Debts of Honor Part 23

"Take it," he said, "It is not my gift, but the gift of someone else: in fact, it is not a gift, but a fixed contract-price. Honorable work deserves honorable payment. For every installment[42] you copy, you get two pieces of twenty. It is not only you that are doing it: many of your school-fellows are occupied in the same work."

[Footnote 42: _i. e._, A printed sheet of sixteen pages.]

Then I was pleased with the two pieces of twenty.

My uneasiness at receiving money from anybody except my parents, who alone were ent.i.tled to make me presents, was only equalled by my pleasure at the possession of my first earnings, the knowledge that I was at last capable of earning something, that at last the tree of life was bearing fruit, which I might reach and pluck for myself.

I accepted the work and its reward. Every second day, punctually at seven o'clock in the evening, Lorand would come to me, give me the matter to be copied, 'matter written, as I recognized, in his own hand writing,' and next day in the morning would come for the ma.n.u.script.

I wrote by night, when Henrik was already asleep: but, had he been awake, he could not have known what I was writing, for it was in Magyar.

And what was in these secret writings?

The journal of the House of Parliament. It was the year 1836. Speeches held in Parliament could not be read in print; the provisional censor ruled the day, and a few scarecrow national papers fed their reading public on stories of the Zummalacarregu type.

So the public helped itself.

In those days shorthand was unknown in our country; four or five quick-fingered young men occupied a bench in the gallery of the House, and "skeletonized" the speeches they heard. At the end of a sitting they pieced their fragments together: in one would be found what was missing in the other: thus they made the speeches complete. They wrote the result out themselves four times, and then each one provided for the copying forty times, of his own copy. The journals of Parliament, thus written, were preserved by the patriots, who were members at that time,--and are probably still in preservation.

The man of to-day, who sighs after the happy days of old, will not understand how dangerous an enterprise, was the attempt made by certain young men "in the glorious age of n.o.ble freedom," to make the public familiar, through their handwriting, with the speeches delivered in Parliament.

These writings had a regenerating influence upon me.

An entirely new world opened out before me: new ideas, new impulses arose within my mind and heart. The name of that world which opened out before me was "home." It was marvellous to listen for the first time to the full meaning of "home." Till then I had had no idea of "home:" now every day I pa.s.sed my nights with it:--the lines, which I wrote down night after night, were imprinted upon those white pages, that are left vacant in the mind of a child. Nor was I the only one impressed.

There is still deeply engraved on my memory that kindling influence, by which the spirit of the youth of that age was transformed through the writing of those pages.

One month later I had no more dreams of becoming Privy-Councillor:--then I knew not how I could ever approach my cousin Melanie.

All at once the school authorities discovered where the parliamentary speeches were reproduced. It was done by the school children, that hundred-handed typesetting machine.

The danger had already spread far; finding no ordinary outlet, it had found its way through twelve-year-old children: hands of children supplied the deficiency of the press.

Great was the apprehension.

The writing of some (among them mine) was recognized. We were accused before the school tribunal.

I was in that frame of mind that I could not fear. The elder boys they tried to frighten with greater things, and yet they did not give way: I would at least do no worse. I was able to grasp it all with my child's mind, the fact that we, who had merely copied for money, could not be severely punished. Probably we never understood what might be in those writings lying before us. We merely piled up letter after letter. But the gravest danger threatened those who had brought those original writings before us.

Twenty-two of the students of the college were called up for trial.

On that day armed soldiers guarded the streets that led to the council-chamber, because the rumor ran that the young members of parliament wished to free the culprits.

On the day in question there were no lessons--merely the accused and their judges were present in the school building.

It is curious that I did not fear, even when under the surveillance of the pedellus,[43] I had to wait in the ante-room of the school tribunal.

And I knew well what was threatening. They would exclude either me or Lorand from the school.

[Footnote 43: Warden of the school.]

That idea was terrible for me.

I had heard thrilling stories of expelled students. How, at such times, they rang that cracked bell, which was used only to proclaim, to the whole town, that an expelled student was being escorted by his fellows out of the town, with songs of penitence. How the poor student became thenceforth a wanderer his whole lifetime through, whom no school would receive, who dared not return to his father's house. Now I merely shrugged my shoulders when I thought of it.

At other times the least rebuke would break my spirit, and drive me to despair; now--I was resolved not even to ask for pardon. As I waited in the ante-room, I met the professors, one after another, as they pa.s.sed through into the council-chamber. Fittingly I greeted them. Some of them did not so much as look at me. As Mr. Schmuck pa.s.sed by he saw me, came forward, and very tenderly addressed me:--

"Well, my child, and you have come here too. Don't be afraid: only look at me always. I shall do all I can for you, as I promised to your dear, good grandmother. Oh how your devoted grandmother would weep if she knew in what a position you now stand. Well, well, don't cry: don't be afraid. I intend to treat you as if you were my own child: only look at me always."

I was glad when he went away. I was angry that he wished to soften me. I must be strong to-day.

The director also noticed me, and called out in harsh tones:

"Well, famous fiddler: now you can show us what kind of a gypsy[44] you are."

[Footnote 44: The czigany (gypsy) is celebrated for his sneaking cowardice, and his fiddle playing, he being a naturally gifted musician, as any one who has heard czigany music in Budapest can testify.]

That pleased me better.

I would be no gypsy!

The examination began: my school-fellows, the greater part of whom were unknown to me, as they were students of a higher cla.s.s, were called in one by one into the tribunal chamber, and one by one they were dismissed; then the pedellus led them into another room, that they might not tell those without what they had been asked, and what they had answered.

I had time enough to scrutinize their faces as they came out.

Each one was unusually flushed, and brought with him the impression of what had pa.s.sed within.

One looked obstinate, another dejected. Some smiled bitterly: others could not raise their eyes to look at their fellows. Each one was suffering from some nervous perturbation which made his face a glaring contrast to the gaping, frozen features without.

I was greatly relieved at not seeing Lorand among the accused. They did not know one of the chief leaders of the secret-writing conspiracy.

But when they left me to the last, I was convinced they were on the right track; the copyers one after another had confessed from whom they had received the matter for copying. I was the last link in the chain, and behind me stood Lorand.

But the chain would snap in two, and after me they would not find Lorand.

For that one thing I was prepared.

At last, after long waiting, my turn came. I was as stupefied, as benumbed, as if I had already pa.s.sed through the ordeal.

No thought of mother or grandmother entered my head; merely the one idea that I must protect Lorand with body and soul: and then I felt as if that thought had turned me to stone: let them beat themselves against that stone.

"Desiderius aronffy," said the director, "tell us whose writing is this?"

"Mine," I answered calmly.

"It is well that you have confessed at once: there is no necessity to compare your writing, to equivocate, as was the case with the others.--What did you write it for?"

"For money."