The Poor Plutocrats

o cultivate the acquaintance of the honest but homely peasantry living around, in whose lowly ci

on look out for other diversions." "My dear child," he would sometimes say to her, "do exactly as you like. I only beg of you one thing: whenever you are tired of these innocent, well-meaning illusions and retu

to his child-wife on the rare

ter part of the day. During the so-called honey-moon the husband an

n, but Henrietta easily guessed it. Mr. Szilard had been very polite to him, the parson added, and had joyfully listened to all he had to tell him about Hidvár and its mistress; but when the priest had pressed h

ained at Pest; he had followed her to the utmost confines of the realm; they were now quite close to each ot

d he did not approach Hidvár because he had no desire to run after a former sweetheart who was now another man's wife. As for Henrietta she had long ago earned fro

sh to go to the Charity Ball at a neighbouring mining town; it

courteous, bowe

gh the post (Margari went to the nearest post-office once a week) a little sealed packet which, to judge from the postmark, must have been posted at Lippá. Before breaking it open, she locked herself in her room, like one about to commit a capital

and opened with a beating heart the lid of

he pendants of the earrings were in the shape of little fishes hanging upon little hooks and with mobile little scales, which at the slightest movement made them seem alive. Each of them had a

indeed pleasan

ty for it? How simple, how nice it all was! How well he must know her tast

not even put them on till the last moment, just before she started on her journey. All day long she was as hap

as rented by a mining engineer and his family. These worthy people felt highly honoured at receiving the baron and his lady beneath their roof. They gave their distinguished guests their best rooms which looked out upon the street, and retired the

apsed with terror every time anybody accosted her unexpectedly. She was the widow of a Unitarian pastor, well to do, people said, and a large mining proprietor. Her nervous affection was due to a painful episode in her life. One night Fatia Negra and his band had broken into her house and played havoc t

ife was astounded at the simplicity of the great lady's costume. She had now only one anxious moment to go through, the moment when her husband first saw the new ornaments. But this moment sped away without any catastrophe, a

came of it

as to come afterwards with the mining engineer when the empty carriage returned. In the meantime the barones

. She felt in the midst of all this homage and devotion as if she had been lifted up to Heaven, and her heart was full of gratitude. If he be here (and he must be here somewhere, hiding in the crowd,

far away, never dreaming that anybody still thought of

ces-she perceived sitting on a corner seat the old lady already alluded to, whose hea

ent she fell back horror-stricken, at the same time stretching out both hands in front of her with widely-outspread fing

a dead silence, and in the midst of this astonishment, in the midst of this silence, the old woman shrieked with a voice full of horror that turned everybody's blood cold: "Madame!-those jewels-on your ne

m beneath her feet. She was wearing stolen jewels on

coiled from her, even her companion, and all eyes were fixed upon her. She had a feeling of being branded with red-hot irons as she stood there, dishonoured and unprotected in the midst of s

, which she at once recogniz

ht those jewels for you at Paris.

nce at the surrounding throng, cried in a threatening voice to those closest to him: "Whoever d

before her eyes and she sank swooning into the arms of the man whom, hitherto, she had hated so much, and who in this most awful moment had been her sole deliverer! When she came

proceeding very cautiously. She opened the window and peeped out. She then saw her husband walking along by the side of the coach with a lantern in his

towards her, he had never demanded anything of her, and no doubt the reason why he had held back from his young wife for a

n. Here the baron halted the coach and looked inside it. When he saw that Henrietta was awake

on, everything, even to her most secret enthusiasms; nay, even that which God

. Only one thing I beg of you: tell me no lies. Act as if you had received the jewelry from me. I will so arrange the matter that nothing more will be heard about it. Such things may happen to anybody. The only awkwardness about the business is that the things were recognized in such a public place, and that the former possessor of the ornaments is so extremely nervous. Don

ked his wife for a co

I write

n her husband's bosom and began to sob bitterly-and a hu

From henceforth she began to regard him through a glass of quite another colour; she began to believe that the faults she had noticed in hi

she looked round and encountered Hátszegi's bright manly glances it almost seemed to her as if the dreadful scene of the night before was a mere dream, from whi

of light to go by. An enigma closed the way to every elucidation, and this enigma was-Fatia Negra. How did the jewelry get out of hi

d by men who regularly wore black masks, but it was never one and the same man who was guilty of these misdeeds. Nevertheless the name had won a sort of nimbus of notoriety among the common people, many had made use of it a

larly informed. Although he opined Fatia Negra wandered through every corner of the kingdom, h

seize him then?"

holds with him, and the other part t

on his head and give it

and then a young fellow braver than the rest has tried to catch him; but th

chieftain little imagines what an enemy he has raised up against him in me, when h

ld have said: "Strong men have given u

. Hátszegi sent back her property to the widow and told her where she could find the vendor-in Paris. We can readily imag

er work of benevolence among the people. She began to think that her husband was right after all when he said, as he did continually: "Let the gentry stick to the gentry, and the poor to the poor!" In fact she was now inclined to think hi

entry and magnates of Transylvania face to face, and it was no wonder if she quickly accommodated herself to her new surroundings and began to be reconciled to h

topics. For a week beforehand the women cannot get a word out of the gentlemen, they herd together in the armoury and talk of nothing but guns

water and ice, and the ladies think it nothing extraordinary if their husbands or lovers, as the case may be, come back, or are carried back, drenched with rain, inv

ngyelesy and numerous other familiar faces from distant counties, who had all met together on

the little rogue on her husband's departure declar

ook a pride in anticipating the wants of all her guests, and at the

orest as usual, and Henrietta was left alone in the castle with Clementina, Margari, and the

ount Kengyelesy had won back from him the whole of the Kengyelesy estate. "Thank God!" sighed Henrietta at this glad intelligence. This was one of the things that had we

oss; nay, he had laughed and said that it only showed how lucky he was in lov

not rejoice in his winnings or that accursed Fatia Negra might

last her excited imagination began to fancy that there was some sort of connecting link between Szilard and Fatia Negra, between the dearest and the most terrible of bei

e received a visi

he never came near the place, but now he hastened to exchange a few word

f other things also," said the priest,

s instantly

of ill-especially girls. More than once she has paid dearly for her quackery, for the county authorities apprehended her for poisoning, and clapped her into jail for some years. Since then she has grown more cautious and does not care about seeing everyone in her lonely little forest hut, especially since I impressed upon her severely

d all over. So he

said it was not a man he wanted to poison but a wild beast. 'What sort of a beast do you want to kill?' she asked him. 'That is no business of yours,' said he. 'But it is my business,' she replied, 'for the poison that a wolf or a savage dog will eat, a bear will not even sniff at, and what makes one beast ill, on that will another beast thrive.' 'Then you must know that it is a bear.'-'Swear that you do not want the venom for a human being.' Fatia Negra swore with all sorts of subterranean oaths that it was really for a bear that he wanted the poison. The medicine-woman thereupon pre

rible," said Henri

id the priest; "the poison

al who is a domestic guardian, in ord

nimal in order that he may steal a

w s

she only comes on a Sunday for prayers. What she said to me was not so much a confession made to a priest as a confidence reposed

he midst of

the herdsman hears no other human voice than his own thrown bac

must dwel

th it. There, by the side of the stream, stands a little wooden hut, one of whose walls reposes on the ascending rock behind it. Here dwells the fair Mariora all alone. And yet I am wrong to say alone, for three of them dwell together there-herself, a little one-year-old child, and a tame bear. Her husband she sometimes does not see for a week at a time, especially in the autumn and winter when the freshly fallen snow has obliterated the pastures. At such times the goatherd encamps on the summit of the mountains and nourishes his kids by felling

would destroy th

the woman pearls and coral which she innocently hung about her person. How was she to know whether such trinkets were worth thousands or whether they could be bought in a pedler's booth for a few pence? She fancies it is but the thank-offering of a grateful guest. But now her eyes have been opened to the fact that these gifts are costly, very costly,-for the Black Mask demanded a price for them which all the treasures in the world could not outweigh, a price, the bare mention of which caused her to shut the door in his face. And when he, unable to obtain his desire by fair words, attempted to gain his object by force, a single cry for help from the woman caused Fatia Negra to feel Ursu's paws on his shoulders and so he knows that this lonely

," interrupted the b

r they cannot read. We cannot entrust the secret to anyone, for no living soul in these parts would dare to convey any message to the disadvantage of the my

will take this message t

ladyship

journey after my last experience; since then I have grown timid and nervous. But I know of one who will hast

indeed, but in the sight of Heaven, and that this woman was very jealous and very brave. "But I beg of your ladyship," the priest had said on that occasion, "to leave my name o

Nabob was much pleased to have the honour of entertaining so distinguished a guest, and immediately spread his table and loaded it with preserves, honey, and fresh cheese. Clementina, who had a good appetite, remained with their host and made ready to talk scand