Chapter XXIII

In which it is shown not only that Satan is the author of all evil, but also that the grisly witches, his handmaidens, are always ready with their malicious practices to plunge poor mortals into utter destruction.

Barbara Pirka had run straight home to the lonely house that stood outside the walls of Zeb. She knew all the short cuts across the mountains, so that she could have given a horseman an hour's start and yet have beaten him easily. Night made no difference to her. She never lost herself, and wandered fearlessly through the wilderness in company with the will-o'-the-wisps and other evil spirits, with whom she manifestly stood on the most friendly terms.

The morning light found her at the Girjo kopanitscha. Here the wife of the kopanitschar of Hamar kept house alone. Her husband, after capturing Janko, had turned her out of doors, and then enlisted in the county militia. What else, then, could his wife do but turn witch? She had already began her novitiate in the school of Barbara Pirka.

"Well, Annie!" cried Barbara on entering, "what do you think? To-day, to-morrow, and the day after to-morrow, three livelong days, is Janko to be tormented. To-night, however, I bring you guests. Make ready a good supper. We shall have music, too, and will hold a wake in Janko's honor."

With that she gave the kopanitschar's wife a ducat to provide supper, and then taught her the diabolical art of tying knots in the entrails of absent foes, so that they may pine away and perish miserably. That very night, all the headsman's apprentices were seized with cramps in the stomach, and if this was not caused by the quantities of sour wine which they had been drinking all day it was certainly due to the malpractices of the two hags.

All this time the young wife was sitting in the upper story of the headsman's house, absolutely alone. Only two of the apprentices were left behind to look after the premises, and they took it in turns to keep watch in the tower and guard the drawbridge.

The lonely house was well protected against every attack. Pointed stakes, planted at the bottom of the moat encircling the walls, made it impossible for anyone to swim over. The narrow windows of the massive walls were guarded by strong iron palings and iron casements, and two gigantic dogs, which would have tackled the most strongly armed intruder, ran loose in the courtyard. Both apprentices were armed with muskets, the barrels of which were so large that one could have fired whole handfuls of lead out of them if necessary.

The young wife was left at home when everyone went to the bloody procedure at Eperies. She, indeed, had not the slightest wish to go with them. Her soul died away within her at the very thought of the frightful things which had such a horrible attraction for other women. But her husband, too, had no wish to take her. He was far too jealous of her, and however kindly the young woman might treat him, he felt that it was deception, every bit of it, and did not trust her. Besides, he feared that Valentine Kalondai might be among the crowds which flocked from every quarter toward Eperies.

Barbara Pirka was charged to remain at home, and on no account quit the house till they all returned. The doorkeepers, too, were to let no one in or out, not even Pirka.

As if it were possible to keep a witch under lock and key! She was at Eperies before the vihodar and his company, although she did not set out till an hour later.

Michal had told Pirka that she should not require her during her husband's absence, and might therefore leave her to herself. She could cook what she wanted; she had learnt to do so at home. In the kitchen was a well from which she could draw water by means of a windlass, an iron chain, and two buckets, so she had no occasion to go down into the courtyard for water. She could therefore lock all the doors behind her (the trellised door leading to the staircase as well as the door closing the corridor), and when at night she had also barred and bolted the heavy oaken door of the kitchen, she felt herself quite secure against all human violence.

All the more defenseless was she against those things which cannot be kept out by bolts and bars.

When the ordinary sounds of day had died away in the house, when the heavy tread of jack-boots, the rough voices, the filthy jests, the hoarse curses of the drunken roysterers, had grown dumb, then the intervening silence brought with it those invisible beings who announce their presence in whispers, sighs, and groans. In every corner she fancied she saw a victim whose blood had grown dry on the hands of the inhabitants of that house. She fancied they came forth to demand back from her their dissevered lives, to claim for their freezing limbs the clothes which the hangman had inherited from them. Every shadow appeared to beckon to her. Lifeless objects became animated and spoke to her. Behind her back she heard a perpetual whimpering and sobbing, and when she stirred the fire the moist logs spat and spluttered. There was a buzzing all around her like the whirring of cockchafers. When the wind arose, there was a howling and groaning all through the house as if whole hosts of spirits were haunting it, and they entered visibly into the dreams of the poor agonized lady, and drove her toward dizzy abysses with their grotesquely hideous faces and mutilated figures.

When, however, she had scared away these imaginary specters, the cold and dreary horror of reality swept before her mind in a still more terrible shape.

What sort of a life was she leading? She was chained to a man whom she loved not when she first married him, but whose very presence filled her now with fear and loathing. She had been deceived, most cruelly deceived. She had been shut out of the world forever, and chained alive to the open gate of hell, where all who entered in mocked and gibbered at her with their decapitated heads. She was without hope, without the prospect of ever escaping from her prison, of ever seeing her fate take a favorable turn, of ever having her woes alleviated. She was tortured by the thought that her father had forgotten her; but what agonized her still more was the reflection that her lover was thinking of her even now, knowing nothing of her misery, fancying her happy, and cursing and adoring her at the same time.

Then there came to her those evil thoughts which are far more terrible than all the pale specters of the tomb and the scaffold--doubt in a heavenly Providence, rebellion against human morality and human justice. The custom which gave a father a right to dispose of the destiny of his child revolted her. She cursed the altar before which a man and a woman are bound together with inseparable chains. She hated human society, which stifles the longings of the heart in the name of respectability. She grew dimly conscious that despair might make her wicked, very wicked.

She began to be afraid of herself.

At night she dared not, and indeed had no desire to sleep in her bedroom. She loathed the marriage bed, and made for herself a sort of couch in the kitchen. The kitchen was her most secure asylum. All night long she kept a roaring fire (she could not bear to remain in the dark) and on the fire she placed pots of water which she kept continually boiling. She had no weapons, and even if she had had them what use would they have been in her weak hands? But she thought herself quite capable of drenching with boiling water any man who dared to approach her.

She had now been shut up alone for five days, and the frightful solitude had made her very nervous. Solitary confinement is the worst of all torments, it is worse than hunger. She would have felt much more comfortable if Pirka had been with her. Even the witch's words, with all their devilish insinuations, were better than the eternal, ghostly gibbering of the crackling logs, this piping and squeaking through doors and window crevices, and this howling in the chimney when the wind blew.

On the fifth morning, as she was turning the windlass in order to draw water from the kitchen well, the words escaped her:

"Oh, that the devil would bring Pirka hither!"

Scarcely had she said it, when she perceived that the windlass began to turn round of its own accord, and from out of the ascending bucket rose the bristly, angular form of Barbara Pirka.

Michal cried:

"Jesus, Maria!" and shrieked aloud for terror.

But Pirka laughed, and said to her:

"Ha, ha! my pretty little lady! You can't lock out a witch you see. A witch can find her way in through any loophole."

Michal really believed that Pirka had come straight out of the water, although her clothes and boots were quite dry.

"Eh, what great supper are we getting ready yonder!" cried Pirka, catching sight of the army of pots on the hearth. Then she looked into them all, one after the other. "Water, water, nothing but boiling water. Well, well! let us put something into one of them that we may have a little good broth."

With that she took out of her knapsack a handful of scraps of paper, and threw them into the boiling water.

"These are names clipped out of the perpetual almanac," whispered she to Michal, with a grin. "The first that comes to the surface will be the name of our beloved."

Then she took a ladle, and fished out the first piece of paper which appeared on the surface of the boiling water. Michal, she said, was to see what was written on it.

Michal took the scrap, and read aloud the name:

"Valentine!"

In her terror she threw it back into the flames.

But the flames, so far from consuming the wet scrap of paper, tossed it up into the air, and the name of the beloved one flew up the chimney with the smoke.

"It won't burn, ladykin!" laughed Pirka. "Hocus-pocus! there it is again!"

And now she had another scrap of paper in her hand, on which was also written the word, Valentine!

"Well, and how has my little lady been amusing herself all this time?" asked Pirka, stroking pretty Michal's hands. "Has she not been wishing that her Pirka was with her again?"

Michal could not deny that she had.

"But those who believe in what the cards say," pursued Pirka, somewhat irrelevantly, "must pay for it, and those who do not believe must also pay, ay, and much more dearly too."

"Let us see!"

Michal crouched down beside Pirka on the mat, where the witch had spread the cards.

"Oh, oh! Great things are in store for us," began Pirka, pointing to the cards. "This here is the old vihodar, and that yonder is his son. Look, there's a coffin. Death threatens the old vihodar. The robbers will kill him."

"What nonsense," interrupted Michal.

"I don't say it. The cards say it. Victory and might await the young master. He kills the robber, and will be promoted to his father's place."

Michal laughed.

"That is certainly not true. Henry would quit the headsman's trade if his father died. He would go to Germany where nobody knows him, and try to get a professorship. He has promised me it a hundred times."

"Well, well, I know nothing. I only say what the cards say. Look now! There is the heart lady! Oh, what a joy awaits her. Her beloved is close at hand. That rose means burning love. That dog is fidelity. This dove-cot is felicity. This very day she will meet him."

"Go along with you, Pirka! It is all nonsense."

"Well, well, my little lady, we shall see. The cards never lie. This very night she will see him."

"He is far away; who knows how far?" sighed Michal.

"Yes, but I've a little buck-goat, and when I send him away and say to him, 'Go, bring me the pretty youth hither whom my lady dotes upon; so true as I came out of that well, my little buck-goat will bring the young man hither though he were even on the Turkish borders."

Michal began to grow frightened.

"Hither he shall not bring him," cried she.

"No, not into this hideous hole, perhaps, not into the house of the vihodar, but into a quiet little cot where the doves bill and coo on the gables."

"But how am I to get there? I should not care about sitting on the buck-goat."

"Nor need you. Barbara Pirka can take her pretty little lady wherever she can go herself, and will lead her through beautiful flowery meadows to the house of bliss by a path on which not even the feet of a butterfly could get wet with dew. The fair lady will then disguise herself as a peasant girl, so that none who meet her on the road may recognize her; but she will also take nice clothes with her, so as to meet her beloved in gorgeous apparel. She must dress herself in his presence three times running, the first time in scarlet, the second time in corn-flower blue, and the third time in purple; she must also put on gold earrings and a goodly chain, and on her head she must wear a coif of pearls. She must pack up all these splendid things. The headsman has bought them for his wife, and she has not worn them once yet. Eh! how beautiful we shall look!"

"Tempt me not, Satan!"

"The cards have said it and Pirka will do it. The pretty lady may like or lump it, that is her lookout. In any case she will pay the price for it."

Michal believed and disbelieved at the same time.

She put together the three dresses--the delicate rose-colored dress, the corn-flower blue, and the purple one; then she hung them all up before her one after the other, examined them all, and considered which would suit her best. Then she let Pirka disguise her as a peasant girl, and put on her a short frock and high red shoes. (In the vihodar's house there was a whole collection of costumes, Heaven only knows whence he got them.) She turned herself round and round, and was quite glad that she looked so pretty, but when Pirka said to her:

"Come, now let us go!" she shrank back, and answered that to do so would be to sin against God.

At that moment a flourish of trumpets was heard before the gates. It was the signal by which Henry usually announced his arrival. The drawbridge now rattled down, and the friendly barking of the watch dogs showed that the newcomer was an old friend.

The blood flew to Michal's face.

"My husband has come. Now you see how the cards have lied!"

She had barely time to roll up the three beautiful dresses into a bundle and pitch them into a dark corner. The peasant costume she was obliged to keep on. However, she could tell her husband that it was her kitchen dress.

The keys of the corridor and the trapdoor Michal handed to Pirka, that she might admit the knocker below.

And now, as she pretended to be busy about the hearth, she awaited the appearance of that face which always made her sick at heart, but which had nevertheless on this occasion, so she thought, come between her and a great temptation, a grievous sin. Yet it was not her husband after all, but a still more detestable shape. It was the second apprentice, who used to lend the vihodar a helping hand in all his great achievements. The first apprentice already worked on his own account.

The intruder did not bestow upon her so much as the shadow of a salutation, but slouched down upon the kitchen bench, threw his heavy hat on the hearth, and blandly said to the lady:

"Give me to drink, my pretty mistress! I'm perishing with thirst."

Then he emptied a bumper of beer to the very dregs, and after that set about delivering his message.

"I bring you good news, my pretty young mistress! The devil has carried off the old vihodar. The accursed Janko has bitten him in the neck with his poisonous teeth and the old 'un croaked straight off."

Michal thought, with a shudder, that the cards had said as much.

"Now your husband will be master in his own house. All the treasures belong to him. And the honor, too. The Count of Zips and the Lord Lieutenant of Saros have already, under their hand and seal, appointed him public executioner in his father's stead, with jurisdiction over the whole hill country, and he has just been accomplishing his masterpiece on Janko, who is still roaring for pain and will roar two days and two nights longer, so that all Eperies will hear him. The woman who does not faint, the child who does not get the falling sickness, and the dog who does not go mad through hearing this howling, will be fit to join the witches' sabbath on the Peak of Lomnitz."

Michal shivered as if in an ague. So Henry had voluntarily taken over his father's office; nay! at once accomplished his hellish masterpiece? He had not thought of flying, though no one could have compelled him to remain. He actually takes delight in cruelty! What! the ex-clergyman, the meek curer of souls, could within so short a time become a bloody headsman, and thus close against Michal every way of escaping from this hell! And all this had been prophesied by the cards of the wise woman!

And as if to raise her horror, disgust, and loathing to the highest pitch, the fellow stepped up to her and said, with a hideous leer:

"My pretty young mistress! you must give the bearer of so many good tidings a couple of busses."

The fellow may have been drunk (he had looked in at every tavern on his way home) but his demand was certainly based on a very ancient custom.

"It is a law with us," said he to the terrified, recoiling woman, "that whoever first brings the news to the headsman's wife that her husband has been installed as master shall receive a couple of good, smacking busses from the young mistress."

And with that he stroked out his stubbly mustaches with both hands and stretched out his arms to clasp pretty Michal round the waist.

This shameless impudence put the tender lady into such a violent rage that she now did what she had all along been meditating; she snatched from the hearth a pot full of boiling water, and soused the importunate loafer from head to foot, scalding him so severely that for one moment he was quite dazed. And during that one moment, Michal rushed upon him, hurled him back with all her might, Pirka assisting her, and their united efforts succeeded in pitching the big strong man headlong out of the kitchen. Then they quickly slammed to the heavy oaken door.

But the parboiled wretch, speedily recovering himself and now madder than ever, fell to cursing and swearing, threatened to do Michal a mischief, and called loudly to his fellow-apprentices to help him; whereupon they hastened up with iron clubs (which also played a part at executions in those days), and began hammering at the oaken door with all their might.

Michal gave herself up for lost. She would rather have sprung down the well than have stopped till the murderers had battered in the door.

"Don't be alarmed, my pretty ladykin," said the witch, taking her by the hand. "The cards have twice spoken the truth, haven't they? And depend upon it they will speak the truth the third time also. Will you trust me now?"

"Take me, body and soul!" cried the unhappy woman, throwing herself into the witch's arms.

"Well! let the pretty lady first take this burning fagot in her hand and step into the bucket. I'll turn the wheel and let her down, not into the water, but only as far as the middle of the shaft. There she will find a narrow platform by an opening, where she must wait till I have let myself down, too."

Michal, in the extremity of her bitterness and despair, was capable of anything, so she allowed Pirka to let her down into the well. By the light of the burning fagots, she found the described opening and stepped into it. The bucket again ascended, and in a short time Pirka also came down, holding fast in her hands the other end of the chain and gradually letting the bucket down ring by ring. On arriving opposite to the opening, she, too, sprang out of the bucket and unloosed it from the chain, whereupon the other bucket loosing its equilibrium, fell down into the water, and the chain ran rattling up to the wheel.

"Well, my pretty little lady! I think we may now go on a little further," said Pirka, who carried on her back the bundle in which were all Michal's fine clothes.

At the end of the narrow passage was an open iron door, which led into a low vaulted cellar, full of large barrels containing pitch, tar, sulphur, and tow, in fact all the raw materials of the headsman's trade, besides sundry tanned hides, the exuviæ of his triumphs. This cellar terminated in a long corridor, and at the end of the corridor was another iron door.

Pirka had a key which opened this door, so she was able to go in and out of the house unseen whenever she liked.

The object of this subterraneous way was to enable the headsman to escape, in case robber bands besieged his house and drove him to extremities. The little iron door led into a wood.

In the cellar was a flight of wooden steps leading up to a trapdoor.

Before quitting this corridor, Pirka wove out of the tow a huge skein, which reached from one end of the corridor to the other, and as she opened the door for Michal to go out, she hurled the burning fagot into the tow.

"Why do you throw the fagot into the tow?" asked Michal.

"Because it would only betray us outside here; nor do we want it, for the moon is still high."

"But the cellar might catch fire?"

"All the better for us, for then they will not be able to pursue us that way if they find out how we have escaped."

"But if the cellar burn, the house may burn too."

"And what then? Is there anything burning there which my pretty mistress or myself would greatly miss?"