Mr. Meyer found the eminent criminal lawyer in the midst of a heap of dusty papers. Mr. Bordacsi, for that was his name, had an extraordinary faculty for so identifying himself with any complicated case he might take up as to absolutely live and breathe in it. Any attempt at sophistry or chicanery made him downright venomous, and he only recovered himself when, by dint of superior ac.u.men, he had enabled the righteous cause to triumph. He was also far-famed for his incorruptibility. Whoever approached him with ducats was incontinently kicked out-of-doors, and if any pretty woman visited him with the intention of making her charms influence his judgments, he would treat her so unceremoniously that she was likely to think twice before visiting him again on a similar errand.
No sooner did Bordacsi perceive Mr. Meyer than he took off his spectacles and put them on the page of the doc.u.ment before him, so as not to lose his place; then he exclaimed, in an extraordinarily rough voice--
"Well, what"s the matter, friend Meyer?"
Mr. Meyer was glad to hear the word "friend," but this was a mere form of expression with his Honour the Judge. He always said "friend" to lawyers" clerks, lackeys, and even to the parties to a suit whom it was his duty to tear to ribbons. Meyer, however, set forth his grievance quite confidently. He even sat down, though he had not been invited to do so, as he was wont to do in the bygone happy days when they were official colleagues together. It was Meyer"s custom never to look those whom he was addressing in the face, which bashfulness deprived him, of course, of the advantage of being able to read from their countenances what impression he was making upon them. He was therefore greatly surprised when, on finishing his speech, his Honour Judge Bordacsi roared at him in the angriest of voices--
"And why do you tell me all this?"
Mr. Meyer"s spirit suddenly grew cold within him; he could not answer a word, only his mouth moved weakly up and down, like the mouth of a puppet that you pull with a string.
"What!" cried Judge Bordacsi, with a still more violent exertion of his lungs, rushing upon his unfortunate client and fixing him with frightfully distended eyes.
In his terror the unfortunate man leaped from the seat in which he had sat down unasked, and murmured tearfully--
"I humbly beg your pardon. I came here for advice and--and protection."
"How? Do you imagine, sir, that I shall take your part?" bawled the judge, as if he were speaking to some one who was stone deaf.
"I fancied," stammered the unfortunate pater-familias, "that the old kindliness which you formerly showed to my house----"
Bordacsi did not let him finish. "Yes, your house! In those days your house was a respectable house, but now your house is a Sodom and Gomorrah which opens its doors wide to all the fools of the town. You have devoted your four girls to the bottomless pit, and you are a scandal to every pure-minded man. You are the corrupter of the youth of this city, and your name is a by-word throughout the kingdom wherever dissolute youths and outraged fathers are to be found."
Here Mr. Meyer burst into tears, and murmured something to the effect that he did not know anything about it.
"With what a handsome family did not G.o.d bless you! and, sir, you have made it the laughing-stock of the world. You have traded with the innocence, the love, and the spiritual welfare of your daughters; you have sold, you have bartered them away to the highest bidder; you have taught them that they must catch pa.s.sers-by in the street with an ogle or a stare, that they must smile, laugh, and make love to men whom they see for the first time in their lives, that they must make money by lying!"
The wretched man was understood to say, amidst his sobs, that he had done none of these things.
"And now, sir, you have one daughter left, the last, the prettiest, the most charming of them all. When I used to visit at your house, sir, she was a little child no higher than my knee, whom every one loved, every one fondled. Don"t you remember, sir? And now, sir, you would abandon her also. And you are angry, you storm and rave when a respectable person wants to save the unfortunate child from having her innocence corrupted, save her from withering away profitlessly in the claws of a pack of gross, rowdy, street-lounging, rake-h.e.l.l young profligates, from living a life of wretchedness and shame, from dying abandoned and accursed, to say nothing of the fire of h.e.l.l after death. And you even raise objections, sir! But, of course, I understand, they would be depriving you of a great treasure, of something you can sell at a high price, something that you can calculate upon making a handsome profit out of, eh?"
Meyer gnashed his teeth with rage and horror.
"Let me tell you, sir, if you are still able to follow good advice,"
continued the judge, in the same pitiless voice, "that if that respectable person, your kinswoman Teresa, is still willing to take charge of your daughter f.a.n.n.y, surrender her unconditionally, renounce all your rights to her now and for evermore, for if you raise any further objections, if the matter comes before the courts, so help me G.o.d! I"ll have you locked up myself."
"Where?" asked the terrified Meyer.
This question took the judge somewhat aback at first, but he soon found an answer.
"Where? Well, in the house of correction, in case the things that are done in your house, sir, are done with your knowledge and consent; and in a madhouse if they are done without your knowledge."
Mr. Meyer had got a sufficient answer at last; he took his leave and departed. He could scarce find the door by which he had entered, and he had to grope his way down to the street. The loafers there who saw him nudged each other with a grin and said, "That chap has had a good skinful somewhere!"
So he had to learn from others that he was not a respectable man; he had to learn from strange lips that people looked down upon him, laughed at, cursed him, sneered at him as the man who made money out of his daughters" love affairs, and whose house was a place where young men were corrupted.
And he had always fancied that he was the best man in the world, whose house was honoured and respected, and whose friendship was sought after!
In his confusion of mind he had wandered out of his way as far as the Malomligeti pond. What a nice pond! he thought. How many wicked girls could be suffocated there! A man, too, might easily leap into it, and be at rest! Then he turned back again and hastened home.
At home they were still chattering and exclaiming at the pretensions of Aunt Teresa. The youngest girl was pa.s.sed from hand to hand, and kissed and embraced as if some great misfortune awaited her.
"Poor f.a.n.n.y, it would be better for you to be a servant with us than to live with Aunt Teresa!"
"Oh, what a pleasant time you"ll have, sewing and knitting all day long, and in the evening reading devotional books to aunty till she dozes off!"
"I know she will always be running us down; you will never see us, and we shall become quite strangers to you."
"Poor f.a.n.n.y, the old f.a.ggot will beat you, too."
"Poor f.a.n.n.y!"
"My poor girl!"
"Poor little sister!"
They quite frightened the child with all these lamentations, and it was at last determined that if f.a.n.n.y would say to papa, if he pressed her, that she did not want to go to Aunt Teresa, they would all take her part.
At that same moment Meyer"s steps were audible upon the staircase. He rushed into the room with his hat on--but, indeed, in such a house as that it was not usual to take off one"s hat at all at any time. He knew that every one was looking at his face, but he also knew that his face was distorted enough to frighten any one who looked at it.
Without bestowing a glance on any one, he simply said to f.a.n.n.y--
"Put on your hat and cloak, and look sharp about it!"
"Why, papa?" asked f.a.n.n.y. Like all badly-brought-up children, she always said, "What for?" before doing anything she was told to do.
"You are to come with me."
"Where?"
"To Aunt Teresa"s."
Every one present affected an air of astonishment. f.a.n.n.y cast down her eyes, and twisting a ribbon round her finger, "I don"t want to go to Aunt Teresa," she faltered timidly.
A disjointed embroidering frame was lying on the table.
f.a.n.n.y stole a glance at her mother and sisters, and meeting with looks of encouragement, repeated, this time in a bold, determined voice--
"I don"t want to go to Aunt Teresa!"
"What? You don"t want to go, eh?"
"I want to stay here with my mother and sisters."
"With your mother and sisters, eh? and become what they are, I suppose?"
and seizing the girl with one hand, he s.n.a.t.c.hed up with the other one of the sticks of the embroidering frame, and, before f.a.n.n.y had time to be frightened, he thrashed her in a way that made his own heart bleed for her.
The sisters tried to interfere, and got their share also, for papa Meyer broke all the remaining sticks of the frame over their shoulders, so that when it came to his wife"s turn, he had to pummel her with his fists till she collapsed in a corner.