"Mariska, have you any money?"
"Yes, dear!" Mariska hastened to answer, "just ten thousand thalers. Do you want them?"
"No, no. But have them all ready to hand, and if you collected your jewels together at the same time you would do well."
"What for, my husband?"
"Because," stammered Ghyka, "because--we may--and very speedily, too--have to set out on our travels."
"Have to travel--in my condition?" asked Mariska, raising a pathetic face up to her husband.
That look transfixed the very soul of Ghyka. His wife was in a condition nearer to death than to life.
"No, I won"t stir a stump," he suddenly cried, beside himself with agitation, striking his sword so violently on the table that it flew from its sheath, "if heaven itself fall on me, I won"t go."
"For G.o.d"s sake, my husband, what is the matter?" cried Mariska in her astonishment; whereupon the Prince proudly raised his eyebrows, approached her with a smile, and pressing his wife to his bosom, said rea.s.suringly:
"Fear nothing. I had an idea in my head; but I have dismissed it, and will think of it no more. Take it that I have asked you nothing."
"But your anxiety?"
"It has gone already. Ask not the reason, for you would laugh at me for it. Sleep in peace. I also will sleep upon it."
The husband caressed and kissed his wife, and his hand trembled no longer, his face was no longer pale, and his lips were no longer so cold as before.
But the wife"s were now. When her husband tenderly kissed her eyes and bade her sleep, she pretended that she was satisfied; but as soon as he had withdrawn from her room, she arose, put on a dressing-gown, and calling one of her maids, descended with her into the hall, and sent for a faithful old servant of her husband"s, who was wont to accompany him everywhere, an old Moldavian courier.
"Jova!" she said, "speak the truth! What"s the matter with your master?
What have you seen and heard?"
"It is a great trouble, my lady. G.o.d deliver us from it! We only escaped destruction at the battle of St. Gothard by not standing up against the Magyars. But what were we to do? Christian cannot fight against Christian, for then should we be fighting against G.o.d. The Turkish army was badly beaten there. And now the Vizier of Buda, that he may wash himself clean, for the Sultan is very wroth, wants to cast the whole blame of the affair on the head of the Prince."
"Great Heaven! And what will be the result?"
"Well, it would not be a bad thing if your Highnesses were to withdraw somewhere or other for a time to give the Sultan"s wrath time to cool."
"To my father"s, eh? in Wallachia?"
"Well, a little farther than that, I should say."
"True, we might go to Transylvania; we have lots of good friends there."
"Even there it might not be as well to stay. You would do well to make a journey to Poland."
"Do you suppose the danger to be so great then?"
"G.o.d grant it be not so bad as I think it."
"Thank you for your advice, Jova. I will tell my husband quite early in the morning."
"My lady, you would do well not to wait till morning."
The woman grew pale.
"What do you mean?"
"I mean that if you would take care of yourselves, you should take carriage this very night, this very hour. I will go before the horses with a lantern, and a courier shall be sent on ahead to have fresh relays of horses awaiting us at every station, so that by the time it begins to grow grey, we shall have left the last hill of this region out of sight."
The terrified Princess returned to her bedchamber, and quickly packed up her most valuable things, making all the necessary preparations for a long journey. But the door leading to her husband"s room was locked, and she durst not call him, but with an indescribable sinking of heart awaited the endlessly distant dawn. She was unable to close her eyes the whole night. Wearied out in body and soul she rose as soon as she saw the light of dawn, sitting with her swimming head against the window, whence she could look down into the courtyard.
Gradually the courtyard awoke to life and noise again, and the hall was peopled with domestics hurrying to and fro. The grooms began walking the horses up and down, the peasant girls with pitchers on their heads were returning from the distant wells, a merry voice began singing a popular ditty in one of the outhouses. All this seemed as strange to the watchful lady as the life and the movement of the outside world seems to one condemned to death who gazes upon it from the window of his cell.
Then the door opened and her husband came out of his bedchamber and greeted his wife with a voice full of boisterous courage. He was dressed in a short stagskin jacket, which he generally wore when he went a-hunting, and wore big Polish boots with star-like spurs.
"Going a-hunting, eh?" asked Mariska, from whose soul all her terrifying phantoms vanished instantly when her husband embraced her in his vigorous arms.
"Yes, I"m going a-hunting. I feel so full of energy that if I don"t tumble about somewhere or other I shall burst. Any boar or bear that I come across to-day will have good cause to remember me."
"Oh! take care no ill befalls you!"
"Befalls me!" cried the Prince, proudly smiting his herculean breast.
The lady flung herself on her husband"s neck with the confidence of a child, and lifting from his head his saucy bonnet with its eagle plume, which gave him such a brave appearance, and smoothing down his curls, kissed his bonny face, and forgot all her thoughts and visions of the bygone night.
The Prince withdrew, and Mariska opened her window and looked out of it to see him mount his horse.
While the Prince was going downstairs, a dirty Turkish cava.s.se in sordid rags entered the courtyard, from which at other times he was wont to fetch letters, and mingled with the ostlers and stablemen without seeming to attract attention.
A few moments later the Prince ordered his horse to be brought in a loud resonant voice, whereupon the cava.s.se immediately came forward, and producing from beneath his dirty dolman a sealed and corded letter, pressed it to his forehead and then handed it to the Prince.
The Prince broke open the letter and his face suddenly turned pale; taking off his cap, he bowed low before the cava.s.se and saluted him.
O Prince of Moldavia! to doff thy eagle-plumed cap to a dirty cava.s.se, and bow thy haughty manly brow before him! Whatever can be the meaning of it all? Mariska"s heart began to throb violently as she gazed down from her window.
The Prince, with all imaginable deference, then indicated the door of his castle to the cava.s.se and invited him to enter first; but the Turk with true boorish insolence, signified that the Prince was to lead the way.
Suddenly, in an illuminated flash, Mariska guessed the mystery. In the moment of peril, with rare presence of mind, she rushed to her secretaire, where her jewels were. Her first thought was that the cava.s.se had come for her husband; he must be bribed therefore to connive at his escape.
Then she saw hastening through the door the old groom Jova. The face of the ancient servitor was full of fear, and there were tears in his eyes.
"Has the cava.s.se come for my husband, then?" she inquired tremulously.
"Yes, my lady," stammered the servant; "why don"t you make haste?"
"Let us give him money."
"He won"t take it. What is money to him? If he returns without the Prince his own head will be forfeit."