Chapter 7. A Man Of Iron

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_ CHAPTER VII. A MAN OF IRON

General Vértessy had for many years been the commandant of a military station in Hungary. After such a long time as that, men get to be acquainted with one another, and the soldier comes to be regarded as quite a member of the family. The townsfolk, too, begin to speak of him as a member of the upper classes; no great entertainment is considered complete without him, and the ordinary civilian exchanges greetings with him as a man and a brother in all places of public resort. The county makes him a magistrate on account of his numerous distinguished services; he receives the freedom of the city for the same reason; and, finally, the only daughter of a most distinguished patrician family, impressed by the gallant soldier's noble qualities, consents to become his wife; and thus the general, as citizen and magistrate, as husband and landlord, becomes rooted by the strongest ties to the soil which it is his duty as a soldier to defend.

His acquaintances in general have the greatest confidence in him; his tenants allude to him gratefully, for he deals mercifully with them; the citizens regard him with respectful astonishment when, on the outbreak of a fire, he orders out his soldiers, and is himself the first to clamber to the top of the burning roof, distributing his commands in the midst of danger as if his life was worth no more than the life of any broken-down, invalided old soldier; the school children rejoice at the sight of him, for he is always sure to be in his place on the occasion of any public examination, to distribute sixpences and shillings to those scholars who give the best answers, and exhort them to hold up their heads and stand upright like good little men! When then, after this, they meet him in the street, the little fellows throw back their heads and stick out their chests so that it does you good to look at them. For the General dearly loves children. Very frequently they break his windows with their tops and balls, but he never scolds them for it, and always gives them back their playthings. "They are but children, let them play!" says he.

In society, too, he is a most agreeable, amusing man, polite and chivalrous towards ladies, and at public entertainments he distinguishes himself by his neat little speeches, which are always good-natured, very much to the point, and seasoned with attic salt of a piquant but not too pungent quality. He is merciful to the absurdities of his fellow-citizens; it is no business of his to impress them with any affectation of soldierly gravity or stiffness; and if at first sight his stern, clean-shaven face--the regulation countenance of soldiers of those days--keeps a timid stranger somewhat at a distance, he has only to open his mouth, and his beautifully pure Magyar accent and intonation prove to demonstration that, soldier as he is, he has remained a true son of his fatherland--and all hearts open to him at once.

But all this ceases at the gate of the barracks. Within the barrack courtyard there is an end to all friendship, kinsmanship, _camaraderie_, and patronage. He is no longer either a county magistrate or an honorary citizen. He has done with all those qualities which make up a man's social amiability. Here Vértessy is only a soldier, a rigorous, inexorable commandant, who never overlooks a blunder, and never leaves a fault unpunished.

As regards the good school children, you could give them no better encouragement than to say to them: "The General is coming and will pat you on the shoulder!" but there was nothing so terrible to the bad school children as to be threatened with the General if they did not learn their lessons. "You'll be sent to the General, and he will tap you from the shoulder to the heel and make another man of you in double-quick time," people used to say to them.

At any rate, so much is certain: the most stubborn, pig-headed louts, whom no school would keep at any price, when sent, despite the tears and protests of their fond mothers, to the General's establishment, used to return from thence in a couple of years or so as if transformed. They had become orderly, methodical, manly fellows, courteous, tractable, and as spick and span as if they had just been taken out of a band-box. As to what exactly happened to them during their manipulation in this same military band-box not one of them was ever known to allude in a boastful spirit; but the lay mind had a very strong suspicion that not much time was wasted inside the barracks in fine talking.

Moreover, the General used to have guilty soldiers tied up and well whipped without first stopping to inquire who their fathers might be. With him punishment was meted out with no regard for persons. It was the uniform, not the man who happened to be inside it, that he regarded. When his soldiers were drawn up in line he was quite blind to the fact that this man perhaps was the son of his old crony, or that man was the son of a county magistrate--sergeants, corporals, ensigns, and privates, these were the only distinctions he ever made. And if anybody tried to distinguish himself by appearing on parade in a dirty jacket, he had it well dusted for him there and then in a way the individual concerned was not likely to forget in a hurry.

Nor did the General ever allow anybody, no matter whom, to be exempted from service. The dear little gentlemen-cadets had to pace up and down when on guard, with seven-pound muskets across their shoulders, just like anybody else, though the hearts of their distinguished mammas almost broke at the sight, when they drove over in their fine coaches to see their darlings. Malingerers, again, had a fearful time of it with him. Such young gentlemen never wanted to go to the hospital more than once. Their distinguished mammas would scurry off to the General full of despair, and explain to him with tears in their eyes that this or that young exquisite lay mortally sick in the hospital, would he allow them to take their poor darlings home, or at least let them come to the hospital to nurse the invalids there, or send them nice tempting dishes from home, or tell the family doctor to call? No, nothing of the sort. The General used to receive them buttoned up to the chin, and nothing on earth could move him. The proper place for the fellow was the barrack-hospital, he would say, there he would receive proper treatment like any other of His Majesty's soldiers; the regimental surgeons had quite sufficient science to cure him. And it regularly happened that after a four or five days' course of a platter of coarse barley pottage, and half an ounce of plain black commissariat bread, the young gentleman was so completely cured of every bodily ailment that he had never the faintest wish ever afterwards to divert himself in the hospital, but preferred instead to attend to his daily duties.

Nor could his officers boast that he showed them any special indulgence. It was really terrible how he contrived to fill up their time all day long: instruction, regimental practice, writing, calculation, technical studies filled up every hour of the day. The smoking-rooms of the cafés and the civic promenades very rarely saw Vértessy's officers gathered together there. The officers had to know everything which the General asked them about, and were often obliged to work out for themselves, with the aid of their mother wit, the details of their extremely laconic instructions. Everyone knew, too, that he could not endure the slightest suspicion of cowardice; if an officer were insulted, he was obliged to fight in defence of his honour, or the regiment was made too hot to hold him. If, on the other hand, the townsmen got to know anything of the details of these duels, he would punish severely all the officers concerned in the affair, for he placed boastfulness on the same level as cowardice. Such severity had this good effect however, that the soldiers tried to live amicably with the townsmen as they knew very well that it would be impossible to keep dark a duel with any of the black-coated gentry, such an event was certain to be an object of common gossip in all four quarters of the town within twenty-four hours.

It was also a recognised fact throughout the length and breadth of the kingdom that the officers of Vértessy's regiment were all well instructed, orderly, serious men, and that this result was due entirely to the initiative of "the iron man," for this was the name most usually and very naturally applied to him.

And his face, figure, and expression, corresponded with the name. He was of a tall, straight, well-knit-together habit of body, with broad shoulders and a well-rounded chest. His head seemed almost too small for his extraordinary developed body, especially as the chestnut-brown hair was clipped quite short. His face was of a deep red, and shaved to the chin, but a pair of small well kept semicircular whiskers helped to give it character. His nose was straight, his mouth small; his eyes were grey and piercing. And everything on this face: nose, mouth, eyes, down to the smallest feature, seemed one and all to be under the most rigorous military discipline, not one of them was suffered to move without the General's command. When once his features are under orders to be coldly severe, the lips may not give expression to joy, the eyes may not be clouded with sorrow, the eyebrows may not contract with rage, or lead anyone to suspect, by so much as a twitch or a jerk, that anything in the world outside has the slightest influence upon the business he may happen to have on hand.

We may add that the General did not acquire this honourable title in times of peace. Formerly, beneath the walls of Dresden, when he was a lieutenant scarcely five-and-twenty years old, he had earned it by holding a position on the battle-field as stubbornly as if he had really been made of cast iron, whereby a totally defeated army corps was saved from the annihilating pursuit of the triumphant foe. Even the enemy's general had inquired on this occasion: "Who is that man of iron who will neither break nor bend?" That, then, was how he had won the epithet "iron."

Subsequently the nickname was applied in jest or flattery; you could take it as spite, fear, or homage, according to the manner in which it was pronounced, naturally always behind the General's back, for it went very hard indeed with the man who ventured to pick a quarrel with him, and still harder, if possible, with anybody who tried to flatter him.

* * * * *

In the ante-chamber of "the iron man" stood an orderly with a big sealed dispatch in his hand, a tall grenadier-sort of warrior, with two stiffly twisted moustachios, the pointed ends of which projected like a couple of fixed bayonets. A deep scar furrowed each of his red cheeks from end to end, a living testimony to the fact that this warrior was no mere sucking soldier. His chin was planted firmly on his stiff cravat and half hidden by the broad loop of his shako. His jacket was as white as chalk, and his buttons shone as if they were fresh from the shop. On his bosom gleamed gloriously the large copper medal of which the veterans of former days used to be so proud. The warrior was standing motionless behind the door, with the big sealed dispatch in his bosom; not a muscle of him moves, his heels are pressed close together at attention, his eyes now and then glance furtively from side to side, but his neck does not stir the least little bit.

The oblique motion of his eyes, however, is explicable by the fact that a trim little wench, a nursery-maid from some village hard by, with a round radiant face, with her hair trailing down her back in ribboned pigtails, is rummaging about the room as if she had no end of work to do there, casting furtive sheep's eyes from time to time at the upright soldier, and looking as if she would very much like to say to him: "Oh! how frightened I am of you!"

"Why don't you sit down, Mr. Soldier?" she says at last; "don't you see that chair there? And here have I been dusting it so nicely for you."

"A pretty thing for an orderly to sit down in the General's ante-chamber," replies the defender of his country. "Short irons would be very soon ready for me, I can tell you."

"Then why are you here at all?"

"That is not for your ears, my little sister."

"You are looking for the General, eh? Well, he is inside that room there along with my lady, his wife--why don't you go in?"

"You've a nice idea of manners, I must say! What! an orderly to make his way into the room of the General's lady!"

"Then give the letter here and I'll take it in for you."

"Now, my little sister, that's quite enough! What! deliver a letter into the hands of anybody but the person to whom it is addressed!"

"Do you know how to write, Mr. Orderly?"

"What a question! Ask me another! Why, if I could write I should have become a sergeant long ago."

"Why don't you take off that shako? It's pretty heavy, ain't it?"

"Now, my little wench, that's quite enough! Right about turn, quick march! They are calling you in the kitchen."

The nursery-maid scuttled off. The veteran was getting quite angry at all these simple questions.

In no very long time, however, the neat little wench came sidling back again. First she poked her head through the kitchen door as if she wanted to find out whether the big soldier there would bite off her nose--which was a little snub, and small enough already.

"Mr. Orderly, the cook has sent you three hearth cakes."

"Good."

"Take them then." This she said, still keeping at a safe distance, and thrusting forward the nice lard-made hearth cakes as if she were offering them to some snappy, snarling watch-dog at the end of a long chain.

"I can't," answered the gallant defender of his country sturdily.

"Ain't you got hands, then?"

"No, not for them. But if you like you can tuck them into my cartridge-box behind there."

"What, in there?" inquired snub-nose amazedly. "But ain't there gunpowder inside?"

"Shove 'em in, they won't hurt it."

"Won't it explode?"

"Not unless a spark from your eyes catches it."

The nursery-maid timidly lifted the brightly-polished lid of the cartridge-box, peeping half up at the soldier to see if he meant to frighten her, and at the same time gazing curiously at the many funny round little things in the cartridge-box, at which she pretended to be desperately afraid.

The gallant soldier was in duty bound not to move his hand, but he so far relaxed as to allow the tips of two of his fingers to crook downwards and give the plump round arm of the wench a good tweak.

"Be off with you, I'm afraid you're a bad man after all, Mr. Soldier!"

"I fancy I am too, otherwise I suppose there would not have been so much of me--little and good you know!"

"Do you know why the cook sent you those cakes?"

"That I may eat them instead of you, I suppose."

"Go along, you naughty man! You do say such naughty things! No, she sent them that you might tell her when the next public whipping will take place."

"Does the cook want to see it then? A nice pastime, I must say. You don't want to see it too, do you?"

"No, not I."

"You ought to see it. It is just the thing for wenches. There are always as many ladies present on such occasions as if it was play-acting."

"Oh, I should like to see it then, the sooner the better. Will there be another soon? That's for the General to decide, isn't it? If I were a General I would order a flogging every morning, and make the band play every evening."

"That would be very nice. Come hither, and I will whisper it."

"Truly?" inquired the wench, half turning her head round. "But don't shout in my ear!"

When she had got near enough to the soldier for him to be able to whisper in her ear, he suddenly planted a smacking kiss on her red cheek.

In her terror the wench gave a bound back to the kitchen door, but there she remained standing, and rubbed her face vigorously with her blue apron.

"Yes, you are indeed a bad man, Mr. Orderly. And still you have not yet told me when the next whipping will be."

"Don't fret, my little sister. The spectacle will be better than you think. There will be a shooting-to-death shortly."

"A shooting-to-death! Oh! that _will_ be nice! And who is going to be shot?"

"A soldier, my little sister."

"And you'll have to shoot him, perhaps, eh?"

"It is quite possible, my little sister."

"Oh, Mr. Soldier, that's too bad!"

The snub-nosed wench made haste to quit a room in which stood a man heartless enough to shoot down his living fellow-man, and outside in the kitchen she had a long discussion with the cook about it, and they came to the conclusion that it must be a very fine entertainment to see a man shot right through the head. First there would be the getting up early, for such spectacles generally take place at dawn, and it would never do to sleep away such an opportunity as that, especially as it was just as likely as not that the poor devil would be placed in the pillory first. What could he have been doing? But suppose they were to pardon him? Oh, no! no chance of that, for the General never pardons anybody; even if it were his own son he would not pardon him if he were found guilty, for he was "the iron man."

* * * * *

Meanwhile, inside there, "the iron man" is sitting in his wife's room on a small embroidered armless chair. Opposite to him on a large elevated divan lies his wife, a tiny, elegant, transparent little lady, with a face of alabaster, and wee wee hands which a child of two would not have known what to do with if they had been doled out to her. Her small strawberry-like mouth scarcely seemed to have been made for talking purposes; all the more eloquent, on the other hand, were her large dark-blue eyes, which were saying at that moment that those who can love are very, very happy.

The iron man was sitting in front of her with his elbows planted on his knees and both his hands stretched forwards. Extended on these two hands of his was a skein of thread, which the elegant little woman was winding with great rapidity.

He need only have stretched his arms a wee bit more to burst the whole skein to pieces, but he has learnt to watch very carefully lest the thread gets entangled, and he laughs heartily every time he moves his hands clumsily, at the same time begging pardon and promising to do better in future.

"My darling, I have an old sword--it served me well in the French war--do you think it would be of any use to you?"

The little lady laughed, and how charmingly she could laugh; it sounded like the bells of a glass harmonica striking against each other.

"I understand the allusion. If you can use the owner of the sword for unwinding thread, you might use his sword instead of scissors."

"I mean what I say."

"That doesn't matter a bit, you must wait till the skein is unwound."

"Naturally that is as it should be, of course. Nor would I suffer anybody else to take my place. To hold a skein of thread requires great strength of mind, not every man is up to it. A giddy head would very soon give way beneath the task. It is a science in itself. Besides, I swore before the parson I would take you 'for better or worse.' You see how I keep my word. Look there now! The thread has tied itself into a knot again. Now, if one of your parlour-maids had been holding it, you would have been angry with her, but as my darling little wife it is not lawful for you to be angry. Do you hear me? It is not lawful for you to be angry with me, I say."

The little lady undid the knot again, and her husband tenderly kissed the little intervening hand as it drew nearer; the little lady affected not to have observed this, but she knew it well enough.

"Look now, my darling! it is you who have taught me to consider myself an extraordinary fine fellow. Formerly, when people used to say: General Vértessy is such and such a man, I only used to hold my tongue and think to myself: Talk away! talk away! _I_ happen to know that Vértessy is as timid as a child, there is one thing he is as much in dread of as any schoolgirl, and that is--unravelling a skein of thread. When I was a little chap I twice ran away from home to avoid this very thing. And now my dear little spouse has made it quite clear to me that General Vértessy is _not_ afraid of it after all. Honour to whom honour is due! General Vértessy is a brave man."

"Naturally; why the thirteenth labour of Hercules brought him more fame than all the rest--don't you remember how he held the skeins of Madame Omphale?"

"That was the greatest of his heroic exploits, certainly. You ladies cannot imagine what tyranny you practice upon the masculine gender when you constrain them to this terrible servitude. To wear chains is a mere jest, but when you bind a man with a skein of thread, a mere gossamer, in fact, and then tell him he must not break it asunder, that is cruelty indeed! Why don't the English invent a machine for this sort of hard labour? They rack their brains about steamboats, about woman's rights, and the emancipation of the negro; but as to _these_ fetters, these..."

"Come, come, attend to your skein!"

And indeed those dangerous fetters, as the General called them, were themselves in great danger, for the General in his ardour had made a slight gesture which had almost ripped them asunder.

"I'll take it away from you if you don't behave yourself properly. Fancy making such lamentations over a little skein-unravelling!"

"Oh, I am not speaking of myself. I am used to all sorts of hardships. I pity more particularly those poor innocent children who come to groan under this unnatural yoke. Just picture to yourself, my dear, one such innocent eight or nine years old, a little lad whose blood bubbles over like champagne, who sees the sun shining through the windows, who hears the boisterous mirth of his comrades outside as they play at ball, and would give anything to run away himself and romp and wrestle and turn somersaults; fancy such a one obliged to remain shut up in a room, fettered by a string of thread or cotton, and made to move his hands up and down just as if he were some stupid machine; fancy him fidgeting first on one leg and then on another, and waiting, waiting for the end of the interminable skein! I wonder they don't become utter blockheads beneath the strain. I wonder their teachers don't forbid it. If I had a child he should not be allowed to hold a skein. No son of mine, I tell you, should ever become a mere skein-unwinding machine..."

And it seemed somehow more than a jest, for the gallant soldier now suddenly forgot all about the skein entrusted to him, and with tender emotion pressed his blushing little wife to his bosom.

The little lady with infinite patience slowly disentangled the chaotic labyrinth of threads again, and then exclaimed with a deep sigh:

"Life and death lie between..."

They both knew the meaning of the allusion.

Then the uninterrupted labour proceeded again. The iron man was now completely silent, but one could observe from the unconsciously radiant expression of his face that his mind was occupied by some very pleasing thought, and in the delightful contemplation thereof he had no longer any idea that he was holding a skein of thread.

Presently, however, he said:

"Let us begin another!"

He must certainly have found it a very agreeable pastime to say that.

It was this time a skein of silk that the little lady wanted to have unwound. This was a still higher symbol of tenderness. Not in vain does the folksong sing of the captive of love being bound with silken chains.

"But, my dear, when I was a little boy, and had to hold skeins, my sisters, by way of compensation, used to tell me tales."

"With all my heart."

"Fire away, then: once upon a time...!"

"Once upon a time there was a girl who always wanted to die."

"Ah! I scarcely bargained for that."

"She was constantly pale, and took it for a compliment when people said to her that she was as white as death."

"She must have eaten lots of raw coffee and chalk, I'll be bound."

"Don't interrupt, I want to tell a tale, not circulate scandal."

"I am all attention."

"Sometimes she carried her bizarre ideas so far as to appear at dances in a white dress trimmed with black, and with a myrtle wreath on her head, just as the dead are wont to be arrayed for the tomb. By way of a breast-pin she used to wear a small skeleton's head carved out of mother-o'-pearl, and she boasted that her gloves had been taken out of the coffin of a deceased friend."

"Shall I be very unfeeling if I allow myself to smile?"

"Pray do nothing of the kind, or you'll be very sorry in a moment."

"Ah, ha! I know a man who fell in love with this girl."

"All the more reason to be serious."

"And subsequently that man got the better of his passion altogether."

"Do not be too sure."

"Too sure! Why, I have been studying the whole case these four years."

"As defendant?"

"Defendant, indeed! I wanted to make that girl my wife. Oh! you were quite a little thing then, a wee wee little lass, scarcely so big as my finger. You were learning to dance in those days and had not yet appeared upon the scene."

"And you deserted that girl on the eve of the wedding!"

"I had reasons for doing so, of which nobody, I fancy, is aware."

"They said at the time that you found out that Benjamin Hétfalusy, the girl's father, was over head and ears in debt, and that you withdrew for that reason."

"I did not take the trouble to contradict the rumour, it was so like General Vértessy to marry for money."

"And the Hétfalusy family became of course your bitterest enemies ever afterwards?"

"They have insulted, but they cannot wound me."

"And you forgave them for it?"

"I never troubled my head about them."

"Say that you forgive them."

"I don't want to flatter myself. I simply forgot them."

"Very well, now let us go on with our story. This poor family has had many heavy visitations of late."

Vértessy's face grew very grave.

"My dear, I am afraid your skein of silk will break asunder on my arms if you go on with such stories. Don't speak to me of the calamities of the Hétfalusy family. I am not at all interested in the happiness of these people, and if they are wretched I don't want to hear anything about it. They seem to have always been bent upon tempting Fate, so that it is not surprising if Fate at last has turned upon them. But I don't want to know anything about it. I am not good enough to grieve with them in their misfortunes, and I am not bad enough to rejoice in their misery. Leave the subject alone, my dear Cornelia."

Cornelia put down the little ball of silk, relieved her husband's arms of the skein, and then sitting beside him on a little stool, kept on stroking him with her tiny hands until she had quite smoothed out all the angry wrinkles on his face, and he had brightened up again and declared, like a good little boy, that he was not a bit put out and would listen to the story again.

"Poor Leonora! her married life was very unhappy."

"But she got what she wanted."

"It seems to me that you know more of my story than I do myself."

"I only know the happy part of it. Was not her husband her youthful ideal?"

"You amaze me. Whenever we used to meet subsequently, she was always full of lamentations, and described herself as very unhappy. To my mind she only took Széphalmi out of bravado, because you deserted her."

"My dear, after that I must whisper in your ear something which only one other soul in the world but myself knows anything about. I am sure _you_ will not say anything about it, because you are good, and that other person will be silent because she is afraid to speak. That pale lady who was so fond of thinking of death, who went to a ball in a myrtle wreath and a white dress with a black fringe, used to have assignations in the dilapidated hut of an old village granny with a youth who was no other than Széphalmi, her present husband. The affair was kept so secret that nobody knew anything about it. The old hag, why I know not, confided the secret to me on the very day when I arrived at Hétfalu Castle in readiness for the wedding. It was as I have said. My pale moonbeam, when everybody was asleep in the castle, used to put on a peasant girl's garb, wrap her head in a flowered kerchief, and glide all alone, along the garden paths, to the old woman's hut at the end of the village, where the youth, disguised as a shepherd, was waiting for her. Oh! this intimacy was of long standing. I heard them talking to each other. In my first mad paroxysm of rage, I was for rushing out and killing the pair of them on the spot; but gradually I recovered my senses, and I asked myself whether it was not more shameful for me, a soldier, to have pried upon a woman than for that woman to have deceived me. Besides, what was there to be done if she loved another? She ought not, of course, to have promised me her hand--a hand without a heart _must_ bring dishonour with it. I said nothing to anybody. I went back to the castle, and the next day I had an interview with the girl's father, and made pecuniary demands upon him, which, in view of the shattered state of his finances, I knew it was impossible for him to comply with. We split upon that very point. There was no marriage. The guests separated. The world laughed. I was cried down as a money-grubber, and for a long time I was in such bad odour, that I'll wager anything that if I had sued for the hand of any respectable girl her relations would have shown me the door in double-quick time. My darling little Cornelia certainly displayed great strength of mind to accept a man who was notorious for having jilted his bride."

"And you had to endure a whole heap of persecutions in consequence."

"Yes, a great many. The Hétfalusys had powerful kinsfolk who did their utmost to make life intolerable to me. A nephew of Benjamin's, who was an officer in the guards, insulted me publicly in the street. The most damaging insinuations were made against me in high places. All my measures were openly and freely criticized. They sought to embroil me with the county authorities. I was persecuted by high and low. I defended myself and held my tongue. I fought duels, I had an answer for everyone. I suffered in silence--but I never betrayed that lady's secret. Keep what I have told you in the depths of your heart, my darling, as I have done hitherto."

Cornelia kissed her husband's high open forehead.

"Yet poor Leonora had her punishment too," said she; "he whom she longed after so much when once she possessed him made her wretched. Széphalmi was unfaithful to her."

"My dear Cornelia, you cannot have love without respect. Széphalmi only married his wife because her desperation drove him to do so. I have often heard people say that Leonora used to dance at parties as if she wished to kill herself, and would drink quantities of iced water when she was in a most heated condition. It was no longer a pretence with her. What scenes took place at home between her mother and herself it was no business of mine to pry into; but this I know right well that the girl one day went straight to Széphalmi and threatened him there and then with something terrible if he did not marry her. I will not tell you, Leonora's former friend, the nature of this threat; it would revolt your pure mind too much, for a heart like yours could form no idea of it; but it is certain that it was fear rather than love which induced Széphalmi to lead her to the altar. I know, however, that the marriage was not unblessed; they have two children."

"They had."

"What! are they dead then?"

"A terrible destiny seems to oppress the whole family. The little girl, her father's darling, disappeared one day without leaving a trace behind her, and the other child was struck dead by lightning while the mother was watching by its sick bed; the mother was killed at the same time."

The General was deeply affected by these words. The heart of the iron man trembled.

"Merciful God...!"

"Old Hétfalusy had a stroke when the dreadful tidings reached him."

"No, _no_! He did _not_ deserve so much suffering. Fate has been more rigorous towards him than he deserved."

"And as if this were not enough--you knew Hétfalusy's son who became a soldier?"

"I knew him. He was a hot-blooded youth, warfare might have made a good soldier of him."

"Well, he quarrelled with his captain in Poland and fired a pistol at him."

"A misfortune, a great misfortune," said the General, pressing his fists so tightly together that if there had been anything inside them it would have been crushed to pieces.

"After this deed the youth fled."

"That is worse still," murmured the General, and he pressed his iron fists still more violently together.

"And if I am not mistaken, this is the third time that he has run away."

There were now two beads of sweat on the General's forehead; he would have wiped it dry with his hand, but he could not, for his fists were firmly clenched, and it never occurred to him to open them.

"My dear Cornelia," said he, "if you know where this young man now is, I implore you to tell me nothing about it. You know that I ought not to hear it."

"You very soon will know all about it; the unhappy youth appeared in his father's house on the very day when his sister and her son lay in their coffins."

"Then he has been arrested," cried the General quickly.

"What makes you think that?"

"Because his own father would be the first person to deliver him up."

Cornelia regarded her husband with amazement.

"Is it not so, I say?" he cried passionately, springing from his seat "Hétfalusy has given up his fugitive son, I'll swear he has, even if I had not been told it beforehand."

"So indeed it is," said Cornelia sadly.

"And how came you to know it before it has been officially reported to me?"

"My uncle is a magistrate there, and he told me. He came from thence in his carriage, while the prisoner was being brought along on foot."

"They are bringing him hither--hither to me," groaned the General impatiently and turning pale. "They will hand him over to me, and I shall have to pronounce judgment upon him."

How he feared, how he shuddered at the thought!

"You could not have told me a worse tale," resumed the General, turning to his wife, and supporting her tender little head against his bosom. "That is a sad, a very sad story."

"But the end has yet to come."

"Yes, and the saddest part of it is that the end of it is in my hands."

"And to my mind it could not be in better hands."

"How can you say that? Is not every member of the Hétfalusy family my personal enemy? If I could forget everything else, must I not remember that they have insulted you? Why, this very young windbag actually insulted you, you my wife, at a public assembly, and now Fate has cast him at my feet, him the last scion of the family, and I must be his judge and pronounce sentence of death upon him! The whole world will believe that I have gladly taken advantage of this grievous opportunity of revenging myself in the most bloody, the most exemplary manner upon my enemies! They will fancy that I condemn the son of my bitterest enemy to the gallows because I am thirsting for his blood. And you say it is well that it should be so!"

"I said it and I will stick to it. I am quite confident that you will save him."

"_I_ save him?" cried the General, opening wide his blue eyes with amazement; "it is impossible."

"I believe that General Vértessy, that rigorous, inflexible man, whom his admirers and his detractors alike called 'the man of iron,' who has never relaxed the rule of discipline to favour friend or kinsman, will do everything in his power to make an exception for once in his life, and save the son of his enemy from the rigour of the law. Oh! I know this gentleman right well, I am confident that so he will act."

"It is impossible, impossible; if he were my own brother I would not save him in his unfortunate position."

"A brother you could not save, I'll allow; but this youth--oh, yes! I am persuaded that you will not be satisfied till you have devised some method of saving this unfortunate youth."

And in saying this, she knew right well how to read the very depths of the heart and mind of the man of iron.

The General impatiently quitted his wife's room, but the moment he had crossed its threshold, there was not a trace of impatience to be seen on his face.

The orderly was still standing in the ante-chamber and, turning on his heels in the direction of the General, presented to him the sealed dispatch which he had thrust into his bosom.

It was the official report of the arrest of the deserter.

The General made a sign to the soldier that he might depart.

Then the General returned to the room he had quitted, spread out the document in front of him, sat down over it, supported his head in his hands, and for a long, long time struggled with oppressive and wearying thoughts. _

Read next: Chapter 8. The Polish Woman

Read previous: Chapter 6. Two Famous Paedagogues

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