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WORKS OF MAURUS JÓKAI
HUNGARIAN EDITION
THE POOR PLUTOCRATS
_Translated from the Hungarian_
_By_
R. NISBET BAIN
NEW YORK
DOUBLEDAY, PAGE & COMPANY
COPYRIGHT, 1899, BY DOUBLEDAY & McCLURE CO.
PREFACE
"Szegény Gazdagok" is, perhaps, the most widely known of all Maurus
Jókai's masterpieces. It was first published at Budapest, in 1860, in
four volumes, and has been repeatedly translated into German, while good
Swedish, Danish, Dutch and Polish versions sufficiently testify to its
popularity on the Continent. Essentially a tale of incident and
adventure, it is one of the best novels of that inexhaustible type with
which I am acquainted. It possesses in an eminent degree the quality of
vividness which R. L. Stevenson prized so highly, and the ingenuity of
its plot, the dramatic force of its episodes, and the startling
unexpectedness of its _dénouement_ are all in the Hungarian master's
most characteristic style. I know of no more stirring incident in
contemporary fiction than the terrible wrestling match between strong
Juon the goatherd and the supple bandit Fatia Negra in the presence of
two trembling, defenceless women, who can do nothing but look on, though
their fate depends upon the issue of the struggle,--and we must go back
to the pages of that unsurpassed master of the weird and thrilling
Sheridan Le Fanu to find anything approaching the terror of poor
Henrietta's awful midnight vigil in the deserted _csárda_ upon the
lonely heath when, at the very advent of her mysterious peril, she
discovers, to her horror, that her sole companion and guardian, the
brave old squire, cannot be aroused from his drugged slumbers.
There is naturally not so much scope for the display of Jókai's peculiar
and delightful humour, in a novel of incident like the present tale as
there is in that fine novel of manners: "A Hungarian Nabob." Yet even in
"Szegény Gazdagok," many of the minor characters (e.g., the parasite
Margari, the old miser Demetrius, the Hungarian Miggs, Clementina, the
frivolous Countess Kengyelesy), are not without a mild Dickensian
flavour, while in that rugged but good-natured and chivalrous Nimrod,
Mr. Gerzson, the Hungarian novelist has drawn to the life one of the
finest types we possess of the better sort of sporting Magyar squires.
Finally, this fascinating story possesses in an eminent degree the charm
of freshness and novelty, a charm becoming rarer every year in these
globe-trotting days, when the ubiquitous tourist boasts that he has
been everywhere and seen everything. Yet it may well be doubted whether
even he has penetrated to the heart of the wild, romantic, sylvan
regions of the Wallachian and Transylvanian Alps, which is the theatre
of the exploits of that prince of robber chieftains, the mighty and
mysterious Fatia Negra, and the home of those picturesque Roumanian
peasants whom Jókai loves to depict and depicts so well.
R. NISBET BAIN.
Contents
CHAPTER
I. BOREDOM
II. A NEW MODE OF DUELLING
III. AN AMIABLE MAN
IV. CHILDISH NONSENSE
V. SHE IS NOT FOR YOU
VI. BRINGING HOME THE BRIDE
VII. THE CAVERN OF LUCSIA
VIII. STRONG JUON
IX. THE GEINA MAID-MARKET
X. THE BLACK JEWELRY
XI. TWO TALES, OF WHICH ONLY ONE IS TRUE
XII. THE SOIRÉES AT ARAD
XIII. TIT FOR TAT
XIV. THE MIKALAI CSÁRDA
XV. WHO IT WAS THAT RECOGNIZED FATIA NEGRA
XVI. LEANDER BABEROSSY
XVII. MR. MARGARI
XVIII. THE UNDISCOVERABLE LADY
XIX. THE SHAKING HAND
XX. THE FIGHT FOR THE GOLD
XXI. THE HUNTED BEAST
XXII. THE SIGHT OF TERROR
XXIII. THE ACCOMMODATION
XXIV. CONCLUSION
POOR PLUTOCRATS
CHAPTER I
BOREDOM
"Was it you who yawned so, Clementina?"
Nobody answered.
The questioner was an old gentleman in his eightieth year or so, dressed
in a splendid flowered silk Kaftan, with a woollen night-cap on his
head, warm cotton stockings on his feet, and diamond, turquoise, and
ruby rings on his fingers. He was reclining on an atlas ottoman, his
face was as wooden as a mummy's, a mere patch-work of wrinkles, he had a
dry, thin, pointed nose, shaggy, autumnal-yellow eyebrows, and his large
prominent black eyes protected by irritably sensitive eyelids, lent
little charm to his peculiar cast of countenance.
"Well! Will nobody answer? Who yawned so loudly behind my back just
now?" he asked again, with an angry snort. "Will nobody answer?"
Nobody answered, and yet there was a sufficient number of people in the
room to have found an answer between them. In front of the hearth was
sitting a young woman about thirty or thirty-five, with just such a
strongly-pronounced pointed nose, with just such high raised eyebrows as
the old gentleman's, only her face was still red (though the favour of
Nature had not much to do with that perhaps) and her eyebrows were still
black; but her thin lips were just as hermetically sealed as the old
man's, when she was not speaking. This young woman was playing at
Patience.
In one of the windows sat a young girl of sixteen, a delicate creature
of rapid growth, whose every limb and feature seemed preternaturally
thin and fragile. She was occupied with some sort of sewing. At another
little sewing-table, immediately opposite to her, was a red-cheeked
damsel with a frightful mop of light hair and a figure which had all the
possibilities of stoutness before it. She was a sort of governess, and
was supposed to be English, though they had only her word for it. She
was reading a book.
On the silk ottoman behind lay the already-mentioned Clementina, who
ought to have confessed to the sin of yawning. She was a spinster
already far advanced in the afternoon of life, and had cinder-coloured
ringlets around her temples and a little bit of beard on her chin. She
was no blood relation of the family but, as an ancient companion to a
former mistress of the house, had long eaten the bread of charity under
that roof. She was now engaged upon some eye-tormenting, fine fancy
work which could not have afforded the poor creature very much
amusement.
The old gentleman on the sofa used to divert himself the whole day by
assembling as many human beings around him as possible and driving them
to desperation by his unendurable nagging and chiding; they, on the
other hand, had by this time discovered that the best defence against
this domestic visitation was never to answer so much as a word.
"Of course! Of course!" continued the old gentleman with stinging
sarcasm. "I know what a bore it is to be near me and about me. I see
through it all. Yes, I _know_ that I am an unendurable old fellow on
whom not a single word should be wasted. I know well enough that you are
not sitting here beside me because you like to be here. Who compels you
to? I certainly shall not prevent anybody's petticoat from going away by
laying hold of it. The gate is not closed. Nothing easier than to be
off. Yet nobody likes the idea, eh? Ah-ha! It is possible that when the
eye of old Lapussa no longer sees, the heart of old Lapussa may no
longer remember. Besides, nobody can tell exactly when the old man may
die. Indeed they are waiting for his death every hour--he is beyond
eighty already. A most awful bore certainly. Ah ha! The old fool is
unable to get up any more, he is not even able to strike anybody. If he
cries out, nobody is afraid of him; but, at any rate, he has strength
enough to pull the bell-rope, send for his steward, tell him to go to
the office of the _alispán_[1] there ferret out and bring back his last
will and testament--and then he can dictate another will to his lawyer
quite cosily at his ease."
[Footnote 1: Vice-lieutenant of the county.]
And in order to emphasize his words more terribly, he there and then
gave a tug at the bell-rope.
Yet for all that nobody turned towards him; the lady kept dealing out
the cards, the young girl continued working beads into her sampler, the
governess went on reading, and the old spinster was still intent upon
some delicate operation with her needle--just as if nobody had spoken a
word.
In answer to the bell an ancient serving-man appeared in the doorway,
and the old gentleman, after waiting a little to see from the
countenances of those present (he could observe them in the mirror
opposite) whether his allusion to his will had produced any effect, and
finding no notice taken of it whatever, said in a sharp, petulant voice:
"Louis!"
The servant approached the sofa and then stood still again.
"My dinner!"
This was the end of the awe-inspiring threat.
The old gentleman observed, or rather, suspected, some slight amusement
in the company present.
"Miss Kleary!" he observed irritably, "don't you observe that Henrietta
is looking out of the window again? I am bound, Miss, to direct your
attention to the fact that I consider such a thing decidedly unbecoming
in a young lady."
"Dear Grandpapa.....!" began the accused.
"Silence! I did not speak to Henrietta, I spoke to Miss Kleary. Miss
Henrietta is still a child who understands nothing. I neither address
her nor attempt to explain anything to her. But I keep Miss Kleary in
this house, I pay Miss Kleary a princely salary, in order that I may
have some one at hand to whom I can explain my educational ideas. Now my
educational ideas are good; nay, Miss, I think I may even say that they
are very good. I will therefore beg you to do me the favour to stick to
them. I know what ought and what ought not to be allowed young girls; I
know that....."
The young girl's face blushed beneath the reproachful look of the old
tyrant, whilst the governess rose defiantly from her place, and in order
that she might wreak her anger upon some one, industriously proceeded to
pick holes in Henrietta's sewing and effectually spoil her whole day's
work.
Thus, it will be perceived, only one person had the right to speak; the
only right the other people had was not to listen to him.
But there was someone else in the background who had better rights than
anybody, and this someone now began to hammer with his fists on the
door, that very door at which the oldest and most trusty domestics
hardly dared to tap--began, I say, to hammer with his fists and kick
with his heels till everyone was downright scared.
This was the little grandson, the old gentleman's spoiled darling little
Maksi.
"Why don't you let in little Maksi?" cried the old gentleman, when he
heard him. "Open the door for little Maksi; don't you know that he is
not tall enough to reach the door-handle? Why don't you let him come to
me when he wants to come?"
At that moment the footman opened the door and the little family prince
bounded in. It was a pale little mouldy sort of flower, with red eyes
and a cornerless mouth like a carp, but with the authentic family nose
and the appurtenances thereof, which took up so much room as to
seriously imperil the prospects of the rest of the head growing in
proportion. The little favourite was wearing a complete Uhlan costume,
even the four-cornered chako was stuck on the side of his head; he was
flourishing a zinc sword and grumbling bitterly.
"What's the matter with little Maksi? Has anybody been annoying him?"
Grandpapa succeeded at last in making out that on running out Maksi had
tripped over his sword, that his tutor had wanted to take it away, that
Maksi had thereupon drawn his weapon and made the aggressor's hand smart
with it, and that finally he had fled for refuge to grandpapa's room as
the only place where he was free from the persecutions of his
instructors.
Grandpapa, in a terrible to do, began to question him: "Come here! Where
did you hit yourself? On the head, eh! Let us see! Why, it is swollen
up--quite red in fact! Put some opodeldoc on it! Clementina, do you
hear?--some opodeldoc for Maksi!" So the family medicament had to be
fetched at once; but Maksi, snatching it from the worthy spinster's
hand, threw it violently to the ground, so that the whole carpet was
bespattered with it.
Nobody was allowed to scold him for this, however, as grandpapa was
instantly ready with an excuse: "Maksi must not be vexed," said he.
"Does not Maksi wear a sword by his side already? Maksi will be a great
soldier one of these days!"
"Yes," replied the lad defiantly, "I'll be a general!"
"Yes, Maksi shall be a general; nothing less than a general, of course.
But come, my boy, take your finger out of your mouth."
The English governess here thought she saw an opportunity of insinuating
a professional remark.
"He who would be a general, must, first of all, learn a great deal."
"I don't want to learn. I mean to know everything without learning it. I
say, grandpapa, if you've lots of money, you will know everything at
once without learning it, won't you?"
The old man looked around him triumphantly.
"Now that I call genius, wit!" cried he.
And with that he tenderly pressed the little urchin's head to his breast
and murmured: "Ah! he is my very grandson, my own flesh and blood."
He was well aware how aggravated all the others would be at these words.
Meanwhile the footman was laying a table. This table was of palisander
wood and supported by the semblance of a swan. It could be placed close
beside the ottoman and was filled with twelve different kinds of dishes.
All these meats were cold, for the doctor forbade his patient hot food.
The old gentleman tasted each one of the dishes with the aid of his
finger-tips, and not one of them pleased him. This was too salt, that
was too sweet, a third was burnt, a fourth was tainted. He threatened to
discharge the cook, and bitterly complained that as he did not die
quickly enough for them, they were conspiring to starve him. They might
have replied that he had ordered all these things himself yesterday; but
nobody took the trouble to contradict him any longer, so gradually the
storm died away of its own accord and the old man, turning towards
Maksi, tenderly invited him to partake of the disparaged dishes.
"Come and eat with me, Maksi, my darling."
"That I will," cried the little horror, grabbing at everything
simultaneously with both hands.
"Oh, fie, fie!" said grandpapa gently. "Take Maksi out for a ride and
let the lacquey go with him instead of his tutor!" The old gentleman
then pushed the little round table aside and signalled to the footman
that he was to put all the dishes carefully away, as he should want to
see them again on the morrow. The footman conscientiously obeyed this
command--which was given regularly every day--and locked up all the
dishes well aware that he would get a sound jacketting if he failed to
produce a single one of them when required to do so.
The old man knew well enough that there was not a servant in the house
who, for any reward on earth, would think of touching any food that had
ever lain on his table; indeed, they held it in such horror that they
used regularly to distribute it among the poor. In order therefore that
the very beggars might have nothing to thank him for, he had the food
kept till it was almost rotten before he let them have it. As for his
own family, he had not dined at the same table with them for ten years.
It was certainly not a sociable family. For example, the old gentleman's
widowed daughter, red-cheeked Madame Langai, did not exchange a single
word with her father for weeks at a time. At first he had expected her
to remain in the same room with him till nine o'clock every evening,
dealing out cards for him or boring herself to death in some other way
for his amusement. She endured it for a whole month without a word; but
at last, one evening, at seven o'clock, she appeared before him in
evening dress and said that she was going to the theatre.
Old Lapussa glared at her with all his eyes.
"To the theatre?" cried he.
"Yes, I have ordered a box."
"Really? Well, I hope you will enjoy yourself!"
The lady quitted him with a shrug. She knew that from that moment she
would inherit a million less than her elder brother; but nevertheless
she went to the theatre regularly every day, and never stirred from her
box so long as there was any one on the stage who had a word to say.
The Lapussa family was of too recent an origin for the great world to
take much notice of it, and the fame of its fabulous wealth went hand in
hand with the rumour of a sordid avarice which was not a recommendable
quality in the eyes of the true gentry. The Lapussas were, in fact, not
of gentle blood at all, but simply rich. Madame Langai's elder brother,
John, was notoriously the greatest bore in the town, whom nobody, from
the members of his own family down to his coffee-house acquaintances,
could endure for a moment. Only his father made much of him. For all his
great wealth, he was very stingy and greedy; he even lent money at usury
to his best friends. Our amusing little friend Maksi was this man's son.
The slender, fanciful damsel, Henrietta, who appeared in that family
like an errant angel specially sent there to be tormented for the sins
of her whole race, was the orphan daughter of another son of old
Lapussa, who had lost father and mother at the same time in the most
tragical manner; they had both been drowned by the capsizing of a small
boat on the Danube. Henrietta herself had only been saved with the
utmost difficulty. She was only twelve years old at the time, and the
catastrophe had had such an effect upon her nerves that ever afterwards
she collapsed at the least sign of anger, and often fell a weeping for
no appreciable cause. Since the death of her parents, who had loved her
dearly, Henrietta had been obliged to live at her grandfather's house,
where nobody loved anybody.
But no, I am mistaken. She had a brother, Koloman by name, who was a
somewhat simple but thoroughly good-natured youth. He used to appear
very rarely among his relations because they always fell foul of him.
The poor fellow's sole fault was that he was in the habit of regularly
selling his new clothes. Still, I am doubtful, after all, whether this
can fairly be imputed to him as a fault at all, for although it was
always being dinned into his ears that his family was immensely rich, he
was never blessed with a penny to spend in amusing himself with his
comrades, and therefore had to do the best he could to raise the wind.
Another failing of Koloman's was that he would not learn Latin, and in
consequence thereof he had to suffer many things. Old Lapussa and his
son John indeed had no notion whatever of the Latin tongue. The former
in his youthful days had never gone to school at all, because he was
occupied in building up a business. The latter had not gone to school in
_his_ youth because by that time his people were already rich and he
considered it beneath him. The consequence was that neither father nor
son had a proper idea on the simplest subjects, except what they picked
up on their travels. Still that was no reason why Koloman should not
learn, but as the tutor had his hands full already with little Maksi,
Koloman was obliged to go to the national school in order to become a
wiser man than his forbears.
Poor Henrietta often slaved away for hours at a time with her younger
brother sitting at the table by her side, helping him to struggle
through the genders, declensions, conjugations, or whatever else the
infernal things were called; and the end of it all was that, at last,
she learnt to know Latin better than Koloman, and secretly translated
all his exercises from Cornelius Nepos and the Bucolics of Virgil for
him.
But we must not linger any longer over these Latin lessons, for a much
more important event claims our attention--Mr. John is coming home, and
we must hasten forward to admire him.
Mr. John Lapussa was a perfect prototype of the whole family. His
extraordinarily lanky pinched figure seemed even lankier than it was by
nature because he always carried his head so high: he peered down from
that elevation upon humanity at large as if there was something the
matter with his eyes which prevented him from properly raising the lids.
In him the dimensions of the family nose were made still more remarkable
by an inordinately tiny chin and thin compressed lips. His moustache was
shaved down to the very corners of his mouth, only a little mouse-tail
sort of arrangement being left on each side, which was twisted upwards
and dyed black with infinite skill. His costume was elegant and
ultra-refined, and only differed from the fashion in being extra stiff
and tight-fitting. Moreover, all the buttons of his shirt and his
waistcoat were precious stones, and he had a plenitude of rings on his
fingers which he delighted to show off by ostentatiously adjusting his
cravat in the course of conversation, or softly stroking the surface of
his superfine coat.
Mr. John entered the room without looking at a soul, and paced up and
down it with his hands behind his back. Then he suddenly caught sight of
his father, kissed his hand and resumed his dignified saunter. It was
evident that he was bursting for some one to speak and ask him what was
the matter.
Clementina was the first to speak.
"Your honour!" said she.
"What is it?" he asked, lifting his head still higher.
"I have finished the embroidery for your shirt front which your honour
was pleased to command."
His honour with a haughty curl of the lip condescended to glance down
upon the proffered embroidery. I am afraid Clementina was a poor
physiognomist, she might have noticed from his face how utterly
indifferent he was to her and her embroidery, which he regarded with
puckered eyes and screwed-up mouth.
"No good. Those flowers are too big; it is the sort of thing the
Wallachian peasants stitch on to their shirts." And with that he took up
Clementina's scissors from the work-table and deliberately snipped into
little bits the whole of the difficult piece of work which the worthy
woman had been slaving away at for a week and more, finally pitching it
away contemptuously while she sat there and stared at him dumfoundered.
"John, John!" said the old man in mild remonstrance.
"To show me such rubbish when I am mad! When I am wroth! When I am
beside myself with fury!"
"Why are you angry, and with whom?"
John went on as if he did not mean to tell the cause of his anger. He
flung himself into an armchair, crossed his legs, plunged his hands into
the depths of his pockets and then, starting up, began to pace the room
again.
"I am furious."
"Then what's the matter?" enquired the old man anxiously.
John again flung himself into an armchair and cocked one leg over the
arm of the chair: "It is all that good-for-nothing Hátszegi!" he cried.
"The fellow is a villain, a scoundrel, a robber!"
"What has he done?"
"What has he done?" cried John, leaping to his feet again, "I'll tell
you. Yesterday he sent word to me by his broker that he would like to
buy those houses of ours in the Szechenyi Square which I have offered
for sale. Wishing to save broker's expenses I went to see him myself at
twelve o'clock. Surely that is the most convenient time for paying
business calls. At least I have always supposed so. I entered his
ante-chamber and there stood a flunkey. He told me I must wait! Told
_me_ forsooth--_me_, John Lapussa--that I must cool my heels in an
ante-chamber, at an inn, to please that wretched Hátszegi. Very well. I
waited. I sent him a message that I _would_ wait. Meanwhile I found I
could not sit down anywhere, for the rascal had piled dirty boots and
brushes on all the chairs. Presently the rascal of a servant came back
and told me that his master could not see me then, would I come back
again in the afternoon--I, John Lapussa, forsooth! Absolutely would not
speak to me, but told me to come again another time! Thou dog, thou
wretched rascal! But wait, I say, that's all!"
At this the old man also grew excited.
"Why did you not box his ears?" cried he.
"I'll do it, and do it well. I'll not stand it. What! send a Lapussa
packing! It cannot be overlooked. I shall immediately go and find two
seconds and challenge him to a duel."
"Nay, John, don't do that! Don't even box his ears in the street, but
give a street-porter ten shillings to cudgel him well as he comes out of
the theatre; that will be best!"
"No, I will kill him. I will shed his blood. He who insults me in a
gentlemanly manner must be shown that I can revenge myself like a
gentleman. I will wipe off the score with pistols--with pistols I say."
The old man and the female members of the family were duly impressed by
this bragging, or rather all except Madame Langai, who was getting ready
for the theatre and took no notice of the general conversation.
Mr. John was much put out by her indifference. "Matilda," he asked,
"what do _you_ say? Ought I not to fight, after such an insult?"
Madame Langai answered the unavoidable question with a cold smile: "I
would only say that if anyone angers you another time you had better
expend your wrath upon him before dinner, for if you nurse your wrath
till after dinner you spoil the whole thing."
Mr. John listened to her in silence and then resumed his promenade with
his hands behind his back snorting furiously. Suddenly he snatched up
his cap and rushed out.
"John, John, what are you going to do?" the old man called after him in
a supplicating voice.
"You'll very soon see, I'll warrant you," and he banged the door behind
him.
The old man turned reproachfully towards Madame Langai. "Why did you
irritate him when he was mad enough already?" he cried. "What will you
gain by his death? He has a son who will inherit everything, you know.
Yes, everything will belong to little Maksi."
Madame Langai calmly went on tying her bonnet strings.
"I know what fiery blood he has," mumbled the old man. "When he is angry
he will listen to nobody, and is capable of facing a whole army. We must
prevent this duel somehow. And you are actually preparing to go to the
theatre when things have come to such a pass? You are actually going to
see a comedy!"
"The actor Ladislaus plays just the same parts on the stage as John does
off the stage," replied Madame Langai bitterly. "And I am as little
afraid of John's rhodomontade as I am of the result of stage duels.
Don't be afraid! He'll come to no harm."
A lacquey now entered to announce that the coach was ready, and Madame
Langai, adjusting her mantilla, went to the playhouse where the actors
were, at least, amusing.