For the Right

by Karl Emil Franzos

"Well--a case of unusual importance, I was saying...." The poor old gentleman felt guilty, however, and was anxious to make reparation. "It is a trouble altogether--this Taras--but I was going to add, I have invited some of our people to dine with us on Sunday, and if you will do me the honour, we shall be charmed, sir."

He held out his hand to Mr. Hajek who put his fingers into it eagerly. An invitation to the district governor's annual dinner when all the elite of the place was assembled would have flattered him at any time; but to a man who had just become engaged to a lady of the Countess Wanda's reputation this was simply invaluable....

"So far he has not heard of it, evidently," the bridegroom elect said to himself as he descended the stairs. "I daresay it will be no secret by Sunday, and it will be as well for me to be seen then at the governor's dinner! However, I need not care now for anybody's opinion, any more than I need for Taras himself. It was foolish of me to excite myself at all about the military movements. What does it matter to me whether the Count's manor house be burnt or not, so long as myself and my cash-box are safe out of it?"

He was still pursuing this high-minded strain of thought, when, at the end of the street, he came into collision with a figure rushing round the corner in the opposite direction. But he saw at a glance that apologies were needless, for it was only Thaddy whom he had sent flying against the wall.

"Oh, to be sure," cried the latter, rubbing his shoulder, "what eagerness in a lover! Romeo going to visit Juliet, I'll be bound."

"Oh no, I am going home; but you, I daresay, are making for the cellars?"

"Alas! I am not in the vein. I was lost in meditation, remembering a certain conversation I once had with my illustrious half-brother, Nicolas I., and how my life since----"

"Nicolas I.! You don't mean to say that this is Thursday? I really was forgetting.... But let me tell you, if you do go to the cellars and should not find any of your friends in the mood to treat you to a glass of Moldavian for your story about Nicolas, I'll not have you try your luck by publishing my engagement with the countess! If you breathe a word of it, I shall deduct fifty florins from your expected pay. Just bear that in mind. Good morning!"

The Czar's half-brother stood stock still, overtaken by an evident conflict. For Bogdan had just told him, "If by this time to-morrow the whole town is not aware of the engagement, I'll have you kicked downstairs when next you show your face here." A sore dilemma for the nobly-born Thaddy--to be kicked downstairs or forego fifty of his hard-earned florins! He would have submitted to the kicking willingly, so long as it left him at liberty to remount those stairs after the performance....

In a distracted state of mind, Thaddy entered the cellars, but the company there was in good humour, greeting him uproariously. "Good heavens," they cried, "are we to stand treat for hearing your romances about Nicolas--this is Thursday!" He could not, of course, submit to this taunt, and resolved, therefore, for once to keep to realities, giving them an account of the mandatar's latest achievement, the plain truth of it, with some exceedingly daring interpolations. But when he added: "This Mr. Hajek is a villain ingrained, sirs!" there was not one to dissent from the statement.