The Baron's Sons Part 30

The young artist is not satisfied with his picture. He has a decided artistic bent and talks of going to Rome to study; but this likeness that he is now trying to paint baffles him. It seems to lack something; although the features are correctly drawn, the whole has a strange and unnatural look.

"Bela, come here, little nephew."

The boy left the Newfoundland dog and ran to his uncle.

"Look here, look at this picture and tell me who it is."

The little fellow stared a moment at the painting with his great blue eyes. "A pretty lady," he answered.

"Don't you know your mamma, Bela?" asked the artist.

"My mamma doesn't look like that," declared the boy, and ran back to his four-footed playmate.

"The likeness is good," said Aranka encouragingly; "I am sure it is."

"But I am sure it is not," protested Jeno, "and the fault is yours.

When you sit to me you are all the time worrying about odon, and that produces exactly the expression I wish to avoid. We want to surprise him with the picture, and he mustn't see you looking so anxious and sad."

"But how can I help it?"

Alas, what tireless efforts the young man had put forth to cheer up his sister-in-law! How carefully he had hidden his own anxious forebodings and predicted an early triumph for the cause of freedom, when his own heavy heart told him it could not be.

A faint cry from the wee mite of humanity in the cradle diverted the mother's attention, and as she bent over her baby and its cry turned to a laugh, the young artist caught at last on her face the expression he had been waiting for,--the tender, happy look of a fond mother.

In the castle at Nemes...o...b..the moon was shining brightly through the windows. It fell on the family portraits, one after another, and they seemed to step from their frames like pale ghosts. Brightest and clearest among them all was the likeness of the man with the heart of stone.

Back and forth glided a woman's form clad in white. One might have thought a marble statue from the family vault had left its pedestal to join the weird a.s.sembly in the portrait gallery. The stillness of the night was broken from time to time by a sigh or a groan or a stifled cry of pain. What ghostly voices were those that disturbed the quiet of that moonlit scene?

The whole Baradlay castle had been turned into a hospital by its mistress and opened to the warriors wounded in the struggle for freedom; and it was these poor soldiers whose cries of pain now broke the stillness of the night. Two physicians were in attendance; the library was turned into a pharmacy and the great hall into a surgeon's operating-room, while the baroness and her women spent their days picking lint and preparing compresses.

Standing in the moonlight before her dead husband's portrait, the widow spoke with him. "No," said she firmly, "you shall not frighten me away. I will meet you face to face. You say to me: 'All this is your work!' I do not deny it. These groans and sighs allow neither you nor me to sleep. But you know well enough that bloodshed and suffering were inevitable; that this cup of bitterness was, sooner or later, to be drained to the bottom; that whoever would enjoy eternal life must first suffer death. You ask me what I have done with your sons. The exact contrary to what you bade me do. Two of them are fighting for their country; one of the two is wounded, and I may hear of his death any day. But I repent not of what I have done. I await what destiny has in store for us, and if I am to lose all my sons, so be it! It is better to suffer defeat in a righteous cause than to triumph in an unrighteous one."

She left the portrait and sought her own apartment, and the moonlight crept on and left the haughty face on the wall in darkness.

CHAPTER XXII.

A WOMAN'S HATRED.

In the Plankenhorst house another of those confidential interviews was being held in which Sister Remigia and her pupil were wont to take part.

Prince Windischgratz's latest despatches had brought news of a decisive engagement in the Royal Forest near Isaszeg. At seven o'clock in the evening the ban[5] had been on the point of dealing the Hungarians a final crushing blow, and the commander-in-chief had been a.s.sured he might go to sleep with no anxiety as to the issue. It was not until seven in the morning that he was awakened by the ban himself with the announcement that he had abandoned the field to the enemy.

Despatches to that effect were immediately sent to Vienna.

[Footnote 5: The victory of Croatia.]

Baroness Plankenhorst and her daughter, with Sister Remigia and Edith, sat talking over the battle of Isaszeg and the supposed victory of the Austrians. Three of the ladies were in the best of humours. In the midst of their lively discussion there came a knock at the door and Rideghvary entered. Both of the Plankenhorst ladies hastened to meet him, greeted him with loud congratulations, and seated him in an armchair. Then for the first time they noticed how pale he looked.

"What news from the front?" asked the baroness eagerly.

"Bad news," he replied; "we have lost the battle of Isaszeg."

"Impossible!" exclaimed Antoinette.

"Yes, it is true," declared the other.

"But why are you so certain of it?" asked Alfonsine. "People are so easily deceived by false rumours."

Rideghvary threw a searching glance at the speaker. "It is more than a rumour, Miss Alfonsine," said he with emphasis. "What I tell you is the truth. The messenger who brought the news was on the spot when Otto Palvicz fell."

The colour suddenly faded from the young lady's cheeks.

"Otto Palvicz?" repeated Sister Remigia. No one else uttered the name.

"Yes," returned Rideghvary, "the courier who was despatched to us was an eye-witness of the encounter between Otto Palvicz and Richard Baradlay. They aimed their swords at each other's heads both at the same time, and both fell at the same instant from their horses."

There were now two pale faces turned anxiously toward the speaker, who continued with cruel deliberation:

"Baradlay still lives; Otto Palvicz is dead."

Edith sank back with a sigh of relief and folded her hands as one who gives thanks in silence, while Alfonsine, her features convulsed with rage and despair, sprang up from her chair and stood looking down wildly upon the speaker. Her mother turned to her in alarm. Was she about to betray her carefully guarded secret? But the girl cared little then what she said or who heard her.

"Cursed be he who killed Otto Palvicz!" she exclaimed, with an ungovernable outburst of pa.s.sion; and then, overcome by her feelings, she sank down on the sofa, sobbing violently. "Oh, my dear Otto!" she moaned, and then, turning again to Rideghvary: "There is no one in this city or in the whole world that can hate better than you and I.

You know all: you have seen me and heard me. Is there any retribution in this world?"

"Yes," answered Rideghvary.

"Find it for me, even if h.e.l.l itself has to be searched for it. Do you understand me?"

"We both understand each other," was the quiet reply.

"And if at any time your hatred slumbers or your zeal slackens, come to me."

"Never fear," returned Rideghvary; "we shall see ourselves revenged in good time--though the heavens fall. We will turn all Hungary into such a scene of mourning as will live in the memory of three generations.

For the next ten years black shall be the fashionable colour to wear.

I hate my country, every blade of gra.s.s that grows in its soil, every infant at its mother's breast. And now you know me as I know you.

Whenever we have need of each other's aid, we shall not fail to lend it."

So saying, he took his hat and departed without bowing to any one in the room.

Sister Remigia, as in duty bound, sought to administer spiritual consolation and advice to Alfonsine. "Throw yourself in your affliction on Heaven's mercy," said she with unction, "and G.o.d will not fail to strengthen and console you."

Alfonsine turned upon her with a wild look. "I ask nothing of Heaven's mercy," she retorted; "I have ceased to pray."