His offer was readily accepted. The two men walked off, and their loud snoring soon informed Janosh that there was now no obstacle to the execution of his plans. Leaving the musket behind, he walked to the shed, where he assured himself of the firm and sound sleep of the two sentinels; and, having done this, he hastened to the loft, where Peti and Kalman waited for him. Janosh pulled off his boots, (there was no occasion for the gipsy's following his example,) and, having lighted a lamp, he crept up the stairs to the top of the house. Kalman kept watch by the lower door. Wrapped up in his cloak, he listened with a beating heart, lest something might interfere with the success of their scheme.
Something of the kind was likely to happen. Kalman was scarcely at his post when he heard the sound of steps approaching from the house in which the judges slept. The young man stepped aside to escape being discovered, and he had already begun to blame himself for failing to "settle" Mr. Skinner sufficiently, when he saw that the person who approached the place, holding a lamp in one hand and a cudgel in the other, was not Skinner, but Mr. Catspaw, the attorney. Kalman raised his hand, and was preparing to rush forward, with a view of "doing for" the lawyer by knocking him down; when, luckily for the attorney, it struck him that that delicate operation could not be performed without some noise, and, consequently, not without hazarding the success of the enterprise. Mr. Catspaw was therefore allowed to pass on, which that worthy man did with the utmost unconcern. But his peaceful and happy state of mind was changed to utter disgust, confusion, and dismay, when, on reaching the door of Viola's cell, he found that there were no sentinels to guard the prisoner.
"Confound it!" muttered he, "they're after no good in this house. That young fellow Kalman has made them all drunk—Skinner, the sentinels, the servants, and all. They would like Viola to escape. They tried it this morning, and as it was no go, they mean to do it by brute force. Confound them! I'll go back and wake some of the men,—I'll remain here and watch the door,—what the devil am I to do? That fellow must be got out of the way! If the case is tried in a common court, he'll say enough to implicate me in the matter; and goodness knows what may come of it! There are some who hate me!—--" And the attorney was about to return to the lower parts of the house, when his attention was attracted by an extraordinary noise, which seemed to come from the prisoner's cell. The noise resembled that of the breaking of planks. He crept to the door and listened. There was the creaking and the sound of the raising of planks; and immediately afterwards there was a sound of some heavy object being carefully lowered into the cell.
"They are breaking through the ceiling!" cried the attorney; "d—n them! I'll stop them yet!" and, in defiance of his usual prudence, he attempted, though unsuccessfully, to open the door. He cursed Skinner for pocketing the key. Peti and Janosh, who were at work on the upper loft, had provided themselves with a ladder, which they lowered into the cell, the noise of which operation was distinctly heard by Kalman, and, indeed, by the sentinels in the shed, whom it awaked, though not sufficiently to induce them to get up, which, considering the quantity of liquor they had drunk, was by no means an easy matter. But if the noise was lost upon them, it was not lost upon the steward; on the contrary, so effectually did it tell upon him, that he fell into an agony of fear and despair.
That worthy servant of the Kishlakis had never donned his nightcap with so proud and happy a feeling as on that night. The great condescension of the members of the court, nor even excepting the Baron, for all that he was a magnate; the important duties which he had to perform, such as the guarding of the prisoner, the construction of the gallows, and other arrangements which required ability and tact, and which brought out his "savoir faire," gave him still stronger feelings of his own importance than those which usually pervaded his unwieldy frame. He gloried in himself, and lay awake, magnifying and exalting his own name.
"I'm born for better things," said he. "I was never meant for farming. To look after the manure, and the planting, and the ploughing and threshing,—curse it! it's slow work, and I am too good for it! I ought to be a lawyer. Providence created me expressly for that profession! Wouldn't I get on in that line! I might come to be a sheriff, and an assessor of the high court, and indeed a lord-lieutenant, and a magnate of the empire! For what place is too high for a Hungarian lawyer?"
Such were the stout man's thoughts. His imagination borrowed a glow from his cups, (for he, too, had drunk deep), and the cares of his fancied honours and dignities kept him awake, in spite of the fatigues of the day, and, indeed, in spite of his own endeavours to go to sleep. He, to whom it was an easy matter to talk a whole party to sleep, now vainly exerted his skill upon himself. He tried every means; he occupied himself with figures and accounts. But the figures danced in a wild maze, and, somehow or other, the accounts would not tally. He opened his eyes, and looked around. The dying glare of his candle threw a dim light on the objects in the room, filling it with gaunt and shadowy forms. He shuddered, and extinguished the candle; but the darkness made matters worse. His thoughts would run on robberies and murders. The greatest brigand in the county, a man sentenced to death, was a prisoner in his house. Who knows what Viola's friends were about? Perhaps they were numerous. Perhaps they were formidable and fierce. Nothing was more natural than that they should attack the house, and liberate their captain. And if so, what was to become of the poor steward, who had so jealously watched lest he might escape, and who had protested, yes, and in the presence of at least a hundred people, every one of whom might have told the robbers of it, that Viola must needs be hanged? That thought made him shake in his bed. And besides, was not his door wide open? Did he not keep it open ever since he was afraid of apoplexy? What was to prevent the outlaws from entering his room, and hanging him on his bed-post? Nothing; for the haiduk, whose duty it was to sleep on the threshold, had been taken away to join the watch on Viola.
The poor steward's alarm had come to its acmé, when he heard the noise of steps in the loft over his head. He sat up in his bed. He heard the steps very distinctly, and immediately afterwards he heard the creaking and breaking of the planks. Yes! the most dreaded event had come to pass. The robbers were at their work of death and destruction! They were burning the house, and cutting the throats of all the inmates! "Gracious God!" groaned he, clasping his hands. What could he do? He might lock the door! There was a singing in his ear, his heart beat irregularly, his breath failed him, his face was covered with sweat, and his limbs trembled,—all these were symptoms of an apoplectic fit. "If I lock the door, I am utterly lost!" thought he; "for no one can come to my assistance!" He hid his head under the blankets. But the noise grew louder, and he fancied somebody was breaking through the wall of the room next to his. Perhaps there were not less than a hundred robbers; perhaps they were bent upon torturing him! Unless the door was locked, there was no possibility of screaming for help; for he knew the first thing they intended to do was to gag him. But then, he was in a perspiration; the room was icy cold: to get up and stand on the cold floor was literally courting a fit of apoplexy. But when he heard Mr. Catspaw hallooing, his fear got the better of all other considerations. He jumped out of bed, wrapped himself up in a blanket, and ran to the door. But what can equal his horror when he heard the door of the corridor turning on its hinges, and when quick steps approached him! He dropped the blanket because it interfered with his movements, and seized the key, when the door was flung open. Before him stood a small man, wrapped in a bunda.
There is a tide in the affairs of a coward in which fear makes him a hero. Such a moment had come for the steward. Furious as a stag at bay, reckless as a man who sees certain death before him, merciless as one to whom no mercy is given, senseless, maddened, frenzied, he rushed upon the new comer, and in the very next moment Mr. Catspaw measured his length on the ground, and roared for help.
"Murder!" screamed the attorney.