The Interpreter: A Tale of the War

by G. J. Whyte-Melville

"She is a witch!" replied one ruffian who had hold of her by the wrist, "and we are going to put her in the Danube. You are an aristocrat, and you shall keep her company!"

"Shall I?" replied the stranger, and in another instant the insolent Swabe, spitting out a mouthful of blood and a couple of front teeth, measured his length upon the pavement. The crowd began to retire, but they were fierce and excited, and their numbers gave them confidence. A comrade of the fallen ruffian advanced upon the champion with bared knife and scowling brow. Another of those straight left-handers, delivered flush from the shoulder, and he lay prostrate by his friend. The stranger had evidently received his fighting education in England, and the instructions of science had not been thrown away on that magnificent frame and those heavy muscular limbs. It was indeed no other than the last Count de Rohan, Victor's father, the associate of the Prince of Wales, the friend of Philip Egerton and Sir Harry Beverley: lastly, what was more to the purpose at the present juncture, the pupil of the famous Jackson. Ere long the intimidated mob ceased to interfere, and the nobleman, conducting the frightened gipsy girl with as much deference as though she had been his equal in rank and station, never left her till he had placed her in his own carriage, and forwarded her, with three or four stout hussars as her escort, half-way back on her homeward journey. There is a little bit of romance safe locked up and hidden away somewhere in a corner of every woman's heart. What was the great Count de Rohan to the vagabond Zingynie maiden but a "bright particular star," from which she must always remain at a hopeless and immeasurable distance? Yet even now, though her hair is grey and her brow is wrinkled--though she has loved and suffered, and borne children and buried them, and wept and laughed, and hoped and feared, and gone the round of earthly joys and earthly sorrows--the colour mounts to her withered cheek, and the blood gathers warmer round her heart, when she thinks of that frank, handsome face, with its noble features and its fearless eyes, and the kindly smile with which it bade her farewell. Therefore has she always felt a thrilling interest in all that appertains to the Count de Rohan; therefore has she mourned him with many a secret tear and many a hidden pang; therefore has she loved and cherished and watched over his child as though he had been her own, exhausting all her skill and all her superstition to prognosticate for him a happy future--to ward off from him the evil that she reads too surely in the stars will be his lot.

Once she has warned him--twice she has warned him--will the third time be too late? She shudders to think how she has neglected him. To-morrow--nay, to-day (for it is long past midnight), is the anniversary of his birth, the festival of St. Hubert, and she would have passed it over unnoticed, would have forgotten it, but for last night's dream. The coming morning strikes chill to her very marrow as she thinks what a strange, wild, eerie dream it was.

She dreamed that she was sitting by the Danube; far, far away down yonder, where its broad yellow flood, washing the flat, fertile shores of Moldavia, sweeps onward to the Black Sea, calm, strong, and not to be stemmed by mortal hand, like the stream of Time--like the course of destiny.

Strange voices whispered in her ears, mingled with the plash and ripple of the mighty river; voices that she could not recognise, yet of which she felt an uncomfortable consciousness that she had heard them before. It was early morning, the raw mist curled over the waters, and her hair--how was this?--once more black and glossy as the raven's wing, was dank and dripping with dew. There was a babe, too, in her lap, and she folded the child tighter to her bosom for warmth and comfort. It nestled and smiled up in her face, though it was none of hers; no gipsy blood could be traced in those blue eyes and golden locks; it was De Rohan's heir: how came it here? She asked the question aloud, and the voices answered all at once and confusedly, with an indistinct and rushing sound. Then they were silent, and the river plashed on.

She felt very lonely, and sang to the child for company a merry gipsy song. And the babe laughed and crowed, and leapt in her arms with delight, and glided from her hands; and the waters closed over its golden head, and it was gone. Then the voices moaned and shrieked, still far away, dim and indistinct; and the river plashed sullenly on.

But the child rose from the waves, and looked back and smiled, and shook the drops from its golden hair, and struck out fearlessly down the stream. It had changed, too, and the blue eyes and the clustering curls belonged to a strong, well-grown young man. Still she watched the form eagerly as it swam, for something reminded her of one she used to think the type of manhood years and years ago. The voices warned her now to rise and hasten, but the river plashed on sullenly as before.

She must run to yonder point, marked as it is by a white wooden cross. Far beyond it the stream whirls and seethes in a deep eddying pool, and she must guide the swimmer to the cross, and help him to land there, or he will be lost--De Rohan's child will be drowned in her sight. How does she know it is called St. Hubert's Cross? Did the voices tell her? They are whispering still, but fainter and farther off. And the river plashes on sullenly, but with a murmur of fierce impatience now.

She waves frantically to the swimmer, and would fain shout to him aloud, but she cannot speak; her shawl is wound so tight round her bosom that it stops her voice, and her fingers struggle in vain amongst the knots. Why will he not turn his head towards her?--why does he dash so eagerly on? proud of his strength, proud of his mastery over the flood--his father's own son. Ah! he hears it too. Far away, past the cross and the whirlpool, down yonder on that sunny patch of sand, sits a mermaid, combing her long bright locks with a golden comb. She sings a sweet, wild, unearthly melody--it would woo a saint to perdition! Hark! how it mingles with the rushing voices and the plash of the angry river!

The sand is deep and quick along the water's edge; she sinks in it up to the ankles, weights seem to clog her limbs, and hands she cannot see to hold her back; breathless she struggles on to reach the cross, for there is a bend in the river there, and he will surely see her, and turn from the song of the mermaid, and she will drag him ashore and rescue him from his fate. The voices are close in her ears now, and the river plashing at her very feet.