Manasseh Part 31

"What, am I really so misshapen as that?" asked Mana.s.seh, in surprise.

"To be sure, or at least you can make yourself so for the nonce. Don't you remember how our neighbour Methuselah's grandson went limping about with one leg longer than the other, when the recruiting officer was here?"

"Methuselah's grandson may do that kind of thing," answered Mana.s.seh, "but not an Adorjan. I can't practise any deceit of that sort."

"Deceit!" cried Aaron; "we are deceiving no one--only the government."

"And is the government no one?" asked his brother.

"Well, it's all right to outwit the Austrians," muttered Aaron.

"I don't agree with you," was all Mana.s.seh could say. "If I am ordered to march I shall obey. My poor lads are obliged to exchange the pick for the rifle, and shall I, their master, s.h.i.+rk my duty?"

"Mana.s.seh is right," declared Anna. "What will do for a grandson of Methuselah will not do for an Adorjan. When an Adorjan's name is called he must answer to it like a man. Our brother will be the pride of his regiment, and will soon rise to be an officer; then he can obtain his discharge and come home."

Mana.s.seh pressed his sister's hand in grat.i.tude for these words of courage and good cheer.

"Yes, but suppose he has to go to war?" objected Blanka.

"Never fear," returned her husband. "Even if Austria becomes involved in the present dispute, the Hungarian regiments are not likely to be sent to the front. They will be stationed in Lombardy, where all is as quiet as possible."

"Then I will go with you," said Blanka, brightening up.

"No, you must stay with us," Anna interposed. "You and the children are best cared for here, and, besides, if Mana.s.seh goes away you will have to look after the iron works. New hands are to be engaged, and ever so much is to be done all over again. How can you think of leaving us in the lurch? There will be no one but you to manage things; you alone can direct the works and put bread into our poor people's mouths."

"Ah, me!" sighed the distressed wife; "and must I live perhaps a whole year without seeing Mana.s.seh--a whole autumn, winter, spring, and summer?"

Anna's eyes filled with tears and a sigh escaped her lips. How many a season had she seen pa.s.s, without hope and without complaint! Blanka knew the meaning of those tears, and she hastened to kiss them away.

And so it came about that the Toroczko young men, and Mana.s.seh with them, were sent off to Lombardy. Thence every month came a letter to Toroczko, to Blanka Adorjan, from her devoted husband. The very first one told her how he had risen from private to corporal and then from corporal to sergeant. But there he stuck. On parting with his wife, he had consoled her with the confident a.s.surance that in a year, at most, she would see him return; but the year lengthened into five. Little Bela no longer sent meaningless scrawls to his father, but wrote short letters in a round, clear hand, and even added verses on his father's birthday. But not a single furlough could that father obtain to go home and see his dear ones. Nor did he gain his long-expected promotion to a lieutenancy. The colonel of the regiment wrote letters with his own hand to Blanka, praising her husband and telling her how he was looked up to by all his comrades and esteemed by his officers; and yet he could not secure his promotion. Even the commandant at Verona had interceded for him in vain. He must have a powerful enemy who pursued him with relentless persistence.

Blanka well knew who that enemy was, but she took no steps--for she felt that they would have been useless--to try to soften him. Her family were united in opposing any suggestion on her part of undertaking a journey.

She did not even venture to visit her husband in Verona. An instinct, a foreboding, and also certain timely warnings, kept her safe at home.

This long period of trial and suspense was not without its chastening effect on the young wife's character. It developed her as only stern experience can. On her shoulders alone rested the cares which her husband had formerly shared with her. The iron works were now under her sole management. Foresight, vigilance, and technical knowledge were called for, and n.o.bly did she meet the demand.

Those five years brought her many a difficult problem to solve and many an anxious hour. Once a hail-storm destroyed all her crops two days before the harvest, and she was forced to buy grain from her own purse.

Again it happened that the crop of iron itself was ruined by something far worse than hail. Some one at Vienna dealt a mortal blow to all the iron mines in the land with a single drop of ink. He lowered the tariff, and native iron production thenceforth could go on only at a loss. But Blanka was determined not to close her mines and her foundries. She recognised the hand that had dealt her this severe blow, but she knew the harsh decree would have to be repealed before long, such an outcry was sure to go up against it. So she p.a.w.ned her jewels, kept all her men at work,--they seconded her efforts n.o.bly by volunteering to take less than full pay,--and wrote nothing at all about her troubles to Mana.s.seh.

CHAPTER XXV.

SECRETS OF THE COMMISSARIAT.

The mysterious workings of the commissary department are beyond the understanding of ordinary mortals. Therefore let it suffice us to take only a pa.s.sing glance at those mysteries.

Benjamin Vajdar was enjoying a tete-a-tete with the Marchioness Caldariva after the theatre.

"Well, what has my cripple to report of his day's doings?" asked Rozina.

"Is all going well in Italy?"

"We signed a contract to-day for supplying our army there with forty thousand cattle," was Vajdar's reply.

"Ah, that will make about two hundredweight of beef to a man," returned the other, reckoning on her fingers.

"Not an ounce of which will ever reach them," said the secretary, with a smile; "but we shall make a couple of millions out of the transaction,--a mere bagatelle for Papa Cagliari, however; not enough to keep him in champagne."

"A very clever stroke of yours," commented the marchioness, with approval; "and I can tell you of another little operation the prince has in hand just now. Bring me the morocco pocketbook out of my writing-desk, please."

Vajdar limped across the room and brought the pocketbook. Rozina opened it and drew forth an official-looking doc.u.ment.

"Here is a contract for so and so many bushels of grain to be furnished to the army. You see it foots up a large sum, but the profits won't be so very great, after all, owing to the recent rise in prices on the corn exchange."

"Oh, don't worry about that," interposed Benjamin, with a knowing smile.

"Who will ever know the difference if a quarter part of the total weight is chaff and clay? It will all grind up into excellent flour, and when the soldier eats his barley bread or his rye loaf it will taste all the better to him. There is nearly half a million florins' clear profit in the transaction, at a moderate estimate."

"Ha, ha, ha!" laughed the beautiful Cyrene. "So the soldiers must eat half a million florins' worth of chaff and clay to enable Papa Cagliari to take his morning bath in champagne."

"Well, what of that? It makes, at most, only two florins' worth to a man, and the soldier who loves his country ought to be glad to eat two florins' worth of her soil. Has the prince any other contract under consideration?"

"Yes, a very important one. He has procured an order that the troops in Italy shall wear for their summer uniform cotton blouses instead of linen, and he has the contract for furnis.h.i.+ng the material."

"But the prices named here are very low," objected Vajdar, reading from the paper Rozina had handed him.

"Ah, but let me explain. The cotton is to be thirty inches wide, with so and so many threads to the warp--according to the specifications. But what soldier will ever think of counting the threads in his blouse, or know whether it was cut from goods thirty inches wide or twenty-eight?

So, you see, with a little tr.i.m.m.i.n.g here and a little paring there we can make a good hundred thousand florins out of the job."

"But are our tracks well covered? Is there no risk in all this?"

"Fear nothing. There are eyegla.s.ses that blind the sharpest of eyes."

"How if there are some eyes that will not be fitted with these gla.s.ses?"

"Again I say, never fear. A victorious campaign covers a mult.i.tude of sins."

"And a lost one brings everything to light."

"Not at all. A slaughtered army tells no tales. But, by the way, is not our Toroczko friend among those who are likely enough to fall some day before the French and Italians?"

"He is still in Lombardy," said Vajdar, with a significant nod of the head. "We have our eyes on him."

"I am curious to know what this apostle of peace will do when he is ordered into battle. You know, he and his comrades are Unitarians and entertain scruples against shedding blood, except in defence of home and country. Will Mana.s.seh Adorjan fight when he is ordered to, or throw down his arms?"

"In either case, he will die," declared Benjamin Vajdar.