The Strange Story of Rab Raby Part 8

CHAPTER IX.

The postmaster did exactly as he had promised, and he did it promptly.

"Now I have got the house, you've got to set up housekeeping, but don't buy much furniture, the wife will see to that. Till you get a wife, I'll lend you my maid-servant to keep house; she's also a good hand at milking, for a cow you must have; and your cooking will have to be done at home, for there is no cafe or hotel here, as at Vienna. And don't trust your wine-cellar key to anyone else!"

Mathias Raby took this good advice, and arranged his new house as if he were settling down for good in it. He had his fields sown with crops, his vineyards overhauled, and laid in a stock of winter provisions. But he encouraged no gossips, took no interest in outsiders, and was reserved with acquaintances to the verge of taciturnity.

But general rumour had it that the gentleman who had thus settled among them, had been sent by the Kaiser himself to investigate matters of state in Szent-Endre.

Soon after this, Raby made an excuse for going to Pesth so as to call on the Tarhalmys.

Tarhalmy was the county notary, and lived in the a.s.sembly House a.s.signed him. Raby knew it well, for when he was a clerk, he used to go there every day. When he reached the door, the heyduke who stood sentry, barred his way, with his musket under his arm, one foot crossed over the other, and his shoulder against the door.

"Tell me, my friend," for thus did Raby accost the old heyduke, "is the worshipful p.r.o.notary at home?"

The man answered, his worship had just gone out, but his lady-daughter was within, and would be delighted to see the honourable gentleman.

Raby hastened up the familiar wooden stairs, that were so well worn down the middle.

Our hero needed no guide through these rooms. He knew all the nooks and corners of the house, and likewise the time at which callers might come--between the hours of three and four in the afternoon. First he betook himself to the ante-room, where he laid aside his sword and hat.

But there was no lackey there to announce him, he had to knock therefore at the first door, to hear a "come in," before he ventured to enter without further preamble.

It was the familiar dining-room, where the women-folk were used to betake themselves to their spinning-wheels.

They sat there now, the Fraulein and the two maids. The spinning-wheel was to our grandmothers what the cycle is to the women of to-day; nay, it took also the place of the pianoforte itself.

Mariska had certainly grown very pretty since Raby had last seen her, although, as Mr. Leanyfalvy had remarked, she was quite simply dressed, and did not curl her hair. He was also quite right about her blushing when she was spoken to. In this instance, words indeed were not needed to bring the colour into her cheeks, she no sooner saw the visitor, than she crimsoned to the roots of her hair. The young girl rose respectfully from the spinning-wheel, glanced shyly at the intruder, and ere he could forbid it, had made him a childish curtsey and kissed his hand.

Raby was very nearly being angry.

"But, Mariska, do you not recognise me?"

"How should I help recognising you, Matyi?"

"Why then do you kiss my hand?"

"Ah, you have become a great man since those days."

"Were I ever so great a man, I would not allow my hand to be kissed by a lady."

"But I am no lady, you see."

"Nor am I a great man. And now please give me your hands that I may kiss them."

But the girl put both hands behind her back.

"No, for then should I be a lady indeed. Please be seated."

She motioned Raby to the leather-covered sofa, and sat down again by the spinning-wheel, as she deftly began afresh to twist the flax into fine silky threads, so that they could talk if they wanted to.

The two maid-servants did not leave the room, but just listened to all that their mistress and her visitor said; it was but proper, they thought.

Raby was meanwhile thinking how to baffle the maids. To this end he asked in German what she was doing?

The young girl gazed at him with her great blue eyes full of sorrowful amazement. Fancy expecting that in the household of the p.r.o.notary of Pesth, that stronghold of Magyar freedom, that anyone, much more the daughter of the house, should speak German! She lowered her eyes, and whispered timidly, "I do not understand German."

"You do not understand German? Why, whatever would you do if you went to a ball here in Pesth, and could not speak to your partners?"

"I never go to any b.a.l.l.s; I can't even dance," murmured the girl.

"You mean to say, you don't dance? Well then, however do you amuse yourself?"

"When I have time for it, I read."

"And what in the world do you read, if you only know Hungarian?" asked Raby.

"Father has a fine library, and so he chooses books for me."

"And how do you spend the whole day?"

"Oh! I have a small garden in the courtyard; I love flowers!"

Tho two were silent, and Raby looked around him.

The whole room was eloquent to him of the past. There, by the work-table, was still the little box containing thread, scissors, and thimble, which he himself had made when he was a clerk. There over the couch, hung a withered wreath of dried flowers which he recognised.

Nothing was lost; all had been carefully preserved, even the pen which he had used for the last time in the office, rested still behind the mirror with his name inscribed upon the holder.

And yet they had not expected him; all these souvenirs had not been spread out at the news of his coming. They were, everyone, abiding witnesses to the way in which his memory was cherished in a guileless maiden's heart which loves, while it yet hardly knows what love is.

Mathias Raby was surely strangely ungrateful to the fate which had preserved such a treasure for him. But it is the way of youth, so unregardful is it of the treasures true love spreads for its unheeding eyes, to be its own for the asking.

But his meditations were interrupted by the entrance of Miska, the heyduke, who came to announce that his worship, the notary, was ready to see Mr. Raby if he would wait upon him in the bureau.

Raby rose from his seat, and took leave of his hostess, who accompanied him to the door.

There they exchanged the usual farewell greetings, and she laid her little hand in his shyly, as if fearing the ceremonial kiss. As Raby took the small soft fingers in his, a magnetic shock, as it were, thrilled his being, so that he would fain have asked the question which was on his lips, the question the girl would have seen in his eyes, had she but raised her own.

And Mariska, too, yearned to ask him, "How long do you stay?" How gladly would she have heard the answer that it was for some time, how naturally would the invitation have risen to her lips to Raby to come again often and see them.

But instead of all this, they did but hold each other's hands a moment half-fearfully, as if each were afraid of the other's kiss.

This once, at any rate, did Raby have the chance of grasping that invisible golden thread which runs once through the life of every mortal. Well for him who seizes it, for it will lead him safely through all perils, but woe to him who lets it go! He cannot pick it up again.

Raby did not seize the thread.

"Good-bye!" they murmured. And a right good word it is this "G.o.d be with you!" Yet what if man refuses the blessing the good G.o.d proffers him?