Manasseh Part 29

"Ha, ha! To deprive you of even this last consolation, I beg to a.s.sure you that the two women will not lay a finger on their pistols, because Zen.o.bia is to gain entrance to them before the men appear. She will come to them in the guise of a friend and deliverer, promising to rescue them for Jonathan's sake. She will furnish them Wallachian peasant clothes, help them about their disguise, and, amidst the general confusion, bring them away with her, alive and unharmed, to St. George, so that you will have the pleasure of seeing Blanka Zboroy in my power. Further details I will leave to your own imagination; and to enable you to pursue these pleasant fancies undisturbed I will now say good night."

"Mana.s.seh!" called a voice from the darkness, when Diurbanu had gone.

"Who calls? Or is it only a rat?" Mana.s.seh had forgotten that his dungeon contained another prisoner beside himself.

"Yes, it's a rat," answered the voice. "I heard my schoolmaster tell a story once about a lion that fell into a snare, and a mouse came and gnawed the ropes so as to set him free. If you will bend down here I'll untie your knots with my teeth."

Mana.s.seh complied. The gipsy had splendid teeth, and he bit and tugged at the knots until the prisoner's hands were free, and he felt himself another man altogether.

"Now pull this stake out from under my knees," directed the fiddler, whose hands were tied together and pa.s.sed over his bent knees, where they were held fast by a stick of wood. His legs being freed, he slipped the cords from his hands like a pair of gloves. He was no little elated over his achievements. "And now we will sell our lives dear!" he cried, with a glad leap into the air.

The rattle of small arms in the distance began to be heard, and through the little opening over the iron door a ruddy light as from a fire became visible. At first Mana.s.seh thought some one was coming again with a torch; but as the iron door did not open, and the red light grew constantly brighter, he finally guessed the cause of the illumination.

Those who were now a.s.saulting Toroczko must have set fire to St. George first, to furnish the people of the former place an example of what they were themselves to expect, and perhaps also to supply a light for the attacking party. The whole village was in flames. So it appeared that Diurbanu's words had conveyed no empty threat. The work of revenge had begun with St. George, and now came Toroczko's turn. That the latter place was offering a spirited resistance could be inferred from the lively firing that was to be plainly heard. But how would it be when the attack in the rear should begin, from the direction of the Szekler Stone? Could Aaron and his forty men offer any effectual opposition to the invaders?

Night must have fallen ere this. Mana.s.seh paced his prison cell in almost unbearable impatience, as he listened to the distant firing, and watched the red glow over the door growing gradually brighter. A heavy booming as of cannon was heard from the Szekler Stone. So the attack in that quarter had begun, and Aaron's battery was at work. Zen.o.bia must be leading the enemy into the town, for surely no means at Aaron's command could repulse the a.s.saulting party.

Mana.s.seh was fast losing all self-control. "I will find a way out of this!" he cried, in a frenzy.

Running to the door, he seized its iron ring and shook the heavy portal in impotent fury. Then he turned back and surveyed his place of confinement with searching eyes. It was now fairly well lighted by the ruddy glare that came through the air-hole. The place had formerly been a wine cellar, but every cask and barrel was now gone. The support on which they had rested, however, remained behind. This was a ma.s.sive oak beam which had served to keep the wine casks from the damp earthen floor of the cellar.

"Lanyi," commanded Mana.s.seh, in quick, energetic tones, "take hold of one end of this beam, and we will batter the door down."

"I'm your man!" responded the gipsy, with alacrity. He was small of person, but every sinew in his wiry frame was of steel. He grasped the beam behind while Mana.s.seh carried the forward end, and so they converted it into a Roman battering-ram.

The booming of cannon was drowned now by the pounding on the iron door.

The two prisoners wondered that no one in the house seemed to hear them.

But those who might before have heard were engaged elsewhere, while to those outside the noises in the street drowned all tumult in the cellar.

At length the lock gave way under the tremendous battering to which it was subjected, and soon the door flew open. The outer door was of wood, and yielded readily.

"Hold on, stand back!" cried the gipsy, as Mana.s.seh was about to run up the stairs. "Wait until I take a peep and see if the coast is clear.

I'll mayhap find a gun that some one has thrown down."

"But I can't wait," returned the other, brushing him aside. "I need no gun. The first man that dares get in my way shall furnish me with arms.

I am going to seek my wife! Let him who values his life run from before me!"

He burst through the door, and sprang up the steps. No sooner was he in the open air than an armed figure confronted him. But Mana.s.seh did not strike down this person, for it was a woman,--Zen.o.bia. A dirk and a brace of pistols were stuck in her belt.

"Take care!" she cried to Mana.s.seh, and she made as if to shield him from view with her cloak. "Stay where you are!"

But Mana.s.seh seized her by the wrist and shouted hoa.r.s.ely in her ear:

"Where are my wife and sister?"

Zen.o.bia understood his tone and the frenzy with which he grasped her arm. With a sad smile she made answer:

"Calm yourself. They are well cared for. They are at home in their own house, where no one can harm them."

He looked at her, in doubt as to her meaning. Zen.o.bia handed him her weapons.

"Here, take these," she commanded. "You may need them. I have no further use for them." Thus, disarmed and in Mana.s.seh's power, she stood calmly before him. "Now be quiet and listen to me," she went on.

The cannon thundered on the Szekler Stone in one continuous roar, while fiery rockets shot from Hidas Peak in a wide curve and fell into the valley below, hastening the mad flight of routed and panic-stricken men, who fled as if for their lives to Gyertyamos, Kapolna, and Bedello, to the woods, and into the mountain defiles. The burning village of St.

George no longer offered them an asylum, and its streets were by this time nearly deserted.

"That is over," said the Wallachian girl, calmly, and she led Mana.s.seh into the empty house. "Aaron might as well stop now," she murmured to herself; "for there are no more to frighten." Then to Mana.s.seh: "You know it takes two to get up a scare,--one to do the frightening and the other to be frightened. If I had but said to our men, 'Stop running away! Those are not the bra.s.s cannon of the national guard, but only Aaron Adorjan's holes in the side of the rock, where he is harmlessly exploding gunpowder; and that roll of drums that you hear on the Csegez road does not mean an approaching brigade of Hungarians, but is only the idle rub-a-dub of a band of school children,'--if I had said that, Toroczko would now lie in ashes. But I held my tongue and let the panic do its work. With this day's rout all is ended, and in an hour's time you can safely return home. When you meet your wife and sister, tell them you saw me this evening, and let them know that the Wallachian girl has forgotten nothing--do you hear me?--nothing. They wrote me a beautiful letter, both of them on one sheet of paper, a letter full of love and kindness. They called me sister and invited me to your wedding, promising me that Jonathan should be there, too, and making me promise to come. And when they had written the letter they even coaxed the stiff-necked Aaron, who hates us Wallachians like poison, to add his signature to it, though I could see in the very way he wrote his name how he disliked to do it. I promised to come, and I kept my word. And Jonathan came with me--I brought him. That night I told your wife and your sister that I should come to Toroczko once more, and not with empty hands, but should bring them something. I have come, and I bring them--you, Mana.s.seh, alive and unharmed. That is how a Wallachian girl remembers a kindness."

She turned to go, but then, as if remembering something, came back and drew a ring from her finger.

"Here," said she, "I will give you this ring. Do you remember it?"

"It belonged to my sister," answered Mana.s.seh, in a tone of sadness. "I bought it for her to give to her lover as an engagement ring. Soon afterward he deserted her."

"I know it. Her name is engraved inside the ring. The pretty fellow who gave it me told me all about it. He said to me: 'My pearl, my turtledove, my diamond, see here, I place this ring on your finger and swear to be true to you. But I can't marry you as long as that other woman lives who wears my betrothal ring, for our laws forbid it. That woman dwells in the big house at Toroczko. You know her name and know what to do to enable me to marry you.'"

Mana.s.seh trembled with suppressed pa.s.sion as he listened. The girl handed him the ring and proceeded:

"Give her back her ring; it belongs to her. And tell me, did not this man come to you and tell you how a shameless creature in woman's form was to steal into your house, and, under the pretext of rescuing your wife and sister, lead them away to misery and dishonour? Speak, did he not tell you some such story?"

"Yes, he did."

Zen.o.bia laughed in hot anger and scorn. "Well, then," said she, in conclusion, "I have another present for you. The proverb says, 'Little kindnesses strengthen the bonds of friendship.' And this will be the smallest of gifts I could possibly make you. The handsome young man who gave me this ring, and is betrothed to me--or thinks he is--lies somewhere yonder in a ditch. His horse took fright at the tumult, and threw him so that he broke his ankle. His fleeing troops left him lying there; they stumbled over him and ran on; no one offered to help him up.

They all hate him, and they see in his fall a punishment from Heaven.

The Wallachian fears to lend aid to him that is thought to lie under G.o.d's displeasure. The fallen man's horse you will find in the church.

Mount it and hasten back to Toroczko. As for the rider, you will do well to hang him to the nearest tree. You have a gipsy here to help you. And now farewell."

She blew a little whistle that hung at her neck, and a lad appeared leading two mountain ponies. Zen.o.bia mounted one, waved a final adieu to Mana.s.seh, and rode away with her attendant toward Bedello.

"Come, sir," said the gipsy, touching Mana.s.seh's elbow, "let us set about what she told us to do. You go into the church and get Diurbanu's horse while I go and find the rider. You have two pistols and a dagger.

What, don't you want them? Then give them to me."

The fiddler was proud to find himself so well armed. He made a belt of the cords he had brought with him from the cellar, and stuck the weapons into it.

"Now we must hurry," he urged, "or the people will be coming back."

While Mana.s.seh made his way to the church, his companion hastened in search of Diurbanu. The little man had sharp eyes and keen wits. He conjectured that the fallen rider, with his broken leg, would avoid the dry harvest-fields, over which the fire was rapidly spreading, and would be found in the moist ditch beside the road. Nor was he wrong in this surmise. He was soon saluted in a voice that he recognised.

"Gipsy, come here!"

"Not so fast," the fiddler replied. "How do I know you won't shoot me?"

"I have nothing to shoot with. I am lying in the water, so that even if I had my pistols the powder would be soaked through."

"But what do you want of me?"

"I wish you to save my life."

"And won't you have me locked up afterward?"