CHAPTER V.
BODOLA.
In one of the innermost recesses of the county of Felsö-Feher, when you have left behind you the Boza Pass, or avoided it by taking one of the narrow footpaths which wind along the mountain side, you will come in sight of the Tatrang valley.
On every side of you are hills wrapped in lilac-coloured mists, and behind the hills the heaven-aspiring peak of Kapri, glistening with early-fallen snow. From the mist-shrouded valley below emerge four or five villages, with their white houses sending up bluish smoke-wreaths among the green orchards. The little Tatrang stream winds, silvery blue, in and out among the quiet villages, forming cascades in its downward progress, which in the dim distance look like fleecy mists. The clouds sink so deeply down into the valleys that their golden, veil-like shapes hide first this and then that object from the eyes of the observer on the hill-tops. There you can see Hosszufalva, with its far-stretching street. There, again, the tiny church of Zajzonfalva, whose pointed, tin-covered roof gleams far and wide in the rays of the sun. Tatrang lies on the banks of the stream, just where a large wooden bridge has been thrown across it. Far, very far off, black and misty, are to be seen the walls of Kronstadt and the blue outlines of the still unscathed citadel. In the valley just below you is the straggling village of Bodola. The houses lie low, but the church stands on rising ground, and opposite the village you notice a sort of small fortress with broad towers, black bastions, and projecting battlements. The western bastion is built on a steep rock, whence there is a fall of three hundred feet on to the roofs of the houses below.
It is only in the distance, however, that the castle looks so gloomy. On approaching nearer, you perceive that what had seemed, from afar, to be a dark green belt of bushes, is really a wreath of flower-gardens thrown round the ramparts. The large Gothic windows are adorned with handsome sculptures and stained glass. A well-kept, serpentine path winds up the steep rock, and there is a mossy stone seat at every bend. Where the rock is most precipitous a breastwork has been thrown up. The pointed turrets of the castle are all painted red, and adorned with fantastic weathercocks.
The path leading through the Boza Pass to Kronstadt is not more than an hour's journey from this little castle, and along this path, at the very time when Prince John Kemeny was still regaling himself at Hermannstadt, we see a long line of cavalry wending their way into the valley below--two thousand Turkish horsemen, or thereabouts, distinguishable from afar by the scarlet tips of their turbans and their snow-white kaftans. Among them are some hundreds of Wallachian irregulars in brown gabardines and long black _csalmaks_.[13]
[Footnote 13: _Csalmak_ [pr. _chalmak_]. A low, skin turban.]
The way is so narrow here that the horsemen can only proceed along in couples, so that while the rearguard is still painfully making its way through the narrow defile between converging rocks, the vanguard has already reached Tatrang.
The Turkish general is a middling-sized, sunburnt man, with eyes as bold and bellicose as an eagle's. A large scar runs right across his forehead. His beard curls in little locks around his chin. His moustache is twisted fiercely upwards on both sides, making one suspect an excessively fiery temper in its possessor, a suspicion confirmed by his hard and curt mode of speech, the haughty carriage of his head, and the impatient movements of his body.
He halts his little army outside the village, to give the rearmost time to come up. Last of all roll a few wagons and a large pumpkin-shaped coach. This is all the heavy baggage which the Turks carry with them. The rearguard is led by a child whose round, cherub face contrasts strangely with his glittering scimitar and his grave, commanding look. He cannot be more than twelve. Inside the coach, the curtains of which are thrown back on both sides so as to freely admit the evening air, we perceive a young lady of about five-and-twenty years of age, dressed half in Turkish, half in Christian costume, for she wears the wide silken hose and the short blue open kaftan of the Turkish ladies, but has taken off her turban, and her face, contrary to Turkish custom, is without a veil. She gazes with the utmost composure out of the carriage window, bestowing her attention now upon the landscape and now upon the passing peasants.
The Turkish commander is marshalling his forces in the village below. They seem used to the strictest discipline. Every one looks steadily at his leader without moving a muscle. At the head of the left wing stands the little boy; a tall, muscular man leads the right. The Wallachs are drawn up in the rear.
"My brave fellows,"--the Pasha addresses his troops in a hard, sharp voice--"you will pitch your tents here! Every one will remain in his place hard by his saddled horse, without laying aside arms or armour. Ferhad Aga[14] with twelve men will go into the village and respectfully ask the magistrate to send hither forty hundredweights of bread, just as much flesh, and double as much hay and oats, at the average price of four asper[15] per pound, neither more nor less."
[Footnote 14: _Aga._ An honorary title among the Turks, here equivalent to lieutenant.]
[Footnote 15: _Asper._ A small silver coin worth about fifteen to twenty kreutzers.]
Then the Pasha turned towards the Wallachs--
"You, dogs! don't suppose that we have come hither to plunder! Stir not from this spot, for if I find out that so much as a goose has been stolen from the village, I'll hang up your leaders and decimate the rest of you!"
He then selected four horsemen.
"You will follow me," said he; "the rest remain here. This very night we resume our march. During my absence Feriz Beg commands."
The little boy bowed.
"If Feriz Beg receives orders from me to quit you, you will obey Ferhad Aga till I return."
With that the Pasha struck his spurs into his horse's sides, and galloped with his escort towards Bodola.
Then the boy whom the Pasha had called Feriz Beg rode forward with soldierly assurance, and in a deep, sonorous voice gave the order to dismount. His hard-mouthed Arab plunged, kicked, and reared, but the little commander, heedless of the capers of his steed, delivered his further orders with perfect self-possession.
Meanwhile the Pasha pursued his way towards Bodola Castle.
Paul Beldi had arrived there only the day before with his wife, having quitted Kemeny's Court without a word of explanation, and was standing in the porch at the moment when the Turkish horsemen trotted into the courtyard. In those days the relations of Transylvania with the Turks were so peculiar, that visits of this kind might be made at any time without any previous announcement.
The Pasha no sooner beheld Beldi, than he sprang from his horse, ran up the steps to him, and brusquely presented himself--"I am Kucsuk Pasha. Being in the way, I came to have a word with thee if thou canst listen."
"Command me," replied Beldi, pointing to the reception-room, and motioning to his guest to enter first.
It was a square-built room, the walls of which were painted with oriental landscapes, the spaces between the windows being filled by large cut-glass mirrors in steel frames. The marble floor was covered with large variegated carpets. Round about the walls hung ancestral pictures, with clusters here and there of ancient weapons of strange shape and construction. In the middle of the room stood a large green marble table with fantastically twisted legs. Huge arm-chairs with morocco coverings and ponderous carvings were dispersed about the room. Facing the entrance was a door leading to a balcony, commanding a panorama of the snow-capped mountains. The evening twilight cast red and lilac patches through the painted windows on the faces of those who are now entering.
"How can I serve you?" inquired Beldi of the Pasha.
"Thou art well aware," replied Kucsuk, "that great discord now prevails in this country on account of the throne."
"It does not concern me. I have made up my mind to remain neutral."
"I have not come hither to beg for thy advice or assistance in that matter; the sword will decide it. What brings me to thee is a purely family affair which concerns me deeply."
Beldi, much surprised, made his guest sit down beside him.
"Speak," said he.
"Thou mayest perhaps have heard, that once upon a time a daughter of the Kallay family fell in love with a young Turkish horseman, naturally without the consent of her kinsfolk?"
"Yes, I've heard of it. People say that the young Turk was equally victorious in love and in war."
"Possibly. His victories in war, however, have disqualified him from being the Knight of Love. Thou seest that my face is furrowed with scars; know that I am the man who wedded that woman!"
Beldi began to regard the Pasha with curiosity and astonishment.
"I have continued to love that woman devotedly," pursued the Pasha. "That may appear strange to thee in the mouth of a Turk, but so it is. I have had neither wife nor concubine beside her. She has borne me a son, of whom I am proud. My affairs just now are in such a critical condition that I must, with God's help, work wonders, or perish on the battle-field. Thou knowest that the religion of Mahommed highly commends such a death. I have therefore no anxiety on that score. It is the thought of my wife which disturbs me. If she should lose me and my son, she would be in great straits. She would be persecuted in Turkey because she remained a Christian; she would be persecuted in Transylvania because she married a Mussulman. There my kinsfolk, here her own, are her enemies. I come to thee therefore with a petition. I have heard tell of thee as an honourable man, and of thy wife as a worthy woman. Receive my consort into thy family circle. She will not be a burden to thee, for I leave her everything I possess. All she wants is thy protection. If thou dost promise me that, thou canst count upon my eternal friendship and gratitude, and mayst command my fortune, my sword, and my life in case I survive."
Beldi pressed the hand of the Pasha.
"Bring your wife hither. I and my family will welcome her as a kinswoman."
"I may bring her then?"
"We shall be delighted to see her," returned Beldi; and he commanded his retainers to escort the Pasha's suite back to Tatrang with torches, and fetch from thence his carriage.
Kucsuk sent word by them that Feriz Beg was to come too.
Meanwhile Beldi introduced Kucsuk to his wife, and he was not a little delighted to find that she recollected the Pasha's wife as one of her girlish friends, whom she looked forward to see again with sincere joy and some curiosity.
After the lapse of some hours the carriage rumbled noisily into the well-paved courtyard. Feriz Beg escorted it on horseback.
Lady Beldi hastened down the steps to meet the Pasha's wife as she stepped out of the coach, and received her with a cry of joy--"What! Catharine! Do you still know me?"
The lady immediately recognized her youthful playfellow, and the two friends rushed into each other's arms, kissed again and again, and said of course the sweetest things to each other--"Why, darling, you are more handsome than ever!"--"And you, dear! What a stately woman you have grown!" etc., etc., etc.
"Look, this is my son," said Catharine, pointing to Feriz Beg, who, after dismounting, had hastened with childlike tenderness to help his mother out of her coach.
"Oh, what a little darling!" cried Lady Beldi, quite enchanted, and covering the rosy-cheeked child with kisses.
If only she had known that this child was a child no longer, but a general!
"And I've got children too!" continued Lady Beldi, with maternal emulation. "You shall see them! Does your son speak Hungarian?"
"Hungarian!" cried Catharine, almost offended; "what! the child of an Hungarian mother, and not speak Hungarian! How can you ask such a question?"
"So much the better," said Lady Beldi, "the children will become friends all the more quickly. From henceforth you belong to the family. Our husbands have settled all that already, and we shall be so delighted!"
The amiable and sprightly housewife then embraced her friend once more, took Feriz Beg by the hand, and led them both into the family circle, chatting merrily all the time, and asking and answering a thousand questions.
A cheerful fire was sparkling in the chimney of the ladies' cabinet. Large flowered-silk curtains darkened the walls. On a little ivory table ticked a gorgeous clock, ablaze with rubies and chrysoprases. Sofas covered in cornflower-blue velvet offered you a luxurious repose. On a round table in the centre of the room, from which an embroidered Persian tapestry fell in rich folds to the ground, stood a heavy candelabrum of massive silver, representing a siren holding on high a taper in each of her outstretched hands.
In front of the fine white marble chimney-piece were Dame Beldi's children. The elder, Sophia, a tall, slight, bashful-looking beauty of some fourteen summers, was bustling about the fire. She still wore her hair as children do, thrown back in two long, large plaits which reached almost to her heels. This girl was afterwards Paul Wesselenyi's consort.
The second child, a little girl of about four, was kneeling at the feet of her elder sister, and throwing dried flowers into the fire. She went by the name of _Aranka_, which in Hungarian means "little goldy," for she carried her name on her locks, which flowed over her round little shoulders in light golden waves. Her vivacious features, sparkling eyes, and tiny hands are never still, and now too she is mischievously teasing and thwarting her elder sister, laughing aloud with artless glee whenever Sophia, naturally without succeeding in the least, tries to be very angry.
On hearing footsteps and voices at the door, both children spring up hastily. The elder one, perceiving strangers, tries to smooth the creases out of her dress, while Aranka rushes uproariously to her mother, embraces her knees, and looks up at her with her plump little smiling face.
"These are my children," said Lady Beldi with inward satisfaction.
Catharine embraced the elder girl, who shyly presented her forehead to be kissed.
"And here's your cousin, little Feriz. You must kiss him too!" said Lady Beldi, pushing together the bashful children, who scarcely dared to press the tips of their lips together. Sophia immediately afterwards blushed right up to the ears, and rushed out of the room. Nothing would induce her to show herself again that evening.
"Oh, you shamefaced mimosa!" cried Lady Beldi, laughing loudly. "Why, Aranka is braver than you. Eh, my little girl? You're not afraid to kiss Cousin Feriz, are you?"
The little thing looked up at the boy and drew back, clinging fast all the time to her mother's skirts, but never once removing her large, dark-blue eyes from Feriz, who knelt down, took the little girl in his arms, and gave her a hearty kiss on her round, rosy cheeks.
Having gone safely through this ordeal, Aranka was quite at home with her new acquaintance. She bade the Turkish cousin sit him down on a stool by the fire, and, laying her head on his lap, began asking him questions about everything he wore, from the hilt of his scimitar to the plume in his turban--absolutely nothing escaped her curiosity.
"Let the children play!" cried Lady Beldi merrily, as with high good-humour she led her friend out upon the balcony, from whence they could survey the whole Tatrang valley now floating in the bright moonlight.
Here the two women--while the men were engaged with serious matters, and the children were playing--here the two women entered into one of those long confidential chats which young ladies find so charming when they are by themselves, especially when they have as much to ask and answer as these two had.
Kucsuk Pasha's wife was a middling-sized, powerfully-built woman. Her well-rounded bosom and broad shoulders were shown off by her tight-fitting kaftan, which was fastened round the waist by a girdle of gold thread, and reached somewhat lower down than is usual with the dresses of Turkish ladies, just permitting a glance at her wide, flowing, red silk pantaloons and her dainty little yellow slippers. Her face, if a trifle too stern and hard, was yet most lovely; her full and florid complexion betokened a somewhat choleric temperament; her thick, coal-black eyebrows had almost grown together, and her gaze was burning in its intensity.
Lady Beldi made her sit down by her side, took her familiarly by the hand, and playfully asked--
"Your husband then has no other wife but you?"
Catharine laughed, and replied with just a shade of impatience--
"I suppose, now, you fancy that an Hungarian woman has only to wed a Turk to instantly become his slave? You have no idea how dearly my husband loves me."
"I am sure of it, Catharine. But recollect that my question related to what has long been customary among you."
"Among us! My dear, I am not a Turkish woman!"
"What then?"
"A Christian, just as you are. We were married by a Calvinist minister, the Rev. Martin Biro, now an exile in Constantinople, and for whom my husband, out of gratitude, has built a church where the Hungarians and Transylvanians who dwell there may attend divine service."
"Really! Then your husband does not persecute the Christians?"
"Certainly not. He believes that every religion is good, as leading to heaven, but that his own faith is the best, as opening the gate of the very highest heaven. Moreover, my husband has a very good heart, and is much more enlightened than most of his fellows."
"But why have you not tried to convert him to the Christian religion?"
"Why should I? Because our poets regularly conclude their love-romances in which a Turk falls in love with a Christian girl, by bringing him to baptism and dressing him in a mente instead of a kaftan? Here, however, you have one of those romances of real life, in which a woman follows her spouse and sacrifices everything for him."
"No doubt you are right, Catharine; but you must let me get used to the idea that a Christian, let alone an Hungarian, girl may wed a Turk."
"And listen, dear Lady Beldi: surely God would have imputed less merit to me, if I had converted my husband to our faith, instead of leaving him in the faith wherein he was born? As a Christian renegade he would have occupied but a humble place in our little church; while as one of the most influential of the Pashas, he has made the fate of all the Christians in Turkey so tolerable, that the Christian subjects of other states flock over to us as to a land of promise. Often, when he has received his share of the spoils of battle, he has handed me a long list with the names of those of my enslaved countrymen whom he has ransomed at a great price. He has expended immense treasures in this way. And believe me, love, the perusal of such a list gives me more pleasure than the sight of the most beautiful oriental pearls which my husband might easily have purchased with the amount, and it has raised him higher in my estimation than if he had learnt the whole Psalter by heart. And he is not the man to break the word he has once given, whether it be to God or to his fellow-man. If he were capable of abjuring his religion, I could believe no longer in his love, for then he would cease to be him whom I have always known; he would cease to be the man who, when once he has said a thing, always abides by it, never goes back from, and is to be moved neither by the terrors of death nor the tears of a woman."
Lady Beldi embraced her friend, and kissed her glowing cheeks.
"You are right, my good Catharine! 'Tis our prejudices that prevent us from rising higher than everyday thoughts. It is true. Love also has her faith, her religion. But how about your country? Have you never thought of that?"
Catharine rose with proud self-satisfaction from her seat, and pressed her friend's hand.
"Let this convince you that I indeed love my country. I am about to sacrifice for it the lives of my husband and my son, whom perhaps I now behold for the last time."
Lady Beldi's face plainly showed that she did not quite grasp the meaning of these words, and Catharine was about to explain them to her, when a servant announced that the gentlemen had long been awaiting them in the dining-room.
Lady Beldi thereupon gave her arm to her friend and led her into the dining-room. The children had already become such close friends that Aranka allowed Feriz Beg to carry her in to dinner, playing all the time with childish coquetry with the diamond clasp of his agraffe.
The lady of the house assigned to every one his place. Catharine took the upper end of the table. On her right sat the Pasha, on her left the hostess. The host took his place at the lower end of the table. Feriz and Aranka sat side by side. Opposite Feriz was an empty place, the shy Sophia's, whom nothing could induce to come to dinner.
Catharine seeing that a large wine-jug was placed in front of her husband, quickly seized it in order to exchange it for a cut-glass caraffe full of pure, sparkling spring water. Lady Beldi remarked the action, and glanced mischievously at her embarrassed friend.
"He never drinks wine," said Catharine apologetically. "It is not good for him. He is of a somewhat excitable nature."
Kucsuk smiled and lifted Catharine's hand to his lips.
"Why gloss over the truth? Why not say straight out that I do not drink wine because the Koran forbids it, because I am a Mussulman?"
Beldi shook his head at his wife and pointed at the children in order to give another turn to the conversation.
"It looks as if your son were already quite at home with us, Kucsuk. You shall see, when you come back, what a Magyar we have made of him."
Kucsuk and Feriz exchanged a proud and rapid glance, and then both of them looked at Beldi.
The child's features had suddenly and completely changed; at that moment he looked wondrously like his father. There was the same hard, stony glance, the same defiant bearing, the same haughty elevation of the brows.
"So thou dost imagine, Beldi," said Kucsuk severely, "that I only brought my son hither to leave him with thee?"
"But surely you do not mean to take that child with you to battle?"
"Child dost thou call him! He is already the commander of four hundred mounted Spahis; has already been in three engagements; has had two horses shot under him, and is to command the left wing of my forces in the impending battle."
The Beldis looked with amazement at the child, who, with all eyes fixed upon him, assumed his most manly air.
"But I hope that you will at least keep him by your side in the heat of the fight?" said Lady Beldi, much disturbed.
"Not at all. I lead the centre. He too will give a good account of himself. When I was his age I already wore the Nishan[16] order on my breast, and I hope that this time he will not return home without having at least deserved it."
[Footnote 16: _Nishan Order._ A Turkish order of merit for valour, instituted by Selim III. It consisted of a gold medallion bearing the Sultan's effigy.]
"But if it comes to a _mêlée_, and he is in danger?" continued Lady Beldi, with increasing apprehension.
"Then he will fight as a brave soldier should," returned Kucsuk, stroking his moustache, which immediately twisted upwards of its own accord.
"Ah, no; he is far too tender to sustain a conflict with grown men!" cried Dame Beldi compassionately.
"Feriz," cried Kucsuk to his son, "just take down that sabre from the wall, and show our friends that thou canst wield it like a man."
The boy sprang up, and, proudly confident in his own strength, chose from the weapons that hung on the wall not a sabre but a huge club--seized it by the extreme end of the handle, and swung it with outstretched arms in every direction with an ease and a dexterity which would have done honour to any man. His feat was rewarded by enthusiastic applause.
"Deuce take it!" cried the astonished Beldi; "that is what I call a good graft, a Magyar scion on a Turkish stock. You did not carry off his mother for nothing. Come, Kucsuk--give me that lad!"
"Be it so! But give me thy daughter."
"Which? Make your choice."
"She who sits next to him. When she has grown up they will make a good pair, and then we shall both have a son and a daughter."
Beldi laughed heartily, and both the women exchanged a smile. Kucsuk looked with an air of satisfaction at his son, who took his aigrette from his turban, tore off the diamond buckle which had pleased Aranka so much, and handed it to the little girl with lavish gallantry. The child timidly stretched out her tiny hand towards the costly gift, the material as well as the moral worth of which she was far from suspecting, but which nothing in the world would now have made her relinquish.
The parents suddenly became silent. Their faces still wore a smile, but there was a melancholy earnestness in their eyes.