Black Diamonds Part 22

"Ah!" cried the Countess Angela, her eyes beaming with pleasure, "let us try the experiment now. Where is there a gla.s.s? Yes, one of the pier-gla.s.ses. Come."

Countess Theudelinde was also excited. She stood up, and went with the others to the pier-gla.s.s.

"Write one of the letters of the alphabet," said Angela, and watched Ivan attentively. She was curious to see the letter he would choose.

If he were vain, as very likely he was, he would write his own initial "I"; if a toady and flatterer, like most of the people round her aunt, he would choose "T," as the countess's initial; and if he were a silly fool, like so many other men, he would write "A." In either of these cases he would have seen on the beauty's face a scornful smile.

Ivan took the piece of coal, and with the point wrote on the gla.s.s the letter "X." Both ladies expressed their astonishment at seeing the coal write, and Countess Theudelinde a.s.sured Ivan it should be preserved carefully with her other jewels.

Countess Angela stood so near Ivan that the folds of her dress touched him.

"I believe," she said, slowly, "every word you told us. I beg of you do not tell me that all your romantic descriptions were but the necessary clothing of a dry scientific subject, meant to make it palatable to your silly, ignorant audience, and to raise in their minds a wish to seek further, so that they might in so seeking acquire a taste for knowledge. I do not want to seek, I believe implicitly all you said; but of this world of wonder and miracles I would know more.

How far does it go? What more do you see, for the magician must know everything?"

The young countess looked into Ivan's eyes as she spoke with a strange magnetic power impossible to resist. Such a look as this had often dazzled men's brains.

"You said, also," continued Angela, "how fiery and strong are those who live in this magnetic kingdom, but that they have no credit for the virtues they possess; it is due to the working of magnetism. I believe this also. Magnetism has, however, two poles, the north and the south pole. I have read that the opposite poles are drawn to one another, and the h.o.m.ogeneous drift asunder. If, therefore, in the magnetic kingdom hearts are drawn to one another, seek one another, love one another, which is an immutable fact, so also is it an immutable fact that there must be human beings who hate one another with an undying, a deadly hatred, and that such hatred is no sin. Am I not right?"

Ivan felt that he was driven into a corner; he understood the drift of the countess's question. Here his knowledge of natural philosophy came to his a.s.sistance.

"It is true," he said, "that so far as life upon the earth is in question, there must also exist antipathies and sympathies. You have studied magnetism, you have read of the poles, therefore you must know that there exists an equator, or line, which is neither north nor south. This is the magnetic equator, that neither draws the magnet nor repulses it, and here there is perfect peace. Just such an equator is found in every human heart, and however a man may be carried away by the pa.s.sions of love or hatred, his line remains unchangeable, and those who dwell there dwell in peace."

"And who are the people who live under the magnetic equator?" asked the countess, with curiosity.

"For example, parents and their children should dwell there."

The young girl's face was covered with a vivid blush; her beautiful eyes shot a battery of lightning glances at Ivan, who remained quite unmoved under this battery.

"We must talk more of this," she said, with sudden dignity.

Ivan bowed before the haughty beauty, who turned and left him to the company of her aunt or of his own s.e.x. He preferred the latter.

Meantime, the lecture being over, a rush had been made to the refreshments. The army of outsiders were the first in the field. If they were of little account elsewhere, they took first place at the buffet, and here the citizen showed distinctly his origin.

Ivan mixed with the company, and conducted himself as one accustomed to such society, and quite at his ease in it, and he was well received. The men were very civil towards him; every man under forty used the friendly "thou" in addressing him; he was made one of themselves. It didn't matter much, as he was said to be leaving Pesth the next day, and would be lost in the depths of Mesopotamia. Some one said he came from Africa. They tried teasing him a bit, all in a friendly way, and were pleased to find this pedant was an excellent fellow, who took the joke in good part, laughed heartily at a well-delivered thrust, and returned it with a sly hit, which never offended any one's feelings.

"He is one of us," they said. "This man is up to everything; he is a capital fellow. We must give him a good time."

"Is it true that you don't drink wine?" asked the Marquis Salista of Ivan.

"Once a year."

"And to-day is not the anniversary?"

"No."

"Then we have drunk enough for one year; let us be moving."

Some of the men returned to the drawing-room; these were, for the most part, the young fellows, and those who wished to dance. The ladies, after their tea, had begun to play quadrilles, and even the "Csardas"

for those who wished for it.

Count Stefan, however, drew away the better portion of the men to his quarters, which were on the second story of the countess's house. Here he entertained in his way. His rooms being on the other side of the house, no noise penetrated to the story below, which was necessary, as the count's champagne was of the very best, and given with no sort of stint; it flowed, in fact. Ivan, who was of the party, showed himself in a new light; he drank wine; his toasts were spicy, his anecdotes fresh and amusing, his wit sharp and unrestrained; and although he drank freely, he didn't turn a hair, he was quite steady.

"Brother," hiccoughed Count Geza, who towards two o'clock was half drunk, "the captain and I have agreed that when you are quite done up we shall carry you home and put you to bed; but, my dear friend, my dear Ritter Magnet, the misery is that I don't think I can get up the stairs; I am quite done. Therefore, take your wings and fly, and let the captain take his, and both of you fly home. As for me--" Here the count laid down on the sofa and fell asleep.

Every one laughed; but the name he had given Ivan--Ritter Magnet--stuck to him.

"Do you care to play cards, my learned one?" said the Marquis Salista.

"Once every three years."

"That is not often enough."

The marquis could not at this moment explain why it was not often enough, for at this moment Count Stefan acquainted his guests that it was time for them to depart, seeing that the ball below stairs had broken up, and every one had gone away. The countess's rest, therefore, might be disturbed by any noise overhead. Every one agreed that this was quite proper.

"Only," said Salista, "there is no need for us to go home. Let us have the card-table. Let us spend our time well. Who is for a game?"

Three players soon presented themselves; Baron Oscar was one of the first. But the fourth? The captain called to Ivan.

"Now, my learned friend."

Count Stefan thought it necessary to inform the stranger, who was his guest, that at the tarok-table the stakes were very high.

"Only a kreuzer the point," said the captain.

"Yes, but kreuzer points in such a game often amount to seven or eight hundred gulden to the losing side. These gentlemen have changed a simple game into a hazardous venture."

Ivan laughed. "Every day of my life I play hazard with nature itself; every day I speculate with all I have on a mere chance, and play only one card." So saying, he rolled his chair to the green table.

The game commenced. The game of hazard, as it is generally played, is a game of chance, it needs only luck and boldness; a drunken man can almost win by accident. But as it is played in Pesth it is something quite different; what is called luck, chance, accident, is here allied to skill, prudence, consideration, and boldness. The tarok-player must not only study his cards, but also the faces of his adversaries. He must be Lavater and Tartuffe in one; he must be a general who develops at every moment a fresh plan of campaign, and a Bosco who can, from the first card that is played, divine the whole situation; he must, however, be generous, and sacrifice himself for the sake of the general good. Therefore it was that the spectators pitied Ivan when he sat down to the card-table to play with these three masters of the game.

It was seven o'clock when the players rose from the card-table. As Ivan pushed back his chair, the marquis said to him:

"Well, comrade, it is a good thing for the world at large that you only drink once a year and play cards once in three years, for if you did both every day there would be no more wine in Salista's cellar nor no gold left in Rothschild's bank."

Ivan had, in truth, stripped the three gentlemen.

"Nevertheless, we must have a parting cup," continued Salista. "Where is the absinthe?" As he spoke he filled two large gla.s.ses with the green, sparkling spirit, of which moderate people, regretting this prudence, it may be, never drink more than a liqueur gla.s.s.

Count Stefan shook his head over what he considered a bad joke, but Ivan did not shrink from the challenge; he clinked his gla.s.s with that of the captain, and emptied it without drawing breath. Then, with his most courteous bow, he took leave of his host, Count Stefan, who on his side a.s.sured him it would always be a pleasure to receive so delightful a guest.

As Ivan made his way into the anteroom his step was steady, his air composed. Not so the marquis; the dose had been too potent for him. He insisted upon claiming Ivan's astrakhan cap as his, and, as there was no use arguing the matter with an inebriate, Ivan had to go home in the military helmet of a hussar officer. On the staircase the captain maintained that he could fly, that he was one of the inhabitants of the magnetic kingdom, and had wings. The others had all the trouble in the world to get him down the stairs. When he came to the first floor he thought of paying the Countess Theudelinde a visit, to thank her for her kind reception of his lecture, for he was the lecturer, and he was ready to blow out the brains of any one who contradicted him. He was with great difficulty got into a _fiacre_, and driven to his hotel. When he got there he had to be carried to his bed, where he lay in a deep sleep until late in the following day.

Meantime Ivan, after a short rest, went about as usual, wrote his letters, and paid some visits.

"He carries his liquor like a man," said Count Stefan. And from this time all the world called him the knight of the magnet.

The knight was to be met everywhere. He had numerous visitors; he was invited to the best houses. He was elected honorary member of the club; he had been introduced by the abbe. The club had three cla.s.ses of members--the day grubs and the evening and the night birds. In the daytime the library, which was an excellent collection of rare books, was visited by all the _litterateurs_ of Pesth. From six to eight came the lawyers and the politicians to play whist and talk politics, and from eight until midnight the men of fas.h.i.+on had their innings. In this way two men might go every day to the club and never meet one another.

Ivan first ransacked the library, then he distributed his time equally. He thought no more of returning home. He enjoyed everything and went everywhere, never missing on the opera nights to pay a visit to the Countess Theudelinde's box on the grand tier.