I must frankly admit that I was not much edified by this turn in the conversation.

Bessy perceived that I was not well pleased with her doings in camp.

"Ah, my dear friend!" she said, "don't fancy by any means that this episode of my life consisted entirely of rioting and revelry, there was a little intermezzo in it also. You know, of course, that, during the winter, things at Comorn were very bad indeed. The Commandant had not the capacity for the problem before him, which included the defence of such an important fortress. The garrison was lazy and mutinous. Whispers of treachery arose, and the chief of the artillery was deprived of his post. It was necessary to inform the Hungarian Government at Debreczin of the dangerous state of things at Comorn, and to beg for a new Commandant who should be a distinguished officer. But how was it possible to carry a message from Comorn to Debreczin? Who would undertake the risky enterprise of carrying the despatch from Comorn, through so many hostile armies, and bringing back the reply to it again? They had sent one messenger already, but he had been unable to get back. It was a joke which might cost a man his head.

"One evening, Rengetegi came to my little room in the barracks, and said: 'Elizabeth, the hour has come for us to part!'

"I immediately thought that he was tipsy.

"'You haven't played me away at cards, I hope?'

"'It is not you, but my own head that I have lost. I have accepted the mission to Debreczin. I've run my head against a wall, I know. It's neck or nothing now. And they've pressed a thousand florins into my hand to make the way before me quite secure.'

"'And you have lost it all at cards this evening?'

"'How did you find that out?'

"'I have made it my study. I know well those Hippocratic countenances. Well, and what are you going to do now?'

"'Save my honour! I'll go on my way without money.'

"'Listen to me! I believe that you would be very glad to get out of this bombarded fortress—but I've no very ardent belief that you'll ever come back again. I tell you what: give me the official despatch which has to be taken, and I'll take care that it reaches the hands of the Government.'

"'But how?' inquired Rengetegi, immensely delighted.

"'That I shall not tell you. I've been turning the matter over for some time. You have only a passive part to play here. You hide yourself in the village of Izsa, which the enemy has not occupied, because it lies within the range of the guns of the fortress, and wait for me there till I return from Debreczin with the answer of the Government.'"

"And Rengetegi actually accepted the proposal?" I inquired. I now began to admire this woman.

"He jumped at it. He gave me soul-stirring examples of the heroic women of history, who had gone to the wars along with their husbands.... He vowed that if I ever returned in safety from my mission he would henceforth call me 'Queen Zenobia.'

"By the evening of the same day I was ready for the enterprise. I made Rengetegi dye his hair, moustache, and beard black, so that it was almost impossible to recognise him."

"So that was your idea!" I cried.

"Then I stowed him away in a peasant's hut at Hetény, with strict instructions not to emerge from his prison till I tapped at the door. Next I set to work to thoroughly disguise my own person. I was to be the leader of a gipsy band. Ah! if you could only have painted my portrait! Then, indeed, I really was lovely! I smeared my face with the juice of green walnut-shells till it was so black that I could pass for a gipsy among the gipsies themselves; I clipped my hair till it only reached down to my shoulders; I put on a jacket which some gentleman or other had worn threadbare before giving it away; hose that certainly were never intended for me, and a shirt that had never been washed: and so I transformed myself into as filthy a shape as ever led a wandering gipsy band."

Here I could not forbear from pressing her hand. What sacrifices will not a woman make for her country and for her lover!

"But all this was a mere joke to what followed. I now had to get together a band. If they catch a gipsy alone they arrest him as a spy; but if he be one of a quartet he may go on his way rejoicing. I provided myself with a violoncellist, a clarinet-player, and a contra-bass. It was easy to persuade them to quit the bombarded town, into which the gentry who had robbed them of their poor hovels had forced them to go. Bread and meat were getting dearer and dearer, and there was nothing to be earned. Who had the heart to pay for music amidst such a frightful carnival?

"Thus, with my little band of three, I set out upon my long and uncertain journey on foot. Gipsies only ride in sledges when a magnate sends for them, and there was no such magnate in the whole district. If on our way we fell in with a cart laden with dried reeds taken out of the swamps for firewood, we would ask for a lift in it. But our legs nearly froze there, and we were glad to get down again and walk.

"In the very first village we came to, O-Gyalla, we fell in with a division of the Austrian investing army, German cuirassiers. The patrol brought us to the major in command. He was indeed a merciless personage. He roared at us, and asked us how we dared to leave the town. We naturally did not understand a word of German, and all four of us, in true gipsy fashion, began to raise objections at the same time: we could not remain in the town, the Honveds posted us right in front of the bombs, and made us play music at the very top of the bastions; all the cannons had fired at us, and that was a thing that gipsies couldn't stand. 'Was sagen die Spitzbuben?' inquired the major of his auditor. The auditor understood Hungarian, and expounded unto him: 'Nix da, you rascals! You are spies, and must be searched. Come! you must undress.' I was not a little alarmed, I can tell you. Not on account of the despatches I had with me, I had put them in a place where they couldn't be found; but they would discover that I was a woman, and that while my face and hands were gipsy, the rest of me was European—and then I should be lost. I hastily said something to the gipsies, and in an instant they out with their instruments and rattled off con fuoco the fine hymn 'Gott erhalte!' At this the frosty face of the old martinet thawed somewhat. 'Well, well, you rascals,' said he, 'as you know what's proper and decent, I won't have you flogged this time, but be off at once and don't remain in the village here. You mustn't play here for anybody. Whoever has an itch for dancing just let him tell me, and I'll give him dancing enough. There's the whipping-post!' Now the clarinet-player was a merry wag, and could not hide his light. 'Devil bless your honour,' said he, 'you pay with big bank-notes.' 'Was sagt der Karl?' asked the major. He says, 'Gott soll segnen den grossen Herren, der zahlt mit grossen Bank78-noten!' At this his honour also laughed. 'But for all that you must pack yourselves off at once. You mustn't stop till you reach Ersekuvar, but there you may play as long as you like.' We kissed his hands and feet, and asked him to let us stay the night there. We were half frozen, we said. We had not a morsel in our stomachs: for a whole week we had only eaten ice and drunk water. But he knew no pity. They blindfolded us, packed us into a sledge, and a patrol of horse escorted us out of the village. Now, of course, it was my very dearest desire to get as soon as possible beyond the iron girdle by which the besieged fortress was girt about. If only he can get out into the wide world, the gipsy has no fear of going astray. He can fiddle his way through the whole of Europe if only he gives his mind to it. And so we made our way along the Danube, from one town to the other, and enjoyed to the full all the romantic adventures of a wandering gipsy's life which abound in winter especially."

"But," interrupted I, "didn't you come across Görgey's Hungarian army, under whose protection you might have continued your journey?"

"Of course I did, but my instructions were to deliver my despatches to the head of the Hungarian Government, and nobody else, not even to a general. It is true that I might have gone on farther with the gallant Magyar army, where gipsy-music is always heartily welcomed. The Honveds, too, never lose their good humour; but, on the other hand, the main Magyar army was going towards Slavonia, whereas it was my object to get to Debreczin as soon as possible. So there was nothing for it but to go straight through the enemy's lines till we reached the banks of the Theiss, when we could be once more in a friendly world."

"But where did you conceal the despatches?" I asked.

"I stuck them inside the belly of my fiddle. Who would break the fiddle of a poor gipsy with which he earns his daily bread? The money we earned in one town was sufficient to hire a sledge to convey us to the next. Gipsies dwell on the skirts of every town. We made ourselves at home there, and they never asked us whence we came; but if we were cross-examined at any place, then we lied to such a degree that the difficulty was to find anybody to believe us. You recollect what a terrible winter it was last year?"

"I remember it very well. I was out all through it with my wife," I said.

"How fine it would have been had we run across each other unexpectedly. I would have played a nocturne beneath your window. Ha, ha, ha!—The bitterest stage of the journey was from Kecskemet to the Theiss. There lay Jellachich,79 with all his army, occupying the towns of the great Hungarian plain one after the other. Here we had to creep through as best we could. As for me, I had the good fortune to play every evening before his Excellency the valiant Ban. He was very pleased with me. With my little band I managed to play the famous Croatian march, 'Szláva, szláva, mu, mu, mu, Jelacsicsu nas omu,' in quite a superior manner. I also knew the tune of the fine 'Kolo' dance, and absolutely won his Excellency's heart with the melodious 'Fanny Schneider' polka. I might say that I was really quite spoiled. There was plenty of money and wine, and, despite my black face and my predominating odour of garlic, the enthusiasm rose so high that all the officers kissed me one after the other."

Bessy had no sooner uttered these words than she buried her face in her hands. Again I came to her rescue.

"Those kisses don't count; you were a man then."

"It was quite a gipsy paradise, but the mischief was we did not know how to escape from it. The chivalrous Ban told us not to try to run away, for in that case he would court-martial and shoot the lot of us. At night, when our duties were done, he locked us up in a little out-house, and placed an armed sentry before the door.

"One night we escaped up the chimney and over the roof of the neighbouring house; that is to say, three of us managed to get away, I and the clarinet-player and the contra-bass. The violoncello, however, could not be got out of the chimney, and the violoncellist declared that he would rather be stretched on the rack than leave his instrument in the lurch. So there we left him—to pay the piper. Besides, I had now not much need of my band; the Theiss was only a four hours' journey off.

"I had heard from the officers that in the willow woods of the Theiss, in the neighbourhood of the 'Szikra' inn, some Hungarian guerillas were encamping. If only we could get among them!

"It was a good thing for us that sentinel duty was very laxly ordered in the camp of the Ban of Croatia. At the end of the town was a putri, or semi-subterranean clay hut of the kind in which field-labourers pass the night during the summer. The soldiers who had been sent out on forepost duty were sitting in this hut, and their muskets were all leaning against the door. One of the gipsies said: 'Let us steal the muskets!' The other said: 'Steal your grandfather; I play with clarinets, not with muskets.' I urged them to press forward. We were near to the sand-hills. Before us lay a savage, rugged plain, where one sand-hill followed hard upon another. Some of these hills were half hollowed out by the wind, and the hollows between them sparsely dotted with dwarf fir-trees. A ghostly region. The sides of these sand-hills were white, and the snow-fall on the top of them was still whiter; and every tree-trunk there is also white with its pendant branches80 bending down beneath the hoar-frost. We dodged up and down among these sand-hills, turning aside from the regular high road so that we might crouch down in case we were pursued. Along the whole length of the plain the broom of the wind swept our footprints over with snow.

"'If only we don't come across wolves!' said the contra-bass, with chattering teeth.

"'How can they be here when so many soldiers are about?' said I, by way of encouragement.

"'Nay, but they like to prowl about camps, because carrion is always to be found there.'

"Where the sand-hills ended, a far-extending flat began, and in the distance was a direful-looking object, resembling a ruin. A light mist covered the whole district, in which mist every object seemed as large again; the full moon shone wanly, like a huge broad halo in the misty heavens."

Here I explained to Bessy that this district was the famous plain of Alpar, where the ancient Magyars fought the decisive battle against Zalán, which gave them possession of the land; the ruin was the wall of the desert church of St. Laurence.

"Indeed! and I may add that this desert is memorable to me also. While we were waddling along as fast as we could, with our short mantles turned against the wind, the contra-bass, who was going on leisurely in front, exclaimed:

"'Devil take all these crows! Why don't they all go to sleep in the tower of the Calvinist church?'

"I inquired why the crows ought to go to sleep on the top of the Calvinist church of all places in the world.

"'Let the Calvinist crow stick to the top of the Calvinist church, and the Papist crow to the top of the Papist church, as is meet and right,' he explained.

"I did not understand this sectarian distinction among crows, but the gipsy made it quite plain to me.

"'One sort of crow is ashen grey, another sort black. The grey sort eats no flesh, but only grain; that is the Papist crow. The black sort lives on flesh, whether it be earthworms or fallen horse; that is the Calvinist crow, for it keeps no fast-days.'

"Then he called my attention to the fact that on the hill there straight before us, a whole army of crows was making a great commotion. At one moment they rose high into the air with loud croakings, at another they descended upon the self-same spot from which they had risen. 'There must be carrion,' he said.

"When we got to the top of the hill, we saw, to our great consternation, that the evil foreboding of the gipsy was correct.

"On the highway below, by the side of the ditch, lay a big black mass, the carcase of a fallen horse, and fighting over what remained of it was a whole army of crows and ravens and five large wolves.

"We were about five hundred paces from the terrible beasts.

"They immediately perceived us, and, leaving the carcase, forthwith began scudding towards us, spurring each other on with their nasty short sharp yelps.

"'Alas, alas! It is all up with us now!' wailed the contra-bass. 'The wolves will eat us up.'

"Even in that hour of mortal peril the clarinetist was true to his gipsy humour. 'Then we shall have a very queer shape at the resurrection,' said he.

"I bade them leave off wailing, and hasten to clamber up into a willow-tree, whither the monsters could not follow us.

"It was an old pollard willow, the branches of which were cut off every year, so that only the crown of it remained, surrounded by young shoots. I, who had never learnt the art of tree-climbing, was hoisted up by the gipsies first of all, and then they hastily scrambled up after me.

"When we had got to the top of the tree we discovered that in the middle of it was a large hole—the whole inside of the tree was hollow, and could contain a man.

"'Leader,' said the contra-bass, 'your loss would be most serious, creep down into that hole.' I took him at his word, and glided down from the crown of the tree into the deep hollow trunk. First of all, however, I tied my long cotton neckerchief to a little branch, that I might be able to hoist myself up again in case of need, for the hole in the willow went right down to its very roots. At the side of the tree, too, close to an old branch, there was an orifice as large as one's fist, through which one could look as through an attic window.

"The five wolves were not long in arriving.

"They did not come quite near at first, but reconnoitred. Whenever one of them sneaked up a little nearer, the clarinet-player aimed at it with his instrument, which the wolf took for a musket. Then the beast would back a little and scratch up the snow with his hind legs. They say the creature is wont to do this when he sees a man stand on the defensive; he tries to blind him with snow.

"When, however, the wolves at last discovered that we had no fire-arms, they sent up the ugliest howls, and began the siege of the willow. They took tremendous leaps in the air to reach the crown of the tree, but it was too high for them.

"Then it occurred to the gipsies that they had often heard that wolves had a strong penchant for music, and they began giving them a clarinet and fiddle concert.

"It is true that the nasty brutes left off the siege, sat round the willow, and began to howl in concert with the music, at the same time raising their horrid jaws towards the moon, and lashing their sides with their ragged brush-like tails; and for a short time I was quite amused at the scene. But suddenly our double danger occurred to my mind.

"'Hey! gipsies. Stop, I say! Is the devil in you? Your music will bring the pickets of the Croats upon us, and they will flay us alive.'

"At this they stopped their music.

"This appeared to make the wolves still more savage, and now they tried a fresh stratagem.

"They had found out that the willow leaned a little to one side, and rushing at it from a little distance, they attempted to scale the sloping side of the tree. This manœuvre was likely to have succeeded. It was then that I saw what a powerful beast the wolf really is, and how much more cunning than any species of dog. Scrambling up at full tilt, they managed to reach the crown of the willow, but there the brave contra-bass was awaiting them, and gave them such a kick on the snout with his iron-heeled boots that the attacking beasts fell head over heels backwards.

"This they repeated ten or twelve times.

"And there was this remarkable circumstance about it, that every time an attacking wolf was prostrated by a kick from the gipsy, the others rushed upon him as he fell, and worried him as if to punish him for his failure.

"Suddenly they left off, and went and sat down in a heap just in front of my window. Their tongues lolled out of their panting mouths; their hot, bestial breath rose into the cold air before me. They appeared to be taking counsel together. The biggest of them seemed to be their leader. If one of the younger ones yelped too much, he would snap at his neck as if to say 'shut up!'

"At last they appeared to have hatched their stratagem. The whole lot of them got up and shuffled farther off, squinting over their shoulders all the time towards the willow-tree.

"My gipsies fancied they were saved.

"'You shall have no roast gipsy this time!' bawled the clarinet-player after them derisively from his sure stronghold, as he fancied it.

"All at once the wolves returned and stormed onwards like race-horses, each one being about a wolf's tail ahead of the other.

"The first of them rushed straight up the tree, and while the contra-bass was kicking him in the head, the second wolf leaped across the first wolf's back and seized the man's leg.

"I heard a despairing shriek:

"'Don't let me go, comrade!'

"The second musician tried to free his down-falling friend from the jaws of the wild beast, and in doing so lost his balance, and the pair of them fell down from the tree.

"What happened after that is more than I can tell you. It is enough that I should have had to live through that mortal struggle of the two luckless victims with those filthy brutes. How many times have I not dreamt it all over again! I believe that even if I had committed all the seven deadly sins, I should have more than expiated them all in that awful hour. I hid my face in the crumbling rottenness of the hollow tree, that I might hear and see nothing. It seemed an eternity to me while the bestial howling lasted which the wolves made as they shared together their accursed banquet in my very presence.

"I dared not stir, lest they might find out that I also was there. Great Heaven! What horrors I had to endure!

"Suddenly a sort of growling and snarling began close beside me. The old wolf was running sniffing round the hollow tree. He had discovered that there was still booty inside it.

"He began to scrape the earth at the root of the tree. He evidently meant to dig a hole beneath the tree through which he might get at me. Fortunately for me, it was not sandy soil, but stony, hard-frozen turf. He could not succeed that way.

"Then he caught sight of the hole in the side of the tree. At one time, perhaps, a branch had been sawed off at this spot, and the bark had rotted away. The wolf began to enlarge this opening, tore it with his claws, and gnawed and worried the rotten wood with his grinders. He had soon so far enlarged the hole as to be able to stick his head into it. I saw the green glare of his fiery eyes; I felt his stinking breath; I heard the gnashing of his teeth. Then despair made me foolhardy. I drew my crooked knife out of the leg of my boot, with the other hand I seized the wolf by the ear, and cut it off at a single twirl.

"At this the beast, with a furious howl, drew back his head from the hole, and began to howl and run away like a whipped cur. The others followed after him. With the wolf's ear remaining in my hand as a trophy, I sank back against the hollow trunk; I could not sink right down, because the hollow space was too narrow."

I felt a cold shudder run all over me at this ghastly narrative. Bessy herself was quite exhausted.

"Alas! I am quite worn out. I tremble at the very thought of it. You are the second person to whom I have told it. But how pale you are all at once!"

I suppose I had turned very pallid. It had suddenly flashed through my brain that just at that very time my wife was on her journey through an uninhabited valley, and the foresters told me that wolves strayed about there.

Bessy sighed deeply, raised her drooping head, and then continued her story:—

"Thus I had freed myself from the wolves; but I was not left very long in the belief that shame at my depriving their leader of one of his ears was the cause of it. No! Wolves are not so shamefaced as all that. A troop of horsemen was approaching from behind the sand-hills. There were six men on horseback and one man on assback.

"One terror had been supplanted by another.

"Peering through the hole in the tree, I recognised the uniforms of the horsemen by the light of the moon—they were Jellachich's hussars. And that there might be no doubt about their coming after us, I recognised as they came near the face of the ass-rider. It was my bass-viol player, whom I had left behind me.

"It was very easy to see what had happened. The gipsy, to save his own skin, or, perhaps, at the flogging-post itself, had confessed that the band had come from Comorn, and was hired by me to go as far as Debreczin. Hence it was not very difficult to conclude that I was only a false gipsy, who was carrying despatches from the beleaguered fortress to the Hungarian Government.

"The horsemen had brought the gipsy with them that he might put them on my track. Once discovered, and I was lost.

"On the snow field, lit up by the moonlight, the scene of the hideous struggle was plain to the newcomers. The long lines of blood, fragments of torn garments, a foot sticking out of a boot in the snow—Ugh! May I never see such a sight again!

"The horsemen galloped quickly up over the crackling snow.

"The violoncellist had to dismount from his ass.

"The good creature howled and groaned from the bottom of his throat, bewailing his comrades in the gipsy tongue, and cursing the monsters who had devoured them.

"The leader of the patrol was a sergeant. He ordered the gipsy about in Croatian, and the gipsy has the peculiar virtue of understanding what is said to him in a language of which he is perfectly ignorant. He replied in Hungarian.

"'Oh, woe, woe! Those accursed wolves have devoured our leader! There's his boot! They've only left his boot. I recognise it well. He bought it only last week at Czegled. He gave six florins for it. A brand-new boot! And this is his foot.'

"It was plain to me that the gipsy had guessed that I was hidden somewhere, and there was enough of the gipsy in him, even amidst the greatest horrors, to induce him to make fools of my pursuers. He betrayed me first of all because he couldn't help it; he saved me finally because he could. He knew very well that I had given my new boots to the contra-bass. My boots were of Russian leather.

"'Look there!' cried the sergeant, and he pointed with his finger. 'Jeden, dwa! Jak sza tri?'81

"The gipsy swore by all that was holy that that was the third.

"'Then where's the first?'

"'That's the first, of course!'

"There was no dinning into his head the arithmetical truism that if you take two from three one remains.

"The sergeant thereupon ordered one of the hussars to dismount from his horse, at the same time pointing at the willow-tree with his sword, whence I concluded that he was about to examine the tree to see if anybody was hidden in its hollow trunk.

"I now veritably believed that the time had come for me to turn my crooked knife against my own throat.

"All at once a crackle of musketry resounded from the brushwood, and a company of guerilla horse dashed out, crying, 'Forward, Magyars!' The Jellachich hussars didn't see the joke of this at all, hastily turned their horses' heads and galloped off in the direction of the town. The violoncellist also mounted his long-eared beast, and ambled gently off in a third direction midway between the two belligerents. He had no desire to take any part in the struggle.

"The guerillas, who were numerous, sent a few volleys after the enemy, but from such a distance that the bullets couldn't possibly hit the fugitives, and then returned in triumph. Then I, hearing them speak Hungarian, quickly hoisted myself up out of the hole into the top of the tree, and began so far as my hoarse voice would allow me, to give them indications of my existence.

"The gallant warriors immediately hastened to the willow-tree and helped me down from my dangerous perch. Their leader, a handsome, chivalrous-looking young man, with a true Hungarian face, began to cross-question me, and asked me whence I came and whither I was going. Perceiving that I was among Hungarian soldiers, I frankly told them that I had come from Comorn, and had been sent to Debreczin with despatches for the Hungarian Government.

"The guerilla captain was a suspicious man.

"'Oho! I daresay! That's easily said, but difficult to believe. What! confide such a mission to a gipsy! A likely tale!'

"I told him that I was no gipsy, though my face was painted so, but that I lived at Comorn and belonged to the place.

"'Then, if you are an inhabitant, tell me if you know one Maurus Jókai there—and what you know of him?'

"I was very pleased to answer such a question. 'I know him very well,' I said, 'and I can tell you this much about him, that he went to the High School at Kecskemet, where he completed his legal studies—or rather learnt how to paint in oils from a worthy comrade of his there.'

"Without more ado he clapped his hand in mine: 'That worthy comrade of his was no other than myself.'

"So you see," she said, turning towards me, "you were of assistance to me, even here."

"Wasn't that old schoolfellow of mine called Jansci?" I asked.

"Yes, that's what they called him. With him was another young man, with quite a girlish face, and him they called Józsi; he inquired about you most particularly. When you gave your artistic representations at Kecskemet, he used to play the girl's parts."

"Quite true," I said, "so it was."

"So you see I must have been there or I should have known nothing about these things. The guerillas told me all about it as they took me with them. They were very attentive. One of them gave me his mantle, another let me mount his nag, and so they took me to the 'Szikra' inn, where they made me drink punch with them, regaled me with veal, and then made me a bed on the straw with their mantles that I might sleep off my exhaustion. The Jellachich hussars gave us no trouble. They could not come back till morning, when the whole regiment would doubtless turn out to capture the guerillas, who would, by that time, be on the other side of the Theiss. The sledges were all ready to start, and would scour back across the frozen river at the first signal to Czibakhaza, where were the foreposts of the Hungarian army under Damjanich.

"But for a long time I could not sleep. Constantly before my eyes flitted the horrible death-struggle between the two unhappy men and the wild beasts, and amidst the howling and shrieking resounded the gay song of the guerillas:

In my dream this tune was mingled with the howling of the wolves, and at one moment the wolves were singing, 'The hut's ablaze,' and at another the Croats were howling at the gipsies sitting on the branch. Towards morning I was awakened by two cannon-shots. I rejoiced to be delivered from my spectres. The lieutenant of the guerillas hurried me into the sledge, as a regiment of hostile horse was approaching from Kecskemet.

"It took us ten minutes to dash across the frozen Theiss. On the opposite bank the foreposts of the Honveds were encamping. The business of the guerillas was to harass the enemy, capture their forage waggons, and then bring word of their movements to the main army.

"They took me straight to General Damjanich.82

"I was now no longer obliged to keep my despatch hidden, so I split up my fiddle, took out of it the documents that were gummed to it, and their production was my best credentials.

"The approving, smiling glance of the powerful, heroic-looking General I shall never forget. At the sight of him I quite forgot that I was personating a man, and would have liked to have fallen down before him and kissed his hand. Indeed, I was so agitated that I could not utter a word.

"The General filled a little glass full of szilvorium.83 'Drink, my son!' said he, 'it will loosen your throat.'

"My throat was hoarse; I had a voice as deep as a man's. I told him I had come from Comorn, and I was sent to Lazar Mészáros, the War Minister.

"'You will seek old Kóficz84 in vain at Debreczin, my son, he commands there no more. So you Comorn folks don't know what's going on outside, eh? Another is at the head of the War Department now. I will give you a letter of introduction to him.'

"Then he sat down and wrote me a couple of lines to a General with a German name, which is expressed in Hungarian by the word Bacsi.85

"He said, while he was writing this letter, that this General with a German name was the life and soul of our military organization.

"Then, by the General's command, I received a nice clean Honved uniform (I had to retain my brown countenance for some time longer), and besides that I had an open passport enjoining upon all to give me every facility to reach Debreczin as quickly as possible.

"On the evening of the following day I arrived at Debreczin, and on descending from my sledge, proceeded at once to the General's. He was a mild, soft-featured gentleman, with a close-clipped beard and moustache. He didn't even wear a General's uniform. Nobody would have guessed his rank from the look of him. After reading through my letter of introduction, he looked me straight and sharply in the face.

"'You are Captain Tihamér Rengetegi, eh?'

"If I had only been intent on my own interest, I might have told him quite frankly that I had no right either to the name or the uniform of a soldier; but how could I betray my faithful consort who was smuggled away in the hovel at Hetény?

"'Yes, General, I am.'

"'Who made you captain?'

"'The War Minister.'

"'For deeds of valour?'

"'During the siege of Vienna I twice carried despatches through the besieging camp from the Hungarian Government to General Bem.'"

Here I intervened: "That is not true; I know very well through whom the Hungarian Government got those despatches."

"Anyhow, my friend boasted of it as his own deed," said Bessy; after which she resumed her narration.

"'Good!' said the General; 'now give me the despatch.'

"The information was written in a secret cipher.

"'I must decipher this first. There will be a meeting to-night of the Committee of National Defence. Early to-morrow morning you will appear before me. Now go to the "White Horse." Speak to nobody. Keep your room!'

"Nevertheless, an hour afterwards he sent for me.

"He led me into his inner room, for he allowed himself the luxury of a double-roomed apartment at Debreczin. Two other ministers, Paul Nyáry and Joseph Patay, were not so fortunate. They had to be content with a double room between them.

"The General was now very gentle with me. He made me sit down at table, and poured me out some tea. He offered me a cigar too, and although I ought not to have done so, I lighted it. It nipped my tongue a good deal, but I had to show them that I was a man.

"Then he made me tell them how I had got out of the fortress, and how I had forced my way through the hostile camp. My relation made a great impression. When I was dismissed, they pressed my hand and assured me that my good and boldly executed service should be rewarded. They further commanded me to come to them early the next day.

"I appeared next day at his headquarters in full parade, and they admitted me before any one else.

"Again they made me sit down in the inner apartment, and drew the bolt before the door of the outer room.

"Stretched out on the table was a large military map which embraced Upper Hungary and Galicia. 'You have brought very important information with you from Comorn,' said he, in a low voice. 'Considering the time when you set out, you have arrived here with astonishing rapidity. You must now take the reply back, which will contain the directions of the Council of War and the appointment of the new Commandant, who will be gazetted to-night. Can you make your way back to the fortress with this despatch?'

"'I'll try.'

"'You must get back without fail. What's your plan?'

"'To go back by the same road in the same manner and the same disguise is impossible. The wolves tore two of my comrades to pieces, the Croats captured the third, and as he may have confessed everything, they would recognise me at once if I appeared before their eyes as I am now. Besides, there is no conceivable reason why gipsies should wish to leave the open plain in order to get into a bombarded town. This despatch can only be conveyed to Comorn by a woman who is obliged to go there on some unimpeachable business, and is provided with an Austrian safe-conduct.'

"The General clapped his hands together in amazement.

"'And do you know of any woman who would undertake such a thing?'

"'Certainly I do.'

"'Where? What's her name?'

"'That's my secret, General. The difficulty of getting into the fortress is also very much increased by the fact that the appointment of Richard Guyon as the new Commandant has already become generally known.'

"The General leaped furiously from his seat.

"'Who, then, has made this public?'

"'It is here in the official gazette,' I replied, drawing out of my pocket that morning's issue of the Közlöny.

"The General tugged his short moustache still shorter.

"'Well, well! I see that we Magyars have yet to learn the art of keeping a secret. The enemy knows it now, but the Comorn folks do not know it.'

"'I have already hit upon a good idea of enabling the mandate of the Council of War to reach their hands.'

"'By a carrier-pigeon or a balloon, I suppose?'

"'A foreign passport is necessary for my plan.'

"'That you shall have—an English passport viséd by the Embassy. In whose name?'

"'In the lady's.'

"'Then you must give us the lady's name.'

"Then I gave him my real name as the lawful wife of Muki Bagotay.

"'And you? Will you get into the fortress?'

"'Possibly, as that lady's coachman—possibly not at all; but the despatch will get in, anyhow.'

"'And how will this lady of yours manage to hide the despatch? I can tell you beforehand, that even if your lady were provided with a safe-conduct from the Princess Windischgrätz86 herself, and so got right through the hostile camp into the invested fortress, the Austrians would indeed welcome her most courteously; but they would at the same time say to her: "Would your little ladyship be so good as to step into that side-chamber; there you will find a complete set of lady's clothes, would you be so kind as to put them on—if they are a little more abundant than your own, that doesn't matter? The toilet you have brought with you may remain here, down even to the shoes and stockings; whenever you like to come back again, you can re-exchange your clothes." For they know that it is possible to write on chemises with invisible ink and reproduce the writing by means of chemical re-agents. It is also possible for the heels of your boots to have secret openings, in which a letter written on straw-paper might be inserted. They might also retain the comb with which you fasten up your hair, for a valuable message might be written thereupon in microscopic letters.'