THE LAST WILL AND TESTAMENT.
They already expected Rudolf at the Castle. The moment he dismounted,
Paul, who was awaiting him in the hall, led him straight to Kárpáthy.
The servants all wore black since their mistress had been buried, and
all the mirrors and escutcheons in the rooms were still covered with the
black crape with which they had been enveloped on the day of the
funeral.
Squire John was waiting for Rudolf in his private room, and as soon as
he saw him enter, he rose from his seat, hastened to meet him, and
warmly pressed his hand.
"Many thanks, Rudolf, many thanks for coming. Pardon me for sending for
you at such an hour and in such hot haste. God has brought you. Thank
you very much for coming. Rudolf, a peculiar feeling has come over me.
Three days ago, a strange sort of sensation, not unpleasant, took
possession of my limbs, and when I awoke from my sleep in the night it
was with a odd sort of joy, I know not how to express it, as if my soul
had quitted me. I take it as an omen of my death. Do not gainsay me, I
beg. I am not afraid of death; I long for it. At such times a quick
current of air brushes past my ear, as if some one were about to fly
away from close beside me. I know what that means. Twice I have had a
similar sensation, and on each occasion a current of air has struck me.
I fancy this will be the last of them. I think of it with joy, and have
not the slightest fear of it. I have sent for you in order that I may
make my last will, while I still have the possession of all my
faculties, and I wish you to be my executor. Will you accept the trust?"
Rudolf indicated his willingness in silence.
"Then come with me to my library. The other witnesses are waiting there
now. I have got them together as rapidly as I could, and they are all
honest fellows."
As they were passing through the suite of rooms, Squire John suddenly
stopped Rudolf, and said--
"Look! in this room I heard her laugh for the last time. On that chair
yonder she lost her shawl--it is there still. On that table is a pair of
gloves, the last she ever wore. Here she used to sit when she sketched.
There's the piano, still open--a _fantasia_ lies, you see, on the
music-stand. If she should come back again, eh?"
And now he opened the door of a room illuminated by candles--Rudolf
shrunk back.
"Old friend, that's not a fit place to enter. Surely you have lost
yourself in your own house! That is your wife's bedroom."
"I know, but I can never pass it without going in. And now I mean to
have a last look at it, for to-morrow I shall have it walled up. Look,
everything remains just as she left it. She did not die in this
room--don't be alarmed! That door yonder leads to the garden. Look,
everything is in its old place--there the lamp by which she used to
read, on the table a half-written letter, which nobody has read. A
hundred times have I entered the room, and not a word of that letter
have I read. To me it is holy. In front of the bed are her two little
embroidered slippers, so tiny that they look as if they had been made
for a child. On the table is an open prayer-book, between the open
leaves of which are an iris and an amaranth and a maple leaf. She
greatly loved those flowers."
"Let us go away from hence, let us go away," urged Rudolf. "It pains me
to hear you talk so."
"It pains you, eh?--it does me good. I have sat here for days together,
and have called to mind every word she said. I see her before me
everywhere, asleep, awake, smiling, sorrowful--I see her resting her
pretty head on the pillows, I see her sleeping, I see her dying----"
"Oh! come, come away!"
"We will go, Rudolf. And I shall never come back again. To-morrow a
smooth wall will be here in the place of the door, and iron shutters
will cover all the windows. I feel that I ought not to seek her here any
more. Elsewhere, elsewhere I will seek her: we will dwell together in
another room. Let us go, let us go!"
And smilingly, without a tear, like one who is preparing for his bridal
day, he quitted the room, casting one more look around upon it from the
threshold, and a dumb kiss into the darkness, as if he were taking leave
for a last time of a beloved object visible only to himself.
"Let us come, let us come!"
In the large library the witnesses were awaiting them.
They were four--the local notary, a stoutish young man, with his back
planted against the warm stove; the estate agent, benevolent Peter
Varga, who had asked, as a favour, that he might wear black like the
other family servants; the parish priest, and Mike Kis. That worthy
youth had quitted the brilliant saloons whose hero he was, to comfort
his old friend in the days of his tribulation. The fiscal was there
also, cutting quills for every one present, and sticking them into the
inkstands, which were placed all round the round table in front of the
witnesses.
When Squire John and Rudolf entered the room, every one present saluted
them with the grave solemnity befitting the occasion.
The Squire beckoned to everybody to be seated--Rudolf on his right, Mike
Kis on his left, the fiscal opposite to him, that they might the better
hear what he was going to say.
At the furthest end of the table sat Mr. Varga, with all the candles
piled in front of him. _He_ knew why.
"My dear friends and good neighbours," began the Nabob, while every one
listened with the deepest attention, "God has numbered my days, and is
about to call me from this transitory life to His glory, and therefore I
call you all to witness that what I am going to say now is said clearly,
deliberately, and while I am in the full possession of all my faculties.
I find that the estates which God, of His goodness, has entrusted to my
hands, now yield over a million of florins more of clear income than
when I came into possession of them. God grant that they may be more
productive of blessings in the hands of others than they have been in
mine! I begin my last will and testament with a reference to her who was
dearest to me in the world and now slumbers in her tomb. This tomb is
the beginning and the end of my arrangements in this life; it has been
my first thought when I rose up, and my last thought when I lay down,
and will last on when I rise up no more. My first bequest, then, is
50,000 florins, the interest on which is to go to that gardener on my
domains whose duty it shall be, in return therefor, to cultivate from
early spring to late autumn, irises and amaranths,--flowers which 'she'
loved so much,--and have them planted regularly round the grave of my
unforgettable wife. Furthermore I bequeath the interest of 10,000
florins to the gardeners of the Castle of Madaras, from father to son,
whose corresponding obligation it shall be to maintain a conservatory
near to the maple tree, beneath which is a white bench." Here the Squire
sighed, half to himself, "That was her favourite seat; there she used to
sit all through the afternoons. And the gardener is to plant another
maple tree beside it, that it may not stand so solitarily there. If at
any time the tree should wither, or if any careless descendant of mine
should ever cut it down, the whole amount reserved for this purpose
shall go to the poor."
Rudolf sat there with a cold, immovable face while all this was being
said; nobody guessed what he felt while these words were being spoken.
"'How foolish the old man must have grown in his latter years,' his
descendants will one day say, when they read these dispositions,
'leaving legacies to trees and shrubs!'"
"Furthermore," pursued Squire John, "I bequeath 50,000 florins to form a
fund for dowering girls of good behaviour on their marriage. On every
anniversary of the day on which my unforgettable wife fell asleep, all
the young maids on my estate shall meet together in the church to pray
to God for the souls of those that have died; then the three among these
virgins whom the priest shall judge to be the most meritorious shall be
presented with bridal wreaths in the presence of the congregation, and
the sum of money set apart for them; and then they shall proceed to the
tomb and deck it with flowers, and pray that God may make her who lies
there happier in the other world than she was in this. And that is my
desire."
Here he stopped, waiting till the lawyer had written down all his words,
during which time a mournful silence prevailed in the room, interrupted
only by the scratching and spluttering of the pen on the paper.
When the lawyer looked up from his parchment by way of signifying that
he had written everything down, the Squire sighed, and hung his head.
"When it pleases God to bring upon me the hour in which I shall quit
this transitory life, when I am dead, I desire to be buried in the dress
in which I was married to her; my faithful servant, old Paul, will know
which it is. The coffin, in which I am to be put, stands all ready in my
bedroom; every day I look at it, and accustom myself to the thought of
it; often I lay me down in it, and bethink me how good it would be were
I never to rise from it again. It is quite ready. I took some trouble
about it; it is just like hers. My name has already been driven into it
with nice silver nails, only the date of my death has to be added. That
priest is to pray over me who prayed over her, and how beautiful that
will be!"
"Sir, sir!" interrupted the priest, "who can read in the book of life
and death, or tell which of us twain will live longest, or die first?"
The Squire beckoned to the priest to bear with him--he himself knew
best.
"Further, remove none of the mourning draperies from the rooms, let
everything remain as it was at the time of her burial. Let the selfsame
cantors come from Debreczen and sing over me the same chants, and no
other. Just what they sang over her, and the selfsame youths must do it.
All those chants were so dear to me."
"Oh, sir," said the priest, "perchance every one of these students may
be grown-up men by then."
The Squire only shook his head, and thus proceeded--
"And when they have opened the vault, they are to break down the
partition wall between the two niches, so that there may be nothing
between her coffin and mine, and I may descend into the grave with the
comfortable thought that I shall sleep beside her till the day of that
joyful resurrection which God grants to every true believer. Amen!"
And all those big grave men sitting round the table there fell
a-weeping, and not one of them felt ashamed of himself before the
others. Even the matter-of-fact lawyer spoilt his nib, and could not see
the letters he was writing. Only on the Squire's face was there no sign
of sadness. He spoke like one bent on preparing his bridal chamber.
"When I am buried, my funeral monument--it is standing all ready in my
museum--must be placed beside hers. The date of death is alone wanting,
and I want nothing added to the inscription: it must remain just as it
is--my name and nothing more. Beneath it are inscribed these lines: 'He
lived but one year, the rest he slept away.' One of my treasures is
beneath the ground, and in no long time I shall be alone with it. My
second treasure, my joy, the hope of my soul, remains here. I mean my
son."
At these words the first tear he had shed appeared in Kárpáthy's eyes.
He dried it hastily, but it was a tear of joy.
"May he never resemble me in anything! may he be better, wiser than his
father was! Mr. Lawyer, write down what I say in as many words. Why
should I make any mystery of it? I am standing before the presence of
God. I want my son to be better than I was. Perchance God will forgive
me for the sake of his virtues. May my country, too, forgive me, and my
ancestors who have led lives like mine, for our sins against her! May
his life make manifest what ours ought to have been! May his wealth
never spoil his heart, so that in his old age he may not repent him of
his youth. I would have my son a happy man. But what is happiness?
Money? possessions? power? No, none of these. I possessed them all, and
yet I was not happy. Let his soul be rich, and then he will be happy.
Let him be an honourable, wise, courageous citizen, a good patriot, a
nobleman not merely by name, but in heart and soul, and then he will be
happy.
"I am well aware," pursued Kárpáthy, "that if I left my son in the
guardianship of his nearest relative--I allude to my nephew Bélá--it
would mean his utter ruin. I charge that kinsman of mine before God's
judgment-seat with being a bad man, a bad relative, a bad patriot, who
would be even worse than he is if he were not as mad as he is bad. No! I
will not have the heart of my boy ruined by such a man as that. I would
place him in the hands of those who would inspire him with all noble
ideas; who would guide him along the paths of honour and virtue; who
would cherish and defend him better than I could do were I able to
stretch forth my hand from the tomb in his defence. I would place him in
the hands of a man who will be a better father to him than I could ever
be, and who, if he cannot love him better than I love him, will, at
least, love him more wisely. The man whom I appoint the legal guardian
of my son is Count Rudolf Szentirmay."
The good old man warmly pressed the hands of the youth sitting on his
right, who thereupon arose from his chair and embraced the Nabob with
tears of emotion. On resuming his seat, he whispered, in a husky voice,
of which he was scarce the master, that he accepted the trust.
"'She' also wished it," said the Nabob. "In her last hour, as she placed
my child in the arms of your wife, she said these words: 'Be a mother
to my child!' I have not forgotten it; and now I say to you, 'Be a
father to my child!' Happy child! What a good father, what a good
mother, you will inherit!
"And now," continued the Nabob, "a word or two concerning him who was
the cause of the bitterest moments of my life. I mean my nephew, who was
christened Bélá, but who calls himself Abellino. I will not reckon up
the sins he has committed against God, his country, and myself. God and
his country forgive him, as I have forgiven him; but I should be a liar
and a hypocrite before God if I said, at this hour, that I loved him. I
feel as cold towards him as towards one whom I have never seen. And now
he is reduced to the beggar's staff; now he has more debts than the
hairs of his head. What will become of him? He cannot work--he has never
earned a penny; he has never learnt anything: he is bankrupt both in
body and mind. He is not likely to take his own life, for libertines do
not readily become suicides. And far be the thought of such a thing from
him. I desire it not. Let him live. Let him have time to turn to God!
Nor do I wish him to be a beggar, to feel want, to beg his bread at
other men's doors. I order, therefore, that my agent at Pest shall pay
him a gold ducat down every day. I fancy that will be quite enough to
keep anybody from suffering want. But this ducat he himself must come
and fetch day by day, and it must be paid to nobody but himself
personally. But every time he fails to come for such ducat it shall be
forfeited to the lawyer, and it must in no case be attached for debt, or
paid to him in advance. But every time my birthday, John Baptist's Day,
comes round, he shall receive a lump sum of one hundred ducats down
extra. It is my wish that he should rejoice beforehand at the coming of
that day every year, and that he should thus remember me from year to
year.
"And now my business with the world is over. I have no other kinsmen to
remember. My friends I can easily count up. I only know of three to whom
I can really give that name. The first is Rudolf, to him I have left my
child. The second is Mike Kis. He, also, was always a good fellow, who
loved me right well. Whenever misfortune came, he was always to be found
by my side. To him I leave my favourite horse and my favourite dog. I
could not leave them a better master, or him a more pleasant keepsake.
My third good friend is my steward, Peter Varga."
"Oh, sir!" the other old man would have murmured; but his tongue refused
to move.
"To him I leave my old servant Paul, and old Vidra the jester, and the
Lapayi property. May he live there happily with my two faithful
servants.
"All my agents now employed upon the estate are to go on receiving their
usual salaries, and they are not to lose their pay if they have to be
discharged from old age or infirmity. The general management of my
estate I leave to the wise discretion of Count Rudolf Szentirmay.
"And now, committing my soul to God and my body to the earth, I await
with resignation my dissolution, and, putting my whole trust in God, I
look forward to the hour when I shall turn to dust."
These last words were also written down. The lawyer then read the will;
and then, first Kárpáthy and then all the witnesses present subscribed
and sealed it. And the same night a fair copy of it was made and sent to
Rudolf, as the chief magistrate of the county.
Then Kárpáthy bade the priest send in the sexton.
He entered accordingly, and a golden goblet with wine in it and a golden
patten with a thin slice of bread on it were placed on a little round
ebony table. It was the Holy Sacrament of the Lord's Supper, the last
supper such as the sick unto death partake of.
The priest stood in front of the table on which the wine and the bread
were. Kárpáthy, with Christian humility, approached the sacred elements,
the others stood around in silence. Then the priest communicated him in
their presence, and, after the simple ceremony was over, the old man
said to the priest--
"In no very long time, I shall see the happier country face to face. If
you hear that I am sick, say no prayers in church for my recovery,--it
would be useless; pray rather for my new life. And now let us go to my
son."
"To my son!" What feeling, what pathos was in that one phrase: "To my
son!"
All who were present followed him, and surrounded the child's cradle.
The little thing looked gravely at all those serious manly faces, as if
it also would have made one of them. The squire lifted him in his arms.
The child looked at him with such big wise eyes, as if he were taking it
all in; and the old man kissed his little lips again and again.
Then he was passed round among all the other old fellows, and he looked
at them all so gravely, as if he knew very well that they were all of
them honourable men; but when Rudolf took him in his arms the child
began to kick and crow, and fight with his little hands, and make a
great fuss, as children are wont to do when they are in a good
humour--who knows why?--and Rudolf kissed the child's forehead.
"How glad he is," said the Nabob, "just as if he knew that from
henceforth you will be his father."
A few hours later the whole company sat down to supper.
They noticed that the Squire ate and drank nothing, but he explained
that, after taking the holy bread and wine, he would not sit down to
ordinary food, and meant to eat nothing till the morrow.
And the old servant waiting upon them whispered to Rudolf that his
master had not touched a thing since yesterday evening.