Chapter 39
"Well, and are you 'n.o.body?'"
f.a.n.n.y gazed into my eyes, became serious, and with trembling lips said:
"If you wish it--I am n.o.body. As if I had never been born."
From that moment f.a.n.n.y began to be "someone," in my eyes.
Her little sophism pleased me. Perhaps on these terms we might come to an agreement.
"You have asked something very difficult of me, f.a.n.n.y; but it is not impossible. Only you must wait a little: give me time to think it over.
Until I have done so, be our go-between. Go in and tell grandmother what you have recommended to me, and that I said in answer, 'it is well.'"
I was cunning. I was dissembling. I thought in that moment, that, if f.a.n.n.y should burst in childish glee into the neighboring room, and in triumphant voice proclaim the concession she had wrung out of me, I might tell her on her return the name of some place that did not exist, and so throw the responsibility off my own shoulders.
But she did not do that.
She went back quietly, and waited long, until her friends had retired by the opposite door: then she came and whispered:--
"I have been long: but I did not wish to speak before my mother. Now your parents are alone: go and speak."
"Something more first. Go back, f.a.n.n.y, and say that I can tell them the truth, only on the condition that mother and grandmother promise not to seek him out, until I show them a letter from Lorand, in which he invites them to come to him: nor to send others in search of him: and, if they wish to send a letter to him, they must first give it to me, that I may send it off to him, and they never show, even by a look, to anyone that they know aught of Lorand's whereabouts."
f.a.n.n.y nodded a.s.sent, and returned into the neighboring room.
A few minutes later she came out again, and held open the door before me.
"Come in."
I went in. She shut the door after me, and then, taking my hand, led me to mother's bedside.
Poor dear mother was now quiet, and pale as death. She seemed to beckon me to her with her eyes. I went to her side, and kissed her hand.
f.a.n.n.y bent over me, and held her face near my lips, that I might whisper in her ear what I knew.
I
Mother sighed and seemed to be calmed. Then grandmother bent over dear mother, that she might learn from her all that had been said.
As she heard it, her grey-headed figure straightened, and clasping her two hands above her head, she panted in wild prophetic ecstasy:
"O Lord G.o.d! who entrustest Thy will to children: may it come to pa.s.s, as Thou hast ordained!"
Then she came to me and embraced me.
"Did you counsel Lorand to go there?"
"I did."
"Did you know what you were doing? It was the will of G.o.d. Every day you must pray now for your brother."
"And you must keep silent for him. For when he is discovered, my brother will die and I cannot live without him."
The storm became calm: they again made peace with me. Mother, some minutes later, fell asleep, and slumbered sweetly. Grandmother motioned to f.a.n.n.y and to me to leave her to herself.
We let down the window-blinds and left the room.
As we stepped out, I said to f.a.n.n.y:
"Remember, my honor has been put into your hands."
The girl gazed into my eyes with ardent enthusiasm and said:
"I shall guard it as I guard mine own."
That was no child's answer, but the answer of a maiden.
CHAPTER XII
A GLANCE INTO A PISTOL-BARREL
The weather changed very rapidly, for all the world as if two evil demons were fighting for the earth: one with fire, the other with ice.
It was the middle of May; it had become so sultry that the earth, which last week had been frozen to dry bones, now began to crack.
The wanderer who disappeared from our sight we shall find on that plain of Lower Hungary, where there are as many high roads as cart-ruts.
It is evening, but the sun had just set, and left a cloudless ruddy sky behind it. On the horizon two or three towers are to be seen so far distant that the traveller who is hurrying before us cannot hope to reach any one of them by nightfall.
The dust had not so overlaid him, nor had the sun so tanned his face that we cannot recognize in these handsome n.o.ble features the pride of the youth of Pressburg, Lorand.
The long journey he has accomplished has evidently not impaired the strength of his muscles, for the horseman who is coming behind him, has to ride hard to overtake him.
The latter leaned back in his shortened stirrups, after the manner of hussars, and wore a silver-b.u.t.toned jacket, a greasy hat, and ragged red trousers. Thrown half over his shoulders was a garment of wolf-skins; around his waist was a wide belt from which two pistol-barrels gleamed, while in the leg of one of his boots a silver-chased knife was thrust.
The horse's harness was glittering with silver, just as the ragged, stained garments of its master.
The rider approached at a trot, but the traveller had not yet thought it worth while to look back and see who was coming after him. Presently he came up to the solitary figure, trudging along, doggedly.
"Good evening, student."
Lorand looked up at him.
"Good evening, gypsy."
At these words the horseman drew aside his skin-mantle that the student might see the pistol-barrels, and consider that even if he were a gypsy, he was something more than a mere musician. But Lorand did not betray the slightest emotion: he did not even take down from his shoulder the stick, on which he was carrying his boots. He was walking bare-footed.
It was cheaper.