Chapter XXVI

The mummery receives its due punishment; nevertheless, Mercy and Compassion come to the mummer's aid, and deliver her out of all her troubles.

When Valentine got home to Kassa, he introduced his beloved Milly to his mother with these words:

"My dear lady mother! you used to say that if she whom I love were even a poor serving maid, you would not consider her origin too curiously, but if only she had a good heart, would accept her as your daughter-in-law. Well! See now, I've brought you my beloved wife, and here she is!"

Milly's face, we may add, was still terribly disfigured by the freckles which the wolf's milk flower juice had eaten into her skin.

Good Dame Sarah smote her hands together.

"Well, my dear son! I'll only say that if this was the young person for whose sake you could desert your mother, and rather endure the Turkish slavery than renounce her and play her false--then, I say you are as immovable as Mount Sion itself; and if you can really love this young person so very much she must have within her hundreds of good qualities."

"And so indeed she has," returned Valentine, and he there and then kissed Milly's freckled face. What cared he though the whole world thought his wife ugly, so long as he knew that she was beautiful?

In the very first week of their acquaintance, Dame Sarah severely tested her daughter-in-law in every possible way, and discovered that she was an angel from the crown of her head to the soles of her feet. She was dutiful, obedient, not fastidious in her work, brisk, cleanly, early to rise and late to bed, sweet-tempered, a great stopper-at-home, modest, and shamefaced. And Dame Sarah had made up her mind to be very strict with her; to find fault with everything she did; and scold and chide her on every possible occasion. But this scolding and chiding was heavenly music to poor Milly's ears, compared with what she had been obliged to endure at that other house, so that the only effect of Dame Sarah's fiercest anger on Milly was to make her kiss her mother-in-law's hands and thank her for the scolding with tears of gratitude. It was equally true, indeed, that it was extremely difficult for Dame Sarah to be really angry. Her face was so round that no wrinkling of her forehead could make it look angular, and her voice was so soft that even her chiding seemed like friendly coaxing. Milly had never known a mother. It had always been the wish of her heart to find a mother in her husband's house. And now she had found what she had wished for; and her soul was satisfied.

When Valentine brought Milly home, she possessed nothing in the world but the clothes on her back. Dame Sarah chided her daughter-in-law again and again because of her bad and scanty attire. Then she bought her woolen stuff for a suit of clothes, cut out the pattern herself, and threw it to Milly, that she might make herself a dress by next Sunday, with which to go to church and show herself among respectable people.

And Michal had to pretend that she did not understand a word of what her mother-in-law explained to her. She who had manufactured the most recondite tarts and cakes at home, and had been far famed as a model housewife, now listened in silence while her mother-in-law told her how a simple soup was made! She dared not even betray her knowledge of needlework and millinery. She dared not say that she could stitch beautifully, and even weave lace. She who was so clever with her fingers now stitched so clumsily that Dame Sarah had to take half her work to pieces again. She held her needle so awkwardly, and her stitches were so irregular, and full of knots and crinkles, that when she tried on her Sunday dress, which had cost her so much trouble, it was found to be a perfectly absurd misfit. In front it was too long, and behind it was too short; where it ought to have fitted tightly it bulged out, and _vice versa_.

And yet this dress pleased her.

And, stranger still, her husband liked her in it too.

The town of Kassa had a lot to say about the lady whom Valentine had brought home as his wife.

"Ah, well! such a treasure was quite worth the trouble which Squire Valentine took to discover it!"

"But, at least, she is of very distinguished parentage: her father was lord-lieutenant of the sheep!"

"Such a beauty has not been seen in Kassa for many a long day!"

"And all that is as nothing compared with her riches. Why, when she climbs up a nut tree to hang out the clothes, she leaves nothing behind her that she can call her own!"

Everyone looked forward to the day when Dame Sarah would present her daughter-in-law to her acquaintances, the notabilities of Kassa.

And what would they have said if they only could have seen her in a dress of her own making!

The anxiously awaited Sunday dawned at last. In the early morning, however, a sergeant came and tapped at Valentine's window, awoke him from his slumbers, and told him that his captain, Count Hommonai, commanded him to mount his horse at once, and ride into the market place fully armed.

Valentine was still a soldier, a corporal in fact. Obey he must. He therefore took leave of his mother and his wife, armed himself, and was at his post at the appointed time. Thence, without showing the slightest regard for the sacredness of the Sabbath, the captain marched off his troops straightway, for tidings had come that a host of Turks had penetrated as far as Naggy Ida, burning all the hamlets in their way. Count Hommonai, therefore, did not take very long to reflect, but quickly collected two hundred horsemen, and set out from Kassa to chastise the Turkish marauders.

Thus it was that Milly or Michal was left entirely in charge of Dame Sarah.

Early in the morning the young lady put on the new dress that was so admirably adapted to spoil her pretty figure altogether. Then she prepared to go to church.

When she was quite ready, Dame Sarah said to her: "Take off that dress, you shall not go to church in that, but in another."

And with that she opened her lofty wardrobe and took out her own beautiful silk dress which she had worn in her younger days, her bodice embroidered with gold flowers, her apron fringed with broad lace, her costly cambric pocket-handkerchief, and gave them all to her daughter-in-law, and while she laced the bodice on to Michal's slim waist, she said, with great self-complacency: "I was just as slim myself, dear, in the first years of my marriage. In those days this was my gala costume, I've never worn it since."

Then she put her beautiful gold-laced coif on Michal's head, and praised at the same time her daughter-in-law's lovely hair. That, at any rate, was a thing of beauty, let her face be never so ugly.

Then she took her gorgeously attired daughter-in-law along with her, first of all thrusting into her right hand the best bound prayer book with a posy in it. How Michal's silk dress rustled as she walked along the streets!

The young wife was perfectly happy, not so much because she actually wore the silk dress, as because Valentine's mother thought her worthy to wear it.

Yet her happiness was only to last till she got to church.

The old cathedral of Kassa had again fallen into the hands of the Protestants, and they now held divine service in it. The first row of pews was assigned to the wives of eminent burgesses who had held office in the town. Among them sat Dame Sarah, for her late husband had been sheriff, and she herself was a rich woman.

In the corner pew sat the wife of old Fürmender. With her pointed nose and large gray coif, she resembled a guinea fowl, and when she spoke the resemblance was more striking than ever. Beside her sat her maiden daughter, and next to her there was room for a dozen more at the very least.

When Dame Sarah and pretty Michal came to the pew Dame Fürmender rose from her place and let Dame Sarah pass in, but when Michal tried to follow her, Dame Fürmender sat back in her place again, thrust her elbows on to the desk in front, and would not let Michal pass.

"Servants must sit in the back seats," said she.

"That is the wife of my son Valentine," cried Dame Sarah, much hurt.

"He too is nothing but an expelled student and a common soldier," replied Dame Fürmender, who excelled at repartee.

At this Michal burst into tears.

She was not distressed on her own account, but she could not bear to hear her husband run down.

And now all the women crowded together at the corner of the pew, and turned their backs upon her just to let her know that there was no room for her anywhere.

Poor Michal could have sunk into the ground for shame, when all at once a wondrously beautiful, handsomely dressed lady stepped out of a richly carved pew covered with heraldic emblazonments which stood close to the central column, hastened toward Michal, and said to her: "What! is there no room for the young lady? Pray come into my pew, there is room enough there." And with that she took pilloried Michal by the hand, led her to her own pew, made her sit down beside her, and pushed toward her her beautiful gold-clasped prayer book, so that they might both sing out of it together.

Now this lady was the Countess Isabella Hommonai the wife of the Captain-General and Commander of Kassa, whom the latter, as we have already mentioned, had married a short time before.

The whole sisterhood of backbiters was most cruelly checkmated, their vexation nearly choked them.

But Michal, with streaming eyes, prayed the Almighty to protect her beloved Valentine in his present great peril, save him from wounds and captivity, and bring him back safe and sound. She had nothing else to pray for.

And when divine service was over, the countess did not consider it beneath her dignity to accompany Michal out of church, waited in the porch for Dame Sarah, and then said to Michal, who gratefully kissed her hand, that she must make haste and come and pay her a visit at the castle.

All the other women heard it and were ready to burst for envy.