The Strange Story of Rab Raby Part 39

They only made two stages a day, so that the journey to Pozsony (which was their goal,) lasted eight days, through resting at the inns on the road. His companions gave themselves out as pig-dealers, and said Raby was their cousin. The third day they fell in with a party of armed heydukes who were searching for their charge. They stopped the cavalcade, and told them of their quest. At each wayside inn Raby could read the notice which posted him up as a criminal and outlaw, for whose identification a reward of two hundred ducats was offered. To his relief, the description of him corresponded to the appearance he had presented in prison, with an over-grown beard, tangled hair, and pale face, wearing a faded silk coat. Little did his pursuers imagine that in the shy Serb maiden, with her cheeks painted red, who understood nothing but her native tongue, that the fugitive they sought stood before them.

More than once it even happened that Raby and his pursuers slept under the same roof.

Meantime, he became more and more attached to his two friends, whose worth he began to realise increasingly.

CHAPTER x.x.xIV.

The fugitives had only one more station to accomplish before they reached the Austrian frontier, where the Hungarian jurisdiction ceased.

Was there trouble at the frontier over Raby's identification, at least it meant that he would be taken to Vienna to prove it, and not back to Pesth.

They heard from travellers they met on the way that the Emperor was back in the capital, owing to the army being in winter quarters, and hostilities against the Turks being suspended for the time being. Raby, thereupon grew more anxious than ever as to his possible reception by the Kaiser, whose concurrence he still doubted in his forcible rescue, though, by this, the Emperor had doubtless seen that his formal orders availed nothing, and he probably thought it impolitic to use military force to free his representative.

It was revolving such thoughts in his mind, that Raby and his guides came to the wayside inn where they were to pa.s.s their last night on Magyar territory. It was a poor little "csarda," as such hostelries are called in Hungary, between Pozsony and Hainburg, wherein only now and again travellers pa.s.sed the night, driven thereto by stress of weather.

The accommodation left much to be desired, and its reputation was none of the best. It was whispered, indeed, that travellers had been murdered and waylaid there, and even now the host was serving his term in the Pozsony prison, where he was a frequent inmate. In his absence, his wife looked after the inn.

There was no proper sleeping-rooms, so the guests had to rest on the straw thrown down for them in the public dining-room, where they forgot their differences of rank as best they could, while the only light was a single tallow candle suspended from the ceiling in a hanging tin-candlestick.

Laying about on the benches, or on the long table, were a crowd of guests that included peasants and shepherds, pedlars and smugglers, while the air was rank with odours of strong cheese, onions, and tobacco-smoke. The hostess ministered herself to the wants of the guests, and handed round the wine.

It was among this company that Raby and his companions took their places; as there was no other woman present among the travellers, the hostess expressed some fear that the pretended Serb maiden would find it somewhat uncomfortable.

The two men thanked her, but said they would look after their sister, and ordered a stewed fowl and some wine, for which the party paid in advance. The water was too bad for anyone to depend on, so Raby had to drink wine, which, unaccustomed as he was to it, soon made him feel drowsy.

In a few minutes he was fast asleep, with his head pillowed on his folded arms on the table.

His slumbers, however, were soon to be disturbed, for there was a loud noise heard outside as of the trampling of horses and the clash of weapons. The hostess said it must be a party of heydukes, and sure enough it was.

Now Raby had ceased to be fearful of discovery by these pursuers, as from the description of him so industriously circulated, they could not recognise him in his present disguise. Moreover, he had been carefully shaven every day since his flight, and his face newly painted, the better to sustain his role.

But this time he had cause for anxiety, for the first voice he heard without was a hatefully familiar one--that of the castellan, Janosics.

How did he come to be here, for they were now in the jurisdiction of Pozsony not of Pesth. He heard the castellan giving orders for one man to come in with him, and the other to remain with the horses.

Raby stole a glance at the door which was half open. A cold shudder seized him as he caught sight of Janosics wearing the Pesth uniform, and carrying a carbine in his hand and a sword at his belt.

Raby pressed his head down lower, so his face might not be seen. The big sleeves of his bodice helped him to hide his features the more easily.

"Up all of you fellows, and let me have a look at you!" shouted the castellan. Those present immediately obeyed, and submitted to the inspection.

"The man I want is not here," grumbled Janosics, as he rapidly ran over the a.s.sembled faces, but when he came to Kurovics, he laughed aloud.

"Aha, Master Kurovics, so you are here, are you? What brings you out this bitter winter weather, pray?"

"Oh, we must look after our business you know," answered the other, without the least embarra.s.sment.

"Where's your pa.s.sport?"

"What do I want with one? I don't cross the frontier."

"Well," shouted the other, "what may you be doing here?"

"Hus.h.!.+ not so loud," retorted Kurovics, with a glance at Raby. "I've got my little cousin to look after."

"Oh, that's the game, is it? Soho, I see; and a nice little baggage it is, I'll be bound. Oh I don't want to wake her if she's tired."

And the castellan sat down between Raby and Kurovics, and asked the latter for a bit of his tobacco. Then he smoked, but always keeping an eye on Raby.

"Pretty, eh?" he asked, and he made as though he would raise the coloured kerchief that half hid the sleeper's face.

"Let her rest, Mr. castellan, I beg. She's wearied out with the journey."

"Well, well, let her be then, but you, hostess, bring us some wine, and take some to the heyduke outside."

"And what may you be doing in this neighbourhood, if I may be so bold?"

inquired Kurovics.

"Oh, an important police-mission. A dangerous felon, the notorious Mathias Raby broke out of Pesth prison last week, and the descriptions circulated of him are not correct, as I could have told them had they asked me. The fellow is not bearded as described, but he was shaved the day before he got out, and had a face as smooth as any girl's."

Raby felt as if the beatings of his heart would burst his bodice, as the new-comer went on:

"When I heard of it, I went to the authorities and told them the mistake they had made, and offered to make it good by riding after the runaway myself to see if I could identify him. And there are two hundred ducats for the man who brings him back alive."

"A nice round sum! I only wish I could find him," answered Kurovics.

"I mean to take him myself," said Janosics coolly. "But hark ye, Kurovics, is it possible that you yourself are leading my prisoner away in a girl's garb? Just let me have another look at her."

Raby would have swooned, only that the castellan was now smoking so closely under his nose that he was nearly choked by it. He was on the point of springing up and surrendering in sheer desperation; it was with the greatest difficulty he mastered his feelings, above all his inclination to cough, for raising his head would betray him directly.

And the suspicion too arose in him that perhaps, after all, his guides were accomplices in a comedy which had for its _denouement_ the arrest of the fugitive just as he was making sure of safety.

"Now I must see her face," said Janosics, and Raby felt his enemy's clammy hand laid on his brow.

"Won't you look at me, little one? I can speak Serb quite well," sneered his persecutor. And the castellan forcibly raised Raby's head, and looked him in the face with a grin of malicious triumph.

But just then the heyduke, who had been waiting outside, dashed into the room in hot haste, crying excitedly, "Villam Pista is here!" With that the scene was changed, and Janosics had to make way for a mightier rival. The very name of the renowned robber-chief spread consternation, and the carabineers, on hearing it, promptly threw their weapons away, the better to run for their lives, while the whole company scattered pell-mell, some out of the window, and others up the chimney, in their hot haste to get off. There was no one finally left in the room but Raby and his two companions, and the hostess.

Outside, they heard some shots fired, followed by a feeble groan that seemed to come from Janosics. Then the door flew open, and Villam Pista himself entered, accompanied by two comrades, his rifle in his hand still smoking from the recent shot. He was a fine-looking young fellow, with no trace of beard on his smooth, handsome face. His bearing and air showed that he was accustomed to be master of the situation wherever he was. His dress fitted him admirably, a richly embroidered cloak fell across his shoulders, on his head was perched a jauntily feathered cap, and a short pipe was in his mouth.

"They are a cursed lot," he cried, as he threw the weapon on to the table. "But I've paid them out; they won't ride quite so merrily back as they did in coming, I'll be bound. I'm sorry, however, the shot did not finish them."

Then he looked round the room. "Bless me, what a miserable light! Is that what you call lighting up?" And he whistled to the hostess, who hurried up with a dozen candles, and promptly placed them on the table in as many sticks.

Raby's companions had placed themselves before him, so that their mantles rather screened him from the highwayman. But the latter spied him out at once owing to his dress, and seizing Raby by the hand, he dragged him out into the middle of the room. For a moment, they looked each other steadily in the face, and Raby recognised in the robber-leader, his wife, Fruzsinka!

And thus it was that they met. But the supposed highwayman still did not betray the situation. He drew Raby closer to him, and whispered hastily in his ear, "Pretend you are frightened, and make your escape by the door."

Raby obeyed, and with a bound across the room, in a trice was outside.