Part 30 (2/2)
”'If what the world whispers turns out to be true, and you have in the meantime been to Vienna--but no! I will not believe it.'
”His magnanimity offended me even more than his indictment.
”'What is it to you whence I come or whither I go?' I replied, turning my back upon him and beginning to talk to the young officers, like one who has nothing to be ashamed of.
”Shortly afterwards I quitted the banqueting-room. I hadn't reached the end of the long pavilion corridor in the fortress when Rengetegi came running after me.
”'What on earth possessed you to calumniate and accuse me before the whole company,' I said to him, 'just as if I were a traitor, or I don't know what?'
”'Tsitt! Zen.o.bia, my Queen. Let us understand each other. It was in your own interest that I had to feign jealousy and rage. Let us go into my room and I'll explain everything.'
”When we were alone together he locked the door and then explained things nicely.
”'It concerns your money.'
”'Aha!'
”'Amidst all this laudation, appreciation, and ovation, and all the other flummery, I did not lose sight of the _main chance_. I told the Governor privately that if he wished to reward me in any way, he might do me the favour not to give to the flames the property deposited in the bank to the credit of the damsel who was so near to my heart, but allow me to bring it back to her. The austere patriot was as inexorable as Brutus. ”Never!” said he. ”We will burn what we have laid hands upon, even though it were the property of my own father. We can make no exception. What would those poor devils say whose paltry ten or twenty florins we surrender to the flames of the _auto-da-fe_ if we allowed the forty or fifty thousand florins of the rich to fly away? Burn they shall!” This he said with a very wrathful voice. Then he added in a milder tone: ”However, I'll confide the burning of them to you.”'
”Now I began to understand.
”'A quarrel between us therefore has become an absolute necessity. We must fly into a rage with each other. The _auto-da-fe_ will take place in a couple of days. The bonfire will be in the centre of the public square. I shall throw the bundles of bank-notes one by one among the spluttering f.a.ggots. You must be close by the booths of the bread-sellers, and break out into curses. You remember the cursing scene from _Deborah_? Very well, it may be useful. After the _auto-da-fe_ there must be a lively scene between us. We must cast our mutual souvenirs at each other's feet. I'll throw at you the embroidered cus.h.i.+on which you worked for my birthday, and inside it will be the money belonging to you and your mamma which I have rescued. Then be off as quick as you can to Vienna.'
”'But how about the packet that you have to burn?'
”'Leave that to me; a few copies of the _Comorn News_ will give every bit as brisk a flame.'
”Everything happened according to his instructions. I saved our property, and you must admit that my friend and I displayed considerable prudence on this occasion. We did n.o.body any wrong: I only recovered what was my own.
”Then we fell out together publicly, as preconcerted. My friend Rengetegi played Oth.e.l.lo in a masterly manner. Then as our acquaintances could not succeed in reconciling us, we solemnly separated and I went back to Vienna.
”On the way back I again fell in with the Austrian major. I showed him the money I brought with me, naturally without letting him know how I came by it. He became so friendly as even to entrust me with a letter to an old acquaintance of his in Vienna, who was none other than my mother's colonel....
”You may imagine the friendly reception which awaited me when I returned to Vienna and gave my mother her money. She folded me in her arms, covered me with kisses, bedewed me with tears, and called me her darling child. What still remained to me of my patrimony, about 40,000 florins, I placed in the Vienna savings-bank. The rest of my dower was in the hands of Muki Bagotay, with the exception of what we spent while we lived together. This also I contrived to get back again--but how?
”In the spring, when the fortune of the war changed, Comorn was relieved, and I hastened off home again. I told my mother that I was urgently bent upon building up again our burnt house--only the roof had been burnt off, the walls remained standing. She approved of my resolution, and was very proud of having such a sensible and enterprising daughter. I immediately set about rebuilding our house, taking advantage of the time which elapsed from the raising of the first to the beginning of the second siege. During my stay at Vienna I moved continually in military circles, and I saw quite plainly what was coming. But why reopen my wounds? All my illusions were over. I had learnt to know my hero at close quarters, behind the scenes, I might say. This 'lord of creation' used to whine before his tailor for a respite with his account till next pay-day, and immediately afterwards would ascend his triumphal car drawn by captive kings and declaim to the populace of conquered Constantinople. But in one particular thing Major Rengetegi really extorted my admiration, I mean by his strategical science.”
”Ah!” cried I.
”You may well say 'ah!' I have read the campaigns of Napoleon I., I have read the campaigns of Charles XII., but in none of them could I discover so many ruses of war as my hero invented in order to triumphantly solve the problem--how a man in his capacity of superior officer may constantly be taking part in the most ticklish skirmishes without allowing his person to get into the way of any wandering bullet. He always knew how to hit upon some mission whereby he might manage to skedaddle out of danger. And if I now and then fluttered the red rag of _self-esteem_ before his eyes, he would reply: 'I have duties towards art; if they shoot away half my leg, how shall I be able to act on the stage again?' Yet, when the battle was over, who so great a hero as he!
Others only mowed down the enemy, he thrashed them afterwards with a flail. 'Tis a dreadful thing when a woman discovers that her hero is a habitual liar, lying with the fiery burning conviction that no man will dare to doubt him, so that she has to make him swear to the truth of every word he utters.
”Meanwhile, I continued my house-building. Every sort of building material was very dear, and there was plenty of money too. Whence did all this money come? I'll tell you. The Russian hosts had already invaded the kingdom. The speculator-species perceived that the national cause was declining. The Hungarian armies were everywhere falling back.
Then Klapka, by a brilliant victory, raised the second siege of Comorn and was within an ace of capturing the besieging host. The region was instantly alive with people, and a whole series of triumphs followed one after another. And now there flocked to Comorn from every part of the kingdom quite a tribe of panic-stricken speculators and jobbers, with bags full of Hungarian bank-notes, and bought everything that was for sale, at whatever price the sellers liked to ask. My Muki also took advantage of this lucky period to regulate his finances. He sold his herds at four times their real value, and paid the price, in Hungarian bank-notes, into the deposit bank at Comorn. It was my dowry paid back, he said. The bank hastened to place the amount in my hands; and I hastened to satisfy therewith my architects and builders, who did not let the money stick to their hands.
”Doesn't this remind you of the round game we used to play as children, when we lit a straw, and, sitting in a circle, pa.s.sed it round from hand to hand; whoever was the last to hold it till the fire burned his hands, him we used to thump unmercifully--that was the forfeit? Just such a burning straw was the dowry paid back to me by my husband. The roof of my father's house was the straw end which remained in my hands. The amount which I deposited in the Vienna bank is all I have left in the world--except Tihamer Rengetegi. But not even he has remained mine, for he has changed into Balvanyossi. And now here we are together. The playing of a common part unites us. From morn to eve every word we say to one another is a lie. It is not even true that any one is pursuing Rengetegi, for at the capitulation of Comorn he received his safe-conduct which guarantees his life and liberty. That is not what distresses him. But he wishes to deny the whole part he played during the Revolution, that as Balvanyossi, the theatre-director, he may get the necessary concession. He is continually urging me to go to Miskolcz to the Government Commissioner and settle the business for him.”
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