The Day of Wrath

by Mór Jókai

The enthusiastic words of the girl had electrified Cornelia Vértessy; indeed, she, the gentler, calmer of the two, was quite carried away by Maria's courage, energy, readiness of resource and impulsive enthusiasm, so that she considered the most fantastic projects which the Polish lady elaborated on the spur of the moment with the rapidity of cloud formation, as perfectly natural and feasible.

They agreed between them that old Hétfalusy and his son-in-law should be brought together to the General's, that Cornelia, at the same time, should present to them the child who was believed to have perished, Maria undertaking to get it from its adopted father. They argued that the scene which would ensue, when the father and grandfather recognised the child they so ardently longed to see could not fail to touch the heart of the General, who at the same instant, when the grandfather recovered his grandchild, would complete the old man's joy by presenting him with his son also.

The dear conspirators had calculated all contingencies, and the whole thing seemed to them as feasible as it was romantic, and therefore bound to succeed ... but they forgot that Fate was, after all, mine host, and that the reckoning was in mine host's own hands and not in theirs.

Nevertheless, Maria, dressed in her masculine attire, which best suited her present purpose, mounted her nag again, and hastened off towards Hétfalu. On her way she posted a letter in which she instructed old Hétfalusy to get into his carriage and hasten to town as soon as possible, she herself meant to go straight to the headsman's dwelling.

It was already late when she turned into the main-road. The sun had already sunk, and there was in the sky that red glare, so trying to the eyes, which envelops every object in a yellow light and obliterates every shadow. In the western sky blood-red rays, like the spokes of a wheel, cut up the oddly-coloured sky into segments; while in the opposite, eastern firmament, solar rays of a similar description rose brown and lofty, like the horns of the crown of an avenging angel.

There was a sombre air of homelessness about the whole region. Not a bird was flying in the air, no cattle were grazing in the fields, even the merry chirp of the crickets was no longer to be heard in the wayside ditches. The road itself was overgrown with grass on both sides, scarce leaving room for a little winding ribbon of a track in the centre, and even there the ruts, which the last luckless cart had left behind it, were hidden by weeds. It was weeks since anybody had passed that way, for every village was afraid of the village next to it, every man avoided his neighbour, and feared to look upon his face.

The lanes and byeways had been quite abandoned, they were only distinguishable by the luxuriant crop of weeds which covered them—weeds more rampant and of darker colour than were to be found elsewhere. The whole land looked just as it used to look in the olden times after a Tartar invasion.

The horse trotted along all alone, before and behind him there was no trace either of man or beast, the rider looked round about her with a melancholy eye.

Here and there on both sides of the road crooked trees were tottering to their fall. They had been stripped bare by the devastating army of caterpillars, and instead of their beautiful green leaves they were clothed with the rags of dusty spider-webs; further away the fruitless orchards looked as if they had been burnt with fire, and, stretching to the horizon, as far as the eye could reach, the arid corn-fields had the appearance of being covered with nothing but scrappy stubble.

The atmosphere was oppressive and lay like a stifling weight on the breast of man; and if, now and then, a faint breath of air flitted languidly over the country, it was as burning hot as if it had just come out of the mouth of a blast-furnace, and only increased the exhausting sensation of oppression.