The Baron's Sons Part 17

By this time Richard had dismounted and thrown his horse's bridle to old Paul. "So the Plankenhorst ladies are still in the city, are they?" he asked, as he proceeded with Fritz toward the entrance of the convent. "And you say they are friends of the revolutionists. Do you know these women?"

"It is one of our chief concerns to know them," was the reply. "Their past is not unknown to us, but now they declare themselves unconditionally on our side. Nothing catches fire like a woman's heart at the cry of freedom. But our confidence in them is a guarded one.

We, too, have our secret police, and all their movements are carefully watched. Should they attempt to open communication with their former friends, we should learn the fact at once and the two ladies would be summarily dealt with. Oh, I a.s.sure you, our forces are well organised."

"I haven't a doubt of it. And is my brother Jeno one of your number?"

"One of the foremost. He holds the rank of second lieutenant."

Richard shook his head incredulously.

The mob was meanwhile gradually making a path for itself through the flames of burning brandy, and as the intrepid Fritz caught sight of one form after another through the blue-green fire, he became more and more aware of the magnitude of the task before him. Distinguished from the rabble about him was one man, no less ragged and dirty than his fellows, but of colossal size and brandishing above his head a six-foot iron bar as if it had been a wooden wand. He was pushing his way forward in a sort of blind frenzy. Seeing the hussars, however, drawn up in formidable array, he paused for his comrades to join him, when he raised aloft his powerful weapon and, pointing to the building before them, shouted, in a hoa.r.s.e, brutal voice: "Into the fire with the nuns!" A bloodthirsty howl answered him from behind.

But suddenly the shrill notes of a bugle were heard above the howling of the mob. It was a signal to the hors.e.m.e.n to hold themselves in readiness for action, and it dampened the ardour of the rioters.

"For heaven's sake," exclaimed Fritz, "don't give the order to attack.

We must avoid bloodshed. I will try to make these fellows listen to me."

"Speak, then, in G.o.d's name! I will stay at your side," said Richard, as he lighted a cigar and waited for his companion to try the effect of his eloquence on the unruly mob before them.

The convent steps served Fritz as a platform. Addressing his hearers as "brothers," he spoke to them about freedom and the const.i.tution and civic duties, about the schemes of the reactionaries, about their common fatherland and emperor and the glorious days they had just witnessed. Now and then a hoa.r.s.e outcry from his auditors forced him to pause, and more than once his remarks were punctuated by a flying potato or bit of tile hurled at his head. Richard, too, was. .h.i.t twice by these missiles.

"Comrade," cried the hussar officer, "I have had quite enough of these potatoes. Wind up your speech as soon as you can and let me try my hand. I shall find a way to make them listen, I promise you!"

"It is a difficult situation," returned Fritz, wiping his brow. "The people have no love for the religious houses; but these nuns are women, and toward women even the revolutionist is chivalrous."

"So I see," rejoined the other dryly, glancing up at the windows of the building, many of which had been shattered by missiles.

Fortunately for the inmates, the cells were protected by inner shutters, which were all securely closed.

The rioters now began to pelt the hussars, whose horses were becoming more and more restless. As Fritz opened his mouth to continue his speech, the man with the iron bar began to harangue also, and the people could understand neither of them.

At that moment there appeared from the opposite direction an odd-looking, long-legged student, with three enormous ostrich plumes waving in his hat and a prominent red nose dominating his thin, smooth-shaven face. A tricoloured sash crossed his breast, while a slender parade-sword, girt high up under his arm to prevent his stumbling over it, hung at his side. With a quick step and a light spring, the young man was presently at the side of Richard and Fritz.

"G.o.d keep you, comrades!" he cried in greeting. "Calm your fears, for here I am,--Hugo Mausmann, first lieutenant in the second legion. You are hard pressed just now, I can well believe. Friend Fritz is a famous orator, but only in the tragic vein. Tragedy is his forte. But a public speaker must know his audience. Here a Hans Sachs is called for rather than a Schiller. Only make your hearers laugh, and you have carried your point. Just let me give these folks a few of my rhymes, and you shall see them open their eyes, and then their mouths, and all burst out laughing; after that you can do what you will with them."

"All right, comrade," returned Richard; "go ahead and make them laugh, or I shall have to try my hand at making them cry."

Hugo Mausmann stepped forward and made a comical gesture, indicating his desire to be heard. Deliberately drawing out his snuff-box, he tapped it with his finger, and proceeded to take a pinch, an action which struck the spectators as so novel, under the circ.u.mstances, that they became silent to a man and thus permitted the speaker to begin his inexhaustible flow of doggerel. With frequent use of such rhyming catchwords as, "in freedom's cause I beg you pause;" "your country's fame, your own good name;" "our banner bright, our heart's delight;"

"we're brothers all, to stand or fall,"--he poured out his jingling verse, concluding in a highly dramatic manner by embracing the hussar officer at his side, in sign of the good-fellowship which he described as uniting all cla.s.ses in the brotherhood of freedom.

"Comrade, you haven't made them laugh yet," said Richard.

Hugo continued his rhymed address, but the people would listen no longer. "Down with the friend of the priests!" sounded from all sides.

"Into the fire with the nuns!" And the shower of missiles came thick and fast. An egg hit the speaker on the nose, and filled his mouth and eyes with its contents.

"Give us a rhyme for that, brother!" shouted the successful marksman, and all laughed now in good earnest; but it was the brutal laugh of malice and ridicule at another's discomfiture.

Richard threw his cigar away and sprang down the steps. Fritz intercepted him, and insisted on being heard.

"Brother," he cried, "do nothing rash. Avoid the shedding of blood--not that I fear bloodshed in itself, but the hatred that is sure to grow out of it. We must not hate one another. Your sword must not drink our people's blood. A peaceful issue is still possible."

"What, then, do you advise?"

"Go and speak to the prioress, and persuade her to leave the building with all her nuns; they have no costly possessions to carry with them, and you can soon clear the house. Then we will admit the leaders of the mob and show them that there is no booty to be had, and no nuns there to burn. We will write on the outer doors: 'This is state property,'--as it really is,--and no further injury will be done to the building. Mausmann and I will keep back the mob while you do your errand. By that time the rest of our party will be here, and we will go among the people and make them listen to reason, and cease from violence."

Richard pressed the other's hand. "You are a brave fellow," he exclaimed, "and I will do as you say. Only keep the 'brothers' amused while I go and talk with the 'sisters.'"

With an added respect for these two young men who were bravely trying to gain their ends by peaceful means, Richard returned to the entrance of the convent, and knocked at the door. The cautious door-keeper was at length persuaded to open to him. The captain of hussars felt somewhat ill at ease in playing any other role before the helpless nuns than that of their defender at the head of his cavalry; he consoled himself, however, with the thought that a nun was after all not the same as other women, but a sort of s.e.xless creature who was not to be treated according to the conventional rules of society.

He found the pa.s.sages all deserted, the nuns being a.s.sembled in the refectory. Pausing on the threshold of this room, the young officer beheld a scene that could not fail to move him deeply. In the middle of the room lay a dying sister, while about her were grouped her companions, ministering to her wants and seeking to comfort her. In the group one face caught his eye and held him spellbound.

It was Edith. This, then, was where her aunt had placed her to await her marriage. She stretched out her hands to her lover in despairing appeal, as the bloodthirsty howls of the infuriated mob fell on her ears. With wrath in his bosom the young man ran down the stairs, and out of the door. As he sprang into his saddle he thought he saw a shutter of one of the upper windows pushed partly open. Perhaps Edith was looking out, and watching him.

"Well, if she is looking, she shall see that her lover is a man," he said to himself.

"Clear out of here, you dirty rascals!" were his words to the mob.

Insolent laughter and mocking shouts were the answer he received.

The officer's sword flashed over his head, the bugle gave the signal to charge, and Richard dashed forward into the very heart of the raging mob, straight toward the giant form of its leader. The latter brandished his iron weapon and made it whistle through the air. At that moment Richard seemed to hear a scream from the window above; then the six-foot iron bar came down toward his head with a hiss as it cleft the air.

All honour to the Al-Bohacen sword that was raised to meet the blow; and all honour to the arm and hand that received the brunt of its force on the sword-hilt. There was a clash and a shower of sparks, but the Damascus blade stood the test and suffered not a nick or a scratch. Before the giant could lift his weapon again he found himself lying under the horse's hoofs. Five minutes later the square was empty.

CHAPTER XIV.

TRUE LOVE.

Through the unlighted streets of Vienna a carriage was slowly making its uncertain way by night. The gas-mains had been wrecked,--that was one of the results of the glorious days of "liberty,"--and only the feeble coach-lamps lighted a path for the equipage.

The carriage halted before the Plankenhorst house, and the coachman stepped down and held the door open while two women alighted, after which he drove into the courtyard, leaving his pa.s.sengers to make the best of their way up the unlighted stairs. The hostess, coming to meet them with a lamp in her hand, kissed one of her callers, who was evidently a nun, and gave her hand to the other. The latter's hood falling back revealed Edith's bright face.

"Heaven must have guided you hither, Sister Remigia!" exclaimed the baroness, in a guarded tone.

"We had need enough of Heaven's guidance in this fearful darkness,"

was the reply. "Not a street lamp is lighted in the whole city, and the pavement is torn up in many places."

"Heaven watches over its chosen ones," said Antoinette, leading her guests into the dining-room, where the table was spread in readiness for them, while the water was already boiling in the tea-kettle.

First a.s.suring herself that no one was in the next room, the hostess locked the door, bade her daughter serve the tea, and then drew her chair to Sister Remigia's side. "What word does the general send?" she asked.

"To-morrow is fixed upon for a general attack," replied the sister, in an anxious tone.

"Did you know that things were going badly?" asked Antoinette.

"How so?"

"The insurgents are counting on a secret understanding with a part of the investing forces. Goldner told me the whole plan. Of course I pretended to be very much alarmed as to what would become of us who have played so important a part in the uprising, if the city should be taken. But the good young man bade me have no fear: in case of any mishap, a plan of escape was arranged for those whose lives would be endangered by remaining. He said that between the Mariahilf and Lerchenfeld cemeteries the line of investment was held by a squadron of hussars with whom the Aula had for some time been fraternising, and that it was hoped this squadron would not only offer a free escape to fugitives in case of danger, but would also join in their flight and cover their rear, thus securing them a safe retreat into Galicia or Hungary. The only thing in the way of this plan, it appears, is the obstinacy of the squadron's commander, Captain Richard Baradlay."