chapter four thousand five hundred and twenty-four, that we are to eat

in court-martial, sir, and we play at Tarok in court-martial, sir, and we----"

"Cease your row!" snarled the justice.

"I will make a row! And I must make a row, and I'm entitled to make a row, and I'd like to see the man who'd prevent me from making a row! I'm as much of an assessor as any man in the county!"

The Baron had meanwhile studied his cards. He was prepared to come out strong, and he urged them to continue the game; but neither Mr. Skinner nor Kenihazy would listen to him, for Kalman did his utmost to excite them still more. Mr. Skinner fancied he saw a sneer on Völgyeshy's lips, which he could not ascribe to any thing but the doubts which it was evident that hated person entertained of his assertion, that he, Paul Skinner, would drink three glasses to Mr. Kenihazy's one, and remain sober into the bargain.

"Don't boast!" said Kalman. "I'll never believe you."

"You won't?"

"No, indeed! I'll back Kenihazy against anybody."

"You will, will you? I say two cows to my greyhound."

"Done! Your greyhound is mangy; but I don't care. I am sure to win."

"Done, I say! Hand us the glasses."

Kalman could scarcely repress a smile of triumph, while Mr. Catspaw moved heaven and earth to prevent the bet; but Kenihazy laughed, and emptied his glass, the valorous judge followed his lead with three glasses, and the game was continued, though rather more noisily than before.

While Kalman was thus occupied in settling the masters, Janosh imitated his example with signal success in the servants' hall; indeed so strenuous were his attacks upon the general sobriety, that scarcely one of the haiduks and peasants was left to whom an impartial observer would have awarded the laurels of abstinence.

A deep silence prevailed in the prisoner's room, at the door of which two of the least intoxicated among the haiduks were placed. Vandory had passed above an hour in the cell, attempting to administer the comforts of religion to the condemned criminal; and when he left, Susi came to take her last leave of her husband, for, according to Mr. Skinner's express orders, she was forbidden to remain later than nine o'clock.

Both Viola and Susi were fearfully anxious and disturbed in their minds. Viola had often thought of the death which awaited him. From the moment of his capture in the St. Vilmosh forest, he knew that his doom was fixed. He made no excuses to the judges, he gave them no fair words; not from pride, but because he knew that neither prayers nor promises could avail him. And what, after all, is death but the loss of life? And was his life of those which a man would grieve to lose? There were his wife and children--but was it not likely that they would be happier, or at least quieter, _after_ the misfortune in whose anticipation they passed their days? Of what good could _he_ be to his wife? Was he not the cause of her misery? of her homeless beggary? Of what use could _he_ be to his children? Was not his name a stigma on their lives? Could he hope, could he pray for any thing for them, except that they might be as unlike their father as possible?

"When I am gone," thought he, "who knows but people may forget that I ever lived? My wife, too, will, perhaps, forget that accursed creature, whose life filled hers with shame and sorrow. My children will have other names; they will go to another place, and all will be well and good. I have but one duty, and that is to die."

His tranquillity of mind was disturbed by the plan of escape which Janosh communicated to him. The old soldier was, indeed, resolved to delay that communication till the last moment, lest Susi's excitement and joy should attract the attention and awaken the suspicions of the justice and his myrmidons. But when he entered the room which had been assigned to Susi and her children; when he saw the pale woman nursing the youngest child in her arms, and utterly lost in the gloom of her despair; when Pishta, with his eyes red with weeping, came up to him, asking him to comfort his mother, and when the infant awoke, and smiled at him, the old hussar was not proof against so much love and so much sorrow; and when Susi, kissing the child, exclaimed, "The poor little thing knows not how soon it will be an orphan!" he wept, and cried out, "No, no, Susi! this here child is as little likely to become an orphan as you are likely to be a widow!" And it was only by her look of utter amazement that he became conscious of what he had said.

There were now no means of keeping the secret. Little Pishta was sent away, and Janosh told her in a whisper of all that they intended to do.

"You see," added he, "we've thought of everything. Don't fret, now; in a few hours, when the gentlemen and the keepers are asleep, (and they are settled, I tell you,) you'll see your husband at large, and on horseback, too. It's no use being sad, and it's no use despairing--that is to say--yes! I mean you ought to despair; you ought to be sad; come, wail and pray, and ask for mercy! else they'll smell a rat. I am an old fool, and ought to know better than to tell you, for if you cannot impose upon them, it's all over with us."

Susi whispered some questions to Janosh, to which he answered in the same subdued tone of voice; adding,

"Give me your child, that I may look at it, and dance it on my knee. What a sweet child it is!" said he, his whole face radiant with smiles; "I never saw a prettier child: and it laughs, too, and at me! No, my fine fellow, we won't let your father come to harm. Ej, Susi, I wish to goodness I had a child like this!"

"My children will love you as their second father," said she, with a happy and grateful look.

"Yes, as their _second_ father," said the old man, sighing; "but it must be a fine thing to be loved as a real father. I say, Susi, I've often thought why God hasn't given _me_ children. You'll say it's because I have no wife. That's true. But why haven't I got a wife? If they had not sent me to the wars, I'd be a grandfather by this time; and, believe me, I'd give my silver medal and my cross for such children as yours. I'd give them both for a single child! Well, God's will be done. Perhaps I have no children because if I had I'd not be so fond of other people's. Young children are all equally beautiful; there's no difference between them. They are fresh and lively, like river trout; but in course of time one half of them turn out to be frogs, and worse."

Janosh saw that Pishta came back with Vandory to call his mother to Viola. Imploring her not to betray the secret, he walked away, fearful lest Susi should want the strength to dissemble her thoughts. His anxiety on this head was perfectly gratuitous. The good news, which Susi communicated to her husband, filled them both with unspeakable dismay. Whoever could have seen Viola would have thought that his stout heart was at last overcome with the fear of death. Need we marvel at this? Was not life powerful within him, trembling in every nerve, throbbing in every vein? Was not his wife by his side? Could he forget his children, whom his death might drive to ruin and, possibly, to crime? Viola had long wished to change his mode of life. He was now at liberty to do so. The brother of the Gulyash was dead. The poor man died at the moment when he was preparing to take his wife and three children to another county, where a place as Gulyash was promised to him. The papers and passports which were necessary for this purpose were in the hands of old Ishtvan, who had promised to take Viola to the place. There, above a hundred miles from the scene of his misfortunes, in a lonely tanya, where nobody knew him or cared to know him, could he not hope to live happily, peacefully, and contentedly? But did not that happiness hang on a slender thread, indeed? Were there not a hundred chances between him and its attainment? A whim of the justice's, a different position of the sentinels, the noise of a falling plank, could snatch the cup of life and liberty from his lips, and cast him back into the valley of the shadow of death.

He was in this state of mind when Mr. Skinner made his appearance in the cell. He was accompanied by Mr. Catspaw and the steward, for his _umbra_, Kenihazy, was in a state which rendered him unfit to be company to any one, even to Mr. Skinner. The change in Viola's manner was too striking to escape the attention of either the attorney or the steward. The justice perambulated the cell with a show of great dignity, and a futile attempt to examine into the condition of the walls. He poked his stick into the straw which served Viola for a lair; when the steward walked up to him, and whispered that the robber had lost all his former boldness.

"Indeed!" cried Mr. Skinner, with a shrill laugh. "I say, Viola, where's your pluck? Where's your impertinence, man? Ain't you going to die game, eh, Viola?"

"Sir," said the robber, biting his lips, "the step which I am preparing to take is bitter, and, I will own it, I feel for my family. What is to become of them?"

"Your family? Oh! your wife! Never mind; _I'll_ protect her."

Viola looked daggers at the man; but he curbed his temper and was silent.

"And as for your children," continued the justice in a bantering tone, "they're very fine children, are they not?--eh? Well, they'll grow up, and come to be hanged--eh? But what's the use of this palaver? I say, Susi, be off! You've had plenty of time for your gossip; and I say, Viola, make your will and all that sort of thing."

The prisoner, deeply sensible of his precarious position, embraced his trembling wife: but Susi would not leave him; she clung to him in all the madness of sorrow.

"I say! you've had time enough to howl and lament!" cried the justice. "Make an end of it, and be off!" And suiting the action to the word, he seized Susi by her dress, and led her to the door. Mr. Catspaw and the steward followed her; but the justice stayed behind, gloating over the sufferings of the prisoner. At length he laughed, and said,--"I say, Viola, who's the man that's in at the death? Who'll swing? I said I'd do it, and you see I'm as good as my word!" And turning on his heels, he left the room, and locked the door.

Two of the soberest men were placed in the hall to watch that door; but even they, thanks to the endeavours of Janosh, were not sober enough for Mr. Catspaw, who was just in the act of lamenting that, in consequence of their host's excessive liberality, there was not a man in the house but was drunk, when he was interrupted by Mr. Skinner.

"Who is drunk? What is drunk?" said the worthy justice, turning fiercely upon the attorney. "I say, sir, nobody's drunk here--no one was drunk here--no one will be drunk--and indeed no one can be drunk! That's what _I_ say, sir! Who dares to contradict me?"

"Don't be a fool!" whispered the attorney; "who the devil said any thing of _you_? But look at these fellows! they're roaring drunk."

"D--n you, he's right!--Confound you, you _are_ roaring drunk! Blast me, I'll have you hanged! If that robber escapes, one of you shall swing in his place! I say, fellows, look sharp! It's truly disgusting," continued the sapient justice, "that men _will_ get drunk--drown their reason in wine, for all the world like so many beasts."

The sentinels vowed, as usual, that they had not had a drop ever so long, and that the prisoner should not escape though he were the very devil; but Mr. Catspaw, alike distrustful of their vigilance and sobriety, insisted on seeing the door double-locked, and on taking away the key. Mr. Skinner protested against this encroachment on the duties of his office. He knew that the attorney suspected him of being less sober than he might have been, and this suspicion rendered him the more obstinate. He pocketed the key and sought his bed-room, denouncing drink and drunkards in the true temperance meeting style.

The inmates of Kishlak manor-house followed his example. The judges, the sentinels at the gate and round the house, the steward, and all retired to rest; and although Susi watched, though Kalman paced his own room with all the impatience of his age, and though old Kishlaki himself, for the first time since many years, courted sleep in vain, yet the house and its environs were hushed and silent. Stillness reigned in the prisoner's cell; the sentinels at the door stood gaping, and waiting for the hour of their relief. The night was cold, and though they did their best to keep the cold out, or at least out of their stomachs, they shivered and complained of the chilly night air. Janosh, who seemed to like the cold and darkness, had meanwhile met Peti, who held Viola's horse at the further end of the garden. The gipsy brought a crowbar and all other tools which they wanted for their purpose; he told the hussar that the Gulyash Ishtvan had promised to bring his cart and horses to the threshing-floor, in order to take away Susi and her children. The old soldier was greatly pleased with this good news. He tied the horse to the garden gate, and told the gipsy to conceal himself somewhere near the loft. This done, he went to look after the sentinels, whom, to his great disgust, he found still awake.

"Is it not ten o'clock?" asked one of them, when Janosh came up.

"Of course it is!" said his comrade. "I'd rather do any robot service than this cold kind of work. It's too much for a soldier, and it's far too much for me. My comrade here was in the wars; he tells me they never force soldiers to play the sentinel so long as we must."

"Who can help it?" said the other man. "It's by order, you know."

"Oh, indeed! It's easy enough, I dare say, to give an order; go and come! stand still! be starved with hunger and cold!--nothing's more easy than play the devil with a poor fellow, while they are stretching their limbs in their warm beds. At least they ought to give us something to eat, or some brandy; I'm sure I was never so cold in all my born days!"

"Don't get sulky!" said Janosh. "I'll tell you what I'll do for you. Master Kalman has given me a bottle of brandy to drink his health. Suppose I go for it. It's nearly full."

He went away and told Kalman how matters stood. When he returned, he brought them a bottle of Sliwowiza and a loaf of bread.

"You see," said he, "that's the way things go on when there's no proper officer. If the judge or any of the other gentlemen had been in the army, they would have made some provision for you, and got some one to relieve you, but as it is----"

"Why, I do hope and trust they will relieve us!" cried one of the men.

"Blessed are those that put their trust in the Lord," retorted Janosh, laughing; "I'd be happy to know who is to relieve you? Why, man, they're all asleep!"

"Give me the bottle! I'm as cold as ice!" said the other man, shaking his head, while his comrade stood drowsily leaning on his musket.

Janosh handed him the bottle, and assured the two men that there was no chance of their being relieved from their duty, and that nothing was more likely than their falling asleep about daybreak, the very time when the justice would go his rounds,--in which case he (Janosh) had no ambition to be in their skins. The bottle went from hand to hand, to keep them awake, as Janosh said, until the poor fellows swore that they would not stand it any longer, and that, come what may, they must sleep.

"Very well!" said Janosh; "I've been in the wars, you know! I'm used to the service. You see I'm not at all sleepy. You may go to the shed and lie on the straw, and when I'm tired I'll wake you. A little sleep will do you good; and by the time the justice turns out you'll be all right."

His offer was readily accepted. The two men walked off, and their loud snoring soon informed Janosh that there was now no obstacle to the execution of his plans. Leaving the musket behind, he walked to the shed, where he assured himself of the firm and sound sleep of the two sentinels; and, having done this, he hastened to the loft, where Peti and Kalman waited for him. Janosh pulled off his boots, (there was no occasion for the gipsy's following his example,) and, having lighted a lamp, he crept up the stairs to the top of the house. Kalman kept watch by the lower door. Wrapped up in his cloak, he listened with a beating heart, lest something might interfere with the success of their scheme.

Something of the kind was likely to happen. Kalman was scarcely at his post when he heard the sound of steps approaching from the house in which the judges slept. The young man stepped aside to escape being discovered, and he had already begun to blame himself for failing to "settle" Mr. Skinner sufficiently, when he saw that the person who approached the place, holding a lamp in one hand and a cudgel in the other, was not Skinner, but Mr. Catspaw, the attorney. Kalman raised his hand, and was preparing to rush forward, with a view of "doing for" the lawyer by knocking him down; when, luckily for the attorney, it struck him that that delicate operation could not be performed without some noise, and, consequently, not without hazarding the success of the enterprise. Mr. Catspaw was therefore allowed to pass on, which that worthy man did with the utmost unconcern. But his peaceful and happy state of mind was changed to utter disgust, confusion, and dismay, when, on reaching the door of Viola's cell, he found that there were no sentinels to guard the prisoner.

"Confound it!" muttered he, "they're after no good in this house. That young fellow Kalman has made them all drunk--Skinner, the sentinels, the servants, and all. They would like Viola to escape. They tried it this morning, and as it was no go, they mean to do it by brute force. Confound them! I'll go back and wake some of the men,--I'll remain here and watch the door,--what the devil am I to do? That fellow must be got out of the way! If the case is tried in a common court, he'll say enough to implicate me in the matter; and goodness knows what may come of it! There are some who hate me!----" And the attorney was about to return to the lower parts of the house, when his attention was attracted by an extraordinary noise, which seemed to come from the prisoner's cell. The noise resembled that of the breaking of planks. He crept to the door and listened. There was the creaking and the sound of the raising of planks; and immediately afterwards there was a sound of some heavy object being carefully lowered into the cell.

"They are breaking through the ceiling!" cried the attorney; "d--n them! I'll stop them yet!" and, in defiance of his usual prudence, he attempted, though unsuccessfully, to open the door. He cursed Skinner for pocketing the key. Peti and Janosh, who were at work on the upper loft, had provided themselves with a ladder, which they lowered into the cell, the noise of which operation was distinctly heard by Kalman, and, indeed, by the sentinels in the shed, whom it awaked, though not sufficiently to induce them to get up, which, considering the quantity of liquor they had drunk, was by no means an easy matter. But if the noise was lost upon them, it was not lost upon the steward; on the contrary, so effectually did it tell upon him, that he fell into an agony of fear and despair.

That worthy servant of the Kishlakis had never donned his nightcap with so proud and happy a feeling as on that night. The great condescension of the members of the court, nor even excepting the Baron, for all that he was a magnate; the important duties which he had to perform, such as the guarding of the prisoner, the construction of the gallows, and other arrangements which required ability and tact, and which brought out his "_savoir faire_," gave him still stronger feelings of his own importance than those which usually pervaded his unwieldy frame. He gloried in himself, and lay awake, magnifying and exalting his own name.

"I'm born for better things," said he. "I was never meant for farming. To look after the manure, and the planting, and the ploughing and threshing,--curse it! it's slow work, and I am too good for it! I ought to be a lawyer. Providence created me expressly for that profession! Wouldn't I get on in that line! I might come to be a sheriff, and an assessor of the high court, and indeed a lord-lieutenant, and a magnate of the empire! For what place is too high for a Hungarian lawyer?"

Such were the stout man's thoughts. His imagination borrowed a glow from his cups, (for he, too, had drunk deep), and the cares of his fancied honours and dignities kept him awake, in spite of the fatigues of the day, and, indeed, in spite of his own endeavours to go to sleep. He, to whom it was an easy matter to talk a whole party to sleep, now vainly exerted his skill upon himself. He tried every means; he occupied himself with figures and accounts. But the figures danced in a wild maze, and, somehow or other, the accounts would not tally. He opened his eyes, and looked around. The dying glare of his candle threw a dim light on the objects in the room, filling it with gaunt and shadowy forms. He shuddered, and extinguished the candle; but the darkness made matters worse. His thoughts _would_ run on robberies and murders. The greatest brigand in the county, a man sentenced to death, was a prisoner in his house. Who knows what Viola's friends were about? Perhaps they were numerous. Perhaps they were formidable and fierce. Nothing was more natural than that they should attack the house, and liberate their captain. And if so, what was to become of the poor steward, who had so jealously watched lest he might escape, and who had protested, yes, and in the presence of at least a hundred people, every one of whom might have told the robbers of it, that Viola must needs be hanged? That thought made him shake in his bed. And besides, was not his door wide open? Did he not keep it open ever since he was afraid of apoplexy? What was to prevent the outlaws from entering his room, and hanging him on his bed-post? Nothing; for the haiduk, whose duty it was to sleep on the threshold, had been taken away to join the watch on Viola.

The poor steward's alarm had come to its _acmé_, when he heard the noise of steps in the loft over his head. He sat up in his bed. He heard the steps very distinctly, and immediately afterwards he heard the creaking and breaking of the planks. Yes! the most dreaded event had come to pass. The robbers were at their work of death and destruction! They were burning the house, and cutting the throats of all the inmates! "Gracious God!" groaned he, clasping his hands. What _could_ he do? He might lock the door! There was a singing in his ear, his heart beat irregularly, his breath failed him, his face was covered with sweat, and his limbs trembled,--all these were symptoms of an apoplectic fit. "If I lock the door, I am utterly lost!" thought he; "for no one can come to my assistance!" He hid his head under the blankets. But the noise grew louder, and he fancied somebody was breaking through the wall of the room next to his. Perhaps there were not less than a hundred robbers; perhaps they were bent upon torturing him! Unless the door was locked, there was no possibility of screaming for help; for he knew the first thing they intended to do was to gag him. But then, he was in a perspiration; the room was icy cold: to get up and stand on the cold floor was literally courting a fit of apoplexy. But when he heard Mr. Catspaw hallooing, his fear got the better of all other considerations. He jumped out of bed, wrapped himself up in a blanket, and ran to the door. But what can equal his horror when he heard the door of the corridor turning on its hinges, and when quick steps approached him! He dropped the blanket because it interfered with his movements, and seized the key, when the door was flung open. Before him stood a small man, wrapped in a bunda.

There is a tide in the affairs of a coward in which fear makes him a hero. Such a moment had come for the steward. Furious as a stag at bay, reckless as a man who sees certain death before him, merciless as one to whom no mercy is given, senseless, maddened, frenzied, he rushed upon the new comer, and in the very next moment Mr. Catspaw measured his length on the ground, and roared for help.

"Murder!" screamed the attorney.

"Assassin!" bawled the steward, throttling his adversary with his left hand while he punched the wretched man's head with his right.

"He is mad!" groaned Mr. Catspaw, grasping the steward's ears, and returning the blows; and thus they would have passed _un vilain quart d'heure_, had not the noise of their combat roused the watch, who rushed to the field of battle, and separated the champions. Lights were brought, and the two worthies stood bleeding from their respective noses and mouths, as they gaped and stared at one another.

"Was it you, sir, who wanted to steal my money?" said the steward.

"He's mad!" cried the attorney: "lock him up; for he's raving mad! Be quick about it; the prisoner is making his escape!"

They seized the steward, pushed him into his room, and locked the door. The poor man stood, for a moment, paralysed with an excess of fear, fury, and fatigue; but the cold reminded him of his danger, viz., of being struck with apoplexy. He crept into his bed, pondering on the deceit and cruelty of this wicked world.

Mr. Catspaw and the servants hastened to the cell. They forced the door open, and found that the robber had fled, as it is but natural to suppose, if we consider the length of time the attorney spent in the embrace or, more properly speaking, under the fists of the steward. For, when Mr. Catspaw raised his first shout, Viola had reached the upper loft, from whence he leaped down stairs, and out of the house. Kalman locked the door of the loft, and hastened to inform Susi of the success of their plan, and to conduct her to the back-door of the garden, which they had scarcely entered, when the fleet steps of a horse, at the top of its speed, informed them of Viola's safety. Susi kissed Kalman's hand, and hastened away; while he, with the happy consciousness of a good deed, hastened to the steward's house, where he found nothing but clamour and confusion. Masters, servants, Pandurs, and peasants, with torches, candles, and lamps, ran in every direction, hallooing and screaming. Every one took his turn at the cell; and everybody declared, what everybody was aware of, that the prisoner had escaped through the ceiling; and everybody gave his advice, which nobody followed, and orders, which nobody obeyed. Not one of them could be induced to go in pursuit of the robber; and all Mr. Catspaw had for his watchfulness was a battered face and the loss of a couple of teeth. Nor was it until daybreak that they all and each became aware of the fact that they had neglected to pursue the robber; and, as it was not likely that Viola would come back of his own free will, they returned to their respective beds, with the exception of Kenihazy, whom--_nec ardor civium, nec frons instantis tyranni_--neither the shaking of the haiduks nor Skinner's imprecations could induce to leave his bed, and who was not, therefore, under the necessity of returning to it.

CHAP. X.

Nothing is more painful to a man of quick and ardent feelings than to be compelled to inactivity, as was the case with young Rety while the events which we have sought to record were passing around him. His feverish anxiety, his petulance, and his obstinacy exceeded all bounds; he would certainly have left his room, and taken an active part in Viola's liberation, had not Etelka informed him of Vilma's anxiety for his safety, and her urgent entreaties that he should not leave his room without the permission either of Vandory or the doctor. Etelka felt her brother's accident more painfully than any other member of the family, not for his sake alone, but also for Vilma's; for she was aware how much the poor girl would have to suffer in consequence. It is, therefore, no wonder that Etelka was sad and dispirited when she retired to her chamber on the evening of the election-day. There was a gloom on her mind which she could not dispel. She knew too much of her step-mother to believe she would ever consent to her brother's marriage with Vilma; and as for her father, he had scarcely a will of his own. It was but natural to suppose that he would do all in his power to change his son's mind, partly in obedience to Lady Rety's behests, and partly because he hated Tengelyi. And Akosh! how could _he_ yield, when even the delay of a few days brought dishonour on the woman he loved? The least Etelka expected was a grievous domestic quarrel; the worst, a breach between father and son.

Her thoughts were bitter; but they were qualified by at least one soft and kind feeling. She admired the generous manner in which Kalman protected Tengelyi. The young man's behaviour was as intrepid as disinterested. He was aware of the grudge which the sheriff bore Tengelyi; and he must have known that his words in the notary's behalf were so many barriers between him and Etelka. He knew it all, and yet he had spoken; and Etelka, who was convinced of his love, admired him the more for his reckless daring and his generous self-denial. Wrapped up in these thoughts, she retired to rest, though restless; and, when she dropped off to sleep, she was roused by the rattling of a carriage from her dreams of the election, robbers, her brother's pale face, and Kalman's bold attitude and looks of defiance. She sat up in her bed, and listened. A quick step was heard on the stairs and in the corridor. The door of the next room opened, and shut. The new comer was Mr. Catspaw, who, after Viola's capture, returned with the notary's papers to Tissaret; and whose apartments, as has been already stated, were next to Etelka's chamber, from which nothing divided them but a thin brick wall. Etelka (as, indeed, on a former occasion, her maid) heard every one of the attorney's movements. "Where can he have come from?" thought she, as she prepared to lie down again; when her attention was attracted by the attorney's voice. To judge from the noise he made, he was arranging some papers.

"Here they are!" said he; "here are the notary's diplomas! Well, sir, who'll prove your descent? And here are the papers which Lady Rety wants. Right, quite right!--I'll put them in a drawer, and lock them up! I'll have my own price for them, won't I? that's all!"

He locked the drawer and walked about the room. Etelka had great difficulty in catching his words; but she understood that they referred to some piece of knavery, when suddenly her attention was attracted by other steps in the corridor. The door opened again, and Mr. Catspaw said, in his usual shrill voice:

"Victory! my lady! The day is ours! Viola is a prisoner. He fought to the last; but we burned his hut, and smoked him out. The papers are in my hands."

"Where are they?" said another voice, which Etelka knew as her step-mother's.

"I burned them, the moment I could lay my hands on them. They'll not give us any more trouble. They were all in a parcel, and Tengelyi's papers too, which your ladyship was so anxious to have."

"For God's sake don't speak so loud!" said Lady Rety. "Etelka returned last night with her father, and if she is awake she will hear every word." Upon which Mr. Catspaw continued the conversation in a whisper, which effectually prevented Etelka from catching the thread of their discourse. When Lady Rety left the attorney's room, Etelka made vain endeavours to sleep; at the break of day she hastened to inform her brother of the events of the night. He induced her to write to Kalman, and old Janosh received orders to take the letter to Kishlak. That day passed in a painful uncertainty, which was but partly relieved when, on the following morning, Janosh returned from his expedition. Viola was saved; but what were Akosh and Etelka to do? They felt convinced that Vandory's papers were stolen in consequence of their parents', or at least their step-mother's, commands. Could there be any truth in the statement (which Kalman communicated to Akosh) that these papers had some relation to their father's elder brother, who had left their grandfather's house when a boy, and that Vandory was the guardian of the family secrets? But why all this mystery? Why did he not--why does he not explain it? Suppose their unfortunate uncle were alive, and somebody wished to deprive him of his property, was it to be expected that Vandory would be a party to so vile a transaction? And if that supposition is false, what papers can the curate possibly possess, that should tempt Lady Rety to commit a crime to obtain them? There were mysteries and uncertainties on every side. The papers, and with them Tengelyi's diplomas, had not been destroyed. Etelka knew that the attorney had locked them up; his having told Lady Rety that they were burnt, proved that he wished to keep and to use them for his own ends. How could Akosh obtain possession of those papers? Was it judicious to speak to Mr. Catspaw? But the wily attorney was sure to deny all knowledge of them, and to destroy or remove them at the very first opportunity. And how could Akosh force him to restore the stolen property? Not by threats of exposure, unless he wished to attack his parents likewise. Akosh was a prey to the most painful indecision. "What can we do?" cried he; "are we to suffer the rascal to rob Tengelyi of his rights? Are we to stand by and let him ruin that good man; or shall we, who are Rety's children, accuse our own parents?"

"Our best plan is to do nothing at all--at least for the present," said Etelka. "All we can do is to watch him. He'll not destroy the papers immediately, or employ them for any bad purpose; and though it is against my principles, I mean, for once, to yield to a woman's curiosity, and listen to all that happens in his room. There's always time for extreme measures."

"I am fond of seeing my way clearly," replied her brother. "We ought not to listen or play the spy. These people are too deep for us, and I'll promise you he will take good care that you hear nothing. Indeed, all you heard that night was owing to his not being aware of your presence. Our best plan is to speak to our father."

"And spoil all! It's the surest way to destroy the papers. Whether he is privy to the affair or not, it's all the same; the papers, will disappear the moment he or anybody suspects _us_ of being in the secret."

"You are right," said Akosh; "we are compelled to be patient and to dissemble."

"Now be careful!" replied Etelka, preparing to leave the room. "I hear my father's footsteps in the hall. He is sure to talk of Vilma; therefore pray keep your temper and your counsel!"

And, kissing her father's hands (whom she met at the door), Miss Rety withdrew.

Father and son met as antagonists, and their instincts taught them an increase of that polite reserve which usually characterised their intercourse. After the necessary inquiries after his son's health, both were for a while silent, till at length the sheriff, with a violent effort, launched into the debate.

"My son," said he, with a smile, which in him meant only that he was at a loss what expression to give to his features; "I ought to scold you for your late adventures, not only because they induced you to withdraw your influence at the election (thank goodness! we managed to do without you), but also for endangering your life. Consider what a father's feelings must be when his son behaves like you."

"My dear father," replied Akosh, his voice trembling with emotion, "I am happy you have broached the affair. That matter must be settled, and the sooner the better."

The sheriff was by no means pleased with the eagerness with which Akosh snatched at his words.

"I am at your service," he said; "but I would advise you to wait before we come to an _éclaircissement_. Leave it till another day. You are excited, and perhaps suffering."

"No, father," replied Akosh, "I cannot wait when my honour is concerned. You know I love Vilma."

The sheriff smiled, and Akosh continued, with a blush:--

"You need not fear my giving you a homily on my love and Vilma's virtues. I intend nothing of the kind; but you are aware of the imprudent step which Tengelyi's obstinacy induced me to take. He would not allow me to visit his house and see his daughter."

"Tengelyi is a sensible man; at least, in a great many respects."

"That may be. I, for one, will not contradict you, nor do I mean to argue the question whether it is reasonable to ask a man to do impossible things, or whether it shows good sense to oppose a strong and honourable feeling, and to drive it, by that very opposition, to secrecy and other steps of a questionable nature. I say I will not argue that point. You know all that has happened. You know that Vilma's reputation is at stake, and that I owe her satisfaction----"

"I know nothing of the kind!" said the sheriff. "My dear son, you make mountains of mole-hills. I must confess, how Vilma's reputation can have suffered is a thing which passes my comprehension. I grant that the business does not reflect much credit on the Tengelyi family, nor, indeed, on Mrs. Tengelyi; but as for the young woman, why, she is turned seventeen!"

Akosh sickened at these words, and the tone in which they were spoken; but he conquered his feelings, and went on:--

"This is no laughing matter, father. Vilma's reputation cannot but suffer; and if I could have doubted it, I'm sure what my mother said of her in this very room would have enlightened my mind on the subject. There is but one remedy for this, and as I have long intended to marry Vilma, I am now resolved to do so without delay. What I ask for is your consent, my father."

Mr. Rety was one of those men who abhor plain questions, because they require plain answers. The manner in which his son put to him one of these objectionable questions, and in so important a matter, too, overwhelmed him with confusion. He muttered something about the dangers of brusquing any business, and that it was impossible for him to make up his mind in a moment, or to give a decision on a subject of the bearings of which he knew so little.

"As for me," replied Akosh, "my resolution is firmly fixed. But if you wish to examine the bearings of the question, I trust you will not forget that Vilma cannot possibly make her appearance any where, unless it be as my betrothed; and that it is cruel in us to prolong, though only for a day, the painful position into which I have brought her family."

"My son," said Rety, with a show of great sympathy, "no one can admire your delicacy more than I do! I promise you that you may rely on my effectual co-operation in any thing we can do to indemnify the Tengelyis for your inconsiderate rashness."

"Which means that you give your consent!" cried Akosh, seizing his father's hand.

Rety proceeded: "I am prepared to go any lengths to indemnify Tengelyi. We are rich, and, if you think proper, I have no objection, I assure you, not the least objection, to grant him a certain quantity of land, and to provide for Vilma in such a manner that----"

Akosh dropped his father's hand.

"Are you aware, sir," cried he, "that I love Vilma? That I love her more than any thing in this world? That she loves me? and that I'd rather die than leave her?"

The sheriff looked wretchedly confused. Akosh proceeded in a more subdued tone:--

"Do not fancy that I come to you for assistance. My late mother's property is in my hands; it will suffice to keep me and my wife. I leave you to do as you please with your property. All I ask is your blessing, which I _do_ trust you will not refuse me."

The sheriff was not without feeling, and the words of his son touched his heart. He was, however, at that time of life in which our principles (which usually emanate from and correspond with our interests) prevail against the softer feelings of humanity, which are so strong in a young and ardent heart; and even if this had not been the case, he would not have dared to grant Akosh's request. Lady Rety's influence over him precluded the mere idea of consent. His reply, therefore, consisted of a variety of those common-place phrases which men are wont to adduce in argument against passions of which they cannot fathom the depth. But his reasonings, however specious, made no impression upon Akosh, who would not even consent to delay, in spite of his father's solemn promise that he was prepared to sanction his son's choice in a year, if Akosh would but follow his advice, and go on his travels.

"You are unreasonable, indeed you are, my dear son!" said the sheriff, at length, while Akosh paced the room in a state of great excitement. "You ought to consider what you are about. You ought to consider that your passion is likely to be your ruin. You must own that I am a good father, an indulgent father. I never opposed any of your wishes, or even whims. Your politics are opposed to mine; still you see I respect them, trusting that time will at length cure you, as it does so many others. My greatest wish was, that you should contract a suitable alliance: indeed, I know several young ladies that would have pleased me, but I have not urged you. I left you to yourself. I scorned to influence your choice. I think it but just that in the present instance you should yield to _my_ will. Consider that there is no stepping back if you once step forward."

"I have left nothing unconsidered," replied Akosh. "My mind is made up. Vilma is all I care for in the world."

"The world! And do _you_ know what the world is? Do you know what you will care for when you are past thirty? At your time of life people are mad for love and a cottage. But, believe me, there are other things in this world to wish and to struggle for, and to possess. A youth is amorous, but a man is ambitious. When love has ceased to yield us happiness, we turn to the world, and would fain exult in the respect and obedience of the many."

Akosh smiled and shook his head.

"You are sceptical now, but I know your time will come. You are generous. You are free from egotism and selfishness: but, after all, you are human. The expression of our features may vary; but we are all formed of the same clay, and our feelings and instincts are very much the same, however varying their expression may be. Your time will come. There will be a day in which your soul will yearn for honours and distinctions. There will be hours in which you will regret that your talents have been left to rust in the back kitchen; and you will curse your folly, which excluded you from the only career in which a man can feel real happiness."

"I cannot believe it! But suppose such were the case; suppose that I were to wake to ambition; who tells me that, in following your advice, I can satisfy that ambition? Thousands of hands are stretched forth to grasp those apples of Tantalus, but whose thirst did they ever slake? Was there ever a man, who strove for distinction, who did not come to despise that which he had gained?"

"Some there are, indeed," said the sheriff; "but they grasp at more than they can reach."

"But who tells you that this is not to be my case? I have never wished for greatness; but if I were to enter the lists, I know that I should struggle for an object which millions have striven for in vain. To be the great man of a county; to be the master of a poor few thousands; to carry my head high like the reeds of the morass, surrounded by the rottenness to which I owe my elevation; to bow and bend like a reed, so that my weakness may not appear from my resistance: no, father, that is not an object to devote one's life to, and yet, could I possibly aspire to any thing else?"

"Why should you not?" replied the sheriff, with great eagerness, for he rejoiced in the turn of the conversation, though smarting under his son's words, which pictured his own condition in very unattractive colours. "Why should you not? A young man of your class may aspire to the highest honours. I admit that the path is thorny, and indeed you would be obliged to make it straight through the county; but you are young, and you have the means to begin where others end. At the end of three years I intend to resign my place in your favour, and when you have once obtained the shrievalty you can aspire to any thing. I trust I shall live to see you as a _judex curiæ_."

"But, my dear father," said Akosh, with a smile, "even if the career you trace out for me were to my mind, even if I would condescend to barter my opinions for office, and to come to the mountain because the mountain will not come to me--why, in the name of all that is reasonable, cannot I do all this with Vilma, as well as without her?"

The sheriff looked up with the greatest amazement expressed in his countenance.

"Are you not aware _where_ it is you live?" said he. "Don't you know that nothing is to be got in this country, unless by means of family influence? Personal merit is a cypher; it multiplies your value if your position be added to it as number one; or do you think I could ever have come to be a sheriff if I had married a woman of ignoble descent?"

"Is it not enough that _I_ am of a noble house?"

"Of course," replied Rety, with deplorable rashness; "if the wife of your choice were any other but Vilma--any other but the daughter of a village notary! I am no tufthunter. If you like, you may marry into a merchant's family--or, really I do not care, take the daughter of a proselyte from Judaism--any thing of the kind will do. I am by no means a tufthunter, my dear Akosh; I am _not_ prejudiced, whatever people may say to the contrary--no! I know too well that nobody ever saw the blood which runs in the veins of the Retys. Take any girl you like, so that she has plenty of money; it will set you upon your legs, my boy. Your sister, you know, is coheiress with you, not with _my_ will, I assure you; but if your wife is not rich, you'll have only one half of what I possess, and----"

"My dear father," cried Akosh, "do not let us pursue this subject any further. It's of no use; I have made up my mind. If my heart alone were concerned, I would sacrifice all my hopes of happiness for your sake; but my honour, and Vilma's present and future happiness, are at stake, and nothing can shake my resolution. I beg, I entreat, do not refuse me your consent! do not compel me to take the most important step of my life without your permission and your blessing!"

"Consider, my son," urged Rety, "consider what your grandfather and father did to raise our family to its present position! Are the struggles of half-a-century to be sacrificed to your passion? to a whim of the moment? Consider that you deprive my house of its peace; for, believe me, my wife and Vilma can never meet as friends; and my wife tells me that she would sooner leave the house than consent to this cursed marriage. Think of your sister, for she too is likely to be ruined by your obstinacy. What gentleman would be kin to a village notary?"

The sheriff would probably have urged a variety of other reasons upon the consideration of his son, but the door opened, and Lady Rety entered the room. Rety's arguments were not likely to have any effect upon his son; nor was it probable that Akosh could ever persuade his father, that a man who had the full enjoyment of his reasoning faculties could prefer the daughter of a poor village notary to the seductive charms of a shrievalty; but still Akosh loved his father, and the sheriff's warmth and sincerity touched his heart. But when his step-mother entered, and (as usual) took the lead in the discussion, her commanding tone and supercilious manner turned the young man's blood to gall, and his every word betrayed his scorn and disgust of the woman, whom he knew to be an accessory of a crime.

"I presume you have talked to Akosh," said Lady Rety, addressing her husband. "Pray what has he to say for himself?"

"Yes, I did mention the matter--and Akosh said he would--that is to say, just at present--that he----"

"That he will never resign Vilma," cried Akosh, "neither now nor ever; that's what he says!"

"Oh, very well!" replied Lady Rety, with an angry look at her son. "You are mistaken, if you believe, sir, that _we_ can ever be brought to consent to this marriage."

"As for your ladyship, I never reckoned on your consent; but----"

"Nor will your father give his. I am sure my husband has never given you reason to suppose----"

"Perhaps not!" said Akosh. "But since my father loves me, I have no reason to suppose that his will is unchangeable."

"It _is_ unchangeable!" cried Lady Rety, violently. "I say it _is_ unchangeable! Am I right, Rety?"

The sheriff nodded his head in token of assent.

"No, never!" continued Lady Rety. "Neither he nor I will ever sanction this folly!"

"If that's the case," said the young man, with a look of contempt, "I shall be forced to do my duty as an honourable man without my father's consent; I shall be forced to leave a house which, it appears, is so completely monopolised by others, that there's no room left for me!"

"And which place does the young gentleman intend to honour with his presence?" sneered Lady Rety. "Does he propose to reside on the domains of his lady-love?"

"There's no occasion for it!" replied Akosh, trembling with excitement. "My mother's property will suffice for me now that she is dead. If she were alive, I'd not be forced to leave my father's house in this manner!"

"Ungrateful wretch!" screamed Lady Rety; "do you reproach me with my condescension? I was born a Baroness of Andorhazy, and nothing compelled _me_ to marry a common-place nobleman! I am sure _I_ was not honoured by the alliance! No, it was _I_ who honoured your family! And as for your mother's property, you shan't have it! You are not of age. You have no right to claim it!"

"I shall be of age in about six weeks."

"And I say no! and no! and no! I scorn the match! I won't stand the disgrace--the infamy! Your father will disown you! curse you! I say I will not allow you to disgrace the name which _I_ bear!"

Akosh would have spoken, but she continued:--

"I will not suffer it! What? is the daughter of a village notary to become my daughter-in-law! A woman without a name! a woman with scarcely a rag to her back! a woman I despise!"

"My lady!" cried Akosh.

"Yes, a dishonourable woman! Your mistress before she was your wife; a----"

The cup was full. Akosh, in a frenzy of passion, rushed forward to attack his step-mother, but the sheriff caught his arm as it descended.

"How dare you?" screamed the young man; "how dare _you_ say so! _you_, the accomplice of robbers and thieves! _You_, who are indeed the disgrace of our house! Why woman, if I were to speak, I could send you to gaol, to your fellows!"

His words were so many thunders in Lady Rety's ear. She stood deadly pale, trembling, with downcast eyes--a picture of guilt and misery. There is no saying what the sheriff might not have done but for Vandory's entrance, which put a stop to all further explanations. When the curate entered, Lady Rety seized her husband's hand and led him out of the room. Akosh, still exhausted with his illness, and fearfully excited, flung himself on the sofa, and wept.

A short time afterwards the sheriff's servant brought a note, in which Rety asked his son to leave the house at his earliest convenience. The curate offered to effect a compromise, but Akosh insisted on going immediately. He took a hurried leave of Etelka, and accompanied Vandory, who had offered him shelter under his own roof.

CHAP. XI.

The majority of mankind are more or less eloquent on the subject of the wounds which love inflicts on the human heart, while they most unjustly forget that if love makes wounds, he also heals them, and that his sorrows and pains are as nothing in comparison to the joys he gives us, by rendering us (for the time) insensible to the other griefs that flesh is heir to. This healing and protecting power of love relieved young Rety from the sorrows that would otherwise have beset his mind, and caused him to triumph over griefs which might have borne down a stouter heart than his.

Vandory introduced his young guest to his house; and this done, he hastened to Tengelyi. The notary was just returned from a journey to some distant place, where he had been consulting a legal friend of his. He was preparing to set out again for Kishlak, to talk to Viola, when he was informed of the prisoner's escape. This news deprived him of all hopes of profiting from Viola's confession; and the disappointment was the more painful from the fact of its strengthening his suspicions of the Rety family. Vandory's conversation did much to calm his mind, and the two friends had a long debate on the situation of affairs, and the danger which threatened Vilma's reputation, in the course of which the curate put great stress on the fact that young Rety's love to Vilma was the cause of his banishment from his father's house. Tengelyi was at length induced to promise that he would not oppose his daughter's attachment to Akosh; and when Vandory hastened away, and returned accompanied by the trembling lover, the notary gave him a kind and even hearty welcome, and, by way of a practical demonstration of the old proverb, "the least said, the soonest mended," he led young Rety to his daughter. Having thus far yielded to the influence of his wise and judicious friend, he returned to Vandory, saying, as if to excuse his own weakness,

"After all, what can we do? They love one another; and fate, it appears, wills their union."

"I've often told you so, but you would not believe me."

"I was not always convinced of it; I wished for an older husband for my daughter, for a man equal to her in rank and position; but fate has willed it otherwise. And, after all, Akosh is thoroughly good and honourable. He will protect my boy,--poor little fellow! he has lost caste, and is now no better than a '_villain_.' My daughter's reputation would have been lost, for we all know Lady Rety's malice: but this marriage will set all right again. In short, it were folly to oppose it, however hostile my principles are to alliances of this kind."

Thus the notary. And love, which but a few days ago had endangered the tranquillity and peace of his house, served now to make it brighter and gladder than ever. But the inmates of the manor-house of Tissaret were a prey to grief and vexation of spirit.

Immediately after the stormy scene in Akosh's room, Lady Rety conducted her husband to her own apartments, where she told him the secret of the recent events, to which she added Mr. Catspaw's account of what had happened during the trial of Viola. The sheriff was shocked and alarmed, though far less than his wily wife had been led to expect. He left her to think the matter over in his study. Lady Rety remained alone, a prey to the bitterest feelings. She thought of what Akosh had said, and of the sacrifices which she pretended to have made for that young man's benefit.

"What," thought she, "what did I slave for? Why did I put my head into the snares of that hateful attorney? Why, indeed? Was it not to raise this family, and to secure a large fortune to that young fool, who now turns against me?"

She sobbed and clasped her hands.

"My life," continued she, "has been _one_ long struggle, a continued sacrifice of my feelings to objects which escaped from my grasp. The man I loved was poor. I felt that my heart yearned for better things than the insipid happiness of a good housewife. I married Rety because his fortune and his position gave me a promise of rank, splendour, and distinction. And what is it I have come to be?--I am a sheriff's lady, the wife of a man who has neither talents nor energy which could raise him to a higher position. Well, I was resigned. I sought another basis for my happiness. I thought of raising Rety's children to that lofty position which their father wanted the strength to reach, or even to covet. What are these children to me? They are not my own children. They have not sprung from my blood. But they bear my name; and though they hate me, their step-mother, still they could not prevent me from profiting by the position into which I wished to force them. All my endeavours were directed to that end. And now! now! I have lost all! All my plans, all the struggles of so many years are in vain, and only because Akosh is in love with Vilma! There's nothing too high for him, and he--he turns his back on me, on the world, on splendour and wealth; and all for the notary's daughter. Confusion! and I cannot even revenge myself on him!"

And Lady Rety racked her inventive mind to find a means to cross her son's plans; but she sickened at the thought that the notary, whom she hated because she could not despise him, was likely to triumph over her. She was lost in these painful thoughts, when Mr. Catspaw entered her room. Lady Rety asked him what the sheriff was doing.

"He is rather excited," said the attorney, seating himself unceremoniously, and with a freedom of manner which was by no means in keeping with his usual respectful politeness. "Your ladyship can have no idea of his state of mind. Indeed he has gone to the length of abusing me--the poor sheriff! But who the deuce can help it? It's a dirty business, and in his position too----"

There was something in Mr. Catspaw's voice and manner which struck Lady Rety, and which made by no means an agreeable impression upon her.

"You are merry, sir," said she; "though really I cannot understand what there is to laugh at?"

"But I can!" replied Mr. Catspaw. "The man who is in at the death, and after a hard run too, has a right to be merry."

"But we are not in at the death!" retorted Lady Rety; "Viola is at large, and we are suspected."

"Fiddlesticks!" exclaimed the attorney, with a loud burst of laughter. "Viola's escape is nothing to us. Is he not sentenced to death? Is he not aware that he cannot appear against us, without bringing his own skin to market? or do you think that the robber will come to be hanged, merely for the pleasure of giving evidence against you and me? And as for any one suspecting us, why it's sheer nonsense! The thing is too bad for anybody to believe it!"

"You would change your opinion if you could hear what Akosh says. I am afraid he knows more than is good for him and for us."

"Fiddlesticks! Stuff and nonsense!" cried the attorney. "What can _he_ know? I dare say he has smelled a rat, but that's all. But I'll dodge him, madam; I'll dodge him!"

"You are determined to see the bright side of things," said Lady Rety, amazed; for usually it was the worthy attorney's habit rather to increase than to lessen the difficulties of a question.

"Why should I not?" answered Mr. Catspaw, as he leaned over towards her. "Have I not devoted my whole life to your family? And have I not braved all dangers? And now that the time of my reward is come, what can prevent me from enjoying myself?"

"What do you mean, sir?" said Lady Rety, with a stare.

"Oh, my dear, good, clever lady, you know to a nicety what I mean! How can you help it?" cried the attorney in a bantering tone, as he seized her hand. "Why should you pretend to make sport of your humble servant? What was your promise? Whenever I could lay my hands on Vandory's papers, I was to have a grant of land as a reward for my faithful services,--_propter fidelia servitia_. You know it was mentioned on the day of the canvass. Your ladyship must remember it; we were in the garden----"

"Yes, yes! I know all about it."

"And what were your ladyship's words on that memorable occasion?"

"I said, My dear Catspaw, on the day you produce those papers, we will transfer the land."

"Oh, your ladyship, I too remember those words which bound me to you with chains of gold. Here, in my heart, they are written in golden letters, and----"

"Why do you remind me of that promise? Do you doubt me, sir?"

"Not I, indeed!" cried Mr. Catspaw, as he pressed her hand. "No! I am sure you mean to stand by what you said. It's the very reason, you know, why I am come to consult you about the draft of the document. Your ladyship will understand, that in the preamble some mention must be made of my merits and my natural modesty----"

"_C'est une vertu que vous cachez avec soin!_" said Lady Rety, sarcastically. "Well, sir, I agree to an enumeration of your transcendent merits. Leave it to me! I will take care that the document is drawn up; but I trust the affair is not pressing."

"Who knows?" replied the attorney, with a sigh. "We are all of us mortal, and----"

"I hope that _I_ do not look like a dying woman!" retorted Lady Rety, with an impatient shrug of her shoulders.

"God forbid, that I, your devoted servant, should live to mourn your loss! But, after all, who can be sure of to-morrow? and am I, whose only hope lies in your promise, to risk my all, and perhaps lose it?"

Lady Rety overcame the disgust she felt at Mr. Catspaw's impertinence. She replied that the suspicion which attached to them must necessarily increase, if such a reward were given to the attorney at this particular time.

"It is much safer to wait," added she, in a confidential tone. "You see the affair must blow over: but to satisfy your mind, I repeat my promise; and depend upon it, my dear Mr. Catspaw, you'll find me as good as my word!"

The attorney kissed her hand in a transport of joy.

"A proud man indeed I am!" said he; "for where is so distinguished a lady to be found as my gracious mistress? so careful, so clever, and so businesslike a lady! And your ladyship is right: there are few solicitors who get through their work as I do; and in the other point too you are right, indeed you are! A cession of land, at this particular time, might possibly get us into a scrape. The truth of the matter is, I thought so too. I intended to point it out to you, but your ladyship's sagacity puts me to the blush. What I wished to direct your attention to is, that there is another way to vent your generous liberality, and to keep the affair quite snug and secret. My plan is a most simple one. Your ladyship need only persuade my gracious master, the sheriff, to sign five bills of ten thousand florins each, of course with convenient terms for payment, say from six to six months. After that----"

"This is a bad joke!" said Lady Rety, staring at Mr. Catspaw in wild amazement. "Fifty thousand florins in Austrian money----"

"I was never more serious in my life. Please to consider that----"

"But it's thrice the value of the grant I promised you!"

"A fair valuation of the land would perhaps amount to a higher figure. Besides, your ladyship must see that the affair was more troublesome and dangerous than I was led to suppose; then there's the loss of my reputation, for Viola's evidence does go for something against me; and, besides, I have paid the Jew a large sum, and I know he'll be at me again, for, to tell you the truth, I believe that Jew has some idea of your ladyship's being mixed up in the affair; and considering all this, it is but fair----"

"Do you really mean to say you expect me to satisfy your impertinent demand?" said Lady Rety, boiling with rage; "do you think me and my husband so foolish as that? What! are we to get into debt for your sake?"

Her violence made no impression on the attorney, who replied with the utmost coolness:

"I'm sure, your ladyship, you are so clever, and so businesslike and generous, that----"

"No, sir, no!" screamed Lady Rety. "Don't you rely upon my generosity, or folly, if you please! Indeed, Mr. Catspaw, I'm happy to know you at last! I'm proud to understand what was at the bottom of your zeal!"

"Your ladyship does me too much honour!" said Mr. Catspaw, with his grating voice; "and it's a pity that you should endanger your precious health by the violence of your gratitude. But this generous burst of passion adds to my conviction that your ladyship will joyfully embrace my proposals."

"Your proposals, indeed!" cried the lady. "You are an impertinent scoundrel, sir! I'd like to see the man that can force _me_ to any thing! The very fulfilment of my promise depends upon my own free will. Where are your witnesses, sir? Where's your judge? No, sir! You have nothing to rely upon except my generosity, particularly since you neglected to fulfil the very first condition of our bargain. Where _are_ those papers, sir? for all _I_ know they may be at Vandory's, or somebody else's; and you, sir, how dare you ask me for money on the wretched plea of your having burnt them!"

"Nothing is so easy for me as to satisfy your ladyship on that point," retorted the attorney, with a sneer. "The papers are still in my hands. You are welcome to see them any time you like."

Lady Rety stood trembling, speechless, and stunned. At length she muttered,--

"You forget, sir! You told me you'd thrown them into the fire."

"I'm fully aware of it!" sneered Mr. Catspaw, "And not only did I tell you I'd burnt the papers, but for a moment I had that insane intention. Thank goodness! I did not carry it into execution."

"But why did you not give me the papers?" said Lady Rety, with so trembling a voice that it was clear she knew the attorney's motives.

"Why did I not give them to _you_? Can your ladyship dare to ask me such a question? But I'll tell you. I did not do it, because, having devoted my life to yourself and your family, I had no mind to be cast aside like a used-up tool. I kept the papers, because I would not trust to your generosity, and because I thought it was better to be safe than to be a fool."

"Do let us talk it quietly over. Suppose I _was_ violent just now! are we not old friends? and have you not spoiled me?" said Lady Rety, forcing a smile. "The papers are in your hands: they are your property; and nothing can be more fair than your wish to sell them. But your demand of fifty thousand florins is utterly inadmissible."

"I would not take one penny less than that," replied Mr. Catspaw, with great composure. "Papers for the possession of which a lady of your ladyship's rank and condition condescends to such deeds as we enacted together, I say, such papers must be worth their weight in gold."

"Beast!" growled Lady Rety, as she walked to and fro in the room.--"My friend," said she, turning to her antagonist, "please to consider my position. You know I have not one fourth part of the money in my possession; and the bills, to be valid, must have my husband's signature. How can I induce him to consent to so great a sacrifice?"

"I know your ladyship's power too well! Nothing can be easier for you than to induce the sheriff to sign the bills. Everybody knows how irresistible your ladyship is!"

Lady Rety made no reply to this cutting speech; but she turned, to hide the tears which bedewed her cheeks. The attorney walked to the window, and drew figures on the panes. After a long pause, the lady mustered up her resolution; and, boldly confronting the lawyer, she asked: "Do you really mean to stand by your demand?"

"I do, indeed," replied Mr. Catspaw.

"You will not let me have the papers under fifty thousand florins?"

"Certainly not."

"Very well, sir; keep them!" said Lady Rety, with a loud laugh: "keep them, sir! make the most of them! What do I care about Akosh's fortune now, since he _will_ marry the notary's daughter! and it was for his sake alone I wanted those cursed papers."

"Am I to make the most of them? Am I, indeed?" said Mr. Catspaw, somewhat startled by the sudden turn of the debate.

"Of course you are!" said Lady Rety. "I declare it's quite amusing! To think that I should have forgotten that I have no reason whatever to care for them since the young gentleman told me his mind! And as for you, my dear sir, indeed it grieves me, but your conduct of this evening will certainly induce me to re-consider my promise,--about the grant, you know."

"Nothing more natural. The papers have possibly lost their former value in your ladyship's eyes; nothing can be more natural, woman's heart is so changeable! but, in my eyes, they retain much of their original value. That value, madam," said Mr. Catspaw, seizing the lady's hand, and affectionately pressing it, "is enhanced by the _manner_ in which we became possessed of them."

"_We?_ Mr. Catspaw! What do you mean, sir?"

"What I mean is clear enough," retorted he, still squeezing her hand. "Viola has accused your ladyship of theft, and of being a partner to a robbery. No matter! Viola is a robber: no man in his senses will believe a word he says. But suppose another witness were to come into court, say, for instance, _I_ were to appear against your ladyship, say I were to give evidence fully corroborating the robber's statements; and suppose, in confirmation of my evidence, I were to produce the papers we stole, the contents of which would prove, beyond the possibility of a doubt, that you, and only you, could have an interest in their abstraction,--what then? My humble opinion is, the affair would make some stir in the county."

"Nonsense!" said Lady Rety. "I do not fear your threats; knowing, as I do, that you cannot ruin me without ruining yourself."

"Don't be too sure of that! We are not exactly in the same position. I'm not interested in the papers; but your ladyship is. I am a poor lawyer; and suppose I were to come into court, declaring that I devoted my life to the service of your house, that my zeal got the better of my duty, and that I assisted your ladyship in the theft; but that, repentant and conscience-stricken, I come to accuse myself, and to give the stolen property up to the court,--is there not a deal of pathos in such an account? Can it fail to touch the hearts of the judges?"

"Demon!" gasped Lady Rety, as she flung herself on the sofa, and covered her face with her hands.

The attorney proceeded:--

"The business will give me a good reputation, and some profit, too. Akosh would do any thing to get Tengelyi's papers. Perhaps he is open to a negotiation; and Vandory, too, (he delights in repentant sinners,) will take my part. But as for your ladyship----"

"Devil! cease to torment me!" screamed the lady, clasping her hands.

"The sheriff's lady in gaol!--it's an ugly thing. The sheriff's influence no doubt would go for something to make the punishment short and mild; they would give you, say, six months, or three months; but still,--you have been in gaol, and,--for thieving in company with a Jew. Besides, there are the cross-examinations, the evidence----"

"Catspaw!" screamed Lady Rety, with the bound of a wounded panther, "No! you cannot do that!"

"I can and I will do it, unless I have the bills on Friday next."

"You shall have them!"

"Five bills of ten thousand florins each, and signed by the sheriff."

"Yes."

"The bills to be payable from six to six months."

"I know it all. For pity's sake, leave me!" cried she, with a dying voice.

"You shall have the papers the day you give me the bills," added the attorney, seizing his hat. "Good night, my lady!" And he left the room.

The noise of his steps had scarcely ceased to sound in the hall, when the door of the hall stove opened, and Peti's curly head appeared in the gap. The gipsy was Mr. Rety's stove-heater; and, in the present instance, he had crept through the chimney to Lady Rety's apartments, where he had listened to her conversation with Mr. Catspaw. He was just about to leave the place, when he met Janosh.

"Dear me! what's the matter?" cried the hussar. "Your face is all soot and ashes, man!"

"No wonder it is!" said the gipsy, wiping his face with the sleeve of his shirt. "You know I am always at that dirty work."

"At it again, man! Make large fires in this house! Give them a taste of hell! I am going to join my master. I've packed my things, and I've done with this house, d--n it!"

"Are you, too, going?"

"With a vengeance, my boy!" replied Janosh. "I've eaten the sheriff's bread, and I never dreamt I should ever leave his house without saying 'God bless you!' But that's the way they've sent my master about his business. Good night!"

The hussar hastened away. Peti took his bunda, crept to the garden, and disappeared in the darkness of the night.

CHAP. XII.

On the following day the sheriff's house resumed its usual tranquil appearance. Mr. Rety, indeed, looked dispirited and gloomy, and Etelka was less cheerful than usual. Lady Rety, too, looked pale; but whatever her feelings were, she kept them under command; and when Mr. Catspaw made his appearance, she received him with a smile, which had lost nothing of its former graciousness. Lady Rety's temper, however violent, was never allowed to interfere with her plans: Mr. Catspaw knew this. He was too familiar with the lady's character to confide in the treacherous tranquillity of her appearance, especially since her maid had told him that her mistress had not gone to bed that night; that she walked to and fro, and showed other signs of restlessness; and that early in the morning she shut the windows of her room with such violence that she broke several panes of glass, which were symptoms--as Mr. Catspaw sagely observed--of an unsettled and disturbed mind. He watched her closely, though unsuccessfully; and none but the chamber-maid knew that Lady Rety, instead of sending the broken windows to the Jewish glazier, had ordered that man to come to her room; and that, strange to say, although the lady remained in the room while the Jew was at work, she never once raised her voice for the purposes of correction and abuse. But as Lady Rety complained of headache and fever, the chamber-maid was justified in finding a reason for this extraordinary mildness in the weak state of her health.

On the third day, however, she was so far restored, that she could accompany her husband and Etelka on a visit to Dustbury. Mr. Catspaw alone remained at home. He was anxious and restless; indeed he would gladly have accompanied the family, for he could not believe in his own safety unless he had his eye on Lady Rety. And that she should go to Dustbury of all places!

"This woman," said Mr. Catspaw, "would do any thing to injure me. I'm sure she has settled a plan of revenge in her mind; I'm quite sure of it! her seeming kindness makes it clear beyond the possibility of a doubt. What can it be? I would not mind it if she were to abuse me or swear at me; but I don't like her present manner,--indeed I don't like it," said Mr. Catspaw, emphatically, as if to convince himself of the very dangerous nature of Lady Rety's intentions. He thought of all and any thing she might, could, or would do; but there was nothing he could think of by which she could ruin him with safety to herself.

"But is it not possible for her to sacrifice her safety to her vindictiveness?" said the attorney; "and if she does, who is the victim? I? It was I who took an active part in the theft. How am I to prove her guilt? Viola knows all about it; but Viola is not likely to show his face again. The county is too hot to hold him. As for the Jew, he'll be as false to me as he is to everybody else; and when once accused, who will believe me if I accuse the sheriff's wife? I must needs make friends," exclaimed the amiable attorney; "everybody hates me; and the cleverest man cannot stand the attacks of numbers. But what am I to do?"

After a careful examination of his position, it appeared to him that there were two ways of providing for unforeseen contingencies. The first was to ingratiate himself with Lady Rety by preventing young Rety's marriage; the second, to creep into that young man's favour. The thing was difficult, but it could be done. After receiving the bills, he could easily retain a few of Vandory's papers. Lady Rety had never seen them: she could not, therefore, suspect any thing. At a later period he (the attorney) thought of presenting those letters and Tengelyi's papers to Akosh, telling him how they were obtained, and what share Lady Rety had in the transaction. Akosh was sure to keep the secret; and, as for Lady Rety, it was not likely that she would accuse Mr. Catspaw, if she knew that her own son was prepared to give evidence against her.

His resolution once taken, he commenced with his usual energy to carry it out; and being informed that the notary was out walking with Vandory and Akosh, and that Mrs. Tengelyi and Vilma were alone, he hastened to the notary's house, studying his part as he walked along, and comforting himself with the reflection, that, however ill they might receive him, they were but women he would have to contend with, he knocked softly at the door.

Mrs. Ershebet and Vilma were at work in the notary's room. They were not a little startled by the attorney's appearance; and Mrs. Ershebet's tone was none of the kindest, when she asked him why and what he came for? but he managed to reply, with the utmost coolness, that he wished to pay his respects to Mr. Tengelyi and his family; and, suiting the action to the word, he took a chair, and waited to be spoken to.

His quiet assurance confounded Mrs. Ershebet. Mr. Catspaw knew it would, and, knowing this, he had prudently timed his visit so as not to meet Mr. Tengelyi. He suspected that the notary would not give him time to say all the kind words which were to make his peace with the family. The attorney's misgivings on that head showed his astounding sagacity; for, indeed, nothing was more likely than that the notary, regardless of his exordiums, would rush into _medias res_ by kicking him out of doors.

Mrs. Ershebet spoke reluctantly, but she spoke. Their conversation was of the weather, the crops, and other things; and when Vilma left the room, the attorney turned to Mrs. Tengelyi, and drawing his chair to her table, said:--

"I am happy the dear girl is gone! I want to speak to you about a subject which concerns your family, and especially your angel Vilma. I know I can open my heart to you, for you are as clever as you are kind."

This flattering speech, and the tone of confidential adulation in which it was spoken, told less strongly upon Mrs. Tengelyi than Mr. Catspaw expected it would. But she concealed her disgust; and hoping to learn something about her husband's papers, she intreated the attorney to speak.

"My dear Mrs. Ershebet," continued that learned man, with a grotesque whine, "permit me again to address you with the words which at one time were so dear to my heart, and whose sound still fills my soul with the reminiscences of youth!"

"Sir!" said Mrs. Tengelyi, angrily, "the less you remind me of the past the better; and, moreover, you know, that at that time too----"

"Do you think I can have forgotten," sighed Mr. Catspaw, "that when, many years ago, I offered you my heart and my hand, you rejected me with contempt, and that you preferred Tengelyi and poverty to Catspaw and tranquil happiness? But, oh! what agonies might have been spared to us if my respected Ershebet had been less blindly devoted to Tengelyi's shining talents, which after all cannot keep the pot boiling."

"If you _have_ something to say, say it, sir! or if you must needs mention my husband, do it with proper respect, and consider to whom you are speaking!"

"God forbid!" said the attorney, humbly, "that I should say or think any offence to Mr. Tengelyi! No! I respect him above all men; and though he wounded my heart, for it is he who robbed me of my hopes of happiness, of my hopes of possessing you--and----"

"Enough!" replied Mrs. Ershebet, with a look of contempt. "I think we know each other. You have given us so many proofs of your love and respect, that we can dispense with your protestations."

The attorney sighed.

"Ah!" said he, "I grieve to find you a victim to the very delusion which enthrals Mr. Tengelyi's mind. You too believe that I am the cause, or at least the promoter, of the lamentable Dustbury quarrel. Very well! I submit. The future will show how greatly you wrong me!"

"Heaven grant that it be so!" sighed Mrs. Tengelyi; "and whatever cause we may have to complain of you, you can rely on my sincere gratitude, if you exert yourself in behalf of my children."

"No thanks! my dearest Mrs. Ershebet, no thanks!" said the attorney, with increasing warmth. "My heart's best wish is to show you that I am still faithful to the love of my youth. If I can prove this, I am amply rewarded; and I believe there is now an opportunity to convince you of my constancy."

Mrs. Tengelyi was astonished, and more than half frightened; but she replied that she had no doubt that Mr. Catspaw's position and influence could be beneficially exerted in behalf of her family.

"Do not suppose that my influence is so great as people say it is. They say that my word is law in Mr. Rety's house. The sheriff and his wife's doings are put down as mine. They have the benefit of the obloquy which falls on me, but I have the vexation and the enmities which ought to be their share. God knows, things would be far different if I had my will. But--never mind! I _have_ some influence in Rety's house, and perhaps I can exert it to your advantage. Mr. Tengelyi, I understand, has been summoned to show cause why he should not be considered as being in a state of _villanage_?"

The coolness with which this question was asked by the very man whom she considered as the prime mover of her husband's troubles, surprised Mrs. Tengelyi to such an extent that she was unable to make any reply.

"And I learn," continued the attorney, "that the papers, by means of which he expected to prove his noble descent have been feloniously abstracted from these premises?"

"If anybody ought to know, it is you!" cried Mrs. Tengelyi, with utter disgust.

"I understand you," said Mr. Catspaw, with a placid smile; "and I am free to confess that I feel hurt that I, of all men, should be suspected of such a thing. Even if such an action were not repugnant to my feelings, I cannot understand what hopes of profit or advantage it could possibly hold out to me. I have no claims on Mr. Tengelyi. His rights or wrongs have no influence on my fortunes or interests. To suppose that I should be guilty of the gratuitous perpetration of such a crime is simply absurd."

"I cannot dispute with you; but, from what my husband says, and from what we have heard of Viola's depositions, it appears----"

"But, dearest Mrs. Ershebet, if this were the case, can you think that I would have dared to come to your house? Why it were the greatest piece of impertinence,--and of folly" (added he, seeing that the former supposition seemed by no means unlikely to Mrs. Tengelyi,) "and, indeed, of madness, if, after so much danger and risk for the purpose of wronging Mr. Tengelyi, I would now exert myself for his advantage."

"As yet we have no proofs of your wish to do any such thing," dryly remarked Mrs. Tengelyi.

"Heaven knows," said Mr. Catspaw, with a pious look to the ceiling,--"Heaven knows, madam, how unjustly you treat me! If you could but know what I did to prevent the person--but no matter! I intend to give you proofs of my friendship, and to gain the esteem even of Mr. Tengelyi, your respected husband."

"God grant it! As far as in us lies, you may rely on our gratitude."

"No gratitude! Do not mention it! What I want is your friendship. The papers," added the attorney, looking cautiously round, and drawing his chair to Mrs. Tengelyi's side, "I say, are the papers such that they give full and satisfactory proofs of your husband's noble descent?"

"Of course they do. What of that?"

"Indeed, indeed!" said Mr. Catspaw, abstractedly. "Important matter! Valuable papers! What baptism is in the kingdom of Heaven, that is noble descent in the kingdom of Hungary. I understand your grief now, and especially when I think what is to become of your little boy!----"

"For God's sake, cease to torment me! If you know what has become of them----"

"But tell me," said Mr. Catspaw, "have you lost _all_ your papers? Are none of the documents left?"

"None!" sighed Mrs. Tengelyi. "They were tied in a parcel, and they are all gone. But if you know where they are, I pray, I entreat you to tell me. If I have ever offended you, pray consider that my children, at least, are innocent of any grudges you may think you owe me!"

Mr. Catspaw had some difficulty to conceal the joy he felt at the effect of his words.

"Alas!" said he, with a sigh, "if it were my own case--believe me, dearest Mrs. Ershebet, if I only knew where the papers are, I'd walk a thousand miles to restore them to you!"

"Do you mean to say that you do _not_ know where they are?" cried Mrs. Tengelyi, with amazement.

"How should I? Do but consider the matter. What Viola says is a mere invention. Let me ask you again: what are those documents to _me_, that I should commit a felony for them?"

"But in what way do you propose to assist my children, if you cannot help us to prove our nobility?"

"But who tells you that I do not mean to assist you in recovering your nobility?" retorted the attorney, with a smile. "As for papers and documents, never mind them! We can do without them."

Mrs. Tengelyi stared at him, but he went on:--

"My dearest Mrs. Ershebet, we live in Hungary, you know, though I am afraid you are wofully ignorant of the doings and dealings of Hungarian life. Who ever heard of nobility being obtained and proved by documents only? Fancy, if every man enjoying the privileges of a nobleman were to be asked for his parchments! I assure you such a proceeding would make greater havoc amongst us than the battle of Mohatsh.[27] Don't you see, my dear madam, that there is a better and simpler way to prove noble descent, viz., by _usus_. Of late they have called it prescription, but that word does not embrace the idea in all its bearings; for prescription is, after all, a kind of law, and where there's law there's no occasion for _usus_; nay, it is a peculiarity of the _usus_ that it presupposes something which is not, and has not been, and never can be founded on law. For instance, you have a large field, and I am your neighbour. I encroach on your field, and plough a small piece away every season. At length you bring an action against me. Very well. I prove that I was in the '_usus_:' that I have always ploughed and reaped to a certain point--say a stone, or tree, or any thing you like. Very well. You say it's a bad habit of mine, and that the field belongs to you. But it's all of no use: I've the _usus_ on my side, and if you go on with your action you're a fool, that's all. Or say, you and I are joint proprietors of a farm. I keep sheep, and you don't. At last you take it into your head to keep sheep. But I say, 'No, you shall not!' And why? Because I've the _usus_ for me!"

[Footnote 27: See Note X.]

"But of what use is all this in our case?"

"This is the use. As you can get any thing by _usus_, so you can get the privileges of nobility by it also."

"I cannot understand this," said Mrs. Tengelyi.

"And yet it is as clear as daylight. I say A. or B. has not a rag of paper to prove his nobility with; nay, more: he himself is aware that his family are not noble; but he has friends in the county, who have kept the tax-gatherer from his door. Now suppose somebody questions his noble descent; what a horrid thing would it be for the poor man if he were compelled to prove how, and why, and when his ancestors were ennobled! No, he simply shows that he never paid any taxes, and he is at once established as a nobleman; especially if he can prove that he has attended an election, where he thrashed somebody, or where somebody thrashed him; for, if there's a thrashing in the case, I'd like to see the man who would dare to doubt the _usus_. I remember the case of a party against whom they brought an action of that kind, and who proved that his grandfather was repeatedly sent to gaol for horse-stealing, without having ever been subjected to corporal punishment. Very well. The _usus_ was proved, that's all. Believe me, you are sadly mistaken if you fancy that you want documents to prove your noble descent. There are many counties in which hundreds of _villains_ are admitted to the franchise by the parties in office, merely for the purpose of carrying a contested election. All you want for the purpose is a friend and----"

"Alas! we have no friends!" sighed Mrs. Tengelyi.

"No, but you have, my dear madam!" cried Mr. Catspaw, nodding his head with great energy; "I say, madam, you have friends who would do any thing to be of service to you! who would hire a score of witnesses to swear that Mr. Tengelyi is descended _rectâ viâ_ from a count's family. Even Mr. Rety----"

"I am sure _he_ will oppose us to the last."

"You are mistaken. When he once sees what interest I take in you, he too will be eager to stop the recorder's process against your husband. I assure you, Mr. Rety is a dear good gentlemanly man; and if we could but remove the cause of this disagreeable quarrel, dear me! I don't see why they shouldn't be as they were at the German university.--I speak of your husband and Mr. Rety, madam."

"What do you mean?"

"The cause of the quarrel, you know, is young Rety's love to that dear girl, Vilma. If means could be found to arrange that business, I am sure we'd go on smoothly and comfortably."

"I am afraid you are not aware, sir," said Mrs. Tengelyi, to whom these words gave a clue to the attorney's intentions, "that it is no use trying to remove that cause of the quarrel. Akosh has made a formal offer; Vilma loves him, and he has our consent. If the sacrifice of my daughter's happiness is the only thing you have to propose----"

"But who thinks of sacrificing the poor girl's happiness?" said Mr. Catspaw, reproachfully. "What man can desire the dear angel's happiness more than I do? But I say, are her affections irrevocably fixed on the sheriff's son?"

Mrs. Tengelyi would have spoken, but the attorney interrupted her.

"A great name and a large fortune are capital things! indeed they are; and I, of all men, ought to know it. It's a fine thing to have your daughter living in a large house, and driving about in a carriage-and-four; but is this happiness? Why, you yourself are the best proof that it is not. You might have married a wealthy man, who would have led you a comfortable life; but you preferred Tengelyi----"

"If you think," cried Mrs. Ershebet, angrily, "that we accepted the offer only because Akosh is rich, you are very much mistaken, I assure you! On the contrary, we wish he were of our own condition in life."

"Just so; exactly, my dear Mrs. Ershebet! If I had a daughter of my own, I'd never give her to my betters. It is true such gentlemen are enabled to introduce their ladies to all the enjoyments of life, enjoyments, too, which are quite out of the question in the humble paths of an easy, comfortable competence, of honourable poverty, if you like the term. They can surround them with splendour, luxury, and Heaven knows what. But as for real love, dearest Mrs. Ershebet, real love, as you and I understand it, flies from the glittering snares of a monied alliance!"

"Akosh is an exception. He adores Vilma."

"Of course he does! nothing more natural. Whom does he not adore! His heart is so full of sentiment. But you see, dearest Mrs. Ershebet, it's a strange thing, a peculiar thing, indeed, my dear madam, this very adoration is--what is it, after all? You kneel down, raise your hands, are transported, enraptured, and all that sort of thing; and when you've done with your prayer, you get up, and go your way. That's adoration, madam."

"No, sir!" said Mrs. Tengelyi, firing up; "I know Akosh! I respect him! I would never have promised him my daughter's hand, if I had doubted his honour."

"Madam, I respect you for respecting Akosh; on my word, I do. He's the best, the most honourable of gentlemen, though I say it, who ought not to say it, because I'm his friend. If he were my own son, I couldn't like him better than I do. Who would quarrel with him for being excitable, and less constant in love than we old people would like to see young gentlemen? You see, dearest Mrs. Ershebet, it is not just, it is not fair, to ask that kind of thing of a young gentleman of Mr. Rety's station."

"But I do ask it!" protested Mrs. Tengelyi. "I give him my daughter; and I have a right to ask----"

"Not an impossibility, I trust!" said Mr. Catspaw, with a smile. "If Akosh were of our own standing in society, your wish to monopolise him would be natural; but in the higher spheres of life such a desire is perfectly ridiculous. What would the world say, if a gentleman of his rank were to confine his attentions to his lady!"

"I trust you do not insinuate any thing disreputable against Akosh----"

"Disreputable? No; indeed not! He has some mistresses; but----"

"Mistresses!" screamed Mrs. Tengelyi.

"Well! and what of that?"

"What, indeed!" cried Mrs. Tengelyi, utterly forgetful of who it was, to whom she spoke. "If he were capable of having but one mistress, now that he has told my daughter, at least a hundred times, that he loves her alone, why it were infamous, despicable,----"

"But I assure you it is wrong to attach any importance to that kind of thing!"

"But I do! Rather than permit such doings----"

"My dear, good Mrs. Ershebet," whispered the attorney, drawing still closer to her; "I know your views of life; and, as your friend and sincere well-wisher, I feel bound to express my opinion that Akosh will never be what you expect him to be. He is a young gentleman of great talents, of energy, hot temper, business habits; he is all that, and more; but he is neither faithful nor constant in love. If you desire a constant son-in-law," he added, seizing her hand, "I can tell you of one."

Mrs. Tengelyi looked at him in hopeless bewilderment.

"Yes, dearest Mrs. Ershebet!" continued Mr. Catspaw, with increasing pathos; "I know a man of tried constancy, of unbounded devotion! a man, indeed, who cannot vie with Akosh in splendour, but in whose arms Vilma is sure to find that tranquil happiness whose value she knows so well how to appreciate. I, madam,--I am ready to take young Rety's place!"

"You, Mr. Catspaw!" cried Mrs. Ershebet, holding up her hands.

"Why not?" said the good man, brimful of kindness. "I am not quite the boy I was when I proposed for you; but I'm not an old man, eh? I am a man in the prime of life, a man of substance, dear Ershebet. What I offer is more than a competence. I've a hundred and fifty thousand florins, if I have a penny. If Vilma marries me, there will be no more questioning about Tengelyi's nobility; indeed, the Retys would be happy to make me a handsome cession of land. And as for that little affair with Akosh, you know I am by far too sensible and indulgent----"

While he was engaged in enumerating the advantages of an alliance between him and Vilma, the attorney had neglected to watch Mrs. Tengelyi's features, and to mark the unmistakeable expression of scorn and disgust which they bore. He was not, therefore, at all prepared for the scene which ensued, when the insulted mother rose and told him to leave the house instantly. He would have spoken, explained, excused himself, and what not! but Mrs. Tengelyi would not allow him to speak, and, to make bad worse, the door opened at this very critical moment, and Tengelyi entered the room.

"What do you want here?" said the notary, with an awful frown.

Mrs. Ershebet cut off the attorney's reply by a circumstantial account of Mr. Catspaw's proposal, in the course of which she commented on that worthy gentleman's behaviour in severe and, indeed, pungent terms.

"Be off! and never again dare to show your impudent face in my house!" said the notary, in reply to Mr. Catspaw's offer; but that gentleman, who, on seeing the notary, had expected no less than that the latter would assault him on the spot, was misled by this seeming moderation. He thought it a duty he owed to himself to make the best of so favourable an opportunity, and launching forth into protestations of his unlimited friendship for the Tengelyi family, he was just in the act of venting his admiration and love of the notary, when the latter addressed him very unceremoniously,--

"Get out, sir! If you don't, I'll kick you!"

"But, sir, please to give me a moment's hearing! Indeed, sir, this is not the way you ought to treat my offer! If Vilma----"

"Don't presume to mention her, you miscreant!" cried Mr. Tengelyi. "_You_ my daughter's husband? You!--a robber, a thief?"

The noise of the altercation brought Vilma and the Liptaka into the room, and the passers-by in the street stopped at the window and listened. Mr. Catspaw was of opinion that the presence of so many witnesses would prevent the notary from proceeding to acts of bodily violence; and, moreover, he was aware that his dignity would not allow him to submit to Tengelyi's insulting language. To talk big was not only safe, but prudent.

"This is too bad!" screamed he. "I'll make you repent it, sir!"

"Repent it?" shouted Tengelyi.

"Yes, repent it, if you please, my dear notary! Perhaps you are not aware that you are not a nobleman?"

"Reptile! dost thou dare to remind me of thy villany?" cried the notary, raising his stick, in spite of the endeavours of his wife and daughter, who sought to restrain him.

"Though I condescend to propose for your daughter, you ought not to forget the difference between your rank and mine!"

"It's the difference between an honest man and a rascal!" cried Tengelyi, still struggling to disengage his arm from the grasp of Mrs. Ershebet.

Mr. Catspaw saw clearly that the delay of another minute would prove dangerous. He retreated, and reached the door just when Tengelyi, whose fury brooked no restraint, broke from those who held him, and rushed in pursuit of him.

"God knows but I'll be the death of that fellow!" said the notary, as he returned to his house, accompanied by Vandory and Akosh, who luckily met him as he was running after the attorney. Exhausted with his passion, he flung himself on a chair; and though his wife, Vandory, and Akosh assured him that Mr. Catspaw was beneath an honest man's notice, a considerable time elapsed before he regained his usual equanimity. The witnesses of the scene, too, were greatly excited and interested; and a report was spread, by some, that Mr. Catspaw had been beaten and kicked, and by others, that Tengelyi would have killed the attorney, but for the flight of the latter.

While these and sundry other rumours on the subject of his danger were spreading in Tissaret, the worthy Mr. Catspaw reached his apartments in safety, though by no means in an enviable mood.

"What a confounded fool I've made of myself!" said he. "Propose for the girl, indeed! curse me, I'm a victim to that silly attachment of mine for the Retys. Would they have given me a penny more for marrying her? No. They cannot help giving me fifty thousand florins, but they won't give me a farthing more. And even if I were to prevent young Rety's marriage, his ungrateful mother would never forgive me. She'll never get over those money matters. Curse her! She'd skin a flint! But who the deuce could have thought that the woman wouldn't let me speak, and that Tengelyi would come home? And he insulted me!--publicly!--before everybody did he insult me, and I cannot even retaliate upon him! I dare not offend that puppy Akosh; for, after all, I don't see what I can do, except giving him Tengelyi's documents, and a few of Vandory's letters. It's a good plan, and it will protect me against being prosecuted. But before doing this I must have the bills in my pocket."

But even this resolution did not quite conquer Mr. Catspaw's apprehensions; for did not Akosh hate him? and might not the young man institute proceedings against him? No! he would bind Akosh by his word of honour,--these young men are so full of prejudice! "And besides, he cannot inform against me, without dishonouring his own name. His mother-in-law is too much mixed up with the affair," muttered the attorney, as he lighted a candle and sat down to examine Vandory's papers.

It was almost eleven o'clock when he finished his labours. He took a few of the letters, put them in an envelope, and placed them in a secret corner of his desk. His examination of the letters had satisfied him that the Retys could not think of braving the publicity of a court of justice. This discovery put him into the best of tempers.

"Capital!" said he, rubbing his hands; "in a few days I shall have fifty thousand florins, and by communicating the affair to Akosh, I can foil any plans of revenge which this woman may have against me. I'm worth two hundred thousand florins! At last I know what I've lived for!" And he prepared to lock the door. He turned the key and tried the door, but it remained open. He tried it again, but without success. Mr. Catspaw shook his head. Something must be the matter with the lock. He thought of bolting the door; but the bolt would not move.

"What the deuce can be the matter?" said he, after another unsuccessful attempt.

He recollected that since Akosh, Etelka, and the Retys were gone, he was quite alone in that part of the house; and so much had his mind of late been occupied with robbers and robberies, that he became uneasy at the thought of passing the night alone and with open doors; and while he thought of it, it struck him that something moved in the stove. He approached it and listened.

"I am a fool!" said he at last; "if I can't lock the door, it's because the lock's used up; and as for the bolt, why I've never moved it. It ought to be rusty by this time!" He went to bed, still thinking of the most profitable plan of investing his money, when a slight noise interrupted his train of agreeable thoughts. Steps were heard on the stairs. They were soft and cautious, like the steps of one who wishes to escape detection. Mr. Catspaw heard them distinctly. They approached from the stairs, and crept along the corridor to his room. He was just about to leave his bed when the door was softly opened, and a man, wrapped up in a bunda, entered the room.

"_Viola!_" said Mr. Catspaw, with a trembling voice, for the shout which he wished to raise died in his throat. His hair stood on end; his jaws shook.

"It's well you know me!" said the outlaw, as he advanced to the attorney's bed. "If you call for help, you are a dead man! Besides, it's no use calling; nobody will hear you."

"I won't call! I won't make a noise!" said Mr. Catspaw, while an ashy paleness spread over his features. "I know you are the last man to hurt me, good Mr. Viola! Do you come for money? I am a poor man, but you are welcome to all I have. No thanks! I am happy to oblige you!"

"_I_ am the last man to hurt you!" said the robber, giving the attorney a look which made his blood creep. "Am I indeed? Don't you think bygones are bygones with me! Not your agony, not all the blood in your veins, can pay me for what you've done to me and mine!"

"You are mistaken, my dear sir; indeed you are----;" the attorney cast a despairing look around him; "I am not----"

"Who?" said Viola, sternly. "Who was it made me a robber? Who was it that drove me forth, like a beast of the forest, while my wife and children were cast as beggars on the world? Say it was not you! Say it was not you who wrote my doom! Say it was not you who would have drunk my blood! Say it is not you who are my curse and my enemy!----"

"I'll give you my all,--I'll give you all I have! I've a couple of hundreds of Mr. Rety's money too, and you are welcome to them, though I shall have to refund them, and----"

"I don't want your money!" said Viola, scornfully. "I want the papers you stole from the notary."

"The papers?" said the attorney, with a look of profound astonishment; "what papers does it please you to mean, my dear Mr. Viola?"

"I mean the papers which you took away when they bound me. If you don't give them up this minute, you'll never rise from this bed."

The robber's tone showed Mr. Catspaw that it was dangerous to trifle with him. He replied,--

"Yes, I had them! You are right, I took them from you; but I lament to say I was rash enough to burn them on the spot. That's the truth of it. I would not tell you a lie, no! not for the world; for you know all and everything."

"If so, tell your lies to others. I know that you keep the papers in this room, and that you've offered them to Lady Rety for fifty thousand florins."

"Who can have told you that?" cried Mr. Catspaw, as a suspicion flashed through his mind that Viola might possibly be hired by Lady Rety; "who? who?"

"Never you mind who it was?" said Viola, dryly; "if you think your life of less value than fifty thousand florins, I'll show you in an instant how little _I_ care for it."

"But do tell me!" cried the attorney, "do tell me who told you that the papers are in my room?--who has sent you?"

"Silence!" and the robber flung his bunda back; "get up! give me the papers, unless----"

Mr. Catspaw rose and walked to his desk. Viola stood quietly by, watching him.

The attorney's hands trembled as he produced the papers. They were in two bundles, and among them were some letters of Tengelyi's, which the Jew had abstracted with the rest.

"Here they are!" said Mr. Catspaw, with a hoarse voice; "you know their value. Ask whatever you please----"

"I don't want your money, keep it!" said the robber, advancing to seize the packet; when the attorney recollected that he kept a loaded pistol in the desk.

Yielding to an impulse of mad despair, he seized it and presented it at Viola.

The robber's eyes shot fire as he saw the weapon. He made a rush; the attorney fell, and the pistol was in Viola's hands.

That movement sealed Mr. Catspaw's doom. Viola was not cruel. He had an instinctive aversion to the shedding of blood. If Mr. Catspaw had given up the papers without resistance, he would have been safe; but the treachery of the action and the struggle inflamed the robber's wilder passions.

"Pity!" screamed Mr. Catspaw, as Viola seized him by the throat.

"Did you pity _me_ when Susi begged for grace, when you wrote my death-warrant?"

The attorney's face grew black, his eyes started from his head; but his despair gave him strength. When he saw the robber's knife descending, he caught it in his hands.

There was a noise in the house. Steps were heard. The attorney's cries had roused the servants.

Viola made a violent movement. Again, and again, and again was the broad steel buried in the breast of his victim. Then, seizing the papers with his bloody hands, he rushed from the room and reached the yard, where he was met by the coachman and another servant. They pursued him.

He crossed the meadow, and disappeared in the thicket which covers the banks of the Theiss.

When the domestics entered the attorney's room they found him dying. There were no traces of a robbery. The wretched man's watch and purse lay on the bed.

"Robbers! Murderers!" cried the cook, who was the first to enter. "Follow him!"

"Send for the doctor!"

"No, send for the curate!"

All was noise and confusion. Two of the men raised the attorney and laid him on the bed.

"Follow him!" gasped Mr. Catspaw, "Follow! My papers!"

"What papers?" said the cook.

"Tengelyi----" groaned the dying man.

His lips moved, but his voice was lost in a hoarse rattle.

"I've caught him!" cried a haiduk from the corridor, as he dragged Jantshi, the Jewish glazier, into the room.

"That's the rascal!" said the haiduk. "That's him. He was hid in the chimney!"

"Oh, the villain!" cried the cook, pushing the reluctant Jew to Mr. Catspaw's bed. "I say, your worship, that's the man!"

The attorney shook his head. His lips moved, but no sound was heard.

"But, sir, I'm sure it's he!" said the cook. "Give us a nod, sir!"

Again Mr. Catspaw shook his head. He seized the cook by the hand; he would have spoken, but it was in vain. With a convulsive motion of his body he stared round, and, falling back, breathed his last.

"I'd like to know what he meant?" said the cook, when they had bound the prisoner and locked him up in the cellar; "when I showed him the Jew, he shook his head."

"His last word," cried Mrs. Kata Cizmeasz, the female cook of the servant's hall, wiping her eyes, less from sorrow for Mr. Catspaw's death, than because she thought it was proper that women should weep on such occasions; "his last word was _Tengelyi_."

"Hold your silly tongue!" said the cook, with dignity; "it's blasphemous to say such a thing of Mr. Tengelyi!"

"Really," reiterated Mrs. Kata Cizmeasz, "it struck me that he said 'Tengelyi;' and when he could not speak, poor dear, he moved his lips, for all the world, as if to say 'Tengelyi' over again. When my poor husband, God rest his soul! was dying of the dropsy, he didn't speak by the day; but I looked at his mouth, and understood what he meant to say. 'Go away! Come here! Give me some water!' Any thing he'd like. I knew it all!" And she wiped her eyes.

"Bless that woman!" said the cook, appealing to the crowd of servants, "She'll be after accusing the notary of the murder. Did I ever!"

"Bless yourself!" retorted Mrs. Kata; "all I say is, that the attorney said 'Tengelyi' when we asked him who had done it? He said it with a clear voice. I heard it quite distinctly, and I'll take my oath on it!"

"Never mind! Who knows what he meant?"

"I am sure _I_ don't; all I say is, that the attorney----"

"Very well; leave it to the judge. Depend upon it, he'll come to know the truth of it, and you'll see that I'm in the right in saying as I do, that the Jew is the murderer," said the cook, angrily; and, turning to the two servants, he added, "Lock the door, and send for the judge! Hands off! is the word in a place where a robbery or a murder has been committed."

CHAP. XIII.

After Mr. Catspaw had left the notary's house on that fatal night, Tengelyi's family, including Akosh and Vandory, settled peacefully down in Mrs. Ershebet's room, while the notary himself was engaged in writing letters. He was determined to recover his rights; and, thinking that some of his father's old friends might possibly assist him in establishing his title, he was about to appeal to them to support him in his present extremity.

While thus employed, his attention was roused by a slight knock at the window. He got up, opened it, and looked out; but as nothing was visible in the darkness, he was just about to return to his work, when a letter was flung into the room. The notary was astonished; but his astonishment increased when, after unfolding the crumpled-up and soiled despatch, he read the following lines:--

"I am a man who owes you a large debt of gratitude. I am accused of having stolen papers from your house, but this is a base and false accusation. The Jew, whom the sheriff's attorney bribed, was the thief. I took them from the Jew; however, the story is too long to tell. Meet me at the lime-tree, just by the ferry, at eleven o'clock; but not earlier. If it cost my life, I will put the papers in your hands before midnight!

"I entreat you, in the name of God, to come, and fear no harm! You have taken my wife and children under your roof, and I would give my life to serve you or any of your family. If you do not come, I know not what to do with the papers: I dare not enter the village; I must cross the Theiss this very night. Let me implore you to keep the meeting secret, and come alone. The county has set a price on my head; and if they get the least hint of my whereabouts, I am a dead man. I am in your hands.

"VIOLA."

The perusal of these lines was no easy task to the notary. "What shall I do?" said he. "If I do not follow the robber's advice, the papers will most probably be irrecoverably lost. If Viola leaves the county, he will take good care not to come back again; and he will destroy them if it be only in order that they should not be proofs against him. On the other hand, if it should be found out that I, a member of the law, and an honest man, had clandestine meetings with a robber, without delivering him up to justice, what a dreadful light it would place me in!" Spiteful things had already been said by his enemies, because he had taken Viola's wife and children into his house. Another man would most likely have thought it his duty and interest to go to the appointed place, though not alone, to arrest Viola, and thus at once to obtain his papers: but this proceeding would not accord with Tengelyi's disposition; he was incapable of such an act, whatever might have been its advantages.

Yet there were but those two alternatives. What to do he knew not. He paced the room, agitated by mingled feelings of duty and patriotism.

First he would yield to the robber's request; then, again, he would not. Thus he continued resolving and wavering, till Mrs. Ershebet called him to supper.

The notary's absence and confusion during supper astonished and perplexed his family.

He burnt the letter after deciphering its contents, lest it should fall into other hands.

After supper was over, Vandory and Akosh took their leave. Mr. Tengelyi wished his wife and daughter good night; and, under the pretence of business, he hastened to his study. When alone, he gave himself up to a full contemplation of his situation. He resolved to see the robber. "Inform against Viola? No, no; such a mean unmanly act I would not be guilty of! And how could I be so unjust to my wife and children as not to embrace this opportunity of establishing my rights? If he has my papers, so much the better! if not, then at least I shall have the satisfaction of knowing that I have neglected nothing to regain my property. It is not likely that this meeting should ever be known. What have I to fear if my conscience is unsullied?"

The clock was on the stroke of eleven, when the notary crept from his house into the garden. When he gained the open field adjoining the house, he struck off to the left, and in a few minutes he reached the path leading to the Theiss. It was a thorough November night. Not a star or even a drifting cloud could be seen; and so dark was it, that it required all the notary's care and knowledge of the way to carry him on without accident. The village was hushed in sleep, and he reached the spot without meeting any one.

In summer this place was one of the prettiest anywhere about. The lime-tree was of gigantic growth, and its wide-spreading branches afforded a delicious shade. The grass around it was of the freshest and purest green, and when other grass-plots were scorched up by the July sun, this place seemed to be fresher and greener than ever. Three sides of the meadow were hedged in and surrounded with bushes; on the unfenced side stood a few old trunks of trees, dropping their bare branches into the yellow Theiss, that washed their withered roots.

Mr. Tengelyi had spent many an hour under that tree with his friend, who, on such occasions, would exclaim that no spot was so charming as the banks of the Theiss; and that if the Turk's Hill were not there, the lime-tree alone would make Tissaret a beautiful place to live in.

Now this spot looks mournful and forsaken. The beautiful green plot is covered with sere and yellow leaves, and the night winds howl through the unclad branches of the noble linden; while the swelling waves of the Theiss lash its sombre banks.

The notary, wrapped in his bunda, walked dejectedly up and down; at times he stood still and listened. On a sudden he heard a rustling in the bush, but seeing no one near, he thought it a delusion, and continued walking, but now and then turning to look at the ferryman's hut, which was about two hundred yards distant, and in the kitchen of which a large fire sent its glaring and flickering shadows dancing on the black landscape.

It was half-past eleven, and yet Viola came not. Could he have changed his mind, or had any thing happened to prevent him? Perhaps he was scared by the hue and cry which had been raised after him.

Suddenly a cry of murder rang through the air. It came nearer.

"Good God!" cried the notary; "can it be that Viola is taken?" And to escape being seen in this questionable place, and at such a time, too, he hastened back to the village.

A few minutes after the notary's departure, Viola broke through the hedge. A parcel of papers was in his hand. One moment he stood still--one moment he cast an anxious and half-desponding look around him. But the man whom he sought was not there. The avenger of blood was at his heels. He leapt down the bank, stepped into a boat which lay hid among the willows; and the lusty strokes of his oars were drowned in the shouts of his pursuers.

"Here he is! That's the place he went in! At him, boys!" cried they, as they rushed into the open space. But here they were at fault. They had lost the track of him they were pursuing. Their clamours roused the old ferryman in his hut. Ferko, the coachman, who led the crowd of servants and peasants from the house, approached, and the ferryman, coming up, asked what was the matter, and whether some one had stolen a horse.

"No, no!" cried the coachman. "Our attorney has been killed, and we have pursued the murderer to this spot. We saw him a minute ago. He's hid in the bush, here; help us to find him. He must be here!"

"The Lord have mercy on us! What, the attorney killed! Well, after all there's not much harm done. But you are far out if you think to find him here. He is in the village by this time! A few minutes before we heard the row here, a man walked very fast by our house to the village. You heard the footsteps, Andresh, didn't you?"

"That's him! that's him! Quick! Go after him!" shouted the coachman; and, without waiting to hear the young man's reply, he darted off precisely in the same direction which the notary had taken on his way home.

"He is not here! He has made for the village, it's plain enough!" said the ferryman, as he with difficulty hobbled after the party.

As the hounds follow the scent, so the coachman and his companions followed the foot-marks. "What's this?" exclaimed Ferko, stooping to pick up a stick which lay on the ground. "It's a stick; a gentleman's walking-stick, too. It's a tshakany[28]; no doubt the robber has stolen it somewhere!"

[Footnote 28: See Note XI.]

They traced the foot-marks up to the hedge of the notary's garden. The coachman walked round it.

"The devil take it!" cried he; "the foot-marks end here."

The others snatched the lantern from his hand, and eagerly looked for a continuation of the foot-marks.

It was no use; the track which had continued up to that point was lost. They were again at fault.

"Surely the earth can't have swallowed him!" said the ferryman.

"Perhaps he's hid on the other side of the hedge," said the coachman: "stay here; I'll jump over and see."

"No, no! don't do that!" cried the ferryman, pulling Ferko back; "that's the way to get a knock on the head. What does it matter to us if the attorney is killed? For my part, I wished him to the devil last summer; he won't come down upon me now for a hundred and fifty florins a year!"

But the coachman, though not stimulated to follow Viola from any love to Catspaw, paid no attention to this advice, and bounded over the fence.

He returned soon afterwards, declaring that all trace of the robber was lost; and they were just about to return home, when the ferryman's son came running to inform them that he had discovered some fresh foot-marks on the garden path. They all ran to the garden gate, which was open, and found the continuation of the foot-marks which they had so suddenly and mysteriously lost. They were distinctly traced up to the very door of the house.

"He is in the notary's house, or perhaps he is in the shed," said Ferko, in the tone of a man who, when he has came to a certain point, will hazard all. "Let us enter."

"What!" said the ferryman, seizing him by the coat; "you don't think of looking in Mr. Tengelyi's house for a murderer, do you?"

"And why not?" retorted Ferko.

"Don't you know it would not be the first time robbers have been in this house? It's here young Mr. Akosh was shot at!"

"But you forget," answered the ferryman, "that this house is a nobleman's!"

"What do we care for that? We are in search of Viola. Moreover, did we not ransack the house with the justice at our head?"

"That's different," said the ferryman; "they were gentlemen,--we are not. They would kick us out of doors."

"Well, we'll see about that. I am Lady Rety's coachman, and have the honour of wearing her livery. I should like to see the notary kick me!"

And Ferko tore himself from the grasp of the ferryman, and rushed into the house, accompanied by the men who came from the Castle.

The old man remained outside, heartily praying that the servants of the place would seize Ferko and his companions, and give them a thorough whipping.

However bold the coachman might have felt in entering the house, he was penitent and abashed when Mr. Tengelyi, who had only just come in, and had not had time to throw off his bunda, stepped out of his room, and said, in a commanding voice, "What do you want here?"

For a moment they stood speechless; but when, gradually regaining confidence, Ferko told the notary that Mr. Catspaw had been murdered, and that they had traced the robber's footsteps up to his door, Mr. Tengelyi became much distressed. He thought of Viola's letter, and could not doubt for a moment that the outlaw had perpetrated this dreadful act to gain possession of the papers. Perhaps he was, though unconsciously, the cause of the murder. This thought made the notary shudder. The coachman and his companions remarked the effect their news produced upon him, and looked amazed at each other, while Tengelyi stood motionless, with the candle trembling in his hand. By degrees he regained his self-possession, and began to inquire how the murder was committed? when? and where?

"We followed the robber to the banks of the Theiss, where we suddenly lost him," said the coachman, casting occasional glances at the notary's boots, which were covered with mud, and at his companions; "from there we have traced his footsteps to your house."

"I beg your pardon," said the ferryman, stepping forward; "we have found foot-marks leading to this place, it is true; but whether they are the robber's marks or not, I cannot say. And you know I said we ought not to enter this house, that it was a nobleman's curia, but----"

"You are mad!" said the notary, with indignation. "If you think a murderer is secreted in my house, search, and leave no corner unexamined!"

The inmates became alarmed by the noise; and Ershebet and Vilma got up and hastily dressed themselves; while the notary, with a lantern in his hand, led the way into every room and nook of his house, until they were convinced that the robber was not there.

"Did you see," said Ferko to the ferryman, holding him back; "did you see how he trembled when I mentioned the murder of the attorney?"

"Of course I did. Do you think I am blind?"

"And his boots too were up to the ankles in mud," continued Ferko.

"That's no wonder, in such weather as this," answered the ferryman; "ours are nearly up to the knees in mud."

"By God! If I had not known him these ten years, I would----"

"You don't mean to say that you suspect the notary of the murder of Catspaw, do you?" demanded the ferryman, with warmth.

"If nobody else had been in the house, upon my soul I'd believe it!"

"You are a fool, Ferko!" exclaimed the old man, turning round in the direction of the Castle, whither all the others repaired in silence.

During the search Mr. Tengelyi had been summoned in great haste to the Castle.

NOTES TO VOL. II.

NOTE I.

BUZOGANY.

Among the characteristic weapons of the ancient Hungarians was the buzogany, a short staff, with a heavy knob of precious metal at the end. The buzogany is a symbol of command, and as such it is still found in the hands of the Indian Rajahs. In Hungary, it was usually hung by the side of the sabre. It still denotes military rank and authority. The lower classes have a similar weapon, the tshakany; a long stick, with a square piece of iron at one end, and a hook at the other. The fokosh is a stick, armed with an axe and spike. The tshakany and fokosh are dangerous weapons in the hands of the Hungarian herdsmen.

NOTE II.

TOKANY.

Tokany is pork roasted with spices and scented herbs.

NOTE III.

SWATOPLUK.

Swatopluk was a king of the Czechian empire in the days of Arpad, who first brought his warriors into the kingdom of Hungary. When Arpad approached the confines of the country, he sent ambassadors to Swatopluk, to ask him for grass from the Hungarian heaths, and for water from the Danube (a variation of the demand of "earth and water" of classic reminiscence); and in return he offered the Czechish king a white steed with a purple bridle. Swatopluk, who had no idea of the Oriental meaning of the demand, readily accepted the horse, and provided Arpad's ambassadors with a plentiful supply of hay and water. Upon this the Hungarians advanced on the great heath between the Danube and the Theiss (A.D. 889). Swatopluk would have opposed them, but they offered him battle, and routed his army. The king of the Czechs was glad to make his escape on the very horse which he had accepted in exchange for his kingdom.

Grotesque illustrations of this transaction are frequently to be met with in ancient Hungarian houses. The legend under the pictures expresses Swatopluk's astonishment and wonder at the sight of the white horse, for, as king of a pedestrian nation, he is profoundly ignorant of horses and horsemanship. He questions the Hungarian ambassadors, whether the horse is likely to bite, and what food will please this wonderful animal; and on the reply that the horse is in the habit of eating _oats_, the king replies, "By my troth, a dainty beast! Nothing will please him but my own food!" The Slowaks, in Upper Hungary, are descendants of the conquered race, and still addicted to the historical diet of Swatopluk, the prince, who sold a kingdom for a horse.

NOTE IV.

HUNGARIAN NAMES.

In all Hungarian names the Christian name is put after the family name, as, Kossuth Lajosh, Lewis Kossuth; Teleky Shandor, Alexander Teleky; Gorove Ishtvan, Stephen Gorove.

NOTE V.

WIZARD STUDENT.

The legend of Faustus has a natural foundation in the creative superstition of darker ages. Hungary, too, has its wizard student, and one who need not blush to be ranged with Faustus, Albertus Magnus, Michael Scott, and Friar Bacon, for his power was and is great. The wizard student is possessor of a dragon, which carries him through the air. He has an absolute control over hailstones and thunderbolts. He is an impertinent fellow, fond of mischief, of pretty women, and milk. It is therefore but natural that the women in the Hungarian villages should offer him jars of milk, to engage his goodwill and to prevent his devastating their harvests with hail and lightning.

NOTE VI.

TATOSH.

This name belongs originally to the priests of the ancient Hungarians, and it is still given to soothsayers. Their characteristic feature is, that they are white-livered and gifted with second sight. But the name of Tatosh is likewise given to the magic steed of the Hungarian legend. The Tatosh is jet black, and so extraordinarily quick-footed that he will gallop on the sea without dipping his hoofs into the water. He is attached and faithful to his master, with whom he converses, and whom he surpasses in understanding.

NOTE VII.

KONDASH.

This word stands for Kanaz, or keeper of swine.

NOTE VIII.

SCARCITY OF HANGMEN.

Almost all the smaller Hungarian towns and boroughs had (before the Revolution) the right of judging and executing the persons who were within their jurisdiction. Capital executions were frequent, as is always the case when the power over life and death is given into the hands of small and close corporations; but still, though a large number of people were hanged each year, the executions which fell to the share of each individual town and borough were few and far between. In cases of this kind the poorer communities were frequently at a loss to find an executioner; for they could not afford to maintain one merely for the chance of employing him once or twice every three years.

The greatest difficulty was usually experienced in a case of _Statarium_; for if the sentence was not executed within a certain time, it was annulled, and the prisoner came within the jurisdiction of the common courts. There was, therefore, no time left to send for an executioner to one of the larger towns; and it was a common occurrence that a gipsy was induced, by threats and promises of reward, to discharge the odious functions of an executioner.

Justice _in a fix_ was the more prone to appeal to the help of the Bohemian population, from the vagrant habits of the gipsies, which prevented the man who volunteered as a hangman suffering from the odium which would have fallen to the share of a resident of the place, and from the fact that the extreme jealousy of the wealthier corporations made it by no means an easy matter to borrow a hangman. It is on record that the inhabitants of Kesmarkt, in the Zips, sent an envoy to the magistrates of the city of Lutshau to ask for the loan of their hangman, a request to which their worships gave an indignant refusal. "For," said they to the negotiator, "tell your masters we keep our hangman _for ourselves and for our children_, but not for the people of Kesmarkt!"

NOTE IX.

HASZONTALAN PARASZT.

The phrase of "good-for-nothing peasant" was, at one time, frequently used by the privileged classes. M. Kossuth's party succeeded in turning the odium of that phrase against those who employed it.

NOTE X.

BATTLE OF MOHATSH.

The city of Mohatsh, in Lower Hungary, was the scene of a terrible battle between the Hungarians and the Turks. Solyman the Magnificent succeeded his father Selymus on the Ottoman throne in the year 1520. After quelling an insurrection in Syria, and establishing his power in Egypt, he resolved to turn his arms against the Christian nations. His great-grandfather had endeavoured, without success, to obtain possession of Belgrade,--a city in which were deposited most of the trophies taken by the Hungarians in their wars with the Turks. The Sultan, having rapidly moved his army towards the frontiers, arrived in Servia before the Hungarians were even aware of his approach.

At this period the Hungarian power had greatly declined. The throne was occupied by Louis II., a young and feeble sovereign, who had no means of raising an army sufficient to contend against his powerful and ambitious enemy. "His nobility," says the quaint historian Knolles, "in whose hands rested the wealth of his kingdom, promised much, but performed, indeed, nothing. Huniades, with his hardy soldiers,--the scourge and terror of the Turks,--were dead long before; so was Matthias, that fortunate warrior: after whom succeeded others given to all pleasure and ease, to whose example the people, fashioning themselves, forgot their wonted valour."

Belgrade fell almost without resistance.

Solyman, having gained his immediate object, broke up his army, returned to Constantinople, and employed himself in fitting out a fleet for the conquest of Rhodes, which he also effected towards the end of the year 1522. Having devoted the three following years to the organisation of a large army, he resumed his designs against Hungary, taking advantage of the distracted state of Europe in consequence of the Italian campaign of Francis I. against Charles V.

The inroad of the Turks was sudden in the extreme. Before Louis had any knowledge of the intentions of Solyman, a Turkish army of two hundred thousand men had crossed the frontiers of Hungary. When the young monarch learned the peril to which his kingdom was exposed, he addressed applications for assistance to most of the Christian princes; but without success. He summoned the prelates and nobles of Hungary to his aid. They obeyed the call with great readiness; but the troops which they brought into the field were ill-appointed and inexperienced. They had been accustomed to triumph over the Turks, and therefore treated the coming danger with haughty contempt. Archbishop Tomoreus, in particular, who had had a few slight skirmishes with the Turks, boasted of his own prowess; and assured the army, in a sermon which he delivered, that the infidels were doomed to destruction.

The king's troops amounted to five-and-twenty thousand men, horse and foot. His old officers foresaw the result of a conflict which was about to be undertaken with such inadequate means, and they advised the king to withdraw from the scene of danger. They insisted on his retiring to the Castle of Buda. But to this proceeding the army objected; and declared that, unless they were led by their sovereign, they would not fight. Whereupon the king advanced with his army, and encamped at Mohatsh, at a short distance from the Turkish vanguard.

A body of Transylvanian horsemen having been expected to join the king, it was debated whether he should not defer giving battle until the arrival of a force so essential for his support against the enemy. The impetuosity of the Archbishop, however, unfortunately decided the councils of the day, and preparations were made for the encounter.

The vanguard of the Turks consisted of twenty thousand horsemen, which were divided into four squadrons, and which harassed the king's troops by skirmishes. So closely did they watch the Hungarian army, that no man could attempt to water his horse in the Danube. They were compelled to resort to digging ditches within the confines of the camp. In the mean time, Solyman arrived at Mohatsh with the main body of his army. The Archbishop Tomoreus arranged the order of the battle. He stationed the cavaliers at intervals among the infantry, fearing that the Turks might crush his line by flank marches, unless it were extended as far as possible. A small force was left in charge of the tents, which were surrounded with waggons chained together; and, next them, a chosen body of horse was placed in reserve, for the purpose of protecting the king's person, in case any disaster should occur.

It is said that the gunners employed on the Turkish side, being, for the most part, Christians, purposely pointed the artillery so high, that their fire was altogether harmless. Nevertheless, at the first onset, the Hungarians were completely routed by the superior number of their antagonists. Tomoreus was among the first victims of that fatal day. His followers displayed their usual gallantry, but perished, in this unequal conflict, one after another; and, the horsemen once trampled down and killed, the camp remained open to the assault of the enemy. The garrison was too weak to make any defence, and the reserve force was called in to assist them. The king, seeing his army overthrown, and his guard engaged in a fatal conflict with the enemy, took to flight; but his horse, scared by the turmoil of the conflict, bore him into a deep morass, in which he was drowned. Solyman marched up to Buda, which he took by assault.

NOTE XI.

For the meaning of Tshakany, see Note I.

END OF THE SECOND VOLUME.

LONDON:

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THE VILLAGE NOTARY.

VOL. III.

THE VILLAGE NOTARY.