THE FINGER-POST OF DEATH
Lorand threw himself exhausted into his arm-chair.
There was an end to every attempt at escape.
He had been recognized by the very woman who ought to detest him more
bitterly than anyone in the world.
Nemesis! the liberal hand of everlasting justice!
He had deserted that woman in the middle of the road, on which they were
flying together passionately into degradation, and now that he wished to
return to life, that woman blocked his way.
There was no hope of pity. Besides, who would accept it--from such a
hand? At such a price? Such a present must be refused, were it life
itself.
Farewell calm happy life! Farewell, intoxicating love!
There was only one way, a direct one--to the opened tomb.
They would laugh over the fallen, but at least not to his face.
The father had departed that way, albeit he had a loving wife, and
growing children:--but he was alone in the world. He owed nobody any
duty.
There were two enfeebled, frail shadows on earth, to which he owed a
duty of care; but they would soon follow him, they had no very long
course to run.
Fate must be accomplished.
The father's blood besprinkled the sons. One spirit drew the other after
it by the hand, till at last all would be there at home together.
Only a few days more remained.
These few days he must be gay and cheerful: must deceive every eye and
heart, that followed attentively him who approached the end of his
journey,--that no one might suspect anything.
There was still one more precaution to be taken.
Desiderius might arrive before the fatal day. In his last letter he had
hinted at it. That must be prevented. The meeting must be arranged
otherwise.
He hurriedly wrote a letter to his brother to come to meet him at
Szolnok on the day before the anniversary, and wait for him at the inn.
He gave as his reason the cynicism of Topandy. He did not wish to
introduce him as a discord in that tender scene. Then they could meet,
and from there could go together to visit their parents.
The plan was quite intelligible and natural. Lorand at once despatched
the letter to the post.
So does the cautious traveler drive from his route at the outset, the
obstacles which might delay him.
Scarcely had he sent the letter off when Topandy entered his room.
Lorand went to meet him. Topandy embraced and kissed him.
"I thank you that you chose my home as a place of refuge from your
prosecutors, my dear Lorand; but there is no need longer to keep in
hiding. Later events have long washed out what happened ten years ago,
and you may return to the world without being disturbed."
"I have known that long since: why, we read the newspapers; but I prefer
to remain here. I am quite satisfied with this world."
"You have a mother and a brother from whom you have no reason to hide."
"I only wish to meet them when I can introduce myself to them as a happy
man."
"That depends on yourself."
"A few days will prove it."
"Be as quick as you can with it. Let only one thought possess your mind:
Melanie is now in Sarvoelgyi's house. The great spiritual delight it will
afford me to think of the hypocrite's death-face which that Pharisee
will make when that trivial woman discloses to him that the young man,
who is living in the neighborhood, is Loerincz Aronffy's son, can only be
surpassed by my anxiety for you, caused by his knowledge of the fact.
For, believe me, he will leave no stone unturned to prevent you, who
will remind him of that night when we spoke of great and little things,
from being able to strike root in this world. He will even talk Melanie
over."
Lorand, shrugging his shoulders, said with light-hearted indifference:
"Melanie is not the only girl on this earth."
"Well said. I don't care. You are my son: and she whom you bring here is
my daughter. Only bring her; the sooner the better."
"It will not take a week."
"Better still. If you want to act, act quickly. In such cases, either
quickly or not at all; either courageously or never."
"There will be no lack of courage."
Topandy spoke of marriage, Lorand of a pistol.
"Well in a week's time I shall be able to give my blessing on your
choice."
"Certainly."
Topandy did not wish to dive further into Lorand's secret. He suspected
the young fellow was choosing between two girls, and did not imagine
that he had already chosen a third:--the one with the down-turned
torch.[69]
Lorand during the following days was as cheerful as a bridegroom during
the week preceding his marriage--so cheerful!--as his father had been
the evening before his death.
[Footnote 69: The torch, which should have been held upright for the
marriage festivities, would be held upside down for the festivities of
death, just as the life would be reversed.]
The last day but one came: May again, but not so chilly as ten years
before. The air in the park was flower-perfumed, full of lark trills,
and nightingale ditties.
Czipra was chasing butterflies on the lawn.
Ever since Melanie had left the house, Czipra's sprightly mood had
returned. She too played in the lovely spring, with the playful birds of
song.
Lorand allowed her to draw him into her circle of playmates:
"How does this hyacinth look in my hair?"
"It suits you admirably, Czipra."
The gypsy girl took off Lorand's hat, and crowned it with a wreath of
leaves, then put it back again, changing its position again and again
until she found out how it suited him best.
Then she pressed his hand under her arm, laid her burning face upon his
shoulder, and thus strolled about with him.
Poor girl! She had forgotten, forgiven everything already!
Six days had passed since that ruling rival had left the house: Lorand
was not sad, did not pine after her, he was good-humored, witty, and
playful; he enjoyed himself. Czipra believed their stars were once more
approaching each other.
Lorand, the smiling and gay Lorand, was thinking that he had but one
more day to live; and then--adieu to the perfumed fields, adieu to the
songster's echo, adieu to the beautiful, love-lorn gypsy girl!
They went arm-in-arm across the bridge, that little bridge that spanned
the brook. They stopped in the middle of the bridge and leaning upon the
railing looked down into the water;--in the self same place where
Melanie's engagement ring fell into the water. They gazed down into the
water-mirror, and the smooth surface reflected their figures; the gypsy
girl still wore a green dress, and a rose-colored sash, but Lorand still
saw Melanie's face in that mirror.
In this place her hand had been in his: in that place she had said of
the lost ring "leave it alone:" in that place he had clasped her in his
arms!
And to-morrow even that would cause no pain!
Topandy now joined them.
"Do you know what, Lorand?" said the old Manichean cheerily: "I thought
I would accompany you this afternoon to Szolnok. We must celebrate the
day you meet your brother: we must drink to it!"
"Will you not take me with you?" inquired Czipra half in jest.
"No!" was the simultaneous reply from both sides.
"Why not?"
"Because it is not fit for you _there_.--There is no room for you
_there_!"
Both replied the same.
Topandy meant "You cannot take part in men's carousals; who knows what
will become of you?" while Lorand--meant something else.
"Well, and when will Lorand return?" inquired Czipra eagerly.
"He must first return to his parents," answered Topandy.
(--"Thither indeed" thought Lorand, "to father and grandfather"--)
"But he will not remain _there_ forever?"
At that both men laughed loudly. What kind of expression was that word
"forever" in one's mouth? Is there a measure for time?
"What will you bring me when you return?" inquired the girl childishly.
Lorand was merciless enough to jest: he tore down a leaf which was
round, like a small coin; placing that on the palm of her hand, he said:
"Something no greater than the circumference of this leaf."
Two understood that he meant "a ring," but what he meant was a "bullet"
in the centre of his forehead.
How pitiless are the jests of a man ready for death.
Their happy dalliance was interrupted by the butler who came to announce
that a young gentleman was waiting to speak with Master Lorand.
Lorand's heart beat fast! It must be Desi!
Had he not received the letter? Had he not acceded to his brother's
request? He had after all come one day sooner than his deliberate
permission had allowed.
Lorand hastened up to the castle.
Topandy called after him:
"If it is a good friend of yours bring him down here into the park: he
must dine with us."
"We shall wait here by the bridge," Czipra added: and there she remained
on the bridge, she did not herself know why, gazing at those plants on
the surface of the water, that were hiding Melanie's ring.
Lorand hastened along the corridors in despondent mood: if his brother
had really come, his last hours would be doubly embittered.
That simulation, that comedy of cynical frivolity, would be difficult to
play before him.
The new arrival was waiting for him in the reception room.
When Lorand opened the door and stood face to face with him, an entirely
new surprise awaited him.
The young cavalier who had thus hastened to find him was not his brother
Desi, but--Pepi Gyali.
Pepi was no taller, no more manly-looking than he had been ten years
before; he had still that childish face, those tiny features, the same
refined movements. He was still as strict an adherent to fashion: and if
time had wrought a change in him, it was only to be seen in a certain,
distinguished bearing,--that of those who often have the opportunity of
playing the protector toward their former friends.
"Good day, dear Lorand," he said in a gay tone, anticipating Lorand. "Do
you still recognize me?"
("Ah," thought Lorand: "you are here as the finger-post of death.")
"I did not want to avoid you: as soon as I knew from the Balnokhazys
that you were here, I came to find you."
After all it was "_she_" that had put him on Lorand's track!
"I have business here with Sarvoelgyi in Madame Balnokhazy's interest--a
legal agreement."
Lorand's only thought, while Gyali was uttering these words, was--how
to behave himself in the presence of this man.
"I hope," said the visitor tenderly extending his hand to Lorand, "that
that old wrangle which happened ten years ago has long been forgotten by
you--as it has by me."
("He wishes to make me recollect it, if perchance I had forgotten.")
"And we shall again be faithful comrades and true."
One thought ran like lightning in a moment through Lorand's brain. "If I
kick this fellow out now as would be my method, everyone would clearly
understand the origin of the catastrophe, and take it as satisfaction
for an insult. No, they must have no such triumph: this wretch must see
that the man who is gazing into the face of his own death is in no way
behind him, who burns to persecute him to the end with exquisiteness, in
cheerful mood."
So Lorand did not get angry, did not show any sullenness or melancholy,
but, as he was wont to do in student days of yore, slapped the dandy's
open hand and grasped it in manly fashion.
"So glad to see you, Pepi. Why the devil should I not have recognised
you? Only I imagined that you would have aged as much as I have since
that time, and now you stand before me the same as ever. I almost asked
you what we had to learn for to-morrow?"
"I am glad of that! Nothing has caused me any displeasure in my life
except the fact that we parted in anger--we, the gay comrades!--and
quarrelled!--why? for a dirty newspaper! The devil take them all!--Taken
all together they are not worth a quarrel between two comrades. Well,
not a word more about it!"
"Well, my boy, very well, if your intentions are good. In any case we
are country fellows who can stand a good deal from one another. To-day
we calumniate each other, to-morrow we carouse together."
Ha, ha, ha!
"But you must introduce me to the old man. I hear he is a gay old fool.
He does not like priests. Why I can tell him enough tales about priests
to keep him going for a week. Come, introduce me. I know his mouth will
never cease laughing, once I begin upon him."
"Naturally it is understood that you will remain here with us."
"Of course. Old Sarvoelgyi, as it is, had made sour faces enough at the
unusual invasion of guests: and he has a cursedly sullen housekeeper.
Besides it is disagreeable always to have to say nice things to the two
ladies: that's not why a fellow comes to the country. _A propos_, I hear
you have a beautiful gypsy girl here."
"You know that too, already?"
"I hope you are not jealous of her?"
"What, the devil! of a gypsy girl?"
("Well just try it with her," thought Lorand, "at any rate you will get
'per procura,' that box on the ears which I cannot give you.")
"Ha, ha! we shall not fight a duel for a gypsy girl, shall we, my boy?"
"Nor for any other girl."
"You have become a wise man like me: I like that. A woman is only a
woman. Among others, what do you say to Madame Balnokhazy? I find she is
still more beautiful than her daughter. _Ma foi_, on my word of honor!
Those ten years on the stage have only done her good. I believe she is
still in love with you."
"That's quite natural," said Lorand in jesting scorn.
In the meantime they had reached the park; they found Topandy and Czipra
by the bridge. Lorand introduced Pepi Gyali as his old school-fellow.
That name fairly magnetized Czipra.--Melanie's fiance!--So the lover had
come after his bride. What a kind fellow this Pepi Gyali was! A really
most amiable young man!
Gyali quite misunderstood the favorable impression his name and
appearance made on Czipra: he was ready to attribute it to his
irresistible charms.
After briefly making the acquaintance of the old man, he very rapidly
took over the part of courtier, which every cavalier according to the
rules of the world is bound to do; besides, she was a gypsy girl,
and--Lorand was not jealous.
"You have in one moment explained to me something over which I have
racked my brains a whole day."
"What can that be?" inquired Czipra curiously.
"How it is that some one can prefer fried fish and fried rolls at
Sarvoelgyi's to cabbage at Topandy's?"
"Who may that someone be?"
"Why, I could not understand that Miss Melanie was able to persuade
herself to change this house for that; now I know: she must have put up
with a great persecution here."
"Persecution?" said Czipra, astonished:--the gentlemen too stared at the
speaker.--"Who would have persecuted her?"
"Who? Why these eyes!" said Gyali, gazing flatteringly into Czipra's
eyes. "The poor girl could not stand the rivalry. It is quite natural
that the moon, however sweet and poetic a phenomenon, always flees
before the sun."
To Czipra this speech was very surprising. There are many who do not
like overburdened sweetness.
"Ah, Melanie is far more beautiful than I," she said, casting her eyes
down, and growing very serious.
"Well it is my bounden duty to believe in that, as in all the miracles
of the apostles: but I cannot help it, if you have made a heretic of
me."
Czipra turned her head aside and gazed down into the water with eyes of
insulted pride: while Lorand, who was standing behind Gyali, thought
within himself:
("If I take you by the neck and drown you in that water, you would
deserve it, and it will do good to my soul: but I should know I had
murdered you: and no one should ever be able to boast of _that_? My name
shall never be connected with yours in death.")
For Lorand might well have known that Gyali's appearance on that day
had no other object than that of reminding Lorand of his awful
obligation.
"My dear boy," said Lorand patting Gyali's shoulder playfully, "I must
show what a general I should have made. I have an important journey this
afternoon to Szolnok."
"Well, go; don't bother yourself on my account. Do exactly as you
please."
"That's not how matters lie, Pepi: you must not stay here in the
meantime."
"The devil! Perhaps you will turn me out?"
"Oh dear no! To-night we shall have a glorious carnival at Szolnok, in
honor of my regeneration. All the gay fellows of the neighborhood are
invited to it. You must come with us too."
"Ha! Your regeneration carnival!" cried Gyali, in a voice of ecstasy,
the while gazing at Czipra apologetically. "Albeit other magnets draw me
hither with overpowering force--I must go there without fail. I must
deliver a 'toast' at your 'regeneration' festival, Lorand."
"My brother Desi will also be there."
"Oho! little Desi? That little rebel. Well all the better. We shall have
much in common with him; of old he was an amusing boy, with his serious
face. Well I shall go with you. I sacrifice myself. I capitulate. Well
we shall go to Szolnok to-night."
Why, anyone might have seen plainly--had he not come that day just to
revel in the agony of Lorand?
"Yes, Pepi," Lorand assured him, "we shall be gay as we were once ten
years ago. Much hidden joy awaits us: we shall break in suddenly upon
it. Well, you are coming with us."
"Without fail: only be so good as to send some one next door for my
traveling-cloak. I shall go with you to your 'regeneration' fete!"
And once again he grasped Lorand's hand tenderly, as one who was
incapable of expressing in words all the good wishes with which his
heart was brimming over.
"You see I should have been a good general after all," said Lorand
smiling. "How beautifully I captured the besieging army."
"Oh, not at all; the blockade is still being kept up."
"But starvation will be a difficult matter where the garrison is well
nourished."
The poor gypsy girl did not understand a word of all this jesting, which
was uttered for her edification: and if she had understood it, was she
not a gypsy girl, just to be sported with in this manner?
Were not Topandy and his comrades wont to jest with her after this
manner.
But Czipra did not laugh over these jests as much as she had done at
other times.
It exercised a distasteful influence upon her heart, when this young
dandy spoke so lightly of Melanie, and even slighted her before the eyes
of another girl. Did all men speak so of their loved ones? And do men
speak so of every girl?
Topandy turned the conversation. He knew his man at the first glance: he
had many weak sides. He began to "my lord" him, and made inquiries about
those foreign princes, whose plenipotentiary minister M. Gyali was
pleased to be.
That had its effect.
Gyali became at once a different person: he strove to maintain an
imposing bearing with a view to raising his dignity, for all the world
as if he had swallowed a poker; he straightened his eyebrows, put his
hands behind him under the tails of his lilac-colored dress-coat and
formed his mouth into the true diplomatic shape.
It was a supreme opportunity for being able to display his grandiose
achievements. Let that other see how high he had flown, while others had
remained fastened to the earth.
"I have just concluded a splendid business for his Excellency, the
Prince of Hohenelm-Weitbreitstein."
"A ruling prince, of course?" inquired Topandy, in naive wonder.
"Why, you know that."
"Of course, of course. His possessions lie just where the corners of the
great principalities of Lippedetmold, Schwarzburg-Sondershausen and
Reuss-major meet."
Oh, Gyali must have been very full of self-confidence when he answered
to the old magistrate's peculiar geographical definition, "yes."
"Your lordship has already doubtless found an excellent situation in the
Principality?"
"I have an order and a title, the gift of His Excellency."
"Of course it may lead to more."
"Oh yes. In return for my winning His Excellency's domains, which he
inherited on his mother's side, he will settle on me 5,000 acres of
land."
"In Hohenelm-Weitbreitstein?"
"No: here in the Magyar country."
"I thought in Hohenelm-Weitbreitstein: for that is a beautiful country."
Gyali began to see that it was after all something more than simplicity
that could give utterance to such easily recognized exaggeration; and
when the old man began to inform him, in which section of which chapter
of the Corpus Juris would be found inscribed His Excellency's Magyar
"indigenatus," etc., etc., Gyali began to feel exceedingly
uncomfortable, and began to again change the course of the conversation.
He chattered on about His Excellency being a fine, free-thinking man,
related a hundred anecdotes about him, how he turned out the Jesuits
from his possessions, what jokes he had played on the monks, how he
persecuted the pietists, and other such things as might be very
inconvenient incumbrances to the Principality of
Hohenelm-Weitbreitstein,--in the case of any such principality existing
in the world.
The theme lasted the whole of dinner time.
Czipra wanted to do all she could to-day for herself. For the
farewell-dinner she sought out all that she had found Lorand liked, and
Lorand was ungrateful enough to allow Gyali the field of compliment to
himself: he could not say one good word to her.
Yet who knew when he would sit at that table again?
Dinner over, Lorand spent a few minutes in running over the house: to
give instructions to every servant as to what was to be done in the
fields, the garden and the forest before his return in two weeks' time.
He gave everyone a tip to drink to his health; for to-morrow he was to
celebrate a great festival.
Topandy, too, was looking over the preparations for the journey. Czipra
was the lady of the house: it was her task, as it had always been, to
amuse the guest who remained alone. Topandy never troubled himself to
amuse anyone, for whose entertainment he was responsible. Czipra was
there, he must listen to what she had to say.
In the meantime the butler, who had been sent to Sarvoelgyi's to bring
Gyali's traveling cloak, came back.
He brought also a letter from the young lady for Lorand.
"From the young lady?"
Lorand took the letter from him and told him to take the cloak up to the
guest's room.
He himself hastened to his own room.
As he passed through the saloon, Gyali met him, coming from Czipra's
room. The dandy's face was peculiarly flurried.
"My dear friend," he said to Lorand, "that gypsy girl of yours is a
regular female panther, and you have trained her well, I can tell
you.--Where is there a looking-glass?"
"Yes she is," replied Lorand. He scarcely knew why he said it: he heard,
but only unconsciously.
Only that letter! Melanie's letter!
He was in such a hurry to reach his room with it. Once there and alone,
he shut the door, kissed the fine rose-colored note, and its azure-blue
letters, the red seal upon it; and clasped it to his breast, as if he
would find out from his heart what was in it.
Well, and what could be in it?
Lorand put the letter down before him and laid his fist heavily upon it.
"Must I know what is in that letter?
"Suppose she writes that she loves me, and awaits happiness from me,
that her love can outbalance a whole lost world, that she is ready to
follow me across the sea, beyond the mocking sneers of acquaintances,
and to disappear with me among the hosts of forgotten figures!
"No. I shall not break open this letter.
"My last step shall not be hesitating.
"And if what seems such a chance meeting is nought but a well planned
revenge? If they have all along been agreed and have only come here
together that they may force me to confess that I am humiliated, that I
beg for happiness, for love, that I am afraid of death because I am in
love with the smiling faces of life; and when I have confessed that,
they will laugh in my face, and will leave me to the contempt of the
whole world, of my own self....
"Let them marry each other!"
Lorand took the beautiful note and locked it up in the drawer of his
table, unopened, unread.
His last thought must be that perhaps he had been loved, and that last
thought would be lightened by the uncertainty: only "perhaps."
And now to prepare for that journey.
It was Lorand's wont to carry two good pistols on a journey. These he
carefully loaded afresh, then hid them in his own traveling trunk.
He left his servant to pack in the trunk as much linen as would be
enough for two weeks, for they were going to journey farther.
Topandy had two carriages ready, his traveling coach and a wagon.
When the carriages drove up, Lorand put on his traveling cloak, lit his
pipe and went down into the courtyard.
Czipra was arranging all matters in the carriages, the trunks were bound
on tightly and the wine-case with its twenty-four bottles of choice
wine, packed away in a sure place.
"You are a good girl after all, Czipra," said Lorand, tenderly patting
the girl's back.
"After all?"
Was he really so devoted to that pipe that he could not take it from his
mouth for one single moment?
Yet she had perhaps deserved a farewell kiss.
"Sit with my uncle in the coach, Pepi," said Lorand to the dandy, "with
me you might risk your life. I might turn you over into the ditch
somewhere and break your neck. And it would be a pity for such a
promising youth."
Lorand sprang up onto the seat and took the reins in his hands.
"Well, adieu, Czipra!"--The coach went first, the wagon following.
Czipra stood at the street-door and gazed from there at the disappearing
youth, as long as she could see him, resting her head sadly against the
doorpost.
But he did not glance back once.
He was going at a gallop towards his doom.
And when evening overtakes the travelers, and the night's million lights
have appeared, and the tiny glowworms are twinkling in the ditches and
hedges, the young fellow will have time enough to think on that theme:
that eternal law rules alike over the worlds and the atoms--but what is
the fate of the intermediate worms? that of the splendid fly? that of
ambitious men and nations struggling for their existence? "Fate gives
justice into the two hands of the evil one, that while with the right he
extinguishes his life, with the left he may stifle the soul."