After Mr. Catspaw had left the notary's house on that fatal night, Tengelyi's family, including Akosh and Vandory, settled peacefully down in Mrs. Ershebet's room, while the notary himself was engaged in writing letters. He was determined to recover his rights; and, thinking that some of his father's old friends might possibly assist him in establishing his title, he was about to appeal to them to support him in his present extremity.
While thus employed, his attention was roused by a slight knock at the window. He got up, opened it, and looked out; but as nothing was visible in the darkness, he was just about to return to his work, when a letter was flung into the room. The notary was astonished; but his astonishment increased when, after unfolding the crumpled-up and soiled despatch, he read the following lines:—
"I am a man who owes you a large debt of gratitude. I am accused of having stolen papers from your house, but this is a base and false accusation. The Jew, whom the sheriff's attorney bribed, was the thief. I took them from the Jew; however, the story is too long to tell. Meet me at the lime-tree, just by the ferry, at eleven o'clock; but not earlier. If it cost my life, I will put the papers in your hands before midnight!
"I entreat you, in the name of God, to come, and fear no harm! You have taken my wife and children under your roof, and I would give my life to serve you or any of your family. If you do not come, I know not what to do with the papers: I dare not enter the village; I must cross the Theiss this very night. Let me implore you to keep the meeting secret, and come alone. The county has set a price on my head; and if they get the least hint of my whereabouts, I am a dead man. I am in your hands.
"Viola."
The perusal of these lines was no easy task to the notary. "What shall I do?" said he. "If I do not follow the robber's advice, the papers will most probably be irrecoverably lost. If Viola leaves the county, he will take good care not to come back again; and he will destroy them if it be only in order that they should not be proofs against him. On the other hand, if it should be found out that I, a member of the law, and an honest man, had clandestine meetings with a robber, without delivering him up to justice, what a dreadful light it would place me in!" Spiteful things had already been said by his enemies, because he had taken Viola's wife and children into his house. Another man would most likely have thought it his duty and interest to go to the appointed place, though not alone, to arrest Viola, and thus at once to obtain his papers: but this proceeding would not accord with Tengelyi's disposition; he was incapable of such an act, whatever might have been its advantages.
Yet there were but those two alternatives. What to do he knew not. He paced the room, agitated by mingled feelings of duty and patriotism.
First he would yield to the robber's request; then, again, he would not. Thus he continued resolving and wavering, till Mrs. Ershebet called him to supper.
The notary's absence and confusion during supper astonished and perplexed his family.
He burnt the letter after deciphering its contents, lest it should fall into other hands.