St. Peter's Umbrella Part 19

"The umbrella can be found," he said; and then added more doubtfully, "I think."

"Tell me all you know."

"Let me see, where shall I begin? It is now about fourteen years since my father disappeared, and I have forgotten most of the details, but this much I remember, that I started to look for him with my brother Sami, and in Podhragy I found the first trace of him, and following this up, I was told that when there he was still quite in his right mind, had sold a few trifles to the villagers, slept at the inn, and had bought a very old seal from a certain Raksanyi for two florins. He must have had all his senses about him then, for when we took him out of the Garam, he had the seal in his coat pocket, and we sold it for fifty florins to an antiquary, as it turned out to be the seal of Vid Mohorai, of the time of King Arpad."

"Yes, but these particulars have nothing to do with the subject in question," interrupted the young man.

"You will see, sir, that they will be useful to you."

"Well, perhaps so; but I don't see what they have to do with the umbrella."

"You will see in time, if you will listen to the rest of my tale. I heard in Podhragy that he went from there to Abelova, so I went there too. From what I heard, I began to fear that my father was beginning to lose his senses, for he had always inclined toward melancholy. Here they told us that he had bought a lot of 'Angel Kreutzers' (small coins, on which the crown of Hungary is represented, held by two angels; they were issued in 1867, and many people wear them as amulets, and believe they bring luck) from the villagers for four kreutzers each; but later on I found I was mistaken in my surmise."

"How was that? Was he not yet mad?"

"No, for a few days later, two young Jews appeared in Abelova, each bringing a bag of 'angel kreutzers,' which they sold to the villagers for three kreutzers each, though they are really worth four."

"So it is possible ..."

"Not only possible, but certain, that the two young cheats had been told by the old man to buy up all the 'angel kreutzers' they could, and he thus became their confederate without knowing it. So it is very probable he may have been mad then, or he would have had nothing to do with the whole affair. From Abelova he went through the Viszoka Hor forest to Dolinka, but we could find out nothing about his doings, though he spent two days there. But in the next village, Sztrecsnyo, the children ran after him, and made fun of him, like of the prophet Elijah, and he, unfastening his pack (not the prophet Elijah, but my poor father), began throwing the various articles he had for sale at them. In fifty years'

time they will still remember that day in Sztrecsnyo, when soap, penknives, and pencils fell among them like manna from heaven. Since then it is a very common saying there: 'There was once a mad Jew in Sztrecsnyo.'"

"Bother Sztrecsnyo, let us return to our subject."

"I have nearly done now. In Kobolnyik my poor old father was seen without his pack; in one hand he had his stick, in the other his umbrella, with which he drove off the dogs which barked at him. So in Kobolnyik he still had his umbrella you see."

Tears were rolling down Moricz's pock-marked face, his heart was quite softened at the remembrance of all these incidents.

"After that we looked for a long time for traces of him, but only heard of him again in Lehota. One stormy summer night he knocked at the door of the watchman's house, the last in the village, but when they saw he was a Jew, they drove him away. They told me he had neither a hat nor an umbrella then, only the heavy, rough stick he used to beat us with when we were children."

"Now I begin to understand the drift of your remarks. You want to show that the umbrella was lost between Kobolnyik and Lehota."

"Yes."

"But that proves nothing, for your father may have lost it in the wood, or among the rocks, and if any one found it, they would probably make use of it to put in the arms of a scarecrow."

"No, that is not it, I know what happened. I heard it by chance, for I was not looking for the umbrella; what did I care for that! I wanted to find my father. Well, among the Kvet mountains I met a tinker walking beside his cart, a very chatty man he seemed to be. I asked him, as I did every one we met, if he had not seen an old Jew about there lately.

'Yes,' he answered, 'I saw him a few weeks ago in Glogova during a downpour of rain; he was spreading an umbrella over a child on the veranda of a small house, and when he had done so he moved on.'"

The lawyer sprang up hastily.

"Go on," he cried.

"There is nothing more to tell, sir. But from the description the tinker gave me, I am sure it was my father, and, besides, Glogova lies just between Lehota and Kobolnyik."

"Well, you have given me valuable information," exclaimed the lawyer, and, taking a fifty-florin note out of his pocketbook, he added: "Accept this as a slight return for your kindness. Good-by."

And off he went like a hound which has just found the scent; over some palings he vaulted, in order to get to his cart as quickly as possible.

On he raced, but as he pa.s.sed the gingerbread stall, Moricz Muncz stood before him again.

"Excuse me for running after you," he exclaimed breathlessly, "but it suddenly occurred to me that I might give you a word of advice, which is this. There are a good many people from Glogova here at the fair, so you really might get the crier to go round and find out if they know anything of the umbrella. If you would promise a reward for any information, in an hour's time you will have plenty, I am sure. In a small village like Glogova, every one knows everything."

"It is quite unnecessary," replied the lawyer, "for I am going to Glogova myself. Thanks all the same."

"Oh, sir, it is I who have to thank you; you have behaved in a princely fas.h.i.+on. Fifty florins for such a trifle! Why, I would have done it for one florin."

The lawyer smiled.

"And I would willingly have given a thousand, Mr. Muncz."

And with that he walked away, past the stall where they were selling nuts, and onions tied up in strings. Moricz stood gazing after him till he was out of sight.

"A thousand florins!" he repeated, shaking his head. "If I had only known!"

And off he went, driving his cow before him.

CHAPTER IV.

THE EARRING.

From the inn opposite Schramek's house lively sounds proceeded. I beg pardon, I ought to call it "hotel," at least, that is the name the inhabitants of Babaszek delighted in giving it, and the more aristocratic of them always patronized it in preference to the other inns. The gypsies from Pelsoc were there, and the sound of their lively music could be heard far and wide through the open windows. Handsome Slovak brides in their picturesque dresses, with their pretty white headgear, and younger girls with red ribbons plaited into their hair, all run in to join the dance, and if the room is too full, late-comers take up their position in the street and dance there.

But curiosity is even stronger than their love of dancing, and all at once the general hopping and skipping ceases, as Janos Fiala, the town-servant and crier, appears on the scene, his drum hung round his neck and his pipe in his mouth. He stops in front of the "hotel," and begins to beat his drum with might and main. What can have happened?

Perhaps the mayor's geese have strayed? Ten or twelve bystanders begin to ply him with questions, but Fiala would not for the world take his beloved pipe out of his mouth, nor would he divulge state secrets before the right moment came. So he first of all beat his drum the required number of times, and then with stentorian voice, shouted the following:

"Be it known to all whom it may interest, that a gold earring, with a green stone in it (how was he to know it was called an emerald?), has been lost, somewhere between the brickfield and the church. Whoever will bring the same to the Town Hall will be handsomely rewarded."

Gyuri paused a moment at the sound of the drum, listened to the crier's words, and then smiled at the look of excitement on the peasant girls'

faces.

"I wouldn't give it back if I found it," said one.

"I'd have a hairpin made of it," said another.

"Heaven grant me luck!" said a third, turning her eyes piously heavenward.

"Don't look at the sky, you stupid," said another; "if you want to find it look at the ground."

But as chance would have it, some one found it who would rather not have done so, and that some one was Gyuri Wibra. He had only walked a few steps, when a green eye seemed to smile up at him from the dust under his feet. He stooped and picked it up; it was the lost earring with the emerald in it. How tiresome, when he was in such a hurry! Why could not one of those hundreds of people at the fair have found it? But the green eye looked so reproachfully at him, that he felt he could not give way to his first impulse and throw it back into the dust, to be trampled on by the cattle from the fair. Who wore such fine jewelry here? Well, whoever it belonged to, he must take it to the Town Hall; it was only a few steps from there after all.

He turned in at the entrance to the Town Hall, where some watering-cans hung from the walls, and a few old rusty implements of torture were exhibited (_sic transit gloria mundi!_), went up the staircase, and entered a room where the Senators were all a.s.sembled round a green baize-covered table, discussing a serious and difficult question.

A most unpleasant thing had happened. One of the watchmen in the Liskovina wood (the property of the town) had arrived there breathlessly not long before, with the news that a well-dressed man had been found hanging on a tree in the wood; what was to be done with the body?

This was what was troubling the worthy Senators, and causing them to frown and pucker their foreheads. Senator Konopka declared that the correct thing to do was to bring the body to the mortuary chapel, and at the same time give notice of the fact to the magistrate, Mr. Mihaly Gery, so that he could tell the district doctor to dissect the body.