The Baron's Sons Part 20

Both forms were clad in coa.r.s.e peasant garments, bedraggled with rain and mud. What Richard had just been reading with so much incredulity in the newspapers from Pest, he now saw to be true. Women of n.o.ble birth were forced to flee from their homes in disguise because of the outrages committed by bloodthirsty hordes of marauders; husbands and brothers were slain before their eyes, and their houses were set on fire. The picture of all this pa.s.sed before him in fancy, as he found himself in the presence of his mother and his betrothed.

He embraced and kissed the former in a pa.s.sion of tenderness, but toward the latter he bore himself with shyness and reserve, hardly able to believe it was actually his Edith.

"So it is all true that the papers tell us?" he asked his mother, pointing to the newspapers on his table.

The baroness glanced at the marked items. "That is but a thousandth part of the truth," she replied.

"I must believe it now," he rejoined, "from the mere fact that you are here before me as a living proof." He struck the table an emphatic blow. "Henceforth no general shall order my movements! You only shall command me, mother. What would you have me do?"

The baroness drew Edith to her side, and then turned to her son. "This girl has told me what to ask of you. Only an hour ago I myself was at a loss how to proceed."

"Edith!" whispered the young man, caressing the little hand extended toward him. "But how has it all come about?"

"This convent pupil," replied the mother with a tender look at Edith, "overheard a plot that was forming for your destruction. Whatever course you choose, you are a dead man if you tarry here longer. Arrest for desertion on the one hand, and a.s.sa.s.sination on the other, threaten you. And this dear girl, without a moment's loss of time, without stopping to weep and wring her hands in despair, escaped from her guardians and sought me out in the dead of night, to beg me make all haste and save you while there was yet time."

"Edith!" stammered the young man once more, overcome by his feelings.

"These are times," continued the baroness, "when mothers are calling their sons home; but you have refused to listen to that call."

"I will listen now, mother; only tell me what to do."

"Learn of your own soldiers. The watchword by which we entered your camp is, 'Saddle horses and right about!' It points your course to you."

"So be it, then," said Richard, and he stepped to the door and issued an order to old Paul.

"The die is cast," said he to his mother as he returned to her side.

"But what will become of you?"

"The Father above will watch over us," she returned calmly.

"But you cannot go back into the city," objected Richard; "it will be stormed to-morrow on all sides, and you would be in great danger. I must be off while we still have darkness and rain to cover our flight; and you had best come with me to the next village, where you can get a conveyance and escape into Hungary. Take Edith with you, too, mother."

The women, however, both shook their heads. "I am going back into the city, my son," declared the baroness.

"But the town will surely be taken to-morrow and you will be in danger," protested Richard.

"Nevertheless I am mindful but of one thing: I have another son there, and I am going back for him, no matter how great the peril. I must bring him away at all hazards."

Richard buried his face in his hands. "Oh, mother," he cried, "how small I seem to myself before your greatness of courage and loftiness of purpose!" He threw a look at Edith, as if to ask: "What will become of you, delicate lily uptorn by the blast? Whither will you go, where find shelter?"

Edith understood the questioning look and hastened to reply. "Don't be anxious about me. Your mother will accompany me to the convent.

Punishment awaits me there, but it won't kill me; and I shall be well taken care of until you come back for me."

The sound of horses' hoofs fell on their ears.

"Time is flying, my son!" exclaimed the baroness. "You must not linger another moment."

A slow rain was falling. The hussars were drawn up in order, and their captain had nothing to do but mount his horse and place himself at their head.

"Saddle horses and right about!" sounded the subdued watchword; and the squadron wheeled around. The trumpeter was dead, but the valiant band needed no bugle blast to spur it forward. In a moment it had vanished in the mist and darkness.

The two women were escorted by old Paul back to the watch-fire, where the market-woman awaited them. Paul himself was to remain behind with one other sentinel to deceive the patrol and allay suspicions. Then the two were to hasten after their comrades.

Dawn was breaking when Edith reentered the convent. A cry of horror was raised in the refectory over her appearance at such an hour. In the whole nunnery not an eye had been closed that night, so great was the alarm caused by Sister Remigia's return unaccompanied by her companion. The door of the coach had been found open, Edith was not inside, and the sister, awaking from her slumbers, could not account for her disappearance. And what made matters worse, no one dared take any action that should publish the scandalous occurrence abroad.

Edith found herself besieged with questions on all sides: where in the world had she been, and what had she been doing all night?

"I will give my answer this evening--not before," she declared; and as her unheard-of contumacy yielded to no threats or scolding, chastis.e.m.e.nt was resorted to.

The pious sisters were horrified when they began to undress their obstinate charge and found her clothes all wet and stained with mud.

Who could tell where she had been roaming about in the night? But she would answer not a word to their questions.

The rod and the scourge were applied with no sparing hand, but neither the one nor the other could make her confess. The brave girl only closed her teeth the more tightly when the shameful blows struck her tender body, and after each stroke she whispered to herself: "Dear Richard!"--repeating the words until at last she fainted under the torture. When she recovered consciousness she found herself in bed, her body half covered with plasters. She was in a high fever, but was able to note the approach of nightfall. She had slept nearly all day.

"Now I will tell where I have been," said she to those around her bed.

"I went to the camp of the hussars and pa.s.sed the night in the room of my lover, their captain. Now you may publish it abroad if you choose."

At this fearful revelation the prioress threw up her hands in consternation. Naturally she took every precaution to keep the matter secret; for had it been allowed to leak out, the good name of that nunnery would have been ruined.

CHAPTER XV.

MOTHER AND SON.

Jeno had of late made his abode in the Plankenhorst house, having formally installed himself there in the room of the footman, who had gone to join the insurgents at the barricades. Thus the young man was able to be in the house day and night. Extraordinary events produce extraordinary situations. The young man's cup of happiness held but one drop of bitterness,--anxious uncertainty what the morrow might bring forth. Would the cause of the insurgents prevail, or would they be defeated? And what would be his fate and that of the Plankenhorsts, in the latter case?

The a.s.sault had come to an end on the evening of the third day. The insurgents had in great part laid down their arms, only a few detached companies still maintaining the unequal contest in the outlying districts. The victorious army was already advancing into the city along its princ.i.p.al streets. In the Plankenhorst parlours there were but three persons, the two ladies and Jeno. Those who had of late been such constant frequenters of that drawing-room were now fallen or scattered. As the military band at the head of the conquering forces pa.s.sed the house, Jeno heard heavy steps ascending the stairs.

The victors were coming; they had singled out that particular house, and there was no escape. The young man nerved himself to meet any issue--except the one actually before him.

The old family friends and acquaintances, the pre-revolutionary frequenters of the Plankenhorst parties, came pouring into the room, smiling with triumph, and all meeting with a hearty welcome from the ladies, who seemed to take the whole affair as a matter of course, and to be affected by the sudden change of atmosphere no more than if the past eight months, with their stirring scenes and epoch-making events, had been but a dream.

No one paid any heed to Jeno or seemed in the smallest degree conscious of his presence, until one guest entered who was polite enough to give him a word of greeting. It was Rideghvary. Making his entrance with no little pomp and ostentation, he congratulated the ladies with much effusion and shook a hand of each in both his own.

Leaving them upon the entrance of a new guest, he sought out Jeno, who was sitting in one of the windows, a pa.s.sive spectator of the scene before him.

"Your humble servant, my young friend," was the elder's condescending salutation. "Glad to find you here, for I have matters of importance to discuss with you which may have great influence on your future.

Pray be good enough to go home and await my coming."

Jeno had still spirit enough to resent this summary mode of sending him home. "I am at your Excellency's service," he replied. "You will not need to go out of the house; I am living here at present,--on the third floor, at the right as you go up."

"Ah, I didn't know that," answered the other, in surprise. "Have the goodness, then, to wait for me there." With that his Excellency returned to the ladies, leaving the young man to seek his chamber in no very pleasant frame of mind.

That room, in which visions of rapture had visited the slumbers of the youthful lover, was a paradise to him no longer. The weary humdrum of ordinary life was beginning again. What in the world could that angular gentleman have to say to him, he wondered. He seemed long enough, in all conscience, about coming.

Suddenly the rustling of a woman's dress fell on Jeno's listening ear, and in another moment Alfonsine entered his room. She had run away from the company below and had hurried up alone to her lover. She seemed agitated, and her coming had apparently been a sudden impulse.