THE BANQUET TRIBUNAL.
The blast of hunting-horns resounded from the Batrina Mountains, the
hubbub of the chase came nearer and nearer; a group of well-dressed,
well-mounted gentlemen led the way, and at their head rode Count
Ladislaus Csaky.
"After him! after him!" resounded on all sides, and the pack were
already in full cry, when the cavalcade, emerging from the thicket into
an open glade, suddenly encountered another party coming from the
opposite direction, in whose leader they all recognized Denis Banfi.
Csaky with considerable confusion called the beaters back.
Banfi rode up to the group with an ironical smile.
"Welcome, gentlemen, to my domains. Delighted, I'm sure, at my great
good fortune. Probably you have lost your way; but, if not, you are my
guests, and consequently doubly welcome. But, pray, why do you stare at
me so wildly? You really remind me of the Hindoo proverb, which says, He
who beats the woods for a stag, oftentimes falls in with a lion."
"We regard your Excellency neither as a stag nor yet as a lion,"
returned Csaky, blushing up to the ears in his confusion. "The fact is,
we fancied ourselves on lawful ground."
"Of course! of course!" returned Banfi, with an offensive smile. "You
are on my property, and that is certainly lawful ground. I don't know
how to express my gratitude for such an honour. No doubt you are tired
too. I therefore invite you all to Bonczhida, just to take a little
pot-luck with me."
"We are much obliged," returned Csaky angrily, "but we are unable just
now to accept your invitation."
"Nay, nay; you'll not put me off. It is not my practice to let those who
have come to me as guests depart hungry and thirsty. I cannot regard
you as poachers, I suppose? And if you are not poachers, you must be
guests."
"A third case is also possible."
"I know of none."
"Your Excellency shall learn from me that there is, though."
"Quite right. But there will be time for that at table. So turn your
horses' heads towards Bonczhida, gentlemen."
"I've already said that we can't accept your invitation."
"What! Are you so ill acquainted with my hospitality as not to know
that, if necessary, I will carry you off by force? Ha, ha! You must take
away with you a reminiscence of Bonczhida. As you know now what my wild
animals are like, you must make the acquaintance of my domestic animals
also. In any case, I mean to take you by force."
"A truce to jesting, Banfi. This is not the place for it."
"Methinks 'tis you that jest. I am perfectly serious when I say that I
will take you with me even against your will."
"We should like to see you do it."
"Then see it you shall," and with that Banfi blew on his horn, and
instantly armed squadrons poured forth from every corner of the wood.
Count Csaky and his merry men were completely surrounded.
"Ha! this is treachery!" cried Csaky wildly.
"Oh dear, no! 'Tis only a little carnival jest," replied Banfi,
laughing. "This time 'tis the quarry which captures the huntsmen.
Forward, comrades! Take these gentlemen's horses by the bridles, and
follow me with them to Bonczhida. If any one stands upon ceremony, tie
his legs to the stirrups."
"I protest against this compulsion," cried Csaky furiously. "I take you
all to witness that I enter my protest against this act of violence."
"I for my part call every one to witness," repeated Banfi, laughing,
"that I've invited these gentlemen to a banquet in the most friendly
manner in the world."
"I protest! 'Tis violence."
"Nonsense! 'Tis a merry jest. 'Tis Hungarian hospitality!"
Some of the gentlemen laughed, others swore. As however Banfi had
numbers on his side, the Csakyites sulkily and wrathfully submitted at
last to their jocose tyrant, and allowed themselves to be conducted to
Bonczhida, though Csaky stopped every one he met on the road, and took
them to witness that Banfi was doing him violence, while Banfi
laughingly endeavoured to make it plain to the good people that the
worthy gentleman was a trifle fuddled, and that they were playing a
harmless little practical joke upon him.
"You will live to bitterly rue this!" cried Csaky, gnashing his teeth,
and half beside himself with rage.
As they were passing through a village, one of Csaky's company, a young
nobleman, whom his friends called Szantho, broke away from the crowd and
vanished before he could be overtaken.
"Let him go to the devil!" cried Banfi gaily. "We will manage to be
merry without him, eh! my lord Ladislaus Csaky?"
Gradually Csaky recovered his sangfroid, and his wrath seemed to abate;
indeed, by the time they reached Bonczhida he wore a radiantly smiling
countenance, for he was well aware that it would be indecent as well as
ridiculous to pull wry faces before ladies. He therefore allowed himself
to be presented to Dames Apafi and Banfi as a chance guest picked up on
the way, without the least show of ill-humour.
Banfi crowned his insult by assigning to Csaky the place of honour at
the head of the table, next his wife, and sitting opposite to him
treated him with the most marked attention, through which there ran,
however, a vein of the most trenchant irony. And Csaky was not even able
to resent it! What must his feelings have been!
As the banquet was drawing to a close and the general mirth increased
proportionately, Csaky grew more and more furious. He was sitting all
the time on burning coals, and had to smile and simper as if he liked
it. At last Banfi invented a fresh torture for him, by raising his pocal
and drinking his guest's health. Csaky was obliged to clink glasses,
drain his own to the very dregs, and endure to see Banfi laughing at him
in his sleeve all the time. Every drop he drank was so much poison to
him with that mocking laugh ringing in his ears.
And all this refined torture was so delicately veiled, that it escaped
the attention of the ladies altogether.
Just as the mirth was most uproarious, the folding-doors suddenly flew
wide open, and, without any previous announcement, Prince Michael Apafi,
to whom the fugitive Szantho had brought the news of Csaky's capture,
entered the room.
Both ladies, with a cry of joyful surprise, hastened towards the
unexpected guest; but the gentlemen, perceiving from the Prince's face
that a storm was brewing, suddenly became very grave.
Banfi alone preserved his usual grand seignorial gaiety, which could
even express anger with a smiling countenance. He sprang quickly from
his seat, and hastened joyfully towards the Prince.
"By Heaven, a lucky coincidence! Your Highness comes to us at the very
instant that we are draining our glasses in your Highness's honour. This
is what I call an unlooked-for and most timely arrival."
Apafi received this salutation with a slight nod, and leading the ladies
back to their places, sat down himself on Banfi's chair. Several of the
guests hastened to offer Banfi their seats, but the Prince beckoned him
to approach.
"Your Excellency will remain standing. We would submit you to a little
friendly cross-examination."
"If we are to be the judges in this case," interrupted the learned
Master Csekalusi, taking up his glass, "allow me to inform you that the
necessary preliminaries[40] have already been observed."
[Footnote 40: A banquet was the usual prelude to
judicial as to all other public proceedings in
Hungary.]
"I will be the judge," said Apafi; "although I do not quite know who is
the master at Bonczhida, myself or Denis Banfi."
"The law of the land is the master of us both, your Highness," returned
Banfi.
"Well answered! You would remind us that an Hungarian nobleman permits
no one to sit in judgment upon him in his own house. But this affair is
after all only a little carnival jest. At least you have been pleased to
call it so, and we will follow your example."
The most anxious suspense was legible in the faces of all present: they
did not know whether the jest would end seriously or the reverse.
"Your Excellency," continued Apafi, "has seized our envoy, Lord
Ladislaus Csaky, and brought him to your house by force."
"Ah!" cried Banfi, with affected astonishment, "I see it all now. Why
then did not the Count tell me at once that you had sent him to hunt in
my preserves? And besides, if your Highness had taken a fancy to some of
my game, why did you not let me know it? I would have shot more
excellent bucks for your Highness than any that my Lord Csaky could
catch."
"This has nothing to do with bucks, my lord baron. You know very well
the ins and outs of the whole business. Don't force me to speak out
plumply before these ladies."
At these words Lady Banfi would have risen, but the Princess prevented
her.
"You must remain here," she whispered in her ear.
"So far, I don't understand a single word," said Banfi, in an injured
tone.
"No? Then we'll recall to your mind a couple of circumstances. The
peasants have caught sight of a panther in your woods."
"It is possible," returned Banfi, laughing--for a Hungarian gentleman
may jest with his guests but never be rude to them, however much they
offend him--"it is possible that this panther is a descendant of those
which came into the land with Árpád,[41] and may therefore be called
ancestral panthers."
[Footnote 41: Árpád, the primeval ancestor of the
Hungarian princes, who first led the Magyars into the
plains of Hungary. He died in 907. With Hungarians, to
come in with Árpád is like our coming over with the
Conqueror.]
"It is no matter for jesting, my lord. That panther has torn a young
Wallach to pieces in the sight of several persons, wherefore I sent out
Lord Ladislaus Csaky to hunt down the beast and kill it. And Csaky had
seen the monster and was hard upon it when you met him in the forest and
stopped him."
"Lord Ladislaus Csaky no doubt mistook his own tiger-skin for a
panther."
"No gibes, please. The lair of the monster is discovered. Do you
understand me now?"
"I understand your Highness. But 'twas a pity to put my lord Csaky to so
much inconvenience for such a trifle. So 'twas he then who discovered
the pleasure-house which I built over a hot spring among the rocks?
Well, I don't think even such a discovery as that will earn for him the
title of a Columbus."
"You persist in sneering then? Will nothing make you bow your haughty
head? Suppose now I knew the secret of that mysterious cave, what
then?"
Banfi began to change colour, and he answered in a low, husky voice,
like a man who finds it very difficult not to speak the truth.
"'Tis a very simple matter, sir. It was I who discovered Börvolgy; but
as soon as the rumour of the hot spring spread abroad, the public tried
to take possession of it. Now, I had also discovered a rich mineral vein
beneath the Gradina Dracului, and to prevent it from being appropriated,
I had a little private pleasure-house built there among the rocks for
the exclusive use of my wife."
By these last words Banfi wished to make the Prince understand that he
ought to spare his wife, but they produced exactly the contrary effect.
"Oh, you vile hypocrite!" cried the Prince, starting up and striking the
table with his clenched fist. "You would use your wife as a cloak, well
knowing all the time that you keep there a Turkish girl on whose account
the Sultan is about to ravage the land with fire and sword!"
Lady Banfi uttered a piercing shriek. Her sister whispered in her ear--
"Be strong! Now is the time to show what you are made of."
Banfi furiously bit his lips, but controlled himself with a mighty
effort, and answered calmly--
"That is not true, sir! That I deny!"
"What! Not true! There are people who have seen her."
"Who?"
"Clement, the Patrol-officer."
"Clement the poet? Ah! We all know that lying is the masterpiece of
poets."
"Very well, my lord baron. As you deny everything, I will try to get to
the bottom of the matter myself. I will therefore go in person to the
place in question, and if I find confirmation of that whereof you are
accused, let me tell you that a threefold punishment awaits you: first,
for the rape of the Turkish girl; next, for the violence done to a
princely messenger; and thirdly, for adultery. Each one of these deeds
is sufficient in itself to hurl you down from your presumptuous height.
My lord Csaky, lead us to this place; and you, my lord Denis Banfi, will
in the meantime remain here."
Banfi stood there with a bloodless face, and his feet rooted to the
ground.
Meanwhile his wife had risen from her seat, and rallying all her
strength with a supreme effort, stepped in front of the Prince and
said--
"Sir, pardon my husband! He knows nothing of this thing--the fault is
mine--the woman whom you seek turned to me for protection in her hour of
need--and--I concealed her in that place--without my husband's
knowledge."
Every word she spoke seemed to cost the pale, fragile lady superhuman
exertion. Banfi turned very red and cast down his eyes before her. The
Princess looked triumphantly at her sister and pressed her hand.
"Well done!" she whispered. "That was indeed noble and heroic!"
Apafi saw through the magnanimous fraud; but he was determined that
Banfi should not escape him that way, so, turning wrathfully upon him,
he exclaimed--
"And you permit your wife to commit such indiscretions, which might so
easily ruin your family, nay, the realm itself? She must be punished for
it, and I therefore request you to reprimand her on the spot!"
Lady Banfi, full of resignation, sank down upon her knees before her
guests, and bowed her head like a criminal awaiting punishment.
"It is not my practice to correct my wife in public," murmured Banfi,
with an unsteady voice.
"Then I'll do so myself," cried Apafi; and approaching the lady he
said--"You deserve, madame, to be sent to jail!"
"That I would not allow, sir!" muttered Banfi between his teeth.
He was now as pale as a corpse. All his blood, all his fire, seemed
concentrated in his eyes. All his muscles quivered with shame and rage.
"Gentlemen!" interrupted a sweet, sonorous voice. How soothingly it
sounded amidst the rough contention of angry men. It was the voice of
the Princess, who stepped between the lady and her accuser. "In former
times," she cried reproachfully, "noblemen were ever wont to respect
noble ladies."
"So you are again at hand to defend those whom I attack?" cried the
Prince petulantly.
"I am again at hand to prevent your Highness from committing an act of
injustice. I have always the _right_ to defend my sister--but it becomes
my _duty_ to do so when she is insulted!"
With these words the Princess embraced Margaret, who no sooner felt
herself in the embrace of a stronger than herself, than she lost all her
artificial strength, and sank senseless into her sister's arms.
Banfi would have hastened to his wife's assistance, but Dame Apafi waved
him back.
"Go!" cried she; "I'll take care of her!"
"Then you mean to remain here?" said the Prince to his consort, in a
voice trembling between wrath and compassion.
"My sister has need of me--and you, I see, can do without me."
Apafi, ever since his wife had begun to speak, had plainly lowered his
crest, and fearing lest she might rout him altogether, he hastily
quitted the battle-field with a half triumph. He could not fail to be
very much discontented with the result of his investigation. He felt
that he had wounded Banfi in a sore place, but he also felt that the
wound was not mortal. The great nobleman had been affronted rather than
humbled. So much the worse for him! What will not bend must be broken.