"By no means!" said Gatzi the Vagabond, with great pride. "I'm in the habit of sleeping in the recorder's kitchen, or in the yard, and I've only come down here because Mr. Völgyeshy told me to watch lest something might happen to you, sir."
"What can he mean?"
"Why that old fellow there is fit for any thing in a small way. He's been after one of the boys in such a manner that the poor child has got the epileptics."
The notary shuddered.
"Why do they allow him to have the children in his cell?" cried he.
Gatzi the Vagabond, stretching his limbs in his bunda, replied, with great composure:—
"They say the fellow's so desperately wicked, that whenever a man was locked in his cell, he was sure to commit some horrid crime the moment he came out of prison. As for Pishta, they've put him here because the recorder says he has no chance of living. He'll lose his head to a certainty. And the children are small and weak; what harm can they do when they get out?"
"But what are they in prison for?"
"It's a queer thing altogether!" yawned Gatzi. "There were no end of fires in the village where they come from, and it was found out that half the children in the place had a hand in it; little toads, you know, of from twelve to fourteen. Mr. Völgyeshy says it's a disease; and I dare say he's right, for one of the boys has been a making fires ever since he came here. But, whether it is a disease or not, it didn't matter. The justice had the other boys and girls soundly whipped; and as for these here two, he sent them to gaol because they're orphans. Fine plants they'll come to be. Good night, sir!"