Chapter I.
| "Our coming Is not for salutation: we have business." Ben. Jonson. |
On the 9th of September 1741, shortly after the hour of nightfall, a silvery mist hung over the broad stream of the Danube, and the environs of the city of Presburg—at that time considered the capital of Hungary—and shrouded the earth with its grey veil; although the heavens above were bright and clear, and the stars shone cheerily and proudly, as if no earthly influence could damp or dull them. Before the St Michael's gate, which opens on the side of the town the most remote from the Danube, and on to the road leading into the interior of the country, and towards the first low ridge of the Carpathians which skirts Presburg to the north, sat a traveller on horseback—his ample cloak wrapped carefully about his person, as much, it would seem, to screen him from observation, as from the first freshness of the commencing autumn season, and his broad three-cornered and gold-laced hat pulled down upon his brow.
He had ridden, at the brisk pace, across the stone bridge which leads over a dry moat to the old gateway, and had suddenly checked his horse on finding the gate closed before him.
"Corpo di Bacco!" he exclaimed aloud, in a tone of intense vexation. "The gate is shut for the night—I feared as much."
"What's to be done!" he continued to murmur to himself, after a pause. "To wake the guardian of the gate, and demand an entrance, would be to excite attention, and subject myself, perhaps, to questionings. No, no! That, above all, must be avoided. And yet, see him I must to-night. Time presses. Should the devil, who has served me so well as yet, desert me now, and take flight, the coward! before a few inches of deal board, and a few pounds of hammered iron! Bolts and bars! Bagatelles! Fortunately the old fox has taken up his earth near the gate. If I calculate aright, the hinder windows of his lodging must look out upon the moat; and I will try whether I cannot come to speech of him."
"Fortuna, jade! Thou art propitious still, if yonder rays be those from the old ivy-owl's watch-lamp!" muttered the traveller once more to himself, as he looked towards a light, which apparently struggled to send its gleams through the thick haze, from a low window of one of the houses overhanging the dry moat, to the left of the gateway. "At all events, I'll even risk the venture; and if, after all, I am out in my reckoning, and should stumble either upon an amorous dame awaiting her adored, or a mad student seeking the philosopher's stone—should I appear as a spirit of love from above, or a spirit of darkness from below—Cospetto! I'll play my part to the life, and find an entrance to this cursed town, spite of locked gates and barred posterns! The Virgin be praised! I am no schoolboy at my first adventure."
"Allons, Briccone!" he cried, applying the spur to his jaded horse, which stood reeking thickly, in the misty air, from the effects of a long and rapid journey. "You must seek other quarters for the night, old boy!"
The animal snorted, as its head was turned once more from the gateway, and moved unwillingly, as if endeavouring to resist the seeming attempt to undertake any further excursion that night: but the way was not long which it was destined to travel. Among the clay-built houses which formed the suburb, the traveller speedily discovered the projecting whisp of hay, announcing that the hovel, from the doorway of which it was suspended, offered accommodation, such as it was, for man and beast. Summoning from the interior a sleepy lad, in a dirty Hungarian costume, of full shirt-sleeves and broad trowsers, which once had been white, and confiding Briccone to his care, he returned to the gateway of the town.
When he again stood upon the gateway bridge, the first care of the stranger was to stoop, and collect a quantity of small pebbles in the hollow of his left hand. Provided with this ammunition, he approached as near as he could towards the spot whence the light he had before remarked proceeded.
"A curse upon this rotten mist!" he muttered. "I can see nothing. Around and about is a fog from the devil's own caldron, as if it were cooked on purpose to blind me; whilst the stars are twinkling above, as if they squinted down upon my confusion, and laughed me to scorn. However, at all ventures, have at my mark!"
With these words, he flung pebble after pebble in the direction of the light. Several of the missiles were heard to rattle against the walls of the house; and a few others rendered a clearer ringing sound, as if they had struck upon glass. After a short space of time, the light disappeared almost entirely; and a window was heard to open. The traveller raised another pebble in his hand, with a smile upon his face, as if inclined to take a last random shot at the head which had probably replaced the light at the open window; but he checked his humour with a short low laugh, and coughed to attract attention. The cough was immediately re-echoed in a hoarse and hollow voice.
"That should be the old raven's croak," said the stranger to himself.
"Bandini!" he cried, in a low but distinct tone, through his hollowed hands.
"Hush!" rejoined the voice from the window. "Not so loud! Is it you?"
"Diavolo!" replied the traveller, approaching closer to the wall of the town, and speaking as low as possible. "Who should it be, man? But the gate is closed; and I have no mind to expose myself to the investigations of the gatekeeper's lantern, and all the cross-examination and tittle-tattle that may follow."
"I waited for you with impatience," pursued his interlocutor; "and when the gate closed for the night, placed my lamp at the window as a beacon."
"All right!" replied the other. "But what's to be done now, man?"
"Can you climb?" continued the hoarse voice.
"Like a cat or a Spanish lover," was the reply. "Perhaps I have no little in me of the first; at all events I have often tried the trade of the latter."
"Descend into the moat from the end of the bridge," pursued the personage at the window. "The passage is easy. I will provide for your ascent."
Following these short instructions, the stranger returned over the bridge; and catching from stem to stem of the few stunted trees that grew upon the precipitous sides of the descent, he clambered, without much difficulty, to the bottom of the steep. As he crossed the reedy and moist soil of the moat, the noise of a falling object directed his steps towards a part of the wall where a ladder of cords awaited him. Profiting by this aid, and grasping, where he could, the projecting stones of the rude masonry which formed the lower part of the house, the stranger mounted with ready agility to the level of a window.
"You have not chosen your quarters upon the town-wall for nothing, I am inclined to suppose, Master Bandini," he said, as he found himself in face of a dark form at the opening to which he had arrived.
"All things have their uses," was the laconic reply, uttered with a hoarse laugh.
In a few moments the stranger had squeezed his person adroitly through the low window, and stood in the interior of the room.
The apartment into which he had been thus clandestinely introduced, was faintly lighted by the single lamp which had served as a beacon; and the rays of this lamp, as they fell upon the dark walls, half revealed, in fantastic indistinctness, a variety of miscellaneous objects. Ranged upon shelves on either side of the entrance door, stood a quantity of jars and phials of different shapes, mixed with glass vessels, containing strange serpents and lizards, and human half-born deformities, preserved in spirits—all the materia medica, either for use or show, necessary for the establishment of a druggist-physician of the day. On the opposite side of the room, beneath the hard and slovenly pallet which served as bed, might be half seen, from under the covering, two or three chests, the iron clasps and fastenings of which, with their immense padlocks, seemed to tell a tale of well-stored treasures of moneys or papers, and of other avocations than those of doctoring and leeching. Above the bed hung the crucifix, that necessary appendage to the dwelling of a good and pious Catholic; but, whether by accident or design, the form of the Divine sufferer on the cross was now turned against the wall. A table in the middle of the room was covered with old books and papers; and before the chair, from which the inmate of the apartment had probably risen when surprised by the signals of his visitor, was a large volume, which he now precipitately closed, but not, however, without being remarked by the stranger, who smiled a significant smile upon observing this hasty movement.
But, if the aspect of the apartment was strange, stranger still was that of its occupier. He was a little man, at an advanced period of life, whose spare and shrivelled form might be fancied ill-calculated to support the large head which surmounted it. Was the head, however, ill-proportioned to the body, still more out of proportion were the large black projecting eyebrows, the huge eagle nose, and the swelled hanging under-lip, to the general contour of the head. His thick black hair was closely shorn to his skull, as if to develop more clearly these interesting features; and if powder had been bestowed upon it, in obedience to the fashion of the better classes of the day, it had been bestowed so sparingly, or had assumed a colour so closely assimilated to that of dust and dirt, as to escape the discovery of all eyes but those of a very closely investigating naturalist. No less doubtful was the colour of the long cravat tied loosely about his neck. His upper person was inclosed in a huge black widely pocketed coat and lappet waistcoat, both many ells too wide for his shrunken form; whilst his nether man disported at ease in a pair of black pantaloons and high boots, which seemed to incase the proportions of a skeleton. From the sleeves of the wide coat hung a pair of long dirty begrimed hands, which, without a doubt, belonged rightfully to the owner of the aforesaid skeleton shanks.
Far different was the appearance of his visitor. He was a tall well-formed man, between thirty and forty years of age. His dress, which he displayed as he threw aside his cloak, cut in the cumbrous fashion of the day, was that of a man of pretensions to a certain rank; and his coiffure, with its necessary appendage of pigtail, might be seen, in spite of his hasty journey, to have been arranged with care, and powdered. Although his person was prepossessing, there was, however, a certain dash of the roué in his appearance, and a look of design and cunning in his dark eyes, long fine-drawn nose, and thin lipless mouth, which would speedily have removed the first more agreeable impression of an observer.
"All's well that ends well!" said the stranger, as he removed his hat and cloak. "It is perhaps better, after all, that I should make my entry thus. I have ridden hard, Master Bandini, and Briccone carried me well; but the road was longer than I had surmised, and I had a matter or two to dispose of on my way."
"Better late than never, noble cavaliere!" replied the man addressed as Bandini.
"Hush! no names, man, until I be assured that we have no listeners here," said the cavaliere.
Without replying, the old man removed the shutters from a window, forming a thorough light to that by which the stranger had entered, and looked out into the winding steep descent which forms the first street of the city of Presburg from St Michael's gate. It was faintly lighted by a lantern, but empty of all passengers.
"How now, man!" said the stranger impatiently.
"Why! if it must be said," replied the old man, closing the shutter and returning; "I have a lodger here, in my apartment. But he is still without; nor will he yet return."
"A lodger!" exclaimed the other, in an angry tone—"and at such a moment! How could you be so incautious, Bandini? This is one of your miserly tricks: you would expose your best friends for a few miserable kreutzers more or less."
"Live and let live, is my maxim," answered Bandini with a growl.
The stranger shrugged his shoulders with vexation.
"And who is this lodger, man?" he cried.
"Only a poor Hungarian country noble," replied Bandini in a more cajoling tone. "A youth! a very youth! a poor unsuspecting youth! He has come, like all the other nobles of the land, great and small, to obey the call of her they call their King, to attend this Diet summoned at Presburg; and he occupies my other rooms with his servant—a rustic!—a mere rustic!—a rude untutored rustic!"
"It was ill done, Bandini," continued the stranger, with still evident marks of discontent. "A lodger in the house, when you must know that I need privacy! It was ill done, I tell you."
The old man only muttered something between his teeth by way of a reply.
"Have a care, man," resumed his visitor, "how you juggle with me in this matter. You are richly paid by my employers for the support you give me, and the concealment your house affords; but should evil befall us—be it through your treachery or your imprudence, it matters not—per Jovem, the evil shall fall a hundred-fold upon your own head. I swear it to you; and you know I am a man to keep my word."
"Jehovah! here's a turmoil about the mere miserable lodging of a poor youth!" growled the old man doggedly, although the rapid passing of a long skeleton finger over the tip of his huge nose betrayed a certain degree of nervous agitation.
"Master Bandini," interrupted the stranger, unheeding him, "I have a word to speak with you—and one that nearly concerns yourself, Master Bandini—before we proceed further in business."
"Look ye!" he pursued, in a more indifferent tone, throwing himself down on to a chair, and crossing his legs composedly, but fixing the man called Bandini at the same time with his keen eye. "Look ye, friend druggist, physician, usurer, miser, secret agent, spy—or whatever other name you bear in designation, avocation, character, or creed"—and he laid a slight emphasis on the word—"there are no friends so sure as those who are convinced we know then thoroughly—a right understanding is sympathy, amico mio, and sympathy is bond and union."
The old man looked through his beetling brows at his visitor without any evidence of trouble; but he ceased irritating the tip of his nose only to twitch more nervously at the sleeves of his coat, as if to give himself an air of composure and dignity by adjusting them, as a modern fop might do by pulling up his shirt-collar.
"Think you I have forgotten," continued the stranger with a slight sneer, "that when we first met in Italy—no matter upon what business, or to what intent—Master Bandini bore the name of Israeli, and that, when forced to leave that country—persecuted, as he himself would say, for some little matter of flagrant usury, and mayhap also of a drug or two that lulled some rich old uncle to a sleep from which he woke not, and made a spendthrift debtor his heir—he returned to the land of his birth, I will not say of his fathers, and, for reasons good, under another name and a foreign guise, thinking that the name of Israel, spite of its adopted termination, smacked somewhat too notoriously of his origin, his Jewish origin, Master Bandini?"
The Jew druggist tossed his heavy head with an expression that, however ill assured, was meant to say, "Well! and what then?"
"Think you I know not that, fearing the prejudices against his race might injure the gains of his various trades, perhaps also that the name he bore might recal reminiscences better forgotten for ever, he assumed a Christian appellation, passed for an honest Christian man—honest, humph!" added the stranger with a sniggering laugh—"and infringed the severe laws of Hungary, which compel all of his tribe to dwell within one prescribed street in each city, and wear one distinctive dress—laws that, if called into execution, would bring him contumely, imprisonment, ruin—ay ruin, Master Israeli—humph, I forgot—Bandini? Think you I have no eyes to see yon cross ostentatiously displayed to Christian visitors, now turned against the wall, with the contempt of one of your accursed race—a deed in itself a crime to merit mortal punishment?"
The Jew stole a glance at the cross, and was evidently moved.
"Think you I divine not," pursued his visitor, hastily snatching from the table the heavy book closed upon his entrance, and flinging it open upon his knees, "that this jargon of the devil is your Hebrew book of worship, in which Master Bandini seeks for rules of conduct for the further welfare of his soul—if so be he have one—in the persecution and torture of Christian men—a pretty religion, cospetto!—or may be, practises sorcery?" And the stranger laughed ironically at his own suggestion. "Think you I know not all this, Master Bandini?"
"And if the Cavaliere Caracalli knows me, what have I to fear from him?" said the Jew sullenly, with a look of defiance.
"Ha! that would seem a threat!" answered the cavaliere haughtily. "Once more, have a care, man, how you deal with me! What you have to fear I will tell you, Master Bandini, rogue—all that your worst fears can contemplate, should I have reason to believe you a traitor." And, at these words, he sprang up from his chair, and confronted the old man, with an evident desire to intimidate him by his movement.
The Jew druggist did not flinch; but he answered with less of defiance.
"I am no traitor—no traitor to you; and, though you know me, why should I not serve you still? Why should we not be friends?"
"Friends! you and I!" said the cavaliere with scorn. "But no matter! This affair of the lodger looks ill, I tell you."
"Times are bad—times are bad, noble cavaliere," stammered the Jew, in a whining and apologetic tone. "Our contract stipulated not that I should not strive to earn an honest livelihood where I could."
"And who prevents you, man," said the cavaliere, with a sneer, "from earning what you please to term an honest livelihood, as far as it interfere not with my interests? But this imprudence"——
"Heavy losses! heavy losses!" continued the old man, interrupting him, to pursue his apology. "I have had heavy and serious losses, which I must strive to cover by what scanty means are left me—to say naught of drugs unpaid, and services to the rich ill recompensed and scouted. I am a needy man. I am, indeed, a needy man." The cavaliere shrugged his shoulders. "Ah! You feel not that, noble sir. But the God of my fathers knows that it is true. Was there not the Illok affair, in which the poor money-lender was cheated of his honest earnings? Did not the Count Csaki leave the country, a bankrupt, and cause me all but utter ruin? And, worse than all, did not the Baron Bartori, after he had made over to me his estates, in return for moneys lent him in his need, die with the intent and purpose, as one would say, to defraud me of my just dues? and did not his son, without whose signature to destroy the entail, I cannot obtain possession of my rights—the God of Israel's curse be on the Philistine laws of this unjust country!—disappear, no one knows whither? He is an honest youth, and a just, they say, who would not deprive a poor needy man of his own: but he may be dead—he may be dead, without giving his precious sign-manual; and I should be a ruined man—a ruined man—alas! alas!"
The cavaliere had borne impatiently the lamentations thus uttered as apologies for his love of gain by the Jew money-lender: and he now broke in upon them with disgust.
"A truce to all this comedy of woe, man! If you be shorn of a lock or two of your ill-gotten golden fleece, we well know that it is still a full and warm one. Come, come—no more of this!" he pursued, as the Jew continued to squeeze alternately the skeleton fingers of each hand, as though he pretended to be wringing them in despair. "We must to business; and since the mischief has been done—and, mark me! it must be remedied forthwith, and this boy driven from the house—see that the coast be clear!"
"He is from home, I tell you," was Bandini's reply; and he was continuing to murmur, with sunken head, the words, "Heavy losses! heavy losses! Why did he die? And were aught to happen to his son, as is likely in these troublesome times, I were ruined—utterly ruined. Oh! heavy losses!"—when an angry exclamation and an imperative gesture from his visitor, repeated the order to look that they were alone and undisturbed.
The old man lighted a small hand-lamp at that which stood upon the table, undrew the bolts that fastened the door, and left the room with sullen look and step. He was gone for a very brief space of time; but this short interval was employed by the stranger in turning over, with rapid hand and scrutinizing eye, the papers which lay upon the table. He shook his head with a sneer of indifference, as if he had found nothing worthy of his attention, and had scarcely time to resume his seat with an air of unconcern, when the Jew returned, and, eyeing him narrowly, advanced into the room with that haste of suspicion and fear, which induced even the usurer to forget his usual precautions of bolts and bars.
"There is no one in the house but ourselves," he said, with still sulky air.
"Then seat yourself, man, and open to me your wallet of sayings and doings; and let's see what scraps of information you may have gleaned. It should be crammed full, ere this. Seat yourself, I say, and clear that gloomy brow of yours," said the cavaliere with a laugh. "What has passed since I last saw you?"
"The city is already thronged with the nobility of Hungary, convoked by this woman, who still asserts her rights over them, in the hope that they may aid her in her troubles;" commenced the Jew, seating himself, in obedience to his visitor's command. "Jehovah! what a stir they make! What moneys do they lavish upon foolish pomp! What spendthrift profusion do they display! It curdles the very blood of a poor thrifty man within him, to witness such insensate prodigality. But they must rue their folly. They will need moneys; they will seek to obtain moneys of the poor druggist. Ah!" And the usurer rubbed his hands with satisfaction; but then, seeing the gestures of impatience displayed by his companion, he proceeded: "But there is much discontent, I hear, among them; and, where she has not enemies, she has lukewarm friends. They will no longer, they say, be governed by a weak woman, who can so ill wield the reins of power, and who has already staked and lost all the other inheritance of her father"——
"Unjustly herited—unjustly held. Forget not that, Master Bandini!" interrupted the Italian.
"Unjustly—well, well! I am no legist to understand these things," pursued the Jew; "only a poor thrifty physician"——
"And usurer," again broke in his companion.
Bandini smiled a sour smile, and continued:
"Call me usurer, if you will. I see no scorn in the term; and I have turned my money-lending to account in this matter. Yes! and in your service; although you but now called me traitor. Have I not refused moneys to those who offered me good securities and values, and at my own loss—at my own loss, cavaliere—because I would not deal with those who would hazard their all in a war to aid this woman in her desperate need? And although my friend Zachariah has lent them sums of precious metal, has it not been upon such great interest, and at such peril to themselves, that they cannot risk so dangerous a venture as the espousing her cause, and upon their written engagement also—and this as by my advice, mark me, noble cavaliere!—that they should not take up arms? Have I not done this to serve you?—at my own loss, I say; and can you call me traitor now?"
"So far all goes well," said the Italian, unheeding the importance attached by the Jew to the supposed services rendered. "Maria Theresa will be foiled in her last attempt at opposition to her enemy's force, by seeking succours from her so-called faithful Hungarians. Success, also, has crowned my efforts in my expedition throughout the land, Master Bandini," he pursued, raising himself from his listless posture, with a look of animation and triumph. "The seeds of discord and discontent have every where been sown. I have visited these proud eagles, the Hungarian nobles, in their country-nests; and I have employed all means to turn them from listening to the appeal of their fugitive queen. To the worldly-wise, I have urged the ruin of war to their already troubled and impoverished country,—to the lovers of their fatherland, the independence of Hungary, and freedom from the House of Austria, if they will seize this opportunity to shake off its yoke, instead of again cringing to its call,—to the man, the weakness of submitting to a woman's sway,—to the needy and the grasping, I have promised, and even already lavished, the bribes of France, Spain, and Sardinia, to induce them to refuse their aid,—to the ambitious, place, rank, orders, courtly favour from my powerful employers, should they espouse their cause. I have studied men's characters, and read men's minds, to turn them to my will; and although I have met with opposition, endangered my life indeed, and risked my safety from ill-will, yet I have so strewn my grain, that, when Maria Theresa shall appear upon the field, she shall reap tares where she hoped to gather wheat. The cause is lost, I tell you!"
The Jew rubbed his hands with an air of satisfaction, which seemed to show that the profits to be divided from his association in the political manœuvres of his visitor were to be proportionate to the success of these hazardous schemes, and that visions of golden reward already floated before his eyes.
"And the opening of the Diet is still fixed for the 11th?" inquired the Italian, after a pause, in which he had allowed his unwonted enthusiasm to cool down to a bearing of indifference, which was more his nature.
"Yes—the day following the morrow," answered Bandini.
"Has she already made her appearance in the city?" again asked his visitor.
"It is supposed that she is not yet here. There has been no solemn entry; but she must be here every hour," was the reply.
"In that morrow we have as yet time for much," said the cavaliere. "I must pursue my measures here with caution. My great scheme, of which more, perhaps, hereafter, may be tried at any issue; and woe betide Maria Theresa, if"—
As he uttered these words, the Italian was startled and interrupted by the abrupt opening of the door of the apartment. The Jew turned round with surprise, whilst his companion, checking the first involuntary movement, which induced him to look in the same direction, buried himself in his chair, so as to conceal himself as much as possible from the intruder.
The person who entered was a tall old man, whose erect figure and firm step proved how little time had weighed upon his natural vigour. His features were bold and rude, although not deficient in that species of manly beauty which an expression of confidence and energy bestows, and were fully displayed by the disposal of his grizzled hair, which, torn back from his forehead, and plastered over his head with an evident profusion of grease, descended on to his back in a long braided tail. His dress was of that description known in other parts of Europe as the hussar uniform, which was worn by certain of the domestics belonging to the Hungarian nobility. The yellow braid profusely bestowed across the breast of his jacket, and upon the pockets and sides of his tight blue pantaloons, was of a colour that showed what good service his attire had already seen. In his brawny hands he held his shako, as he advanced into the room, with more of rudeness than of deference in his manner.
"Is it you, Master Farkas?" said the Jew, rising to meet him. "I did not hear you enter."
"I opened the street door below with the pass-key you gave us," replied the man; whilst, at these words, the cavaliere stamped his foot in anger.
"You made but little noise," resumed Bandini suspiciously.
"I suppose you were too much engaged to hear us; for I see you have a visitor," said the old man, fixing his eyes upon the form whose back was turned to him, and advancing familiarly further into the room.
But the Jew intercepted him.
"What do you want here, Master Farkas?"
"Teremtette!" said the fellow roughly. "Would you have my lord up to bed in the dark, like a rat or a gipsy thief? I want a light."
"I will attend your master forthwith," said the Jew, taking up the hand-lamp, and hastening to the door.
"My master, ugh! My lord, if it please or please not your worship," growled Farkas, preceding the landlord out of the apartment.
When the Jew returned, his visitor confronted him with angry looks.
"See to what you expose me, fellow, by your villanous meanness!" exclaimed the cavaliere. "And, not content with harbouring vagabonds in your house, that, for aught I know, may be spies upon us, you furnish them with pass-keys, to surprise us when they will—to ear-wig at the doors, hear our discourse, betray our secrets. How now, fellow, what have you to answer?"
"I tell you that they are most innocent and unsuspecting rustics, both," stammered the Jew—"both master and man. There can be no danger."
"No danger!" continued the angry cavaliere. "No danger, fellow! Cospetto! this very circumstance may be my ruin! That voice, too, was not unknown to me. I have heard it somewhere, although I know not where. It sounded to me as the reminiscence of some past evil—a raven's croak, announcing still more ill to come. Santa Vergine! If we are lost, I will have your life, with my own hand;" and he half drew his sword from the scabbard.
Bandini drew back sulkily, with further protestations, deprecations, and endeavours to mollify his visitor: but it was long before the cavaliere could be appeased. Once he left the room and listened in the passage, and at the young Hungarian's door. Then he descended to the street entrance, and examined the lock: and only when convinced that the other inhabitants of the house were still, and had probably retired to rest, did he come back. When he returned to the Jew's room, his brow was still knitted angrily; but, after drawing a bolt across the door, he sat down with less of agitation.
More unfriendly words again passed between the confederates; but, after a time, the Italian spy and the Jew money-lender were again conversing, in lowered tones, upon the schemes of the former.