Poor Raby, he was a prisoner in such surroundings that they would have
served for the wildest page of romance. No sound came to him from the
outer world, as he lay there chained to the blank wall in his living
grave--the underground dungeon whose door no key opened. Yet for all
this he was not forgotten.
In the deathlike stillness of the night he heard what sounded like a
noise of scratching in the roof of his cell, as if someone were trying
to bore through the ceiling.
All at once the sound ceased, and from above he heard a well-remembered
voice: "Poor Raby!" it murmured.
At the sound, a thrill of joy shook the prisoner, in spite of his
fetters; it spoke to him of life and hope.
"Can you hear me?" asked the voice.
"Perfectly," answered Raby.
"Trust in God, He will deliver you, He will not let you be lost. If
to-morrow you hear a sound of knocking, give heed. Good-bye."
Then there was again stillness. But Raby slept in his heavy fetters
rocked by that hope, as peacefully as a child in its mother's arms.
When he awoke at daybreak, it seemed like a dream, till he was reminded
of its reality by a light tapping on the ceiling of his cell.
And then, just over his head, there appeared a long hollow cane thrust
down from a small aperture in the roof, and it came lower and lower till
it reached his fettered hands.
"Have you got it?" asked the voice. "If so, open it carefully."
Raby carefully opened the sealed end and found a minute phial of ink,
and an equally slender pen made from a crow's feather. Round it was
rolled a sheet of paper.
"Write, and I will wait to take it," said the voice, and the prisoner,
as might be imagined, was not long in obeying the request of his unseen
monitress. Carefully and minutely, in spite of his fettered hand, he
traced on the paper a letter to the Emperor, telling him all that had
happened, and in the relief of giving this welcome vent to his feelings,
he forgot his wretched surroundings. When it was done he rolled up the
paper, tucked it in the cane, and pushed it up again through the
ceiling.
On the evening of the next day he heard the voice again: "Dear Raby,
take courage. Your letter has gone to Vienna by the Jew Abraham."
Raby's heart warmed at this news, it would mean at the most only a week
more of his present captivity--and for that time he had bread and water
enough.
Meantime, before the said week came to an end, his Excellency the
governor sent for Mr. Laskoy.
"We are in a nice quandary, my friend, and you will have to get us out
of it; hear what has happened," and his Excellency paused as if to
emphasise what was to follow. "Three days after Raby was imprisoned, the
Emperor summoned me to Vienna. I went as fast as posts could carry me,
to hear, as his first question: 'What have the authorities done with
Raby?'
"I told him that Mathias Raby had already had a fair hearing before the
magistracy, but that owing to a dangerous sickness which had suddenly
overtaken him, he was now in the hands of the doctor, pending being
confronted with his accusers. The Emperor did not interrupt me, but when
I had done, out he comes with a letter written by your prisoner in spite
of his irons and fast barred door, setting forth his grievances to his
master in very plain terms. And I can assure you he didn't spare either
of us."
Laskoy was petrified with amazement. "That means," pursued his
Excellency, "that Raby has found ways and means of writing to the Kaiser
from his dungeon. When I had read the letter through, the Emperor said:
'Mark my words, if Mathias Raby is not released from prison by the day
after to-morrow (you will be back in Pesth by then), I shall give orders
that his custodians be themselves arrested and put in the Dark Tower for
the rest of their lives on bread and water. So you see what you have to
reckon with, and the best thing you can do is to set the prisoner free
at once.'"
The lieutenant did not want urging, he rode to the prison in hot haste,
and demanded to see the head-gaoler. No sooner had Janosics appeared,
bearing his huge bunch of keys, than Laskoy sprang at him straight away
like a wild cat, seized him by the ears, and banged his head against the
door unmercifully, till the keys rattled again in his hands.
"Take that for your pains," he cried, "I'll teach you how to look after
your prisoners! What do you mean by letting Raby write to the Emperor
from his dungeon?"
The castellan was dumbfoundered with pain and amazement. "All I can say
is, your worship," he cried, rubbing his head, "that Raby must be in
league with the Devil."
And though all the authorities of Pesth put their heads together, they
could not solve the mystery. The only thing they were clear upon was
that Janosics deserved fifty strokes with the lash, a punishment he
promptly received.
* * * * *
The following day his Excellency went to the Assembly House, and two
letters were put into his hands by Laskoy with a crafty smile. Both were
in Raby's handwriting. The one was dated from Szent-Endre; it contained
an expression of the writer's gratitude for his release by the Pesth
authorities, and his willingness to abide henceforth by the laws of the
land. Further, it announced his determination to withdraw from public
life and attend to his private concerns, and the writer begged that the
accompanying letter, if it met with the governor's approbation, might
be, after reading, forwarded by special messenger to the Emperor.
The second missive contained a formal admission by the writer that he
had been led astray by false evidence, that the story of the
treasure-chest was a lying invention of the deceased "pope"; further it
expressed his regret at having caused the Pesth magistracy so much
inconvenience, and his determination not to return to Vienna but to pass
the rest of his life in the country, to which end he begged the pension
allotted to him might be sent to him at Szent-Endre.
His Excellency immediately dispatched this missive to Vienna, and drove
back home. You do not imprison Pesth people so easily in the Dark Tower.
* * * * *
Yes, it was all very cleverly arranged, but perhaps the reader will not
be surprised to learn that Raby still languished in his dungeon a closer
captive than ever. At the discovery of Raby's letter to the Emperor, a
contingent of heydukes had visited the prisoner in his cell, searched
the dungeon for ink and paper, but in vain, for the thick rime which
glazed the ceiling, effectually hid the small hole at the top. The
result was that, failing to get any light on the mystery, Raby was
fettered closer than before, the door barred and sealed with the
lieutenant's own private seal, and the prisoner was once more left to
the solitude of his cell.
And as for the supposed letters, why they were easily accounted for by
the fact that an accomplished forger then in prison, who was anxious to
please his judges to the best of his ability, which was great, had
written them at their bidding.
So Raby waited till his good angel again provided him, by means of the
hole in the ceiling, with ink and paper in the cane, but this time he
only wrote the words, "I am still here, your Majesty," and signed it
with his blood, for his foot was bleeding profusely through the chain
cutting into it. But even this was assuaged by his protectress by means
of a linen bandage concealed in the cane, with which Raby was enabled to
bind up his ankle.
Before the week was out, his dungeon-door was opened one morning, and an
unusually large allowance of bread, and two pitchers of water were
thrust into his cell. Then the man he had seen once before, whom he
recognised as a mason, appeared with his assistants, and with their
help, took his cell door off its hinges, and proceeded to brick it up.
And through Raby's mind ran old stories he had read of people being
walled up alive in the Middle Ages, and a shuddering horror fell upon
him, at the fate reserved for him.