St. Peter's Umbrella Part 27

Gyuri and Mrs. Szliminszky started.

"Yes, my dear," answered the latter, slightly confused.

Gyuri smiled mischievously.

"I see," said Veronica, "you don't believe the story."

"No, I do not."

"Really?" asked the girl reproachfully; "and why?"

"Because I never believe nonsense, and because ..."

He had nearly said too much, but he kept back the words that rose to his lips when he saw how wounded the girl appeared at his incredulity. She smiled, turned her head away, and gazed silently at her plate. Gyuri was silent too, though he felt inclined to cry out:

"I am rich at last, for in the handle of that umbrella there are unknown treasures."

It is remarkable that if good luck befalls a man, his first wish (for he still has wishes, even if they are all fulfilled) is to communicate it to others; he would like trumpets sounded, heralds to be sent round to announce it to the whole world. But then comes doubt, the everlasting "perhaps." And so it was with Gyuri.

"What is the umbrella like, Miss Veronica?" he asked.

Veronica closed her lips firmly, as though she considered it unnecessary to answer him, then thought better of it, and said:

"It is not much to look at; it is of faded red stuff, looks a thousand years old, and is patched all over."

"With a border of small green flowers?"

"Have you seen it?"

"No, I only asked."

"Yes, there is a border of green flowers on it."

"Could I see it?"

"Certainly. Do you wish to?"

"That is what I am going to Glogova for."

"Why, if you don't believe in it?"

"Just for that very reason. If I believed in it I should not go."

"You are a heathen."

She drew her chair away from him, at which he at once became serious.

"Have I hurt you?" he asked contritely.

"No, but you frighten me," and her lovely oval face expressed disappointment.

"I will believe anything you like, only don't be afraid of me."

Veronica smiled slightly.

"It would be a shame not to believe it," struck in Mrs. Szliminszky, "for it is a fact--there is plenty to prove it. If you don't believe that, you don't believe anything. Either the miracles in the Bible are true, and if so, this is true too, or ..."

But she could not finish her sentence, for at that moment Madame Krisbay rose from the table, saying she was tired, and would like to retire to her room, and Mrs. Mravucsan led her and Veronica to two small rooms opening on to the courtyard. In the doorway Gyuri bowed to Veronica, who returned it with a slight nod.

"Shall we start early in the morning?" he asked.

She bowed with mock humility.

"As you like, Mr. Thomas," she said.

Gyuri understood the reference, and answered in the same strain:

"It depends upon how long the saints sleep."

Veronica turned her head, and shook her fist playfully at him.

"I will pay you out!" she said.

Gyuri could hardly take his eyes off her, she looked so pretty as she spoke. Let the saints look like that if they could!

Soon after the Szliminszky pair started for home, accompanied by a man carrying a lantern. Mrs. Szliminszky had made Wladin put on a light spring coat, hung a long cloak over his shoulders, tied a big woollen scarf round his neck, and having ordered him only to breathe through his nose, once they were out, she turned to Gyuri again.

"Yes, it is a beautiful legend, it made a great impression on me."

"Poor legends!" returned Gyuri. "If we were to pick some of them to pieces, and take the romance out of them, their saintly odor, their mystery, what strange and simple truths would be left!"

"Well, they must not be picked to pieces, that is all. Wladin, turn up the collar of your coat."

The lawyer thought for a minute.

"Perhaps you are right," he said.

After a short time Gyuri also asked to be shown to his room.

"The magnet has gone!" muttered the lawyer's clerk.

Hardly had the door closed when Kukucska, the butcher, exclaimed:

"Now we are free!"

He took off his coat, rolled up his sleeves, thus showing the head of an ox tatooed on his left arm, then winked knowingly at Mravucsan. The mayor seemed to understand the look, for he went to a cupboard and pulled out one of the drawers, from which he took a pack of cards. The knave of spades was missing, but that did not make any difference to the intelligent members of Babaszek society, for they had once before played "Preference" with those cards, and the last player had simply received one card less when they were dealt out, though he was supposed to have the knave of spades, and it was called the "spirit card." If they were playing spades, the last player in imagination threw the knave on it, saying: "I play the spirit card!" So now, in spite of this small difficulty, they decided to play, and the game lasted till daylight. The Senators, the butcher, and the clergyman played, the lawyer's clerk dealt, and Klempa looked on, having no money to lose, and went from one player to the other, looking over their shoulders, and giving them advice what to play. But one after the other sent him away, declaring he brought them bad luck, which rather depressed him. So the poor schoolmaster wandered from one to the other, till at last he took a seat between the clergyman and the butcher, dropped his weary head on the table, and went to sleep, his long beard doubled up, and serving as a pillow. But he was to have a sad awakening, for that mischievous Pal Kukucska, seeing the beard on the table, conceived the idea of sealing it there; and fetching a candle and sealing-wax, they dropped some on the beard in three places, and Mravucsan pressed his own signet ring on it. Then they went on playing, until he should awake.

Other incidents, and not very pleasant ones either, were taking place in the house. Madame Krisbay, to whom the mayor's wife had given her own bedroom, would not go to bed with the enormous eider-down quilt over her, for she was afraid of being suffocated during the night. She asked for a "paplan" (a kind of wadded bed cover), but Mrs. Mravucsan did not possess such a thing, so she brought in her husband's enormous fur-lined cloak and threw it over madame, which so frightened the poor nervous woman that she was attacked by migraine, and the mayor's wife had to spend the night by her bed, putting horse-radish on her temples.