"Pretty, eh?" he asked, and he made as though he would raise the coloured kerchief that half hid the sleeper's face.
"Let her rest, Mr. castellan, I beg. She's wearied out with the journey."
"Well, well, let her be then, but you, hostess, bring us some wine, and take some to the heyduke outside."
"And what may you be doing in this neighbourhood, if I may be so bold?" inquired Kurovics.
"Oh, an important police-mission. A dangerous felon, the notorious Mathias Ráby broke out of Pesth prison last week, and the descriptions circulated of him are not correct, as I could have told them had they asked me. The fellow is not bearded as described, but he was shaved the day before he got out, and had a face as smooth as any girl's."
Ráby felt as if the beatings of his heart would burst his bodice, as the new-comer went on:
"When I heard of it, I went to the authorities and told them the mistake they had made, and offered to make it good by riding after the runaway myself to see if I could identify him. And there are two hundred ducats for the man who brings him back alive."
"A nice round sum! I only wish I could find him," answered Kurovics.
"I mean to take him myself," said Janosics coolly. "But hark ye, Kurovics, is it possible that you yourself are leading my prisoner away in a girl's garb? Just let me have another look at her."
Ráby would have swooned, only that the castellan was now smoking so closely under his nose that he was nearly choked by it. He was on the point of springing up and surrendering in sheer desperation; it was with the greatest difficulty he mastered his feelings, above all his inclination to cough, for raising his head would betray him directly. And the suspicion too arose in him that perhaps, after all, his guides were accomplices in a comedy which had for its dénouement the arrest of the fugitive just as he was making sure of safety.