God proffers him?




CHAPTER X.


When Raby went into the office, the clerk told him that the chief was
expecting him in the "state-room" as it was called, in which
distinguished guests were received. This apartment was much more richly
furnished than the rest; it was therefore intended as a compliment to
Raby, that the pronotary should receive him there, rather than in his
bureau.

The pronotary was a fine-looking man of distinguished bearing. His thick
grey hair was combed straight back from his brows, and except for his
short moustache, he was clean-shaven. His short embroidered dolman
reached to his hips, and was confined by a costly girdle, wherefrom
depended a little pouch containing pen and ink, while his watch-chain
dangled from his breeches' pocket.

Raby was rather doubtful as to what sort of greeting he should venture
on. The French style exacted a solemn posturing with sundry bows and
curtseys; the German fashion demanded you should shake your neighbour's
hand as lustily as possible, but old-fashioned Hungarian etiquette
prescribed that the younger should kiss the hand of the elder. Raby
bethought him of the kiss he had received in coming thither, and that
decided him. He would pay it back now to the father. The face of the old
gentleman brightened at this greeting.

"Look you, my friend," he exclaimed in a clear deep voice, "in former
times, I would have patted you on the head, but I cannot do that now for
fear of dishevelling the coiffure your friseur has arranged. Don't you
regret, by the way, wasting so much flour?"

His guest was glad to catch the old man in such a good temper, and
determined to profit by it, so he kept up the jest.

"Yet it is far better surely, that I should tumble into flour than
bran?"

"I think not, my boy, besides you are not so far from tumbling into bran
as you seem to think."

Raby looked at him with astonishment.

Tarhalmy's face became suddenly grave.

"I know well enough why you are here!"

(How could he know why he had come? wondered his guest.)

"Not at my house, but why you are in this country. And if you will
permit me, I will tell you what I think about your mission."

"Oh pray do!" exclaimed Raby.

"Well, my young friend, you know I have always loved you as my own son.
I recognised all your capabilities, and always said 'that boy will some
day do great things!' A better brought-up, better disposed youth than
you were, with a higher sense of honour, could not be found. I would
not hesitate to entrust you with untold millions--or an innocent maiden.
But I warn you, if you persist in the way you have marked out for
yourself, you will soon be rotting in one of our prisons; and I shall
hear your chains clanking, without being able to stir a finger to set
you free."

"And all that because I am a friend of the people?"

"Rather an enemy of the nation, say!"

"Are not the people and the nation one and the same?"

"No, not at all: the nation is the state. You idealists cannot see the
wood for the trees; you cannot see the nation for the people. Only make
the people believe that they fare better under a despotism than under a
constitution, and you are the right side of the hedge."

"So you think it's a choice of being ruled by one tyrant or five hundred
thousand."

"Wait, young man, the five hundred thousand are the defenders of the
country on the field of battle, judges, commanders, pastors of souls and
teachers."

"Yes, it was like that formerly. But time does not stand still, even if
conditions remain the same. The new age demands a better system of
defence, a more enlightened code of justice and government, as well as
better methods of instruction."

"But you can't get all that in Hungary by just speaking the word! Nor
anywhere else, for that matter. We defend our much abused Asiatic
traditions, only through passive resistance."

"Yet the question which once was asked of old from the oracle of Dodona,
is still the pressing problem for us: which is the most desirable, a
flourishing Hungarian nation according to the ancient idea of it, or
popular freedom?"

At these words, the pronotary shook the young man cordially by the hand.

"That was a pertinent question. I honour you for your candour. So many
proselytes of the Emperor that I have come across so far, will insist on
it that between these two antagonistic ideals a compromise is possible:
that, after the abolition of the privileges of the nobles, with an
equalisation of taxes, and a mutual obligation to bear the common
burden, the country can remain the same as it was. But you openly admit
there are only two alternatives, in the face of which we must needs
choose. You have chosen your part, I too have made up my mind. I believe
that in our part of the world it is more necessary for the
constitutional, patriotic Hungarian nation to endure, than for the
peasants to have one day a week more for idling; that it is better for
the aristocracy to give orders to the mob, than that the mob should give
orders to the aristocracy."

The young man laughed aloud.

"No, no, my honoured friend, I do not come here with the intention of
touching our hereditary constitution with my little finger. In this does
my whole mission consist--in rectifying abuses which cry aloud to
Heaven for redress in the Court of the County Assembly."

"And pray who entrusts you with it?"

"Firstly the Emperor, and then the oppressed people themselves."

"That's just where the fault lies: neither the Emperor nor the people
have the right to lay such a duty on you. That right belongs alone to
the Pesth Assembly."

"But the Crown has the right to demand that such a right be exercised."

"Very likely. The Assembly will do whatever it be called upon to do."

"And if the Assembly acquit itself badly? For its own officials are
guilty of the misery of the people."

"Oh, that is no secret. Our officials are in a body quite ready to
fleece the folk in the very way that has aroused your indignation. But
up till now, we have elected these officials ourselves, and we would
rather have them over us, even if they were stained with the seven
capital sins, than have the Emperor's nominees, were they angels from
heaven. This is no legal quibble, but a question of actual conditions.
Whatever the people suffer, they will recover sooner or later; if a man
dies, another is born in his place; but the constitution can neither
suffer nor die. You stand for the Emperor, I stand for the voice of the
nation. Both are mortal. We shall see which of the two survives. But I
warn you to reckon on no one's support in the work you have undertaken,
for everyone will regard you as an enemy."

"Thank you," said Raby. "Also, there is a satisfaction in remembering
that there is at least one man I can reckon on who won't desert me."

"And who is that, pray?" asked Tarhalmy smiling rather grimly, for he
thought it was the Emperor he meant.

"Why myself."

The pronotary embraced him, exclaiming tenderly as he did so: "Poor
fellow, poor fellow!" Then he said gently: "Farewell, in case I never
see you again!"

And Mathias Raby went away without mentioning even a word of Mariska.
What a horrible thing these politics are, to be sure!




CHAPTER XI.


Raby had scarcely left, than pretty Mariska put her little head in at
the opposite door which led from the reception-room to the
dining-parlour. Mr. von Tarhalmy was striding up and down the apartment
as if perturbed.

"Did you call me, dear father?" asked the girl.

"No, no, child; but come in."

"You are not vexed, father?"

"Not a bit of it, my dear."

"I thought you were quarrelling with someone."

"Nothing of the sort. We have only been discussing some business
matters. So just come in."

The girl nestled up to her father's side affectionately.

"I quite thought you called me," she murmured, "and that you said, we
have a guest coming to-morrow, Mariska."

"Aha, you are right enough," smiled Tarhalmy. "Of course I said so. Your
cousin Matyi will dine with us to-morrow. Bless me, if I hadn't quite
forgotten all about it."

"And it's well I should know it in good time."

"Yes, indeed, and see you have his favourite dishes for him. Have you
plenty of stores, or must any be procured?"

"No, indeed, I have everything I want in the house."

And therewith, Mariska kissed her father's hand, nay both of them, and
danced back into the next room as light-hearted as a bird.

And the two maids at the spinning-wheel must be up and doing; one to
pound almonds in the mortar; the other to sift fine flour for fritters.
The Fraulein herself set about peeling lemons, seeing she was going to
make some of Matyi's favourite cakes, such as no Vienna pastry-cook
could turn out. And through the whole household there was the sound of
singing, for Mariska too could sing on occasion--and this was one.

But the pronotary himself sent his heyduke to go and find Mr. Mathias
Raby, and tell him, with his compliments, that he would expect him to
dinner the next day.

       *       *       *       *       *

Raby was meantime interviewing some of the high officials of Pesth.

The first one he visited was the lord-lieutenant of the city.

For this visit he had to put on court dress, as that official was a
direct representative of the Emperor.

His Excellency was an unpopular person, disliked by everyone. He was a
hard man whom nothing softened. He sympathized with no one, and he was
in nobody's good graces. Yet he was a personality everyone had to reckon
with.

His very appearance bespoke the man. The copper-coloured complexion and
ill-shaven face, with its deep frowning eyebrows, heightened the natural
defect of his neck, which was twisted towards the right shoulder. His
hair was lank and reddish; his dress a cross between the Hungarian and
Austrian mode, slovenly and dirty, and stained with snuff, while the
order of St. Stephen, which he wore round his neck, was defaced and half
torn away. His voice had a repellent snarl about it. He spoke German
with everybody, but it was a vile patois.

When Raby was ushered into his presence, his Excellency was drinking his
coffee, and his visitor had to stand till he had finished.

When he had set his cup down, he got up, and turning abruptly to Raby,
asked him if he were a count?

His visitor could not imagine what prompted this question, but he
answered that he was only an untitled gentleman of good family.

Thereupon his Excellency pointed to Raby's silk vest, and snapped:

"Well, then, what do you mean by this? According to the prescription of
the 'dress regulations,' no one under the rank of a count may wear
embroidery."

And in fact there was at this time a "dress regulation" in force to this
effect. Kaiser Joseph carried his paternal interest in his subjects so
far as to lay down rules as to how they should dress. Fashions and
ornaments which were permitted to the count, were not allowed the baron.
In this way, you could specify at first sight what rank a man held, for
even his hat revealed it. Only for princes and princesses was it
permitted to wear both black and white feathers; counts wore white
alone, barons black, and so forth down the scale. These sumptuary laws
even affected walking-sticks which had their mountings differentiated
according to the rank of the possessor.

That was why Raby had offended the lord-lieutenant. As a simple
gentleman, he had no right to either gold or silver embroidery.

"This is the dress usually worn by the secretary of the imperial
cabinet," was the only explanation Raby offered.

"Ah, that is another thing. But I don't approve of these concessions
being allowed to those who are not men of rank."

He scanned his caller mistrustfully from head to foot, and then went on
stiffly. "But I already have your credentials. Discharge your duty, but
take care what you are about, for you will find no one here to help you
out of a difficulty. So I have the honour to be your very humble
servant."

But Raby did not mean to let himself be dismissed in this fashion.

"I too, am your Excellency's very humble servant," he answered. "But I
have a special mission to your Excellency which concerns both of us: my
duty is to speak, as it is likewise to present you with the imperial
warrant."

The determined tone of the speaker levelled at once all distinctions of
age and rank. His Excellency vainly took refuge in walking up and down
the room, for Raby kept pace with him, and he poured forth his whole
story into his ear, for he was determined that in such a high quarter,
the right side should be known.

When he had finished his explanations, he raised his cocked hat with an
elaborate bow, bent his knee ceremoniously to the proper degree, and
withdrew, with the three paces prescribed by correct etiquette, to the
door.

Mathias Raby now hastened to the dwelling of the district commissioner,
who lived alone in an old house at Buda. Before it stood a sentry, and
at the entrance was also a porter who rang the bell if a visitor came in
a sedan-chair--the favourite means of locomotion. You could, if you
wished, have a carriage, but it was not so comfortable. Nor was it
advisable to go on foot, for in the covered ways which led round the
water-city, it was dark enough to cause ordinary pedestrians to dread
being robbed--as indeed they easily could have been.

Raby hastened up the steps of the district commissioner's house with
renewed confidence, for the commissioner had been one of his Vienna
acquaintances, and so when the lackey announced the visitor, ordered
Raby to be admitted at once, though he had not finished his toilet.

At that epoch, dress was no light matter even for a man. The _friseur_
was occupied in shaving his client; then from one box he took out some
white cosmetic, from another some red colouring, to apply them to the
proper place on the cheeks, for, at that era, not only women, but also
men of fashion painted their faces. Then the eyebrows were darkened, and
blue streaks were faintly outlined on the temples with a paint-brush
dipped in ultramarine; finally, a patch was applied with artful
dexterity on the right spot above the reddened lips. Only when all this
was done, could the final operation be carried out--that of powdering
the curled and twisted hair, the patient holding meanwhile a kind of
paper bag before his face, whilst the barber powdered the coiffure with
a large brush.

"How are you, my friend?" was his host's greeting, as Raby entered.
"I'll be done in a few minutes; meanwhile, sit down and read."

On the writing-table, to which he motioned Raby, lay some of the latest
pamphlets and pasquinades of the moment, mostly directed against the
Emperor.

Raby turned them over. "I've seen these before," he remarked.

"And is not his Majesty very angry at them?" asked the commissioner.

"Not a bit of it; he sends for the pamphlets, and not only does he make
me read them to him, but he is heartily amused."

"Otherwise the author might find himself fastened to the wheel, eh!"

"Joseph has thought of a more sensible punishment. A writer sold his
pasquinades at thirty kreutzers apiece, and built a house with his
profits. But recently the Kaiser, as soon as one of these productions
appeared, had it reprinted and sold for eight kreutzers. The result was
that the writer had the whole edition left on his hands, while everyone
bought that issued by the Kaiser. The proceeds were given to charity."

"Not a very seemly trade for an Emperor, eh? It were far more becoming
to a prince to have the fellow's head off."

"Yes, the Kaiser has distinctly plebeian ideas, it must be owned."

"What too did he mean by putting in the pillory an officer of the Guard?
Only think of it, just for misappropriating from the treasury sixty-six
thousand gulden. And it was only to build an alchymist's laboratory.
Could he help it because it turned out a failure?"

"Ah, well, now the ice is broken."

Meantime the _friseur_ had finished his work and gone, so it was easy
for Raby to broach his errand, with such an opening:

"The Emperor visits with extreme severity the embezzlement of public
funds; it is for this very purpose that he has sent me to bring to light
certain abuses connected with the Szent-Endre municipality."

"I know, I know," said his Excellency, as he poured some eau de Cologne
over his hands, "it has come to my ears. But you will be a long time
finding your way out of that tangle, once you get into it; let me warn
you. By the way, is there a new opera company at the Vienna theatre?"

"Ah, my good friend, I've no time to run after plays and players. I've
dramas of my own to look after, and they deal with the picking of other
people's pockets."

"The deuce take your dramas! Does one still see pretty women at Vienna?
Where do you have your evening gatherings during the winter?"

"We go to 'The Good Woman.' The sign-board is a woman without a head."

"What does the hostess say to that, pray?"

"I shall have no chance of asking her, seeing that I shall spend the
winter here, and pass my time in verifying accounts."

"Stuff and nonsense! Cut it short, sir, and get back to Vienna as soon
as you can. Say you have found nothing. By the way, have you been in
Pozsony? They say they pay their theatrical companies far better than we
do; isn't it a shame?"

"May I venture to ask if his Excellency will deign to listen to my
representations about the Szent-Endre affair?"

"My dear fellow, just tell me everything. I am wholly at your service.
And don't mind my interruptions. I shall hear all. Have the officials
really so oppressed the poor? It's unheard-of! And the Rascian 'pope'
might well speak out. He's a good sort! Just such another as some of our
priests in Vienna. Did you ever hear how--oh, yes, I'm listening right
enough. I see quite well that you've discovered some sort of roguery.
The story of the hidden coffer sounds just like a play, doesn't it? 'The
Hidden Treasure,' or 'The Forty Thieves.' Go on! I declare that notary
ought to be placed in Dante's Inferno. What was that celebrated forgery
case, by the way, when some count or other, of high family, was put in
prison surely? You can't be too severe with that kind of thing. Yes, the
small fry, like your notary, don't get out of the net, but the man with
a handle to his name, gets clean off! We ought to make some examples in
high places."

Raby longed to express to his Excellency his conviction that the
Szent-Endre culprits would also elude justice; but it seemed wiser to be
silent till his loquacious friend had had his say.

And now indeed the district commissioner, who was really a good sort of
fellow, showed that he had quite understood the whole business.

"You leave it to me, my friend; I'll follow it up. You may reckon on my
help. If the councillors show themselves recalcitrant, we will know how
to make them dance! But now it's time for the theatre, my friend. What
do you say to coming with me? I have a box. You will be able to see all
the pretty girls of Pesth and Buda together."

"Much beholden to you, but I regret I can't take advantage of your
offer," answered Raby; "I must hasten homewards to send in my report to
the Emperor."

"Oh, what's the good of drawing up reports? Take my advice and don't
send him any. And if you won't come to the theatre with me, then come
and dine to-morrow and we can talk things over."

But Raby went home to draw up his report.

       *       *       *       *       *

Meantime, the lord-lieutenant was demanding of his secretary:

"Which is the Statute that treats of _nobilis cum rusticis tumultuans_?"

The secretary was a walking legal code. He not only knew that the law in
question was article thirty-three, of the year 1514, but could quote the
passage word for word: "Noblemen who take part in any risings of the
peasantry shall be banished, and shall forfeit the whole of their
estates."

His Excellency uttered a growl of discontent; evidently the citation was
not an apt one.

"What about that other statute of _Nota Conjurationis_?"

"Article forty of 1536 pronounces sedition to be high-treason. See _Nota
Infidelitatis_."

His Excellency shook his head.

"And that of _Calumniator Consiliariorum_?"

"Article of the year 1588 runs as follows:--Whosoever shall calumniate
and unjustly attaint any of the Empire's councillors, shall be condemned
to lose his head and forfeit all his goods."

"That is better. You can go."

The speaker was obviously contented this time.

But immediately afterwards he recalled the secretary.

"Which article is it that treats of the _Portatores Causarum_?"

"Article sixty-three, of the year 1498. Whosoever shall bring his cause
before a tribunal other than that of his own country, shall be arrested
and imprisoned in the Dark Tower."

"Now you can retire."

       *       *       *       *       *

His worship, the district commissioner, who during Raby's relation had
appeared to pay not the slightest attention to the Szent-Endre story,
had no sooner got to his box at the theatre, than he sent immediately
for pen, ink, and paper, and, quite oblivious of the play, hurriedly
drew up a missive to the prefect, wherein he set forth Mathias Raby's
mission, and how he had been directly authorised by the Emperor to
revise the finances, pointing out that he was well informed as to
everything, even to the contents of the strong box. He would further
suggest that it would be wise for the prefect to go and look into things
for himself, otherwise disagreeable consequences might ensue.

This note he sent by a special messenger to ensure its speedy delivery.

       *       *       *       *       *

Tarhalmy's heyduke came back late in the evening with Raby's refusal. He
could not come, because he was already pledged to dine with the district
commissioner.

"You need not trouble about the almond-cakes, Mariska," said the
pronotary to his daughter, "Cousin Matyi will not be with us to-morrow,
he is flying higher game."

And all at once the sound of singing ceased in the house.




CHAPTER XII.


Hardly had Mathias Raby returned to Szent-Endre than he realised that
everyone was aware of his mission. Gifts of all kinds poured in, and his
servant told him that in his absence two casks of wine had arrived--she
knew not from whom. In the courtyard, big stacks of firewood had already
been piled up--the gift of some anonymous donor, while the poultry-yard
was full of feathered stock which seemed to have flown down from the
skies.

It was a pity the recipient did not appreciate them. Yet he knew the
time would come when all those who now plied him with gifts, would be
ready to deprive him of everything, if he ventured to set foot in their
streets. He forbade the maid to touch any of them under pain of instant
dismissal. The poor girl was quite dumbfoundered with surprise, for what
could one have better than such presents?

On the day of his return, two well-known citizens appeared at his door
with a smart coach and four beautiful horses. One of them was Mr. Peter
Paprika; in former times he had himself fulfilled a term of office as
magistrate six years, so he understood the situation. The two had come
to wish Mr. Raby good day, Peter Paprika adding that, as his worship
must have so many journeys to make in so many different directions, he
was sure he could not exist without a carriage and horses. For Raby,
moreover, the price of the whole equipage, including horses, would only
be forty gulden! Nor need he be surprised at this abnormally cheap
price, for they were not stolen. The four horses were from the stud of
the State, the carriage was the best the local builder could turn out.

Mathias Raby thanked them for the offer, but refused to buy the
equipage, even at this price.

However, they still pressed their bid, adding that fodder for the horses
would be provided gratis, whereupon Raby told them point blank that
their bribes would not in the least avail to turn him from his purpose.

Mr. Paprika returned dejectedly to the town council where his colleagues
waited to learn the result of his mission.

"I'm afraid," he announced to his fellow-councillors, "it won't avail us
to dip in the little chest for this. We have a difficult customer to
deal with. We must dive into the big one."

They talked the matter over, and determined that if necessary, they
would sacrifice half the common wealth, and for this, bleed the treasure
itself, to such an end. And Peter Paprika was entrusted to find out a
new opportunity for proffering the bribe.

So the next day they sought out Raby, and put the whole thing before
him. They hinted broadly enough that you did not muzzle the ox that
trod out the corn, and that he who cut up a goose was justified in
keeping the best bit for himself, and other like arguments, and finally
laid on his table the sum of three thousand ducats.

Even to-day three thousand ducats are not a sum to be despised: in those
days, indeed, they represented a respectable fortune. But Raby nearly
drubbed the envoy who brought them out of the room. He was righteously
indignant, and angrily showed the messenger the door.

"I never saw a man so angry," growled Peter Paprika, "I've heard men
often enough refuse money in so many words, but they contrived to pocket
the ducats discreetly, directly they have the chance." So they thought
it might happen this time. A week elapsed, and people already began to
smile knowingly at Raby when they met him in the street, saying to
themselves, "He only wants a little bigger net, but he'll be caught in
the end."

How greatly was popular opinion disconcerted, when in all the churches
the following Sunday, a "command" from the Emperor was read to the
effect "that the three thousand ducats which the worshipful town council
had given to Mr. Mathias Raby for benevolent purposes, were to be
divided among the inhabitants whose homes the preceding year had been
destroyed by fire, and that each one would receive seventy-five gulden
apiece."

What a procession it was that took its way to Raby's house. The
unfortunate victims of the conflagration came with their children and
chattels to thank their benefactor and to kiss his hand. The homes of
many of them had still to be made good, and the help could not have come
at a more seasonable time. But it set the officials against Raby. They
could not tell the recipients of this bounty what had really happened.
But the latter guessed immediately that the town council had given Mr.
Raby three thousand ducats, not for any charitable ends, but in order to
bribe him, and that he was making over to them these ill-gotten gains.
Well might the poor regard him as their deliverer!

Nevertheless, the councillors began to shake in their shoes. Judge,
notary, and old Paprika hastened to the prefect, and announced with
anxiety and horror that a dragon had been set on to them, who would not
be pacified with the treasure itself.

"Well, we'll just fetch out a bigger one still to satisfy him."

What that greater treasure was, we shall in the course of events now
learn.




CHAPTER XIII.


For some days the great circuit had been in full swing in the city. It
was a new institution, inaugurated by the Emperor Joseph, whereby the
lord-lieutenant or his representative, annually had to make a tour
through the county to procure information of all kinds, and refer the
same to the district commissioner, of whom there were ten in all
throughout the country.

The business was easily settled in some counties. But in that of Pesth,
which is as large as a German kingdom, the number of official
entertainments was so great that it demanded an ostrich's digestion.
These municipal officials, like the lord-lieutenant himself, must eat
and drink hard three or four days running, while, at the end, the whole
burden of the work fell on the substitute, the eldest and best qualified
magistrate. No one answered to this demand better than our old friend,
Mr. Laskoy.

When the circuit came to Szent-Endre, it was naturally the turn of the
prefect to give an entertainment. To this the imperial court secretary,
Mr. Mathias Raby of Raba and Mura, received a formal invitation in due
course.

As it was so great an official gathering, he put on his Viennese dress,
and arrived at the prefecture by twelve o'clock, the hour appointed.

He was received by a lordly looking lackey, who discreetly gave him to
understand that he was somewhat early, that the gentry were still in
council, but that till dinner-time, he might, if he would, go into the
garden where he would find Mademoiselle, the prefect's niece.

Raby instantly conceived a high opinion of the lady of the house, who,
thus immediately preceding a great banquet, could find leisure to walk
in the garden. She could not be wholly wrapped up in her housewifery.

But how find a garden he had never seen and seek out a lady who was a
complete stranger to him? However, help was nigh. Just as if it had
scented him, a black poodle came running down the corridor wagging his
tail, as welcoming the guest, and finally took the end of Raby's cane
between his teeth and drew him to the door that led into the garden.
Raby, seeing the dog wanted to play with the cane, let him have it,
whereupon the cunning little beast seized it in the middle and preceded
Raby down the garden path where Fraulein Fruzsinka was to be found. The
garden was laid out in the prevalent mode, in a maze composed of trees,
among which one had vainly sought for an outlet. There, indeed, Raby had
never found the lady on his own account, for she had ensconced herself
in the innermost recess and was reading, seated on the mossy bank.

She was no longer the Hungarian amazon who had worn the riding gear we
met her in, earlier in this story. She was now the Viennese "elegante,"
whose toilette proclaimed her the lady of fashion, with her
walking-stick, her elaborate coiffure, and lace ruffles, all
irreproachably correct. Nor were cosmetics and patches wanting that the
mode demanded, and she answered Raby's greeting with the prescribed
German formula: "Your servant, sir."

The poodle broke the ice, by running up with his cane and laying it at
his mistress' feet.

But Fraulein Fruzsinka picked it up gently and gave it back to Raby. She
held a richly bound book, Wieland's "Oberon," which she showed to her
guest.

Now with ladies who read Wieland you can talk of something else besides
ordinary themes. And in the first quarter of an hour of his conversation
with her, Mathias Raby discovered that his hostess was a highly
cultivated woman who could discuss the French philosophers as an
ordinary provincial belle might the latest fashion in head dresses, and
speak German fluently.

And her eyes, how marvellous they were!

They came out of the maze pursuing the talk on literature, and bent
their steps towards the flower garden. Passing the flower-beds, Fraulein
Fruzsinka betrayed also her knowledge of that "language of flowers"
which just then was the rage in Vienna. The young lady broke off a twig
of evergreen, and gave it to Raby, who well recollected the couplet
which set forth its symbolism:

    "The evergreen is always green, although it blossoms never,
    So may the friendship 'twixt a man and woman last for ever."

But there was nothing of the coquette about her; she made no advances
whatever.

The sound of the dinner-gong here breaking off their talk, his hostess
accompanied Raby back to the house, where the company were impatiently
awaiting them. The dinner was already on the table.

The Fraulein presented Raby to the other guests who all greeted him
warmly.

The meal threatened to be interminable, as course succeeded course, till
at last someone threw out a hint to the effect that a little exercise
would be good for the diners, who had a game of skittles awaiting them.

"Skittles," indeed, was as it were the word of dismissal, and the
suggestion nearly spoiled the proposal made by another guest that after
dinner they should have a song from Fraulein Fruzsinka on the
clavichord.

But the skittle players were in the majority though there was a keen
opposition.

Finally matters were compromised by settling that they should have their
hostess' song first, and then the skittles. At first a few of the guests
loitered round the clavichord, at which Fraulein Fruzsinka, with her
really sweet voice, was commencing a ditty. But you could not well smoke
there, so one by one they stole out into the garden where the skittles
were already in full swing.

Meanwhile, Fraulein Fruzsinka remained at the clavichord alone with
Mathias Raby, who from his knowledge of music could turn over for her at
the right moment.

The singer soon shut the music book, and rose impatiently from the
instrument.

"What people these are!" she exclaimed with a little irritated gesture
of her hands. "Not a lofty idea, not a noble aspiration among them, as
far as one can judge. And that is our world!"

Raby, who had the instincts of a courtier, sought to excuse his fellow
guests.

"Their own official concerns fill their minds entirely."

"Their official concerns indeed! Yes, I should think so! Did you hear
the anecdotes with which they regaled each other at table? Quite
frankly, with the most shameless cynicism. Yet they were all true. Among
such people as ours, ignorance, idleness and greed counter-balance one
another. Not one of them knows his business: each neglects his duty. But
see if there is anything to be got out of any official function, and
everyone is ready to seize it for himself."

Raby held a brief for the accused.

"With us, offices of that kind are ill-paid. The official's salary is
scant; he has, too, a house and family to keep up."

Fruzsinka laughed aloud. "There is not a married man among all of them.
They are all a penniless lot who come to pay their court to me. Each of
them would marry me, were they not all afraid of me!"

"Afraid of the Fraulein? You must make a strange impression on them."

"Yes, think of it! Can you believe that anyone is frightened at me
because I wear a fashionable gown, read novels, am clever at music, but
indifferent to kitchen and cellar; thereat the wooer shudders. He says
to himself, 'he cannot possibly tolerate that,' and takes himself off
forthwith."

"On the contrary, dainty toilettes and culture bespeak wealth, and that
alone should be one more spur for the suitors, surely."

"Oh certainly, if they were sure that my uncle, who is rich, were going
to leave me his money. But that is a secret no one knows. There are two
things my wooer cannot find out, whether my uncle really loves me, and
whether I know how to flatter him well enough, so as not to forfeit his
affection. And truly I do not quite know myself."

"And that surely is not difficult to decide. For your beautiful
toilettes and good education witness sufficiently to his affection for
you."

"Ah, as far as my education goes, I have only to thank the gracious
Empress Maria Theresa, for I was educated at her Elizabeth Institute in
Buda, and my education cost no one a heller. And as regards my dress, my
uncle insists on my dressing well, in order to captivate each new-comer.
If it is an aristocratic cavalier who appears on the scene, forthwith I
must don my pearl-embroidered bodice and lace stomacher and the plumed
hat, but if it be an ordinary townsman, I wear the provincial dress of
the simple country girl. Yes, would you know everything at this, our
first meeting? And, indeed, as it is the first, so will it be the last.
But would you hear how that must be, come with me into my own
sitting-room, for here someone will overhear us."

Raby was already under the spell of the sorceress, and he followed her
willingly into her boudoir.

"You are not the first, dear Raby," pursued his hostess, "who has come
into this town vowing vengeance on us, to demand that justice be done. I
say 'us,' for as you see, I too am leagued with this confederacy. And
each of such emissaries in turn have I seen withdraw after a time, his
anger appeased. Now, once more, they hear that a man of iron has come to
set his foot down with inexorable rigour; he distributes the vast bribe
which has been offered him, among the poor, while to win him over, even
the great coffer is ransacked, but in vain. Thereupon, the authorities
bethink them of another treasure still, the prefect's niece. And they
trick her out as a fashionable lady, and leave her alone with the
incorruptible. You see I am quite frank! Do you not blush for me? I do
for myself, I can assure you. Take my advice, and fly from this place!"

"But, Fraulein, all you tell me does but make me still more determined
to pursue the purpose for which I came hither."

"I see you to-day for the first time; I know nothing of you but what I
have heard from your opponents; but what I have heard of you only makes
me take your side. You are no ordinary man. Go, I tell you, and save
yourself; flee from this place!"

"I save myself?"

"Yes, indeed! You cannot imagine how evilly disposed to you are those
among whom you find yourself. Indeed, they have threatened to take your
life."

What does she mean? Will she scare him away from the field of his
labours, so that intimidated by her words, he returns to Vienna? Or has
she measured her man, and seen that he is to be best caught by seeking
to divert him from his purpose? And does she know that for such a one,
the most powerful enticement of all will be to seek to turn him from
his goal?

Raby responded to the signal that his hostess made him, to come closer;
nay, he took the fan she held, and fanned her and himself with it.

"That is splendid; why it will make my stay here quite a romantic
experience," he said.

"You will rue it, however, and expose yourself to a thousand dangers
which you have not the power to withstand. I see you are confident of
your strength. But if you had to fight with someone, would it not
disquiet you to know your adversary was an excellent shot. Suppose the
moment you entered the field, someone whispered to you: 'Be on your
guard; your second is in league with your opponent, he has placed no
bullets in your pistol.' Would you not, in such a case, refuse to
fight?"

"But the case is quite unthinkable."

"So you deem it. But to prove to you, that I am not seeking, as your
enemies would have me do, to try and entangle you in my net, I will tear
asunder the snare already closing round you, and show you something
which shall enlighten you once and for all."

She went to her writing-table and took out of a drawer a letter.

"Say, do you know this handwriting?"

"Very well, it is that of the district commissioner."

"The note was addressed to me, in order to awaken no suspicion. Please
read it."

It was the letter which the district commissioner had written at the
theatre.

As he read it, Raby fairly crimsoned with wrath. He was thunderstruck to
find that his official chief, who had promised to support his mission,
should have a secret understanding with those whom he was pledged to
punish. Whom should he trust, if this was the state of things?

"Now will you not fly?" said Fraulein Fruzsinka. Her words urged him to
go, but her eyes held him back.

"No, indeed! now will I remain," cried Raby impetuously, as he rose to
go. And as if to prove that he had determined to do and dare all, he
hastily seized her hand and raised it passionately to his lips.

And she did not withdraw hers, but vehemently returned its pressure, as
if to say: "This is the man I have long been looking for!"

"Leave me now," she whispered; but her eyes seemed to say, "Come again,
soon!"

Mathias Raby knew now that fate had led him to a kindred soul at last!




CHAPTER XIV.


Were this story a romance pure and simple, it would suffice to tell that
Fraulein Fruzsinka had fire in her eyes, and Mr. Mathias but a heart of
wax, that, consequently, when they met, the one melted the other.

But since this history is, in the main, a true narrative, we do not
think it should be supposed that such was the case. Mathias Raby being a
diplomatist as well as a philosopher, did not seek in the lady of his
dreams a Venus Anadyomene, but rather a fully equipped Minerva, and he
thought that he had before him a high-minded woman, whose insight
penetrated the evil intentions of his enemies, and whose hands should
serve to set him free from the snares their wickedness had woven around
him. To save such a woman from a degrading position was in itself surely
a knightly and a noble deed. And what a splendid help would it not be to
him, in the struggle that lay before him, to choose such a companion,
who could circumvent the designs of his enemies, and be to him a
guardian angel as well as a helpmate.

So it came about that one day Mathias Raby sought out his uncle, Mr.
Leanyfalvy, with this request.

"I have come, my dear uncle, to remind you of your promise. I need a
'best man.'"

"A 'best man'? All right, my boy, I'm ready; let's have the horses put
to."

"It won't be necessary; it is only at the other end of the city. It is
to the prefecture I want to go."

"It's the Fruzsinka, then," exclaimed the old gentleman, and he began to
scratch his head in deep perplexity. Finally, he blurted out, "Listen to
me, my boy, take my advice and choose anyone else."

"Uncle, I forbid you to speak thus! She is my betrothed."

"I will not say anything against the woman of your choice. I will only
say this: your father and mother were worthy God-fearing folk. If there
had been twenty commandments to keep instead of ten, they would have
observed them all scrupulously. And they loved each other so dearly,
that when your father died, your mother followed him the very next day.
And so it can be said to your own credit, that you are neither a
murderer nor a robber. Therefore, I want to know how it is that, since
neither you nor your parents have ever committed mortal sin, such a
punishment should be destined for you, as marrying Fraulein Fruzsinka?"

"Uncle, I forbid you----"

"If you only knew the woman she is!"

"I know quite well, she herself has told me all."

"All, has she, what sort of an 'all' is it?"

Mathias Raby shrugged his shoulders as one who does not understand
grammatical subtleties. "Oh, with women, the world is an everyday
matter."

"But these are not everyday matters."

"Well, I will hear no evil of her."

"May Heaven forgive me if I make a mistake! But what does it concern me
after all? Yet I found for you a nice, well-brought up girl to whom the
other one cannot hold a candle! What are the black gipsy eyes of the one
compared to the innocent blue ones of the other? But if such a wife
pleases you, there is nothing more to be said. Only you will have a wife
and no mistake, I'll warrant you!"

"Now, dear uncle, I beg of you to come and accompany me in my wooing."

Mr. Leanyfalvy began to see that he must play a part in this pantomime
after all.

"I've no clothes to go in," he explained. "In these I could not enter
such grand company."

"I will bring you a new coat from Pesth."

"It's no use, nephew. Among such grand folks a simple gentleman like me,
who am a mere nobody, has no business. Take the district commissioner
with you; he is a great man, and can write worshipful before his name."

"I don't want any great men. I'd rather have you!"

Now the postmaster came out with his true meaning.

"I don't want to be your 'best man!'" he said bluntly.

"You don't, and why not?"

"Because I am exceedingly angry, and I should quarrel with you. I am
seriously vexed with you, not because you insist on marrying
Fruzsinka--you can be angry with yourself for that--but because you are
leaving that sweet, pretty, innocent child, to eat her heart out in
disappointment. I do not want to have anything more to do with you; you
are nothing to me. Now go, and take your grand friend with you!"

"Very well, I won't take anyone. I'll go alone and ask for her myself."

Thereupon, Raby turned away and went. It would be indeed absurd that a
man, in such a high position, who had been educated at the Theresianum,
and was the trusted confidant of the Emperor himself, should let himself
be dissuaded from his purpose by a simple unlearned rustic.

The contradiction only strengthened him in his determination.

And then--those glorious eyes!

       *       *       *       *       *

Raby was one of those men who, once having set themselves an end in
view, pursue it unflinchingly. He went straight away to the prefect,
stated plainly his errand, and asked for the hand of his niece.

The prefect, however, pushed his cap back a little off his brows, and
demanded somewhat abruptly if his visitor understood Hungarian?

Raby was a little disconcerted by the question.

"Yes, I can speak Hungarian," he answered shortly.

"But, my friend, to speak Hungarian and to understand it are two very
different things, as we shall see directly. I ask you, what is it you
want? Do you want to take my niece Fruzsinka as your wife, or do you
wish to be the husband of my niece Fruzsinka?"

"Surely that is one and the same thing," said the suitor.

"Not a bit of it; they are quite distinct. Let's put it plainly. For
instance, you elect to be my niece's husband. In this case you come and
live here at the prefecture, and you get thrown in as a marriage
settlement, a coach and four, a coachman and lackey, and will have in
fact all the money you need. If you are tired of the chancery work in
Vienna, we can get you elected administrator of Visegrad, which post
happens to be vacant. You only need walk into it, or if you would prefer
to do so, you can easily keep your appointment at Court, and a deputy
will look after the Visegrad affairs for you, perhaps better than you
could yourself. All you have to do is to spend the income, if you come
to live here. This is one alternative. The other is that you take my
niece as your wife, and make your own little home for her, and the rest
is your concern, not mine. Now I have spoken plainly, do you understand
me?"

"Perfectly, and I am also ready with my answer. I ask for no prefecture,
no coach and four, no administratorship; I only ask for Fraulein
Fruzsinka, whom I love; I ask for the lady, not for the property."

"Well, go and have a talk with her. If she is agreeable to the proposal,
I won't raise any objection."

Thereupon, he sent the wooer to Fraulein Fruzsinka, who had previously
suggested to Raby that he should come on this particular day and
formally propose for her hand.

"You come without a 'best man,'" said Fruzsinka, as Raby entered. "You
have found no one who would undertake the office, that is it. Each of
the friends you asked refused, and tried to set you against me?"

"I assure you, Fraulein, that there is no man living from whom I would
listen to the slightest word against you, not even my own father. I will
tell you truthfully how the matter stands. I have one good old friend in
this world whom you know well, my uncle Leanyfalvy. I begged him to bear
me company, but he refused solely, however, on this ground, that he had
already chosen a bride for me, a playmate of my childhood, and had so
set his heart on my having her, that he is angered at my making another
choice."

"And why not marry the playmate of your childhood?"

"That too will I tell you, and be as candid with you as you were with
me. This girl is a dear, gentle, little creature, whose life it were a
shame to link with my own stormy career. Why, I should have to transform
myself to marry her. If I were a man who simply swims with the stream,
and troubles not as to what passes outside his own house, then could I
woo such a bride indeed. But I am possessed by a demon of unrest that
will let me have no peace; the misery of the people is constantly before
me, urging me unceasingly to champion their cause against their
oppressors. Nothing shall stop my mouth from pleading their rights. My
life will be a perpetual struggle, I see that clearly. And can I fetter
to such a destiny, a mere child whose only strength is her inexhaustible
patience and gentleness? Every moment would it not be a torment to me,
that each woe I drew down upon my head would fall likewise upon that of
a guiltless and innocent being with a hundredfold weight. No, Fraulein,
when I reckoned up the obstacles to the career I had set before me, I
determined to ask no woman to share it. Till fate threw me across your
path, I had never thought of marriage. But at the first glance, I said
to myself, 'There is the complement of my own being; there is a woman
whose soul is consumed like mine with a restless consciousness of the
world's woes. No one can understand her as I do.' What shocks others in
you is just what attracts me. My destiny can only be shared by one who
has plenty of ambition and no dread of danger. If you are truly mine,
give me your answer."

Fraulein Fruzsinka's only response was to throw herself on Raby's breast
and take his face between her hands.

       *       *       *       *       *

Three weeks later, the marriage ceremony took place. When the wedding
was over, the worthy prefect rubbed his hands and murmured, "Now thank
Heaven, Mathias Raby has already the yoke round his neck. That is
something to be thankful for."




CHAPTER XV.


Wonder of wonders! Fruzsinka had become domesticated. Since her
marriage, she had been a different being. Her former rich dress was now
exchanged for a simple homespun gown, and she wore only the national
dress of the Hungarian woman. She rarely even looked in a book, for the
young matron was now wholly occupied with the things of the household.

She made an ideal housewife, superintending everything herself, and
never parting with her keys. She kneaded the dough for the fritters
which no hand must touch but hers; she skimmed too the milk, and roasted
the coffee. She even had a spinning-wheel brought in and sat at it,
though the yarn spun did not amount to much, only the spinning-wheel
indeed knew whether it went backwards or forwards.

But on her lord and master, Fruzsinka lavished the most passionate
devotion. Never did she allow him to leave the house without her
buttoning his coat for him, and had he the least ailment she made no end
of ado.

She never dreamed of going out without him, and was, as a matter of
fact, jealous of every pretty woman, but Raby liked to think that her
watchfulness had regard rather to the designs of his enemies than from
any other cause. He began to see that all women who love their husbands
are alike, and that those stories of the wives of heroes who themselves
spur their spouses on to fight and place the sword in their grasp,
belong to the domain of myth, not to that of reality.

For the rest, Raby's business seemed as if it was going to settle itself
smoothly. The municipality gave orders to the district commissioner who,
in his turn, forwarded directions to various subordinate officials, and
a deputation, which was entrusted with full judicial powers, was elected
to audit the accounts. All was ready for taking active steps, Raby only
needed to come forward with the formal impeachment, for he now held the
threads of the business in his own hands.

The various officials concerned strongly suspected that they themselves
were mixed up in the affair, but consoled themselves with the thought
that the commissioner would himself preside.

But the district commissioner was very easy-going, had they known it,
and that was his failing. He did not like seeing his friends set by the
ears, therefore he betrayed the inimical intentions of each one to the
other, in order to frustrate strife. They should leave one another
alone; why quarrel, when you might live at peace with your neighbour,
was his philosophy.

At last the important day dawned when the commission was to sit for the
investigation of the Szent-Endre accounts. The district commissioner did
not keep them long waiting. His impartiality was shown by his accepting
an invitation to the prefect's to dinner, and by inviting himself to
Raby's to supper, for he too had been an old flame of Fruzsinka's.

They assembled for the great work in the Town Hall, and had unearthed
accounts of years' standing--and nice models of book-keeping they were,
full of erasures and corrections, just where the most important entries
could be expected. Under such circumstances, the commissioner divided
the work up, so that each one might do his share of it without being
overlooked by the others. Raby could have burst with indignation when he
regarded the commission's irregularities as to procedure.

With the most unblushing impudence, all sorts of frauds, corruptions,
and tyrannical methods were simply ignored in the investigation.

"Fiddlesticks!" exclaimed the commissioner to the protesting Raby, "that
happens everywhere."

And finally, when the worshipful commission of burghers who understood
about as much of finance as a hen does of the alphabet, summed up the
results of the revision, they gave out, that in spite of all efforts to
make them balance, there was a deficit amounting to eighty-six thousand
gulden, for which it was impossible to account.

"Fiddlesticks," cried the commissioner again, "let's go on!"

"No, no, we cannot possibly pass that over, and we will not go on,"
cried the indignant Raby. "Does not your worship recollect that on
account of just such a deficit, a captain of the guard had, but a while
back, to stand in the pillory with a black board round his neck. Shall
an officer of the imperial body guard be thus punished, and these who
have hidden the gold, go free? These things are no trifles. Will you be
pleased to order that the secret treasure-chest be produced."

The reference to the captain of the guard was not, it seemed, without
its effect on the commissioner. He struck the table with his long cane
as if to threaten the company, as he spoke.

"Hear, you people! This business passes all bearing. In the Emperor's
name, I herewith order you to fetch out yon secret treasure-chest, in
which the embezzled money is stored. And if it is not here by two
o'clock this afternoon, at which hour we have to be ready with our
report, I shall have you all clapped into the Dark Tower. So look you to
it! Now we'll go to dinner!"

Raby did not appear at the prefect's banquet; he never allowed his wife
to have her meals alone. It seemed a long while till two o'clock, the
hour named for the continuation of the investigation, when they promised
to let him know. And he remembered the question of the timber had not
been touched on. This must be worked in somehow.

At last it was time to go to the Town Hall. The councillors sat round
the long table waiting for him.

"Now, you gentlemen," ordered the district commissioner, "out with your
secret chest."

The notary rose obediently from his seat, and went into the adjoining
room, whence he came back with a small iron casket about the size of a
lady's workbox, which he brought and set down on the table.

"Here, your lordship, is our secret chest, here too is the key; be
pleased to open it for yourself."

The district commissioner looked in, and found inside the sum of two
gulden and forty-five kreutzers all told.

"This is our treasure," cried the notary dejectedly. Everyone burst out
laughing, and even Raby himself could not forbear joining in, though it
was no matter for jest.

When the laugh had subsided, Raby was the first to speak: "Now then, you
gentlemen of the council, that was a pleasant jest, but permit me to
remind you that it was a question not of this cash-box, but of the great
chest, the secret way to which only the notary knows how to find."

"I know of a secret way?" exclaimed the notary. "Who dares say that of
me? I beg the commission to search the Town Hall thoroughly, to see
whether anyone can discover a secret passage there. If you find one,
well, there is my head, ready to lie on the block!"

"I know well enough," said Raby, "there is such a place: to brick it up
perhaps is not difficult. But there is another entrance. The Rascian
'pope' knows it, and will be able to show us where the entrance to this
stolen treasure is. I would suggest that he be cited."

To this the district commissioner had an objection.

"The Rascian 'pope' is an ecclesiastic, so cannot be summoned before a
secular tribunal. He is under the immediate jurisdiction of the
Patriarch of Carlovitz. The Patriarch will not understand the procedure
of the Hungarian commissioners, but is only responsible to the Croatian
and Slavonic tribunals. The Szent-Endre municipality can address a
memorial to the Archbishop of Carlovitz to cite the Greek pastor of
Szent-Endre at their tribunal, if he does not mind giving the
information."

So this was settled.

Raby looked at the clock.

"We had other circumstances to consider. There is still the question of
the timber. My indictment charges the municipality with aiding and
abetting great devastation in the woods. Whilst the poor are not allowed
to pick even dry brushwood in winter, and the sick in the hospital are
dying of cold, the overseers are allowed to sell timber, and to give
away hundreds of stacks as bribes. This cannot be gainsaid. There are
the felled trees to witness to it."

"What do you mean, Mr. Raby? That is all very well, but it may, or may
not be true. You just let us manage our own affairs," said the notary.

The district commissioner here remarked that the thing must be looked
into, and if proven, this alone would be cause enough to bar all those
concerned from holding office. He thereupon ordered a carriage should
come round directly, so that they could examine the wood while it was
yet daylight.

Whilst they were waiting to start, suddenly a man rushed in white with
terror.

"For Heaven's sake, come quickly, gentlemen, the wood is on fire!"

All sprang up from the table, for sure enough the wood was on fire. In
vain did Raby try to appease them, the conflagration could only have
just broken out, and it would be easy in the damp winter weather to
master it. No one listened to him; it was all up with the commission and
its enquiry.

All made for the street, shouting "Fire!" and clamouring for ladders and
buckets to extinguish the flames. At last they produced the only
watering-cart the city possessed, but a hind wheel was off, and how to
get it along no one knew. Helpless confusion reigned. Crowds of
distracted citizens ran up and down the streets; the men shouted, the
women screamed. Amid the barking of the dogs, the cackling of hens, and
the ringing of bells, the townspeople tore hither and thither as if
possessed, while the dragoons galloped about trying to keep order.

"Come along, my dear fellow," said the district commissioner to Raby.
"Let's go to your poor wife, she will be distracted with fear and
anxiety: it's time you consoled her."

And really it was the wisest thing Raby could do.

And sure enough, there was Fruzsinka awaiting them at the gate, and it
was touching to see how she fell on Raby's neck, sobbing her heart out,
for she had feared some harm had come to him. Nor did she recover
herself, but the whole evening trembled every time the alarm bell rang,
and was inattentive to their distinguished guest's choicest anecdotes
which he told for their benefit during supper.

Before he left, the news came that the wood was quite destroyed by the
fire.

"It is all your fault," he cried to Raby. "Had you never raised that
unlucky question about the timber, no one would have thought of setting
fire to the wood, and this enormous damage might have been avoided."

Only the presence of his wife prevented Raby coming to blows with the
district commissioner.




CHAPTER XVI.


Raby had said nothing to Fruzsinka of what had happened at the
commission. But when the guest had gone, he brought out his travelling
bag and began to pack up as if for a journey.

"Is it possible you are going on a journey?" asked Fruzsinka
reproachfully, "without telling me? Don't you know that the wife packs
for her husband?"

Raby did not want his wife to guess whither he was bound. So he made her
believe he was only going as far as Tyrnau to take the official
depositions regarding the Szent-Endre affair; though since the
commission had reduced the whole business to such a farce, how to
produce his proofs and, as prosecutor, lay the matter before them at
head-quarters, he hardly knew himself. So he told her he could not take
her with him, because he would have to travel by diligence or in a
peasant's cart, and such a jaunt would be too trying in winter for a
delicate woman.

"Now if I were you, I would not go to Tyrnau; I would rather go straight
to Vienna, and tell the Emperor himself what roguery is going forward
here."

Raby was astounded. This was precisely what he had intended to do, and
the journey to Tyrnau had only been a pretext.

"I would lay the whole plot before him," went on Fruzsinka, "and would
say, 'Sire, send a man in my place who may bring these conspirators to
book, and make an end to their intrigues.'"

Raby began to understand. Then he said aloud: "But I don't know of any
man who would take on such an unthankful business."

"Is it possible that you mean then to go on with the struggle?" asked
Fruzsinka plaintively. "Dearest, I beseech you, think of our position.
We are living among enemies. Those who were not ashamed to set fire to
the wood, to wipe out the proof of their guilt, will not shrink from
burning our own house over our heads. I tremble each time you go out,
and have no peace till I see you again. Every night I dream they have
murdered you. O Raby, the very thought of living among these people
makes me shudder, there are surely no other such vindictive folk on the
face of the earth. Come away from this place. Let us go to Vienna! There
your career is made. Leave this thankless, malevolent people to their
fate!"

Mathias Raby's heart grew suddenly heavy, and a dark misgiving gripped
him in its clutches.

"You would be the first to despise me," he exclaimed, "were I to be
weakened by your words, and quit my post to fly to another country."

"Do you mean then to continue the struggle?"

"It is no question of struggle, but rather of right and wrong and just
punishment," he answered gloomily.

"Ah, well! I suppose it is only womanly weakness that gets the best of
me. Yet I, too, have thought out the whole affair. You mean that the
embezzlements which you have brought to light shall be avenged?"

"Yes, that is what I do mean!"

"Now, has it ever occurred to you that if anyone investigates this
affair, at least a part of the odium which it incurs, may fall on your
wife?"

"How can that be, Fruzsinka?"

"You remember that absurd housekeeping account, don't you?"

"Yes, indeed, the one we all laughed at so heartily. But how would your
name be mentioned in connection with such a business? The items were set
down by the head cook, and the prefect settled the account."

"But everyone knows that it was to my advantage. Now suppose I was
confronted with the prefect and the cook, in the case of a formal
inquiry? Would not it be a disgrace for you?"

"And pray would it not be a disgrace," returned Raby, "if your husband
had to make this confession to the Emperor who sent him: 'Sire, I am no
better than all the others you have sent to right your subjects' wrongs,
and here I have come back to tell you that everywhere in this world
roguery reigns triumphant.' And if he answered me never a word but just
looked at me with those keen eyes of his, what shame should I not feel?
You shrink at being confronted with the prefect, because the least
morsel of the pitch which sticks to him may perchance darken the tip of
your little finger, but you do not blush that I may stand before the
Emperor and say: 'Sire, here is my wife, with whose paint I have daubed
the prefect white.'"

Frau Fruzsinka at this changed her point of attack.

"Remember," she urged, "that if we fly in the face of my uncle, we risk
losing a considerable property."

Now it was Raby's turn.

"You fear the prospect of losing the property, but I tremble at the
chance of your possessing it."

"I do not understand," faltered his wife.

"I quite believe you," returned Raby bitterly.

Fruzsinka dared not pursue this tack further, it was time to try
another. She threw herself on her husband's neck, and gazed with those
wonderful eyes of hers straight into his.

"Raby, did we swear that we would make the people, or ourselves happy,
which was it, dear?"

At those words, and that glance, Raby's heart softened.

What can one advance to those most unanswerable of arguments?

Who will blame Mathias Raby if he weakly gave way then, as many a strong
man had done before him, and threw his half-packed bag into a corner.

And as the temptress had gone so far, now she proceeded still further:

"Now I'll unpack for you," she cried merrily.

Thereupon, she took the hunting-pouch from the wall and carefully filled
it with savoury spiced meat and flaky white bread; then she deftly
replenished the flask with wine, and cried: "Now go and enjoy yourself!
Don't stay mewed up in the house. You are bothered; well, go and get
some sport, and let the fresh air blow the cobwebs away."

And so saying, she helped him on with his shooting coat, and handed him
his gun, and so it fell out that Raby hung up his sword and knapsack,
and went neither to Tyrnau nor to Vienna, but just into the copse to try
and shoot hares. He heard behind him, as he left the house, the merry
song his wife was warbling to herself.

As he sauntered along the street, it occurred to him that up till now he
had not met one of his former acquaintances in the town, nor seen a
single one of his old schoolmates.

But just then, he ran on to a townsman, whose wasted bent frame and
dejected air did not prevent Raby from recognising him as one of his old
contemporaries. The man wore a leathern apron, and carried carpenters'
tools. He returned Raby's greeting politely and was about to shuffle
past him. But the latter stopped him.

"Dacso Marczi! Is it possible? Are you really Marczi? And won't you just
wait that we may have a word together; it is so long since we have
met."

And he seized the limp hand of the stranger and held it fast.

"Oh, I am indeed glad to see your worship again," returned his new-found
friend.

"Never mind 'my worship,' you can leave him out of it," said Raby.
"Didn't we sit beside each other at school, and you would pass me
without a word? Tell me how things are going with you?"

The man looked round to left and right, and in his eyes there lurked a
nameless fear.

"Well, as far as that goes," he began, "but don't let us talk here, it
is not wise to discuss these things in the street."

Raby dropped his hand. "Ah, you are afraid suspicion may rest on you if
you are seen talking to me!"

"It is not that. But I fear, on the contrary, that it might be
unpleasant for you, if you were seen talking to a mere carpenter. I am
just going to look after my mates in the lower town who are putting new
joists to the burned houses. May Heaven bless your efforts to help the
poor people!" added the man in a lower voice.

"Good, I'll go with you," said Raby, "it's all the same to me which way
I take."

"But don't let yourself be drawn into talk with them. They are always
ready to complain, and there are always people ready to repeat all that
is said."

So they walked together down the street--the dapper sportsman, and the
working-man in his leather apron.

Raby well remembered the houses they passed, and their owners, and asked
after the latter.

"Yes, they all live there still, but the houses no longer belong to
them. The magistrate has bought one, the notary another, and Peter
Paprika a third. The original owners are only there as tenants, and now
they have put an execution in the houses."

"And wherefore?"

"For what was owing for tithes."

"And is old Sajtos still there, who used to be so good to us boys when
we came home from school?"

"Yes, indeed, you may see her any Sunday at the church door begging."

"Sajtos begging? Why she was quite a well-to-do woman. What has happened
to her?"

"Oh, the old story, 'bad times.' There are many more who have come to
beggary in the same way. Just go any Sunday morning past the door of the
Catholic church, where the beggars congregate, and you will see plenty
of your old acquaintances," said Marczi sorrowfully.

"But what has brought them to it?"

And Marczi told him many a sad record of oppression and misery that
wrung Raby's heart as he listened.

But now they had arrived at the lower town, where the ruins of the forty
houses burned out in the great fire still stood. The streets hereabouts
were nearly a morass and all but impassable.

The men who were commencing to put the roofs on, greeted Raby timidly,
as if half afraid, and they quickly drove indoors the women who stood
furtively about in the surrounding courts. Raby's questions they only
answered with the greatest caution, fencing with his enquiries as to why
the work of restoration had been so long delayed. Marczi drew him away.

"They will never tell you where the shoe pinches," he said, "whatever
bait you offer; they know too well what the end for them would be. You
would listen to their grievance and then retail it to the Emperor. He
would send to the town council to know why his subjects' wrongs were not
redressed? Thereupon the complainants would be arrested, get twenty
strokes with the lash, and the Kaiser would be told the grievances of
his subjects were amended. Oh, our people know better than to complain!
At no price would they confess why their houses are yet unfinished, or
how much of the compensation is still owing."

"Surely their wrongs cry aloud to Heaven," said Raby indignantly. "I
only wish I could get documentary evidence of it!"

"Well, they won't give it to you, but if you really wish it, I could get
you many such testimonies by to-morrow, and bring them to your house."

"And are you not afraid of the authorities being angry with you?"

"I? What does their anger matter to me, I don't need them, but they
can't do without me. I've got them too much in my power. Listen, for you
are an honest man, to no other would I venture to say it. One day they
summoned me to bring my masons' tools to the Town Hall. No sooner had I
arrived, than they bid me go to the secret passage with the notary,
which only he and I know of; the aperture was made during the Turkish
rule, and except the notary and the Rascian 'pope,' no one knows the
whereabouts. I had to wall up the opening."

"So you know the entrance to the room which contains the secret
treasure?"

"Yes, indeed, I know it; I have so managed it that no one save the
notary shall ever be able to find it again."

"And would you be willing to take me to it?" Raby ventured to ask.

"No, for they have bound me by a terrible oath never, except at the
bidding of the notary, to break open the walled-up passage. What I have
sworn, I hold sacred, but this much will I say, that you can still
manage to get there."

"Through the 'pope' who knows the other entrance, eh?"

"Mark well, not through the first. It is as much as his life is worth to
betray that secret. But there is another way yet. If you can gain the
ear of the Emperor, persuade him to order the election of new
representatives in the council, then there would be neither the judge,
nor the notary, nor any at present in office to reckon with. If we get a
new notary, I could show him the secret passage without any difficulty,
since my oath compels me only to 'open it at the notary's bidding.'"

"That is a good idea, Marczi, I will try and follow it out."

"You too care for the rights of our poor oppressed folk. May the good
God reward you! But I will tell you where our greatest danger lies; it
is in the surveying of the land that the Emperor has ordered. The whole
work the surveyor performs is a sham. The best fields under his survey
become ownerless, and the municipality takes possession of them. The
common folk have to be satisfied with sterile, marshy waste land, and
the peasants have to sell their last cow, because they have no pasture
for it. Come with me a little way, and I will show you."

So Raby sauntered the livelong day with his old school-fellow through
the fields, and saw much. If the new surveying measures were taken,
four-fifths of the peasants' property was ruined, the remaining fifth
was devoured by their oppressors, and the owner became houseless and a
serf.

Towards evening, Raby turned homewards with an empty game-bag and a
heavy heart.

His mood surely had not escaped Fruzsinka, for she welcomed him with
more than ordinary tenderness. She had prepared for his supper some of
his favourite dumplings, but somehow even these delicacies failed to
satisfy him, and he only wanted to go to bed.

The next morning, Marczi was there quite early. He brought what he had
promised, a whole hoard of documents. Raby took them into his study, and
was the whole day long deciphering them.

       *       *       *       *       *

Marczi, meantime, went about his own business.

As he came out towards the market-place, at the end of the long street,
he heard the tones of a bagpipe, and the strains of a violin fell on his
ear. But when he came up with the music, he saw what was going forward.
The recruiting officers were coming down the street.

So the Emperor wanted soldiers, that was evident enough.

And a right merry affair it was, this recruiting!

They chose out from among the hussars the finest looking fellow, and he
was sent from town to town with a dozen comrades to enlist recruits.

They played and sang some such song as this as they went:

    "Merry is the game we play,
    See, our uniforms so gay,
    And the ensign that we bear,
    'Twas our sweethearts placed it there!"

They each carried a bottle of good wine in their hands, and every
citizen they met was promptly treated to a cup, till he noticed that
they wore the hussar uniform. But no human power, once he had tasted the
wine, could then free him, and he belonged thenceforth to the recruiting
sergeants.

The recruiters reaped the best harvest in the market-place, where they
led a riotous dance. It was a regular Magyar measure, a wild, capricious
"Csardas," with a dash in it of defiant pride, every movement and
gesture suggesting reckless abandon. The clapping of hands, the clinking
of spurs, the stamping of feet, all helped towards it, and when the last
movement came, foot and heel vied with each other, as the tall figures
swayed hither and thither, with the sabre swinging jauntily at their
sides, and the "csako" on their heads. No wonder that with a dozen such
warriors dancing in a row, the women's eyes sparkled as they watched,
and they beckoned to the tallest men in the crowd to come and join in.

The recruiters had finished their dance, and were coming along the
street where Marczi was walking.

In front was the recruiting-sergeant, and he seemed in a right merry
mood. Behind him came the piper, taking wild leaps and bounds as he
played an accompaniment to the dancers on his bagpipes; then followed
the rest, strutting along like peacocks, offering the bottle to all they
met.

Marczi did not look at them; he was in too much of a hurry. But the
recruiting-sergeant stopped him.

"Halloa, comrade, won't you stop for a word? Anyone would think you had
stolen something by the way you run."

"I am in a hurry. I have a job I want to finish. You have done your
work, I see?"

"Don't be a fool, man, we can only live once. Have a drink!"

"The deuce take your drink. Don't you see that to-day I've carpentering
business on hand. It won't do for me to get giddy when I'm on the
ladder."

"Well, a gulp of wine wouldn't do you any harm. You don't go any further
till you've had a swallow from my bottle, I tell you."

"Oh, very well," and Marczi took the proffered drink.

"Here's to our true friendship, comrade!" said the other as he followed
suit.

Marczi was turning away, having thus gratified his interlocutor, when
the latter called him back.

"Marczi, Marczi!" he called, "here's something for you. Here, hold out
your hand!"

And the recruiting-sergeant pulled out a thaler from his coat-pocket,
and forced it into Marczi's hand, shaking it as he did so.

This time the carpenter would have gone off in earnest, but the other
called him back in quite a peremptory tone.

"Dacso Marczi," he shouted, "you must stay, you can't go now. You have
drunk of the soldier's wine, and accepted the press-money, now there is
no drawing back, so off you march with the rest!"

The carpenter stood dumbfoundered whilst they pressed an hussar's
"csako" on his head. He felt for the handle of his saw in the belt of
his apron. For one instant he had a wild impulse to fall upon the
sergeant; but then he reflected, it was all his own fault. So he
resigned himself to his fate. What had he to regret, indeed, in leaving
this town? There was no one there who would weep for him. So he quietly
took off his apron.

"If I am to be a soldier, let us see where the wine bottle is. Piper,
play my favourite song, 'A soldier's life for me!'"

    "The Danube waters long shall flow
    'Ere thou again my face shalt know."

"Now, Mr. Corporal, are you ready? Off we go, and walk and talk till
morning."

And the newly-made soldier drank with the recruiters to his new
profession.

On the morrow, the recruiting-sergeant went with the ex-carpenter to his
old home, so that he might arrange his affairs there before leaving. He
had an old aunt to whom he could safely entrust his belongings. Besides,
ten years after all, are not an eternity. They pass before one can look
round.

The good old soul was busy tying up her nephew's bundle, when a
messenger appeared with an official air, and the order:

"Dacso Marczi, it is settled at head-quarters that the recruiters are to
stay a week here; during that time you are to stop here and not attempt
to go anywhere else; but you are to put your three horses to, and drive
to-day with relays to Pesth."

Marczi was inclined to rebel, but it availed nothing.

The sergeant only laughed.

"It's no jest, Marczi. They reckon on you for the relays. A gulden for
every horse and each station, besides money for the driver, and for
drinks."

"But why should I go with relays, when there are plenty of carriage
owners who have nothing better to do than to chatter with jackanapes?"

"My dear fellow, this is why, so you shall not think we are getting the
best of you. You know that the surveyor has finished his work and is to
leave the town to-day. You know, too, how angry the mob are with him.
They will pelt him with stones. But if they see that you, whom they all
like, are the coachman, they won't do it for fear of hitting you."

In half an hour from that time, a light carriage, drawn by three good
horses, stood at the gate of the prefect's residence, where the surveyor
was staying. On the box sat Dacso Marczi himself. The orderlies carried
out the surveyor's documents, done up in large bundles, to lay them
under the leather covering of the back seat. The surveyor himself was
well guarded against the cold, having on a seasonable fur coat and warm
overshoes, while the lappets of his fur cap were fastened well under his
chin.

"Now, Marczi, if you drive well, we'll drink to-day to any amount," he
cried.

"Ay, that we will," agreed the driver as they dashed off.

       *       *       *       *       *

Mathias Raby was again pressed by his wife to go and get some shooting.
Perhaps he might be more lucky to-day, and bring home a hare.

His spouse was all affection and anxiety. So he went.

But the things Raby had heard lately he could not get out of his head.

Therefore he did not go far into the country, but turned back in the
direction of Pesth. There, he saw a mob of men, women, and children, who
all seemed to be waiting for someone.

He would not ask for whom, for he knew they would not tell him.

But hardly had Raby gone a few hundred paces past them, than he noted a
carriage drawn by three horses, coming from the prefecture at a quick
gallop, whereupon the whole crowd of people, till now silent, burst
forth with loud cries, and placed themselves on either side of the road.

The passenger inside the carriage he did not recognise; neither could he
make out what it was the mob were shouting to him. But their tone was
sufficiently menacing. As the equipage dashed between the rows of
people, the yells became still louder, whilst fists were raised and
sticks were brandished threateningly. The carriage did not stop, but
cleared the mob till it had left it far behind.

When the carriage reached Raby, he saw the surveyor cowering on the back
seat. Now he gathered what the people's cries had meant. But he did not
understand what it was till the carriage pulled up close to him, and he
recognised in the driver, Dacso Marczi.

"Your very humble servant," exclaimed the surveyor to Raby. "Did you
hear the infernal row they made? That's the way they receive me
everywhere. If Marczi had not been my coachman, I should have had stones
thrown at my head."

"Your worship," cried Marczi, in a voice already thick with wine; "is
there still some brandy in the flask?"

"Yes, Marczi, here you are, drink!"

The coachman took the bottle and emptied it.

"Marczi, you will do yourself harm!" objected Raby.

"Not a bit of it," stammered the driver, whilst he set down the flask,
and with that he whipped up the horses, and off they flew, so that the
wheels scattered the mud on all sides.

At one spot where the high road nears the Danube, a side-path winds in
the direction of the river towards the ferry. When Marczi's carriage had
reached this point, the coachman turned the horses and urged them with
the whip along the path. Then all at once the carriage dashed from the
steep bank into the river below.

"Help, help!" yelled the driver, waving his hat; but horses and carriage
were already struggling against the strong tide of the river, now
swollen by its spring flood.

But no help was forthcoming, and Raby only saw a man muffled up in a fur
coat, struggling desperately to free himself from the sinking carriage,
but the heavy garment dragged him helplessly down. Soon the vehicle with
its passenger began to sink, and at last the horses' heads disappeared
in the stream. Coachman, surveyor, and documents all had gone to the
bottom of the Danube. Nor was any trace of them ever found.

Mathias Raby stood horror-stricken on the highway, while around him the
wintry wind swept over the stubble fields, and carried it with the sound
as of a howling of many voices that echoed afar off like the laughter of
despair.


END OF THE FIRST VOLUME.




CHAPTER XVII.


This catastrophe was destined to affect Raby's mood in a fateful way.
When he went home he told his wife all that had happened, and she
quickly guessed the sequel.

"Now you will be more intent than ever on pursuing your mad enterprise,"
she said.

"And shall I let myself be shamed into abandoning it by the fate of an
ignorant boor, who, little idea as he had of the higher virtues, was
ready to sacrifice his life in order to save his fellow-citizens from
beggary?"

"You will drive me to exasperation," cried Fruzsinka.

"I would rather have your anger than your contempt, dearest."

"And is our love nothing to you at all?"

"Better that the whole world hate me for my determination, than to earn
your love through cowardice. I know that your very opposition to my work
is a proof of your love, and therefore, I pray you, my angel, Fruzsinka,
listen to me. If I leave this place, I shut every door to a future
career. It is now or never, I must go to Vienna. If I write and tell
the Emperor that the struggle is of no avail, he will dismiss me at once
from my post."

But Fruzsinka answered nothing, she only wept.

That meant of course that Raby ought to have stayed at home, for only a
heart of stone could leave a weeping woman and refuse to comfort her.
But Mathias Raby had just that heart of stone, and he was quite prepared
to leave his wife in tears, so to Vienna he went. For you could travel
there quickly enough, as there was a famous diligence which carried its
passengers in a day to the Austrian capital.

Moreover, no one except Fruzsinka knew he had gone to Vienna.

There he showed himself nowhere. He knew that the Emperor was accustomed
to walk every morning in the so-called "meadow garden," where, clad in a
simple short coat and plain hat, he was often taken for one of his own
equerries. There Raby could speak to him, and tell him how matters stood
in Hungary.

The Kaiser commended what Raby had already done and encouraged him to go
on and prosper. He gave him every aid in his power to help him,
including a special pass, wherein all to whom he showed it, were adjured
to respect the bearer's person. But he advised Raby only to show this
letter in a case of extreme necessity, and begged him not to tell anyone
of the interview he had just had.

Then Raby hastened homewards, feeling he had ordered his affairs for the
best.

On the return journey he arranged to reach Pesth in time to attend the
meeting of the County Assembly.

First, he proceeded to the Assembly House to look out certain documents.

The first person he met was the pronotary, Tarhalmy.

Tarhalmy was more friendly, yet more gruff than ever. He called Raby
into his room, and when they were alone, exclaimed:

"You come at the right time, my friend, for we have already cited you as
a 'runaway noble,' as the legal phrase has it."

"Cited me! What in the world for, I should like to know?"

"Yes, my friend, you are impeached. And guess wherefore! They say you
are Gyongyom Miska himself, and actually dare to accuse you of robbing
the Jew Rotheisel three days ago in the Styrian forest."

Raby hardly knew whether to laugh or to be indignant at such a charge.

"But surely that is a very poor joke!" he protested.

"I quite agree that it is. But they have only just brought the
accusation, and you can easily get out of it by proving an _alibi_."

Raby reddened in spite of himself.

"But I cannot lower myself so far as to disprove so preposterous an
allegation," he said. "Besides, you have only to call Abraham Rotheisel
to give testimony that it was not I who robbed him. I shall prove no
_alibi_."

"My dear fellow, I know you won't. Simply, because you won't own up to
where you have been for three days past, and the person who could prove
your _alibi_ could not be called as a witness. I shall not be the judge:
you know that the chief notary only acts as referee of the tribunal in
such cases. You will naturally never confess where you have been these
last three days. But there are people who want to know, and that is the
serious side of the jest."

"Rotheisel will be quite ready to disprove it; he knows me well enough."

"I know it. But the testimony of a Jew only counts in our law when he is
sworn."

"Won't Rotheisel swear?"

"I am not so sure. The Jew very rarely takes an oath if he can help it.
The Talmud makes it very difficult for him. But you can depend upon it,
Abraham Rotheisel will be as anxious as possible to clear you from such
an absurd accusation, directly he hears of it."

"He is a good kind of man," said Raby, "and I am certain that he will
swear."

"I hope he may. But anyhow, it will be decided to-day, as the tribunal
is sitting even now."

"And shall I have to stand in the dock?" said Raby anxiously.

"Yes, I am afraid you must. So I advise you to stay here and see the
business through."

"With your permission I will first write a letter."

"Pardon me, dear friend, but in this room you may neither write nor
despatch a letter."

"Am I then a prisoner already?"

"Not exactly, but you are accused, so that I cannot officially be a
party to any correspondence you carry on. Meanwhile, I would suggest you
just go upstairs to my own private rooms, where you will find my
daughter who will give you pen, ink, and paper, wherewith to write;
moreover, she will gladly carry it to the post herself. Then, seeing
that the business will be prolonged till evening, you will, I hope,
share our homely dinner with us."

A blow in the face could hardly have hurt Raby more than this kindly
proposal. For would it not mean meeting Mariska again?

But Raby had a ready excuse for not accepting Tarhalmy's hospitable
offer.

"I am grateful indeed for your kind invitation, but I am being strictly
dieted just now for a nervous complaint, and hardly dare eat anything
but dry bread."

"Nervous complaint, eh? Why, what does that mean?"

"Well, for one thing, I cannot sleep at night."

Tarhalmy was just going to give him some good advice, when the tension
was broken by the entry of a heyduke coming to announce the arrival of
the Jew, who had to be carried in a litter to the court, as he was still
weak from the wounds he had received, and could not stand.

At the announcement that Abraham was ready to give his testimony on
oath, the tribunal formally cited the defendant to appear before them.

Raby recognised a good many of his acquaintances sitting round the
table. The tribunal was presided over by Mr. von Laskoy, whose usually
merry mood had become serious for awhile. He asked the parties
implicated their creed and calling, and all the customary questions.

Then a young man, in whom Raby recognised an old school-fellow, rose,
and read out the formal indictment in which Mr. Mathias Raby of Raba and
Mura, gentleman, and an inhabitant of Szent-Endre, was accused of
disguising himself as a highwayman named Gyongyom Miska, and of robbing
peaceable travellers. How on a particular day he had waylaid the Jew,
Abraham Rothesel _alias_ Rotheisel, in the Styrian wood, had stunned him
with a blow on the head, and had stolen from him the sum of five
thousand gulden. The proof whereof being that whilst the said Mathias
Raby was in the neighbourhood without anyone knowing his exact
whereabouts, the depredations of the redoubtable robber had been going
on. Moreover, it was known to all, that, though Mathias Raby had
inherited no great wealth from his parents, he had, nevertheless,
scattered money lavishly on all sides--which fact greatly strengthened
suspicion against him. But the most convincing testimony of all would be
furnished by the Jew's own driver, who would swear to the identity of
the accused with Gyongyom Miska. The prosecutors now asked for the
witnesses to be sworn, and demanded that the said Mathias Raby, if
convicted, might be hanged, or if his rank forbade that, beheaded.

The reading of this impeachment was received by all present with the
seriousness befitting the situation. The president then turned to Raby.

"Will the accused deny this impeachment by proving an _alibi_?"

"I abstain from making such a defence," answered Raby, "and only ask to
be confronted with my accuser."

The first witness for the prosecution stepped forward in the person of
the coachman, whose appearance betokened him to be a rogue of the first
water, and obviously ready to swear to anything, provided he were well
paid for it.

According to the customary formula, he was questioned as to his
antecedents, and owned up unconcernedly to having himself been nine
times in prison.

When asked if he recognised in Raby the robber who had waylaid the Jew
Rotheisel, he answered promptly:

"Recognise him again, I should just think so! There can be no question
of their not being one and the same. Only then he happened to be wearing
a black wig, and a curly moustache, with a peasant's cloak over his
shoulder. But I knew it was Mr. Raby directly I heard his voice."

Raby, addressing the court, now spoke in Latin, knowing that the
peasants were ignorant of that language,

"I protest against the evidence of this witness; I know him for the
coachman who drove the official who came to bribe me. This witness
therefore is not impartial."

The prosecutor replied that this could not be proven, but Raby
interrupted him whilst he turned to the witness and said to him in
Magyar,

"Pray how could you have recognised my voice since I have never spoken
to you in all my life?"

"Ay, does not the worshipful gentleman remember that I drove Mr. Paprika
into his courtyard in the new coach and four. The gentleman talked so
loudly then, that the deafest man must have heard him."

And thereby the case against Raby fell to the ground.

It must in fairness be admitted that on this, as on later occasions,
many upright and honourable men sat in the jury who were quite ready to
take Raby's part, though they were in a minority. One such here
protested against such a witness being heard on oath, and the coachman
was consequently discharged.

Now, however, old Abraham, supported by his two sons, entered the room,
his head still bound up on account of his wound, his legs trembling
visibly under him.

"Abraham Rotheisel," said the president, "tell us plainly, how was the
attack on you made?"

"I tell nothing of the kind," retorted the Jew. "I have not come here to
lay a complaint. Gyongyom Miska is not here. You have summoned me
simply to bear witness that it was not Mr. Raby who robbed me, and that
I willingly do."

"Think of what you are doing, Abraham! It was dark, you could not see
your assailant's face, remember."

"Ay, if it had been but Egyptian darkness, and if I had been as blind as
Tobit, nay, if the highwayman and Mr. Raby had been as like to one
another as two peas, yet I will swear it was not Mathias Raby, whom I
have known from his childhood, ever since he was a baby. Moreover,
neither his face nor figure resembled in the least those of the man who
robbed me."

Here the Jew was questioned as to his assailant's appearance, but
persisted that in no wise did the robber resemble Raby. The "worshipful
gentleman" who robbed him was, he said, very different looking.

"Why do you call him a 'worshipful gentleman,'" asked the president.

"How do I know he might not have been one? I have seen highwaymen and
gentlemen very much alike indeed," answered the Jew, "and in time may
see still more. But I keep my convictions to myself."

Raby's counsel here observed that one witness contradicted another, and
thus tended to invalidate the evidence.

"Naturally," returned Laskoy, "only kindly remember that according to
our laws, the testimony of a Jew against that of a Christian can only be
accepted on oath."

At the sound of the word "oath," Abraham's two sons began to tear their
garments, and throwing themselves at the feet of the magistrate, they
implored him not to allow their father to be sworn, as it was contrary
to the Talmud.

"I fear I cannot help you in this matter," answered Laskoy. "I must
carry out the law regarding Jews witnessing against Christians. If you
would free your father from the need of swearing, you must ask Mr. Raby;
one word from him obviates the necessity of an oath. He has only to
prove an _alibi_, and the case is immediately dismissed."

Whereupon the two young Jews dashed across to Raby, fell on their knees
before him, and begged and implored him with might and main, to set up
this _alibi_--it was only a matter of speaking one word.

But old Abraham flew into a mighty rage.

"Get up both of you, and be off directly, and leave a brave man in
peace. Who called you to come hither, running after me as the foals
after the mare? Hold your miserable cackle, and away with you! Be kind
enough, Mr. heyduke, to turn these two noisy fellows out of the court.
Go home at once, you boys, I don't need your support, or your teaching
in this matter. And I beg pardon, gentlemen, for the behaviour of these
two good-for-nothings. Now I am ready to be sworn."

So after the two young Jews had been turned out, Abraham was sworn,
though he took the oath in Hebrew, so that none present could follow
the formula.

When it was over, Abraham prepared to leave the court, for Mathias Raby
was free. This time at least had he escaped the dungeon his enemies had
prepared for him.




CHAPTER XVIII.


Raby could hardly bear the delay in getting home. When the open verdict
was pronounced, a coach was already at the door of the Assembly House,
to bear him on his way: he threw himself into it, while the sparks flew
under the swift hoofs of his horses.

Szent-Endre was not, after all, the other side of the world, but the
distance seemed endless. On the way, he racked his brains as to how he
would find Fruzsinka. Yet he could not have possibly dreamed of what his
actual home-coming would be.

As he sprang from the vehicle, to knock at his house-door, he found the
summons of the court nailed under the knocker, with all the
misdemeanours and crimes whereof he had been falsely accused before the
tribunal, set forth at length. As is well known, these kind of summonses
were fixed to the house-door, were there no means of presenting them to
the person cited.

Rage drove every other thought from Raby's mind when he found this
disgraceful document fluttering over his door. He tore it down
indignantly, and beat with hand and foot at the entrance to gain
admission.

Poor Boske, the maid-servant, at last opened it, looking white and
frightened. "Why had they allowed this thing to be fastened to the
door," he inquired angrily.

"I humbly beg pardon," stammered the girl, "the gentleman who brought it
nailed it there with a hammer, and said if I tore it down I should be
hanged."

"Why did your mistress not do it?"

"The gracious lady-mistress?"

"Yes, my wife, where is she then?"

"Ah, my dear kind master, how shall I tell you? Please don't kill me for
it! The gracious lady-mistress has left home."

"Stuff and nonsense! She has only probably gone to pay a visit."

"Ah, no indeed, she has not done that, she has, oh how shall I say it,
run away. The very day the gracious master went, the lady-mistress wrote
a letter and gave it to the gipsy Csicsa to carry. She did not wait for
an answer, but packed up, called a coach, loaded it with her luggage,
and drove off without saying a word about the dinner."

"Perhaps she has gone to her uncle's at the prefecture?"

"No, indeed, she went in the other direction; I watched her from the
street-door down the road, as far as I could see."

Raby went into the parlour. The girl had spoken the truth, that was
evident. All the chests stood open; Fruzsinka had packed up all her own
belongings when she went; she had not even left a single souvenir
behind.

Raby was completely nonplussed; it was indeed a horrible situation for a
man who hastens home on the wings of love to find his house destitute of
all that made it home for him. He could think of nothing better than to
seek out his uncle, the old postmaster, from whom, since his marriage,
he had been somewhat estranged.

Raby entered the old man's room without speaking a word, where he sat
down and stretched out his legs in gloomy silence. He shrewdly suspected
that his host knew what had happened, and why he was there. How should
he not, considering everyone in Szent-Endre knew by this time. The old
gentleman shrugged first one, and then the other shoulder expressively,
whilst he coughed and cleared his throat in visible embarrassment.

"H'm, h'm!" he said, significantly, "these fashionable ladies have not
much feeling. Besides, you can never take them seriously. Therefore you
must not let the grass grow under your feet."

"If I did but know where she has gone to?" sighed Raby.

"Now just wait! I fancy I can help you to find out. For two days past a
letter has been lying here addressed to your wife. There--take it and
read it." And he handed Raby a sealed missive.

"I, how can I open a letter which is directed to my wife?" he asked
anxiously.

"Yes, indeed, why not? Are not man and wife according to the Hungarian
law one flesh? A letter addressed for the one can legally be opened by
the other, and I would do it, if I incurred the galleys for it, my
friend, if I were in your place. Just read it, and I will be the
guarantee that I delivered it into your hands."

Raby opened the note with trembling fingers.

It was in the handwriting of the judge, Petray, and though short, was
quite intelligible.

      "My darling Fruzsinka,

      "From your own letter I see that you find it
      impossible to put up with your tyrant any longer. I
      thought as much long since. You do quite right in
      leaving him, and the sooner you get away from him the
      better; the man will come to no good. My house, as you
      know, will ever be a safe asylum for you. I await you
      with open arms.

      "Your devoted friend,

      "PETRAY."

Raby's eyes were no longer glazed and staring as heretofore; they shot
sparks now.

"Read it, my friend," he said, as he handed it to Mr. Leanyfalvy.

"Well, at any rate, now you know where you are."

"Know it, indeed I do," answered Raby, as he grimly folded up the note,
and placed it in his coat pocket.

"And pray what do you mean to do?"

"First, I would have a four-horse coach."

"You shall have it sure enough. And then----?"

"Then I'll go home and fetch my pistols and sword; look for a second,
and then--either he or I are dead men."

"That's it! It's the only way. Only see to it that you think it out
accurately. Suppose your opponent wants to fight with swords? Perhaps
he's an out-and-out swordsman."

"What does that matter? The sword will satisfy equally the duelling
regulations, and will merely prove which of us can fence the better."

"Good! But take this much warning. The judge is a very cunning man; you
will have to be on your guard. Be careful not to be the first to draw
the sword, else he'll be hanging round your neck an attainder in
pursuance of an antiquated law which rules that 'he who first draws the
sword shall be held to incur blood-guiltiness.'"

"Many thanks, I'll remember your good advice."

"Ah! if you had always done so! Yet I am right glad that you don't look
askance at me any longer. You are another man since you made up your
mind to fight! How a wife demoralises a man to be sure! There is nothing
wanting now, except a sword and a pair of pistols. You need not go home
for those. I have a rare old blade which was used at the storming of
Buda, and will cut through iron itself; it is worth a good deal more
than your parade-sword. And here are my pistols, each is loaded with
three bullets; if you understand what shooting straight means, you can
kill three enemies at once. So good luck, my young friend, I am glad
you are going."

The old gentleman embraced his nephew as if he were going to face the
enemy, and had his best horses put in for him, and they brought Raby to
the judge's house in less than an hour.

The uninvited guest just caught the judge going out.

"Come back with me to the house," said his visitor, "I want to have a
word with you."

Petray guessed from the speaker's tone that it was on no friendly
business that he had come, though he affected not to perceive it, and
treated Raby with his accustomed familiarity.

When they had come into Petray's parlour, Raby drew the letter out of
his pocket and held it before his host's face.

"Do you recognise this writing?"

Petray drew himself up.

"What presumption is this, pray? To open a letter directed to someone
else, it is unheard of!"

"It is perfectly legal," said Raby. "Your protest is useless. In the
eyes of the law, a letter written to my wife is a letter written to me."

"It is, I say, a great piece of presumption, to attack a man like this
in his own house."

"You need not make such a noise! You may see I carry pistols in my
belt." Then adopting a more familiar tone, Raby added, "It comes to
this, either you take one of these two pistols, and we fire according to
the prescribed rules, or if you refuse me the satisfaction of a

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