The principal sufferers, however, were the two prisoners who were to be exchanged, and from whom both sides tried to extort as much as possible, so that in their mutual distress they grew quite fond of each other.
At last Valentine sent the extra two hundred gulden, and both Simplex and the Turkish butcher were escorted to Eger with fetters on only one leg. There the Kaimakan received his gold and the butcher his wife. Ibrahim Kermes celebrated his liberation with a banquet, to which Simplex was also invited, and regaled with mutton in twelve different editions. Finally, Ibrahim presented him with a pair of red morocco slippers, while Jigerdilla sent Valentine a couple of superfine laced pocket-handkerchiefs, with initials embroidered in the four corners in Turkish letters, and wet with the tears from her lovely eyes at the recollection of him.
But Ibrahim Kermes swore by the beard of the Prophet that he would never again buy a Calvinist giaour as a slave, even if he could get him for a single denarius.
And now, after all this, it is high time that Valentine set out to seek his unhappy Michal.
CHAPTER XXI.
Is full of good tidings, inasmuch as it treats of the discomfiture of evil-doers.
Simplex had quite won Valentine's heart by warning him of the dangers threatening his sweetheart which he had overheard in the robber's camp. It is true he did not tell him the whole truth for fear of frightening him too much, or even making him lose courage altogether. But so much he did tell him: that Catsrider, instead of taking his Michal to the parsonage which, as a curer of souls, he ought to have occupied, had remained in his father's house, where they had treated Michal very cruelly. But he added that, sooner or later, the robbers would destroy the house, and then Michal had a most terrible fate to expect.
"What shall I do? Merciful Heaven, what shall I do?" groaned poor Valentine.
"My dear fellow," said Simplex, "what you have to do is perfectly plain. You must carry off your beloved from the place at once."