It is time to return to Frau Fruzsinka, and to explain how she had come
to be a prisoner under the same roof as her husband.
When Fruzsinka found that Raby was, in spite of the efforts she had made
to save him, a prisoner in Pesth, her rage and disgust knew no bounds.
The abandoned woman still carried on her miserable masquerade in man's
attire, and as a pretended highwayman, continued to strike terror into
the hearts of the countryside.
One night, however, she was taken with what seemed a sudden faintness,
and seeking shelter in a peasant's hut, was betrayed by the owner to the
heydukes, and carried off by her captors to the prison in Pesth. By the
time she arrived there, she was evidently seriously ill, and appeared to
be in a high fever, although it never occurred to the prison authorities
that her malady might be infectious.
Janosics, who had hailed her arrival with ill-concealed delight,
perceiving his prisoner wore a richly embroidered kerchief round her
neck, proceeded to annex it, and bind it round his own. But this rough
undressing, to which she was subjected as a culprit, was too much for
Fruzsinka, and she soon betrayed her sex by her tears at the rough
treatment Janosics meted out to her.
As might be expected, the news soon spread that this was no highwayman,
but a woman, and she too of noble family.
Tarhalmy recognised her at once, and he tingled with shame at the
thought of Mathias Raby's wife being treated as a common felon. And the
case of a woman of Fruzsinka's position being sent there was so rare
that there was literally no provision for such prisoners in the
building, and so it came to pass that the disused "archive-room," as it
was called, the room where Mariska had been able to communicate with
Raby, was that now appointed for Fruzsinka.
"You will be rewarded for this," gasped the wretched woman. "I shall not
trouble you long, for I shall not live over to-morrow."
And when Tarhalmy, having found a maid to wait on her, was leaving the
room, she called him back to whisper:
"I know you have a daughter you love dearly. Send her away immediately
from this house, so she escape the contagion I have brought with me."
Tarhalmy hastened to warn Mariska that she might go to the house of her
aunt at Buda, and told her who the prisoner really was.
But the girl was terrified at the thought of leaving Raby, perhaps to
starve, nor did she shrink at the idea of nursing Fruzsinka, but begged
her father to let her remain at home, and tend the sick woman.
But Tarhalmy would not let her carry her self-abnegation so far.
Meantime, the doctor came, and deceived by the patient's symptoms, which
seemed to him those of an ordinary fever, made a false diagnosis of
Fruzsinka's case, and failed to recognise her malady for what it really
was--the oriental plague, which was then raging in the near East.
But the plague-stricken woman would not allow a soul to come near her,
and refused all attempt at help or consolation, for she, being a
Calvinist, would not even see the kindly Capuchin friar who came to
offer his services.
And Mariska was allowed to remain till the news of Lievenkopp's
threatening mission determined her father to send her away.
As for that officer's demand, it was, deemed Tarhalmy, a question to be
settled by the Pesth tribunal, and the still closed door of the
prisoner's dungeon would be the answer to the Emperor's mandate, whilst
the prisoner himself, when it came to the execution of justice, should
know who was master in Pesth!
Surely Tarhalmy had good reasons for sending his daughter away.
Thus was Raby bereft of his guardian-angel, and so it came to pass that
his evil genius, his wretched wife, lay dying in the room over his
dungeon.
But Fruzsinka's prophecy came true; she died the next day, and was
promptly buried. No one mourned the dead woman, as no one had excused
her.