"Prettier than their parents by a good deal! Yes, they are pretty girls enough, I suppose," said Peter grudgingly, "some people admire them much, particularly the younger one, Mária, as she is now. She used to be Marána, but that's the name they gave her at her baptism, and the other they called Erzsébet (Elizabeth). The King and Queen and their sons all have Magyar names now. But they will bring no good to the country," Master Peter added, after a pause, "no good, that I am sure of! Why, there have been quarrels already where they have settled them. Everybody hates the sight of them and their felt tents, and the King has had to divide them. What have they been doing? Why, plundering their neighbours to be sure, as anyone might have known they would. Mere barbarians, that's what they are, and we shall have a pretty piece of work with them before we have done."
"And Jolánta, you saw her?" Dora interposed, by way of diverting her father's attention from a topic which invariably excited him.
"Yes, I saw Jolánta," was the answer, given with such a grave shake of the head that Dora asked whether there were anything amiss with her.
"Amiss? h-m! Dora, my girl," said Master Peter, laying his hand affectionately on her shoulder, "I am glad that you did not marry him!"
"I?" laughed Dora, "why should I?"
"Ah, you have forgotten how they used to call you 'Paul's little wife,' when you were only a baby, and you did not know, of course, that your old father was fool enough to be disappointed when he chose your cousin instead."
"But isn't he kind to her? Isn't she happy?" inquired Dora.
"That is a question I did not ask, child, so I can't say. But she is just a shadow of what she was."
"Selfish scoundrel!" burst forth Master Peter the next moment, unable to keep down his indignation, which was not solely on Jolánta's account.
He had heard a good deal in Pest. Honest friends had not been wanting to tell him of the reports about his daughter, and his pride had been deeply wounded by the half pitying tone in which some of his acquaintances had inquired for her, as also by the fact that the Queen had not asked for her, though she was on quite intimate terms with Jolánta, and in the natural course of things would have wished to see Dora also at Court.