Here she stopped short. She evidently meant me to find out the rest of the story for myself.
"Poor woman!" I murmured. I was sorry and embarra.s.sed.
She burst out laughing.
"Don"t pity me, pray! I am perfectly happy. Gyuricza did not strike me with his whip. I am now mistress in the herdsman"s hut."
And she seemed quite proud of it all!
Then she began to tell me of her new hero with real enthusiasm. He was what man was meant to be when first created, all strength and truth; there was nothing artificial, nothing false, nothing effeminate about him. "When he comes home at night he goes to the fireplace to smoke his pipe; then he empties a can of b.u.t.termilk to the very dregs. Wine is only put upon the table on Sundays. Then he asks, "Have you any good dumpling soup, sweetheart?" "Of course I have, and cured bacon and groat pottage as well." As soon as it is ready we turn it out and sit down to it. We eat with tin spoons out of a large common dish. No invitation is needed there. The lady herself fetches the water from the spring. The master drinks one half of it and offers the other half to his wife: "You drink too!" And after that they don"t go in for much stargazing, nor do they care a fig for the world and all its thousand troubles. They sleep with open doors, and the four sheep-dogs guard the house.
"At three o"clock in the morning Bessy gets up and goes into the stable to milk the cows; by dawn it must be all done. The little milking-stool is now her throne. She pours the fresh foaming milk into the pails and takes them into the cellar with the help of the serving maid. When the boy sounds his horn the cows must be driven out; they must be pastured apart from the brood-cows. And all this time the master is eating his breakfast: peppered bacon and green leeks with good _papramorgo_,[37]
and then he follows his herds out into the pastures. The reason why he cracks his whip so loudly is because he knows that some one is standing there in the little door and looking after him. Then _she_ has to skim the cream from the standing milk, churn the milk, and take the b.u.t.ter to market. Then she has to buckle to bread-baking. The maid is sent to heat the oven; meanwhile she herself is kneading the dough, then she shovels out the burning embers with the oven scoop, and wipes down the inside of the oven with a wet kitchen-clout; then the loaves are shot in by means of the long baking-shovel (first of all, however, are baked the "fire-cakes," which "my soul"[38] loves so much), finally the "lock-up"
stone is smeared with clay and placed in front of the oven, and one must be ready to an instant to pull the stone from the mouth of the oven again and take out the loaves. Meanwhile, she has had time to prepare upon the hearth a pottage of millet and smoked bacon, and carry it quickly, pot and all, to the pasturage, so that when the mid-day bell rings, the master may have his victuals ready laid on his outspread fur pelisse. After dinner, beneath the shadow of the big wild nut-tree, she may take a nap with an ap.r.o.n thrown over her face. On returning home she gets out her bruised flax and heckles it, so that when the husband returns home he finds wife and family sitting by the distaff and singing together the spinning songs of the country folk, till the pigs come running home with a great grunting and demand their slush.--Oh, such a life as that is pure enjoyment!"
[Footnote 37: A sort of _eau-de-vie_.]
[Footnote 38: _Lelkem_, _i.e._, "My darling."]
I shook my head dubiously.
"It will bore you one day."
"Bore me! Don"t you recollect when I was in your lath hut I painted this very life to you as my ideal?--A hut of rushes and a bed of straw. You spoke to me of fame and glory. The lowing of kine, the tinkling of sheep-bells, the cracking of whips is my delight. It was so even then.
Since that time I have learnt to know the great world, but it hasn"t altered me. I am full of disgust with everything that is to be found in palaces. Those demi-men, those Sunday husbands--those refined and exquisitely polite she-sinners, those model sticklers for virtue who sin through the whole ten commandments day after day, and vie even with the ladies of the ballet, with this difference, however, that the ballet-dancers are much more modest in private than these great ladies are in public--I am sick and weary of the whole lot of them. I would rather have a man who never washes his mouth after he has eaten garlic, than a man who returns home from an orgie and pretends he has been to a political conference. The famous Hamilton bed, which costs you a hundred ducats if you sleep in it for a single night, is wretchedness itself compared to the bed of fresh straw on which I sleep. Believe me when I tell you that I am perfectly happy."
"I"ll believe anything you like, but there"s one circ.u.mstance I cannot understand. How is it that n.o.body disturbs this sweet idyll of yours? Is the one man who is so confoundedly nearly interested in your happiness, is that man still alive? Does Muki Bagotay still exist anywhere in the wide world?"
"I fancy so."
"Well, if he does, I"ll only say that what flows through his veins is milk, not blood. Is he content to carry the horns of his hundred oxen? A rich and powerful landlord, a county magnate, and the master of your ideal peasant!--A thousand lightnings! if I were only in his place!"
Bessy, with a sarcastic smile, folded her hands together above her knees.
"Well, come now! If you were in dear Muki"s place what would _you_ do?"
"I"ll tell you. I wouldn"t call Peter Gyuricza out, but one fine day I would put my democratic principles on the shelf, and collecting my heydukes and my rustics, I"d give chase to the herdsman, trounce him according to his deserts, and kick him out of my employment. I would get another herdsman; but as for my wife, I"d tie her to the pummel of my saddle, and drag her like that to my castle. That"s what _I_ would do, were I the husband of Muki Bagotay"s wife!"
I had certainly got a little heated. It was only afterwards that I reflected, "What"s Hecuba to me? Why should I bother my head about Peter Gyuricza?"
Bessy, however, laughed most heartily.
"Ha! ha! ha! You"d have done that to me, would you? You"d have tied me to your horse"s tail and whipped me home, eh? How sorry I am then that I did not choose you! What a fine thing it would have been if I could have boasted of bearing the impression of your blows on my body! Tell me now, have you ever struck any one who was unable to hit you back?"
At this I was fairly put to silence.
"But let that be! You could not be so good a Muki Bagotay as Muki Bagotay himself would have been if he could. He actually _did_ try the very recipe which you now recommend. The very next day he sent his bailiff with the verbal message to Peter Gyuricza to pack himself off forthwith, but me the bailiff was to bring straight home. The bailiff gave himself airs, and would have used force, so I gave him a sound box on the ears, which he"ll not forget in a hurry; whereupon Peter Gyuricza threw him out of the house.
"Next day the wounded honour of the offended husband resorted to still stronger measures: six _pandurs_[39] appeared upon the scene with swords and pistols. Peter and I were outside in the pastures. Thither they came after us. But Peter was not a bit put out. He hastily called together his young shepherds; there were four of them; they caught up their cudgels, and the four sheep dogs took the same side. The six _pandurs_ never dreamt we should tackle them. The corporal of the _pandurs_ threatened to fire if we offered the least resistance. I immediately rushed forward in front of Peter, and said to them, "Very well! there you are! Fire!" There was a pretty rumpus, the dogs began to bark, and at last even the stolid steers got mad, and the big old bull rushed out of the herd and charged straight at the _pandurs_, who were thronging round the herdsman. They took to their heels straightway, and those who did not leave their shakos behind them might think themselves lucky."
[Footnote 39: County police.]
"Why, that was quite an epic poem!"
"Wasn"t it! But you haven"t heard the end of it yet. After the repulse of the second a.s.sault, Muki began to carry on the war in grim earnest.
One evening, our maid, who had been sent out as a spy, came back with the terrifying news that his honour had sent out orders that on the following day all his tenants were to a.s.semble in the courtyard of the castle armed with cudgels, flails, and pitchforks; to his huntsmen and heydukes also he had distributed guns and ammunition. The whole of this host was to advance upon us in battle array on the morrow. It would have been well, perhaps, to have fled before them while there was yet time.
But we did not fly."
"Then what was the end of it all?"
"A very droll ending indeed. When the danger was greatest, good luck sent a deliverer, a good friend, just as usually happens in happily-constructed dramas, who intervened with a mighty hand and diverted the stroke from our heads."
"And who was this good friend?"
"Why, who else but the bearer of this fine blonde beard!" cried she, with an ironical smile, caressing my chin.
"I? Why, I was not in that part of the country at all."
"Ah! but poets have long arms, you know. At the very moment when Muki was placing firearms in the hands of his peasants, freedom was proclaimed at Pest. The rumour spread throughout the kingdom like wildfire--the Revolution had broken out. They say in Pressburg that Petofi and you were on the Rakos[40] at the head of 40,000 peasants, and that a new Dozsa[41] war had begun. The retainers of Muki also thronged up to his castle, not to carry me off by force, but to demand their liberties. "We"ll work no more!" they cried; "we"ll pay no more t.i.thes, and no more hearth-money."[42] Freedom had broken out with a vengeance! Muki was thereupon so terrified that he fled incontinently through the back door in the clothes of his lackey, and never stopped till he was safely out of the kingdom. I have heard nothing of him since. So you see your mighty hand turned aside the danger that was hovering over our heads. We drank your health afterwards in big b.u.mpers."
[Footnote 40: A plain to the east of Pest, where, from the earliest times, elective a.s.semblies were held.]
[Footnote 41: George Dozsa, the leader of the Hungarian _jacquerie_ of 1514, who was finally captured and executed after truly infernal torments.]
[Footnote 42: _Fustpenz_--lit., smoke money, so much on each chimney.]
I certainly had never calculated upon success of this sort.
"Well," said I, "you have certainly disposed of Mr. Janos Nepomuk Bagotay for a time (though I would call your attention to the fact that he will not be very long in perceiving that there is no Dozsa war in Hungary, and will then return with reinforcements), but may I ask what her ladyship your mother says to all this?"
"I should have come to that, even if you had not asked me. In fact, this is the very thing which brings me to you. One fine evening when I was returning home from the maize fields, with my kerchief full of pods, I found an official notification nailed on the door of our hut. The lawyer"s clerk who brought it, delighted to find n.o.body at home, had fastened the doc.u.ment to the door-post and decamped. It gave me to understand that Muki was bringing an action against me for adultery. A term was fixed, however, within which, according to custom, we might appear before the priest at any place we liked and be reconciled if possible. After the lapse of six weeks the priest would make another attempt to bring about a reconciliation; if this did not succeed, he would bid us go to the ----! and we should have to appear before the judge instead!"
I now began to see to what I was indebted for the pleasure of her visit.
I should very much have liked to have banged the door in her face with the words: "I am not a lawyer, though I have served my terms!" But I let her go on.
"I immediately took down the notification from the door," she resumed, "and sent my little maid with it to town to my mother"s. By way of explanation I wrote her a letter, a task not unattended with difficulty, as Peter Gyuricza"s hut was singularly ill-provided with writing materials. First of all I had to manufacture ink from wild juniper berries, then I carved a pen from a goose-quill; in place of paper I made use of beautifully smooth maize leaves."
"Just as the Egyptians used papyrus?"
"Yes, and if papyrus was good enough for the daughters of the Pharaohs, why shouldn"t maize-membranes be good enough for me? I wrote and told her everything that had happened. I entirely justified my proceedings.
If there was but one drop of justice in her composition she would be bound to acknowledge that my line of action was as clear as the day.
Muki had made off with the herdsman"s wife; I, following the _lex talionis_--an eye for eye--had made off with Gyuricza. He had brought an action against me; Gyuricza would bring an action against his own wife.
The pair of us stood on exactly the same legal footing. If the two divorces were carried out, I meant to make the man of my choice my lawful husband, and would become in name what I already was in fact, the wife of Peter Gyuricza. I referred to you also in my letter."
"To me?"
"Yes. I argued that there was now no difference between peasants and gentlemen, and pointed out that since the 15th March you had omitted the privileged "_y_"[43] from the end of your name, and had subst.i.tuted for it a simple "_i_," and you were a "glorious patriot," as every one knew.
n.o.body therefore had any reason to be ashamed of Peter Gyuricza.
Besides, I did not mean that he should remain a herdsman any longer; but as soon as my mother handed over to me my patrimony (so much of it I mean as Muki had not already squandered away), I meant to purchase a farm, and Gyuricza and I would settle down upon it as independent proprietors."