Pretty Michal

"You shall have all you want," said Barbara to Simplex. "Let the others eat first, and then come into the kitchen. You shall have a good supper."

"I'll take good care not to eat any of it," said the wagoner. "She'll be sure to give me something to drink which will turn me into a swine."

"You'll then at least have a finer burial than if you had remained a man," jeered Simplex.

Nothing could induce the wagoner to stir a step from beside his horses, and he was quite content to sup upon the buckwheat balls which he had brought with him in his knapsack. Simplex, on turning in himself about midnight, derisively assured his snoring companion that he neighed as if he were turned into a horse already.

Meanwhile the woman led the priest and his wife into the palisaded mansion.

It was a massive structure, consisting of numerous rooms united together by long narrow passages with heavy iron-clouted doors. She stopped at last in a hexagonal vaulted chamber, from the central arch of which hung a huge lamp. But a far brighter light came from the hearth, whereon enormous logs were sparkling and crackling.

Nothing in this chamber called to mind the dismal business of the master of the house. Old-fashioned presses were ranged around the walls, and in the midst of the chamber stood a round table with feet resembling tigers' claws, and leather-covered chairs all round it. In a corner stood a dumb-waiter covered with glittering plate and pewter. Small pictures and clusters of weapons were visible on the walls. This chamber led into a small side-room, the door of which was so low that a person entering it had to duck his head.

"This will be your bedroom," said the woman; "it is a nice, quiet place, out of hearing of the howling dogs."

Barbara Pirka no longer recognized Henry, though they had often torn each other's hair out in the good old times.

The woman remarked that Michal's clothing was wet through, and that her shoes had suffered from her wanderings through the mountains.

"Would madam like to change her clothes?" asked the old woman obsequiously.

"I have no change," replied Michal, "the robbers have taken the whole of our baggage, and we ourselves only escaped from them by the devious mountain paths."

"D——d scoundrels! It would be as well perhaps if you were to lie down in a warm bed, and take a little hot wine. That would do you good, and you need not come to supper."

"I thank you for your kindness," said Michal, who was thinking all the while of the object of their coming thither—viz., the reconciliation with Henry's father—"but I wish to eat in company with the master of the house."

"Do you really?" remarked the woman, contracting her brows. "Are you not afraid of him, then? Have you so strong a heart? So much the better."

With that she turned and left the room, and there was but time for the husband and wife to exchange a few words, whereby Michal learnt that Barbara Pirka was an old housekeeper of the Catsriders, when back she came again with a change of raiment on her arm.

It consisted of a dress of heavy purple silk, embroidered at the skirts with colored garlands, a girdle of Turkish stuff, and a broad lace collar; the bodice was fastened in front with gold clasps.

"You would do well to put on these dry clothes."

Michal allowed the housekeeper to undress her, and then help her on first with the silk dress, which had been airing all the time over the fire, and then with the golden-clasped bodice, the Turkish girdle, and the lace collar.

"Just look, now! It might have been made for her."

Then she took Michal's wet shoes from her feet and gave her instead slippers of fine red Korduan leather, and as there was no mirror in the room, she herself supplied its place by turning her round and round and surveying her from head to foot.

"Just as if it had been made to order. Don't be afraid, my dear lady pastor. No common wench ever wore that dress. It was a noble, beautiful lady who once made a brave show therein, and she only wore it twice. She looked like a flower, and was the fairest of the fair. I chopped off her head myself."

Michal felt her knees totter. She was wearing on her body the garments of a woman who had died a felon's death.

CHAPTER VIII.

Michal felt that her husband's hand was trembling as he approached the master of the house, though he made superhuman efforts to appear calm.

"Peace and blessing rest upon this house!" stammered Henry, whereupon the old man sighed deeply but without returning the salutation.

"Is your reverence the pastor of Great Leta?" It was the first time he had addressed Henry. His voice was deep and sonorous as if it proceeded from a bronze statue, his whole body seemed to reëcho the sound.

"I have been elected the successor of the late pastor. Forgive me, master, for causing you so much inconvenience!"

"Your visit is nothing unusual," returned the old man, "the late pastor of Leta was often a guest in this sad house," and he thereupon beckoned to his guests to be seated.

"This is my wife," stammered Henry.

The old man did not even affect the bare semblance of cordiality. He coldly said: "Women also, nowadays, seem to love sad spectacles." Michal, however, before sitting down, folded her hands on the back of the chair, and piously inclining her head said grace.

The old man wrinkled his eyebrows and turned his face away.

Then they sat down to eat.

Nothing but vegetables was served, and after the vegetables came cheese. No flesh was to be seen, not a dish was there which required the assistance of a knife. Of beer and wine, however, there was no stint. The master of the house urged no one to eat, he left that to the housekeeper. She poured out for Michal beer and wine. Michal begged for water instead, but this they would not give her. They told her that the water of Zeb gave skin diseases to those who drank of it. So she had to sip beer.

During the meal no one broke silence, but after the first cup was drunk, the master of the house raised his voice.

"Did the rascals plunder your reverence as well?"

"We ourselves only escaped as by a miracle."

"They will receive their reward. Your reverence will see them the day after to-morrow."

Henry stared at him with astonishment.

"Yes, the soldiers have captured six of them, and these with some others will be executed the day after to-morrow."

Henry looked blankly at the old man, whose sharp eyes took in his astonishment at once.

"What! has not your reverence been sent here on purpose to give the last consolations of religion to those of the poor sinners who are of the same communion as yourself?"

Henry's face grew pale.

The old man guessed his thoughts.

"Such an office is no doubt none of the most pleasant. Not every clergyman likes to be at the side of the poor sinners during such a sad spectacle. The Franciscans of Eperies are sent to shrive the Catholics, the pastors of Great Leta to comfort the Protestants. Indeed this office is part of the cure. On every such sad occasion the pastor of Great Leta has to sit in the felons' car by my side with the delinquents opposite. He is therefore a frequent guest at my house."

To Henry it seemed as if the house were falling about his ears. He had known nothing of all this till now. He began to wipe away the sweat from his brow.

"Did not your reverence know then that the black cassock of the pastor of Great Leta and the red mantle of the vihodar of Zeb go together? Did the Consistory conceal the fact from your reverence when they recapitulated the emoluments of the benefice—a denarius for each baptism, a Mary-florin for each burial, and a Kremnitz ducat for the last sacraments administered to each poor felon?"

"To tell you the truth," stammered Henry, "I did not go very closely into the question of the temporalities. I only thought about my spiritual duties."

"Then if you have not come hither to act as chaplain at the execution of the law's sentence, to what other circumstances does my poor house owe the honor of your society?"

Michal threw Henry an encouraging look, signifying that now was the time to confess everything.

"I will tell you my story, master," began Henry. "Ten years ago I fled from my father's house. My father loved me. He was good to me. I was his only son, and I forsook him, nevertheless, because I did not want to follow his trade, because I strove after higher things. It was my wish to become a scholar and a clergyman. For the last ten years I have not let my father know where I was. During that time I have endured much misery; but I have also been compensated for it. I have made progress in the path of learning. I was the first among my fellow-scholars. The high-born sons of great statesmen and churchmen sat on the same bench with me, with me the poor mendicant student; but no one has ever sat before me. I outstripped them all. I was the favorite of the professor and the presbyters. When I mounted the pulpit to preach, the people strained their ears so as not to lose a single word, and no one ever went to sleep when I was speaking. When scarcely four-and-twenty years of age I was elected a regular minister, and the superintendent confirmed the choice. I was not even obliged to officiate beforehand as chaplain in the usual way. 'Twas the greatest distinction which could have befallen a theologian. In the examination which preceded my consecration, my replies were such that the whole Consistory cried unanimously, 'Eminentissime!' And my benefactor, my protector, the famous, most learned Dr. David Fröhlich, crowned the efforts of my laborious life by giving me his only daughter to wife. I then resolved to seek out in his solitude my long-deserted father, who thought me dead, and was passing his declining years in dreary abandonment. I said to my beloved wife, 'Let us go and seek out my poor old father, let us present ourselves as traveling strangers and take him by surprise. We owe our first visit to him.' My beloved agreed to my wishes. On the day after the wedding we set out to visit my father, but robbers waylaid our caravan and took from us our horse and mule. We ourselves, guided by good men, escaped by making a long detour over the mountains, after which we continued our journey by sledge in wretched plight. Night overtook us. We found the gates of the city closed. We were too much afraid of robbers to pass the night outside. We perceived a house in front of the town. We begged for admittance and it was granted, and now we beg pardon for the trouble we have caused."

The master of the house kept his eyes fixed on the lips of the speaker till he had quite finished.

"Then a mere chance has brought your reverence hither?"

Henry's lips refused to say yes, he merely nodded with his head, as if, forsooth, it were not as great a sin to lie with the whole head as with the mouth alone!

"Then until your reverence has received your father's blessing, you cannot, I presume, taste of the earthly joys of wedded life?" inquired the master of the house, thereby betraying not only his acquaintance with ecclesiastical ordinances but the possession of the art of expressing himself politely.

"True, but such consent I hope to obtain this very day, for I am now in my father's house. My name is Henry Catsrider," and with that the young man rose from his seat.

But the lady, in a transport of conjugal loyalty and devotion, threw herself at the father's feet, seized his hand and kissed it.

She actually kissed the hand of the vihodar, the headsman. With glowing, cleaving lips she kissed the hand which had never been kissed.

CHAPTER IX.

But the master did not extend his hand to his son. On the contrary, when the housekeeper entered to clear the table, he told her to leave it alone for the present, and first of all conduct the gentle lady to her room, make her a comfortable bed, lay her down in it and lull her gently to sleep. "The reverend gentleman," he added, "will remain behind with me, for I've a couple of words to say to him."

Michal thanked him for his courtesy, and holding out her hand to her husband, asked him shyly:

"I suppose you will come soon?"

"As soon as I have received my father's blessing," replied Henry, unctuously, from which Barbara Pirka gathered that the clergyman was the master's son.

The heavy doors had no sooner closed behind the two women than Christian Catsrider said to his son:

"Follow me!"

With that he took out of his side pocket a key with a double ward, and unlocked therewith a secret door, discovering a spiral staircase which led up to a tower.

Henry knew from experience that the old man kept his treasures in this tower. That his father should lead him thither seemed therefore an omen of good.

"Take the lamp and go on before."

Henry took the lamp and led the way up the staircase whilst the old man closed the iron door behind them.

After ascending twelve steps, they came to a large round room. Heaped up all round lay, not the treasures of the master, but all the instruments of his trade which were employed in the torturings and executions of those times, with a description of which we will not harrow the readers of this sufficiently sad story. Nowadays these instruments are only to be found in museums; men have discovered other ways of ameliorating their fellow-creatures.

Henry looked around him with horror at this frightful arsenal. He could not imagine what the old man had to say to him in such a place.

The master did not leave him very long in doubt. On the wall hung an enormous two-edged sword in a sheath of black leather. This sword the old man took down, and drew from its red velvet-lined sheath the broad blade, which was concave at both edges from much grinding, and of a mirror-like brightness; then, seizing the weapon with both hands, he said to his son in a cold, calm voice:

"Kneel down, my lad. You must die!"

"Oh! my father!" cried Henry.

"No, not your father. Your judge and executioner."

"Why do you want to kill me?"

"I have been headsman of Zeb for forty years. During that time I have dispatched many malefactors to the other world; but such a precious scoundrel as you are it has never yet been my misfortune to meet."

"What offense have I committed?" asked the horror-stricken Henry.

"You have run through a whole catalogue of crimes, each one of which is sufficient to bring a man to the scaffold. You are a thief! You have robbed the benefactor who received you into his house. You are a liar! You have denied your own father. You are a blasphemer! You have stretched out your hand toward the sacrament of the altar, knowing all the time that you were profaning that holy rite. You are a murderer—a parricide! For never was a man's affection so cruelly murdered as mine has been by you, to say nothing of the honor of this innocent woman and her father. Enough; you must die!"

"But if I have committed such crimes, why not bring me before the judges? I ought to be judged according to law and equity."

"Hold your tongue. You are beyond the pale of the law. There is a statute in force against abductors. That statute says that whosoever is caught in the act of abducting a youth or a maiden need not be brought before the tribunals, but may be sent direct to the headsman who is to judge and sentence him forthwith. Now you are such a robber. You have abducted a girl. You are caught in the act. And I will be a merciful judge to you, for I'll condemn you simply to be beheaded. Undress and kneel down!"

Henry rallied all his courage. He began to smile. Perhaps the old man was jesting with him. Perhaps he wanted to try his courage.

"'Tis well, my father. You've scared me enough now. A truce to jesting. I've neither murdered nor robbed. I am certainly anything but a parricide. If I did not honor my father, I should not be here now. Pray give me your blessing, therefore, and let me go to my wife. Michal followed me of her own free will, and she is waiting for me now."

"The virgin you have brought with you is not your wife, and she awaits you in vain. At dawn I will send her back to her father under a strong escort together with the news of your death."

At these words the son was seized with a paroxysm of rage. Trusting in the great strength by which he had so often distinguished himself among his fellow-scholars, he fell fiercely upon his father. He fancied he would be able to wrest the sword from him, break loose from this ambuscade, and venture another leap through the dormer window and over the palisades, as he had done ten years before. But he reckoned without his host. The old man had only to stretch out his left hand, seize him by the chest and hurl him like a young kitten to the other side of the room, where he bounded head foremost against the wall, and fell all of a heap.

"It only needed that," murmured the old man. "Now that you have raised your hand against your master and judge, against your own father, you've not another crime to commit. This is the first case among the thousands of which I have had experience in which the condemned has presumed to wrestle with the headsman. Curer of souls indeed! In what Bible did you learn that, I should like to know."

The humiliated wretch, after this overthrow, lost his strength of mind altogether. The hero who had thus found his master in a physical encounter no longer felt equal to an intellectual contest; he writhed to his father on his knees, and cried, sobbing loudly all the time:

"Mercy, my father! I am your only son!"

"A precious only son, truly, who has outraged his own father. You fled from me. You said to yourself: 'My father pursues a dishonorable trade. I will not share his fate!' Alas! that it should be so. I cleanse the human race of its filth. My hand cannot be as white as a lily. They send for me to wipe away all their dirt, all that is vile and disgusting. A terrible fate! But someone, if it be only one in a hundred thousand, must submit to it. Evil-doers thrive like a brood of serpents. You have seen them yourself. You have been surrounded by them. You have felt how powerful they are even where the sword has been whetted to destroy them. I have already peopled many a room in hell with these damned spirits, and yet they spring up again like so many poisonous funguses. But for the gallows the dominion of Satan in these parts would gain the upper hand. I too live in a state of horror night and day. When I am alone I loathe myself. When I lay me down to sleep, someone must stand by my bedside to wake me when I dream, for the dreams I dream are ghastly. Once I even resigned my office. The King's grace releases the headsman after a thirty years' service, and a Royal decree ennobles him after a thirty years' obloquy. But I had not laid the sword aside for more than six months when traveling in the district became impossible. In the town, women were robbed in the broad daylight, and malefactors danced in the churches, which they had broken open and plundered. I again began to work in blood. A ghastly work! Men hide themselves, dogs howl, grazing flocks disperse when they scent me from afar. There is no seat for me in the church, and every door in the town is closed against me. The good abhor me even more than the evil. But for all that I care nothing. What does grieve me is that my son should loathe me. The thousands of terrifying shapes which are waiting for me in the next world to stone me with their decapitated heads do not frighten me. My own son, who smites me in the face, he it is who really hurls me into hell."

"No, my father," interrupted Henry, "I adjure you by the living God not to say so. I do not abhor you. You, too, serve humanity. I condemn you not. But Heaven has not given me so strong a heart as yours. I have chosen the mission of reconciliation, of amelioration. I, too, would destroy the evil which you destroy, if not with the sword at least by the Word of God."

"Then you think it belongs to the eternal fitness of things that your father should be a headsman, while you are a curer of souls; that when you are dispensing the Lord's Supper, all the people should look with fear and loathing at your hand to see whether you have not inherited some blood-mark from your father; that the children in your parish should come into the world with red blotches instead of moles; that the rabble, when we sit side by side in the felons' car, should cry out: 'There go the headsman and his son, the parson; the old 'un flays the sinners, and the youngster patches 'em up again!' Perhaps, however, you think nothing of the sort. Perhaps you will prefer to go on denying your father. Perhaps you will prefer to live a lie six days in the week, and then ascend the pulpit to preach eternal truth on the seventh day. But then would not the words 'Our Father' stick in your throat? Would you not hear the devil whispering in your ear every time you repeated the fifth commandment? But enough of this. Keep steady! Stretch out your head, and let us make an end of it!"

The young man was almost in a state of collapse. He tried to raise himself from the floor with one hand, and, as if even the cold stones had pity upon him, there suddenly resounded from the room below a soft chant, a lowly prayer sung by a woman's gentle voice:

The young man began to sob. The father leaned with both hands upon his sword. For a long time he was silent. He would not speak so long as that evening prayer lasted.

His son threw himself sobbing on the ground, and moistened the flagstones with his tears.

"Do you wish to live?" asked the father in a low voice.

Henry rose from the ground with overflowing joy. He was certain from this sudden softness of tone that the mortal rage of his father had given way to a milder frame of mind.

"Are you not sorry for that poor creature?" inquired his father.

"I love her as I love my own soul."

"I didn't ask you that, I asked you whether you feel compassion for her; you need say no more."

"Yes, I do."

"Do you feel compassion for your father?"

"I love and honor you."

"Don't talk so much, but answer my question!"

"God knows that I feel compassion for you."

"You take the name of the Lord into your mouth much too often. If you want to live, if you have any pity for me and for that poor creature, rise up! Don't blubber! It's not pretty and does not become you. You are a man, remember! Take off that garment! Here's another! Put it on and follow me!"

Henry took off his black cassock and put on the linen jacket which the old man had taken out of a cupboard for him. It was a plain jacket, without either buttons or buckles, and fastened round the waist by a leather girdle. It did not escape Henry that the old man carefully counted out two hundred gold pieces, which he took from the same cupboard and put into the girdle. "'Tis yours," said he, as he buckled the girdle round his son's body. Then he beckoned to him to take the lamp and again go on in front, only this time they descended the staircase. The old man took the sword with him.

Henry was thinking to himself that if he could only escape from his father with a whole skin he would never venture within those walls again so long as the old man was alive.

But the old man also knew very well what his son's thoughts were, and he himself was thinking of how he could best prevent him from doing anything of the sort again.

CHAPTER X.

"Yes. Now I'm a witch and can make and mar as I please. But even those whom I benefit must suffer for it. I was once the wife of a headsman myself. The business pleased me. The only thing that surprises me is how a judge can leave to another the torturing and execution of those he has condemned to death instead of doing it himself. If I were the Emperor I would make a decree that every judge should be his own executioner. I was always at my husband's side when he was at work. I would not have stayed away at any price. When the felon was a woman I used to clip off her hair with a pair of shears. What a lot of lovely hair I've cut off in my time! After my husband's death (a mad dog bit him and he died from the effects of it), I continued the business with an assistant. My assistant was a lanky, awkward fellow. Once he put me to shame on the scaffold by breaking down altogether at his task, so I snatched the sword out of his hand and finished the job myself. Then they took the business away from me and kicked me out: they said that it was not meet that a woman should wield the headsman's sword. So I came hither and entered the service of this vihodar. He could get no other servant, and no other master would look at me. But you are shivering, my dovey! Shall I tell you some pretty tale, my pet?"

At the word "dovey" Michal suddenly recollected her favorite fantail pigeon, which she had put into her pocket, and she begged Barbara to take out the poor creature and give it meat and drink. She had brought some grain with her.

"All right, my darling! But the dove cannot remain in this house. There are so many owls and hawks here that the timid creature would die of fright at the very sight of these savage birds of prey; and besides, don't you know that if your little hen pigeon were to live here and lay eggs without pairing, and hatch them, the brood would be goblins instead of chickens?"

Superstition is contagious. Michal already began to believe that her dove would hatch a brood of gnomes.

She began to be tormented with a desire to know exactly how she stood, and what was going on about her. Pirka was a queer creature, certainly; but she was the only woman in the house, and women always hold together, especially in such a house as this. She was not afraid of speaking out before Pirka.

Pirka fed the dove and gave it water, and then stuck it into Michal's pocket again.

"There now!" she said. "She feels all the better for that, I know."

Then she covered up the pretty lady with a warm counterpane and a bearskin, and while doing so caught sight of the small silk sachet which was fastened round her neck. Pirka's eyes began to sparkle savagely. She thought it was an amulet against witchcraft; but Michal told her that it was only a talisman against the plague, nothing more. Then Pirka laughed.

"You don't need that here. The plague never penetrates into this house. At the time of the great Egyptian sickness the headsmen were the gravediggers. Not one of them died."

"How was that?"

"Why, don't you know? They've made a compact with Death."

Of course no one need take this literally, but it is certain that men with such blunted nerves as headsmen are not so liable to contagion as other people.

"It is a memento of my poor mother," said Michal, pressing the silken sachet to her lips.

"Don't do that," said Pirka, in a warning voice. "As often as one kisses such mementos the dead person turns round in his grave."

At this Michal could not restrain her tears.

"Come, come, my pretty darling, don't weep! Shall I tell you a pretty tale? What shall it be about?"

Michal ceased to sob. She begged Pirka to tell her the story of the lady whose dress she had worn that day.

"Alas, alas, my darling! that is a very sad story; you'll not be able to sleep if you hear that."

But she told her about it all the same.

"There was once a wondrously beautiful lady, the only daughter of a noble house. They married her to a Polish lord whom she did not love. She loved another, a beautiful, brown Hungarian lad, and what is more she took care never to be very far away from him. One day the Polish nobleman observed that his wife had on a beautiful dress of cornflower-blue silk. He asked her: 'Where did you get that beautiful silk dress from?' She replied: 'My mother sent it to me from Szeszko as a birthday gift.' The husband did not shirk the trouble of riding all the way to Szeszko and asking his mother-in-law whether she had sent her daughter the beautiful blue dress. Back he came to his wife. 'Wife, your mother has told me that she sent you that blue dress. You have lied and your mother has lied also. Confess now from whom you got that beautiful dress.' Then his wife told him she had bought it at the Lemberg fair with her own money from an Armenian of Ungvar. The husband did not shirk the trouble of riding all the way to Ungvar. There he sought out the Armenian and asked if his wife had purchased from him the cornflower-blue dress. Then he came back and sent for his wife. 'Wife, wife, you have not spoken the truth, and the Armenian has lied as well as you, for he said you did buy the cornflower dress from him.' Then, at last, the woman confessed that she got the cornflower-blue dress from her lover. It was the death of her. She was condemned to be beheaded. She was obliged to mount the scaffold in her beautiful dress, and there take it off and put on sack-cloth. Never had so handsome a face, so majestic a figure and such a soft, swan-like neck been seen there before. It was then I met with the mishap I've already told you of. When my chief assistant seized the sword and saw such a beautiful creature before him, he grew green in the face, his eyes became fixed and glazed, his knees tottered, and at last, as if seized by an epileptic fit, he fell down and tumbled backward off the scaffold. Then I gave the sword to my younger assistant. He, however, sank down on his knees before the kneeling lady, held the handle of his sword in front of him like a crucifix, and began to chant an Ave Maria. The sheriff was filled with dismay, the Polish nobleman, who stood close by, began to curse, called all who dwelt in Hungary cowardly milksops, and spat on the scaffold. Filled with fury thereat, I seized the sword and with a single blow cut off the woman's head. Then I took up the head by its long tresses and dashed it in the nobleman's face. 'You Polack,' I cried, 'take home what is yours!' That was why they drove me away."

A cold shudder ran through Michal's limbs despite all her warm wrappings.

"How long Henry remains away," she whispered softly.

"I'll go out, my pretty lambkin, and listen at the door to hear what he is saying to the old master."

So Pirka went through the dining-room and stopped to listen at the iron door and find out what was going on in the tower; and Michal, meanwhile, sang that evening hymn which had reached the ears of the headsman and his son.

Soon afterward Barbara Pirka returned, and with a sly grin whispered in Michal's ear:

"Don't fret, darling, the old man has made it all up, and now they are hugging and kissing each other."

But still Henry did not come back to his wife.

The howling of many dogs resounded through the courtyard below. The hideous din penetrated the thick vaults and double corridors and reached the very room where Michal lay.

"They will soon be quiet," said the housekeeper grimly.

Michal, in order to change the subject to something more agreeable, asked Pirka whether there was any garden to the house.

"You can't keep one," answered Pirka. "Here neither tree nor flower will flourish. The master's wife found that out long ago, when she tried to garden. The first summer after she came here, all the branches of the trees curved inwardly as if they would have crept under the ground, and the roots were devoured by worms. Nothing prospers but the black elder-tree, and even that produces red berries."

Meanwhile, the howling of the dogs grew fainter, as if the number of them was gradually growing smaller.

"What a long time Henry remains away," sighed the young wife.

"He'll very soon be here now, my pretty sweetheart!"

By this time only two dogs were howling in the courtyard below.

Pirka smiled, and began to arch her eyebrows.

"His reverence will be here almost immediately," said she.

And now only a single dog was howling through the night.

The storm, too, furiously shook the window-casements.

Suddenly the last dog ceased barking.

Pirka blinked, and said:

"The master will soon be here now."

During these odd scenes, Michal consoled herself with the reflection that the whole thing would be over in a day. Even the last day and the last night of a condemned felon must come to an end. Let them once get over this unpleasant day and they would go right away. They would have a home of their own, a quiet, peaceful parsonage all to themselves, with a large flower garden and a dove-cot.

Barbara Pirka had prophesied rightly. Soon after the last dog had quite ceased howling a man's step was heard approaching the door of the bedroom. Pirka murmured an incantation in the gipsy tongue over Michal, which might have been a blessing for all that Michal knew to the contrary. Then the old woman withdrew.

Immediately afterward Henry came in. The first thing he did was to extinguish the lamp, so that his wife might not see his face. Then he undressed and lay down beside her, for they both shared the same couch. Henry threw the bearskin coverlet off the bed; he was bathed in sweat.

The young wife was shivering, and her teeth chattered. She drew herself up like a hedgehog, and dared not close her eyes. To prevent herself from falling asleep she kept on repeating all the quotations which she knew by heart one after the other.

But Henry was in a raging fever. He kept tossing about on his couch, and murmured repeatedly, "Jesus, Maria, and St. Joseph!" and whenever sleep was about to overcome him he would almost throttle himself, and plunge with his feet till he almost kicked out the footboard.

The wife trembled, the husband groaned, the tempest outside shook the window-panes, the weathercocks creaked on the roof, the owls hooted in the lofts, and so the night wore on.

It was only toward morning that sleep sank down upon the young wife's weary eyelids. She had already kept vigil for two nights running, and now her slumber was tormented by frightful dreams till, when the morning was far advanced, Barbara Pirka came and woke her.

The housekeeper brought the sleeper a steaming wine-posset in a porcelain bowl.

Michal was not in the least refreshed by her repose. She felt weaker than ever. A parching thirst tormented her. All her bones ached. She was glad that Pirka had brought her drink. She cared little whether the woman was a witch or not, and she felt that it would not much matter if the hag's potion were to enchant her and change her into some bestial shape.

She eagerly took the bowl and drained it to the very dregs.

Then she called Barbara Pirka, and said:

"Where is my husband?"

Pirka replied:

"He has gone to town with his father."

"And what is my husband doing in town?" asked pretty Michal once more.

"He is helping his father to catch dogs."

CHAPTER XI.

"What then, after all, is the use of all the wisdom of the learned, of all the precepts of the saints? Why cast horoscopes, why consult the stars, if it is all to end like this? And they had said: 'How can you, a clergyman's daughter, give your hand to a man who works in blood, for he'll be bound to follow his father's trade? Will you allow your whole life to be a ceaseless bloodshedding? What! every day to rise and shed blood, and every night to lie down with blood! Every day to trace blood on the hands of him who embraces you! To be bound for life to a man whose very calling it is to lay violent hands on God's innocent creatures!' Alas! alas! Then it was only the blood of sheep and oxen that was in question. And now! What avails it, then, all the wisdom of the wise, when such things are possible? What if the little automatic dog had wagged his tail and stuck out his tongue by way of warning? And to think that a living wise man should have had no idea of the impending ruin of a human soul, and that soul his very daughter! What, then, is the use of amulets and talismanic necklaces? What is the good of the angelic choirs in heaven when they cannot protect the faithful from such calamities?"

"Ha! ha! ha!" laughed Barbara Pirka, "there are very many more men in this world, my jewel, than there are angels in heaven. It is not everyone that has a guardian angel to look after him, but there isn't a man in this world who hasn't seven devils all to himself. I, too, was carried off from my father's house by my husband. He told me he was a tanner, and I, silly fool! did not inquire what sort of hides he tanned. But I made him pay one hundred-fold for that one deceit, I warrant you."

Michal stared blankly at her. She did not understand a word of what Pirka was talking about.

Pirka shrugged her shoulders.

"My ruby! won't we put on our clothes?"

"No!" cried Michal, defiantly, and throwing herself back in the bed. "Where are the clothes in which I came hither?"

"They are still very wet and hanging up to dry. They are tattered and torn, too, and want a lot of mending."

"I'll wait here till I get them."

So she stayed in bed. She would have nothing to do with the terrible finery which had belonged to the unhappy Polish lady.

And all day long nobody troubled her. Everyone in the house had something to do in town.

Barbara Pirka brought her her dinner; but the hag had no sooner taken it in than she had to take it out again. Michal would not touch a morsel.

Late in the afternoon the men came home. Michal again heard a horrible howling and yelping, brawling voices and heavy footsteps. It was only when they passed her door that they trod softly. Someone standing outside whispered to them:

"Pst! be quiet! The lady keeps her bed!"

"If she keeps her bed, she must be ill!" so thought they all.

When it was dark, Barbara Pirka came down again and lit the lamp in Michal's room.

How happy the evening hours had been to Michal at home, when she could go to her book-shelves and take down her learned folios. Then she had never felt alone.

But here there were not even books!

The night was far advanced. Every living thing had long ago gone to sleep. Cautious footsteps approached the chamber where Michal lay.

The door opened and Henry entered.

He wore a gold-embroidered doublet buckled round with a stately girdle; his sleeves were trimmed with gold lace right up to the elbows. His large, tight-fitting jack-boots were of yellow buckskin, and they too were richly embroidered with lace. No bride could have wished for a more handsomely equipped bridegroom. But he had no sooner entered the room than Michal sprang from her bed, and wrapping herself in the bearskin, shrieked in a voice hoarse with rage:

"How dare you come in hither? This is the bedroom of my husband, the pastor of Great Leta! None else has any business here at all!"

The witch's potion must certainly have changed Michal's very nature, for language such as this was the last thing to be expected from so meek and gentle a creature in the hour of her terrible dereliction.

And some mighty spell really was at work, for that big, strong man, who could have brought the weak creature before him to her knees in the twinkling of an eye, was so frightened by Michal's repellent gesture, so timidly apprehensive of her furiously flashing eyes, that he could not utter a word, but slunk out of the chamber like a whipped cur.

Some person who had been eavesdropping outside all the time giggled aloud, and then was heard the voice of a man blaspheming the name of God, and gnashing his teeth with rage.

Surely that was not the parson of Great Leta?

Certainly not. But what has become of him? Well, after the work of yesterday night and to-day, the doors of every church are shut against Henry Catsrider, and the steps leading to every pulpit are broken down as far as he is concerned.

The old vihodar had taken very good care that his son should never be a clergyman again.

And Michal remained alone with her phantoms.

She thought upon the vanished days of her maidenhood; of the innocent joys amidst which her days had glided so sweetly away; of the studies, which had always been a source of delight to her.

Whither had vanished all those joys and all those studies? What availed her now the books of all those learned men? What to her now was moral philosophy, horticulture, or domestic economy? Here there was no morality, no garden, no home! Her life at home had been a monastic life, but it was a veritable heaven compared with this hell.

But when she fell a-thinking how happy she might have been if she had given her hand to him whom her heart had chosen—who was not perhaps very learned, but certainly upright, honest, good-hearted, and over head and ears in love—then indeed evil thoughts began to arise within her.

When the moon shone through the iron bars of her window she could not help thinking what a nice time the witches must have of it; they had only to bestride their broomsticks and scud through the air, even narrow iron bars could not stop them.

What if her forsaken sweetheart were thinking of her now? Would he ever learn into what depths of misery the mistress of his heart had fallen?

While she was thinking of these things, and drying her streaming eyes, she suddenly heard in the court below the tune of one of her favorite songs, which ran thus: