Pretty Michal

by Mór Jókai

"And for that reason you don't trust yourself to talk with the girls. He also says you will have nothing to do with your father's business because you have a horror of blood."

"He says that, does he? Well, I'll just show you to-morrow that I've no fear of blood, and am well able to carry on my father's trade."

Dame Sarah rejoiced greatly at these words, for nothing would have pleased her better than to have seen her son relieve her of the cares of the business; and no sooner had Valentine declared his intention of approving himself a master in his craft than she handed over to him the keys of the chamber in which were preserved the tools and weapons of his father, the butcher's ax, the knives, muskets, and swords, which no man's hand had been allowed to touch since his death. It is not surprising, therefore, if all these implements were somewhat rust-eaten, and it was only natural that Valentine should spend the whole of the forenoon in furbishing them up with polishing powder, tow, and chalk, till they shone as bright as mirrors. He was evidently determined that his father's tools should gleam quite splendidly when he wrought his promised masterpiece.

At midday Dame Sarah served up all Valentine's favorite dishes, and after she had feasted her little son right royally, she told him that she had given due notice to the guild-master that her boy was about to qualify himself for his profession, and also that she had already paid for the license. All ready in the stall stood the fat ox whereon he was to display his dexterity on this occasion. In the cellar a cask of wine had been broached, and on the counter she had deposited four or five gold pieces, as it was quite possible that the 'prentice hand of the young master might have lost its cunning, so that he would not be able to fell the ox at a single blow, in which case he would have to pay to the butcher's guild a gold piece for every extra blow till the ox fell.

"Alas, dear mother," cried Valentine, "my guild-master is not where you seek him. Captain Count Hommonai will be my guild-master. It is not in the slaughter-house, but on the battlefield that I mean to achieve my masterpiece. I will not strike oxen, which are unable to defend themselves, but Turks, who can give back blow for blow. War shall be my trade."

At first Dame Sarah would not believe him, she thought it was only the wine which was speaking out of him; but when Valentine fetched down his father's arms, the old sword, the musket, the long three-edged dagger, all most splendidly burnished, the good woman burst into tears, fell upon his neck, begged him to stay at home, and adjured him not to commit such an act of folly. He was still too weak a lad for that sort of thing, she said. What! had she brought him up so nicely, and even got a learned professor to teach him Latin, only that he might now go away and be cut down by the first wild Turk he met, or get one of his legs torn off by a chain-shot, and leave his widowed mother comfortless? But all this had not the slightest effect upon Valentine. He replied that his father had gone to the wars before him, and he meant to do what his father had done.

Now when Dame Sarah saw that all her maternal begging and praying and all her fine words were quite thrown away upon her son, she suddenly turned round and overwhelmed him with the bitterest curses.

"Very well, then, you wicked, obstinate son, if you will bring trouble and sorrow down upon your mother's head, go, and be hanged to you. I know all about it. Young Fürmender has told me that you have chummed up with a vagabond sort of fellow, one Simplex, who serves as field-trumpeter with Count Hommonai, and is your dearest bosom friend. He it is who leads you astray into all kinds of wickedness. He it is who has persuaded you to be a soldier. Very well, if your comrade is dearer to you than your own mother, be off with you. You may go and die far away where I can't get you buried, for all that I care. If one of your hands is cut off I'll disown you, for my son had both his hands. You may go and beg your bread, but don't look to me for help. From me you don't get a red farthing. Your father left all his property to me, remember."

"Except his weapons," said Valentine. He asked for nothing more, but went straight off to Captain Hommonai and enlisted under his banner. They gave him a horse, a wolf skin, and three Polish guldens by way of enlistment-money, and kept fast hold of him, for the troops were to set out for the camp at Onod at a moment's notice.

And Mistress Sarah hardened her heart to such a degree, that as the banderium marched out of the town the same night amidst the blare of clarions, she did not even stand in the doorway to greet her son for the last time; but she hid herself behind the flower-pots in the window, and while she peered yearningly after him, she poured out all the fury of her heart upon the trumpeter by wishing that he might break his neck on the way. And this curse was within an ace of being fulfilled upon worthy Simplex.