"My son, it is in the natural order," returned Madame Belenyi, gravely, and as if there were no other course for a young man but to have either a mother or a wife to look after him. It did not enter into her imagination that he could look after himself.
"Sooner or later I shall obey your wishes; but just now, as we have got a house, I shall have enough to do to provide the house-keeping, and I could not take a wife with me here and there when I have to fulfil my professional engagements. For this sort of Bohemian life, vagabondizing from Paris to London, Petersburg to Vienna, is a bad thing for a woman, whether she goes with her husband or is left behind."
"But we have something to live on, Arpad. I have been very lucky with your earnings, and there is a nice nest-egg in the bank. Besides, there are the shares. Don't laugh, you silly boy! Although they are only worth ten gulden, yet there are a thousand of them. If we realize them, that would be ten thousand gulden. In a small town like this that sum would be a fortune, and with it you need not scruple to take a wife."
"Mamma, you don't understand about these shares. One could easily be realized, but if the next day I were to go to the same place with another for sale they would kick me out. Any one who would offer a thousand Bondavara shares in the money-market would be sent to the mad-house. Put the shares away with those other important papers Csanta gave you, and, if you like, treasure the hope that one day they may be worth as much as the paper they are printed on."
"Well, stranger things have happened. Did you ever think we would come back to this house? I am very sorry I did not keep the other papers. I burned them. Who knows what luck we may have with those bonds? If, one day, they rise again to par, we shall realize twice two hundred thousand gulden—"
"I don't count on such strokes of luck as that, mamma. The worst compliment Providence can pay a man is to let him win in a lottery. It is just as if God said to him, 'You ass! I cannot keep you in any other manner.' God would not allow a man who has any intellect to win in a lottery. To such a one he would say, 'Wilt thou cease to beg alms of Me in such a shameless manner? Is it not sufficient that I have endowed thee with talent? My consolation prizes are reserved for the dunderheads.'" Then he added, "Mother, don't be afraid, we shall live from my art. Wait a little and you shall see; only give me time. Meantime I shall buy for the little girl a doll with a china head as a plaything. You must take care of me for a little longer."
At these words the widow embraced her boy tenderly. She was happy; but that evening Arpad, when it was moonlight, went out and sat under the weeping-willow and played a melancholy air on his flute. Sometimes he stopped to listen to a soft silvery voice singing a national air on the other side of the stream. The singer, however, when she heard the flute no more, knew that he was listening, and stopped her song. It is so sweet to be young!
CHAPTER XXXVII
EUREKA
Ivan's fears as to the safety of his own colliery were growing day by day. One morning he found that the amount of hydrogen was scarcely perceptible; still there was water in the pit. This discovery made him thoughtful; he could not understand it. He descended into the cavern where the pond was. Not one drop of water!