Lorand said it was a good plan: whatever Topándy desired he would agree to. He might declare war against the bandits, for all he cared.
That evening, guided by moonlight, they poled their way to the centre of the marsh: Lorand himself directed the shots, and was lucky enough to lodge his first shell in the side of the rick. Soon the dry mass of hay was flaming like a burning pyramid in the midst of the morass. The two besiegers had reached home long before the blazing rick had time to light up the district far. As they watched, all at once the flame scattered, exploding millions of sparks up to heaven, and the fragments of the burning rick were strewed on the water's surface by the wind. Surely hidden gunpowder had caused that explosion.
At that moment no one was at home in this barbarous dwelling. Not a single voice was heard during the burning, save the howling of the terrified wolves round about.
CHAPTER XXV
WHILE THE MUSIC SOUNDS
At Lankadomb the order of things had changed.
After the famous scandal, Topándy's dwelling was very quiet—no guest crossed its threshold: while at Sárvölgyi's house there was an entertainment every evening, sounds of music until dawn of day.
They wished to show that they were in a gay mood.
Sárvölgyi began to win fame among the gypsies. These wandering musicians began to reckon his house among one of their happy asylums, so that even the bands of neighboring towns came to frequent it, one handing on the news of it to the other.