"So much the better."
"I only hope it is for her—for me it is. But it is the turning-point of my fate too: so just listen to the end, to all the little trifling incidents of the tale—as Mistress Boris related them to Czipra, and Czipra to me. They all belong to the complete picture."
"I am all ears," said Lorand, sitting down, and determining to show a very indifferent face when they related before him the tale of Melanie's marriage.
"Well, after you left here, they knowing nothing of your departure, Madame Bálnokházy said to her daughter: 'Just for mere obstinacy's sake you must marry Gyáli: let these men see how much we care for their fables!'—therewith she wrote a letter herself to Gyáli to come back immediately to Lankadomb, and show himself: they were awaiting him with open arms. He must not be afraid of the brothers Áronffy. He must look into their faces as behooved a man of dignity. To provide against any possible insults, he must protect himself with a couple of pocket-pistols: such things he must always carry in his pocket, to display beneath the nose of anyone who attempted to frighten him with his gigantic stature!—Gyáli shortly appeared in the village again, and very ostentatiously drove up and down before my window, driving the horses himself with the ladies sitting behind, as if he hoped to take the greatest revenge upon me in this way. I merely said: 'If you are satisfied with him, it is nothing to me.' It seems that in the world of to-day the ladies like the man, upon whom others have spat, whom others have insulted and kicked out!—they know all—well, I had no wish to quarrel with their taste.
"I determined just for that reason not to do anything mad. I would be clever. I would look down upon the world's madness with contemplative philosophy, and merely carry out the clever jest of annulling my previous will in which I had made Melanie my heiress, and which had been stored away in the county archive room, making another which I shall keep here at home, in which not a single mention is made of my niece.
"The wedding was solemnized with great pomp.
"Sárvölgyi did not complain of the expense incurred. He thought to revenge himself on me. He collected all the friends he could from the vicinity: I too received a lithographed invitation. Look at that!"
Topándy took the vellum from his pocket-book and handed it to Lorand.
Dear Mr. Topándy:
It will give me great pleasure if you and your nephew Lorand Áronffy will accept our invitation to the wedding of my daughter Melanie and Joseph Gyáli, at Mr. Sárvölgyi's house.
Emilia Bálnokházy.
"Keep half for yourself."