Part 64 (1/2)
”Heavy roads, I a.s.sure you, gentlemen! I'd never have thought that we should have had so much trouble.”
”So he did trouble you!” said Mr. Skinner. ”Very well. I thought as much. You are so late, I am sure something came in your way.”
”Came in my way with a vengeance!” said Mr. Kenihazy. ”Luckily, I had the two haiduks. I could never have done without them.”
”What the devil! Did the notary fight? Did they endeavour to rescue him?”
”No! not exactly!” said Mr. Kenihazy, reluctantly; for the general interest these questions excited made him loth to disappoint his audience, ”we fell asleep on the road. They are doing something to the bridges. We were forced to leave the d.y.k.e. The carriage was almost swamped in the mud; and, as I told you, if the haiduks had not been with me, and if I and the notary had not put our shoulders to the wheels, bless me, we shouldn't have been here till to-morrow morning; in which case the brigand would have attempted to rob me of my prisoner.
But I'd like to have seen them, that's all!” added he, shaking his fist; ”I'd have taught them manners, dirty knaves as they are!”
This explanation of Mr. Kenihazy's late arrival was far too commonplace to satisfy the wors.h.i.+pful gentlemen; but still the princ.i.p.al interest remained concentrated on Tengelyi, and half-a-dozen voices asked at once:
”How did the notary behave?”
”What did he say?”
”Did he make any ill-natured remarks?”
”He did not do any thing,” replied Mr. Kenihazy; ”how could he? since the sheriff ordered me to treat him with the greatest leniency!”
Everybody was astonished, and the recorder exclaimed:
”Are you sure that the sheriff gave such an order?”
”Of course he did. I never saw him more energetic in my life than when he told me that he was convinced of Mr. Tengelyi's innocence--yes, innocence was the word!--and that we ought to avoid any thing which could possibly make his position more painful.”
”Strange!” cried Shaskay, shaking his head.
”_I_ thought it strange; but as the sheriff told me that to offend the prisoner was as much as an offence to himself----”
”It's quite natural! quite! you know,” cried Mr. Skinner, when he saw and cursed his clerk for the effect which those words had on the company, but particularly on the recorder. ”It's quite natural, you know. His son is in love with the notary's daughter; and now that Tengelyi has got himself into trouble, the sheriff must do something in the way of taking his part, for there is no saying what that hot-headed fellow Akosh would not do. But _I_ am the man who knows the sheriff's real sentiments. Lady Rety told me to use all due diligence and severity in the trial of the offender, who has murdered her most faithful servant; and we know, gentlemen, that the sheriff never differs in opinion with his lady.”
”If that is the case, I have been wrong in what I did,” said Mr.
Kenihazy, scratching his head; ”after what the sheriff told me, I did not even offer to bind his hands and feet--indeed, I have treated him with great politeness. I wanted to converse with him, but he made no reply to what I said.”
”Conscience! it's all conscience!” groaned Mr. Shaskay.
”That's what I thought when he refused to smoke a pipe, though I offered it over and over again.”
”You might have let it alone, sir,” said Mr. Zatonyi, with great severity. ”In your relations with prisoners, your behaviour ought to be dignified, grave, and majestic: to show them that there is some difference between you and a vagabond.”
”Never mind, Bandi,” said Mr. Skinner, when he saw that his clerk smarted under the reproof, ”never mind; you're over polite, you know.
Tell them to send the prisoner up. We'll be grave enough, I warrant you!”
Mr. Kenihazy left the room; and a few minutes afterwards Tengelyi entered with an escort of four haiduks. Volgyeshy accompanied him. That gentleman had left the company, when he heard of the notary's arrival: he had gone to confer with him. The notary's face was serious, and his behaviour had that dignity, gravity, and majesty which the a.s.sessor advised Kenihazy to practise in his relations with culprits.
”How devilishly proud the fellow is!” whispered Mr. Skinner to Mr.
Zatonyi: ”but never mind; we'll get it out of him in no time.”
”So we would if the sheriff did not protect him!” sighed Zatonyi.
The formal surrender of the prisoner was made, and Tengelyi expected every moment that they would take him to his prison; when Captain Karvay asked the recorder what kind of a chain the notary was to have.