Mathias Ráby was again pressed by his wife to go and get some shooting. Perhaps he might be more lucky to-day, and bring home a hare.
His spouse was all affection and anxiety. So he went.
But the things Ráby had heard lately he could not get out of his head.
Therefore he did not go far into the country, but turned back in the direction of Pesth. There, he saw a mob of men, women, and children, who all seemed to be waiting for someone.
He would not ask for whom, for he knew they would not tell him.
But hardly had Ráby gone a few hundred paces past them, than he noted a carriage drawn by three horses, coming from the prefecture at a quick gallop, whereupon the whole crowd of people, till now silent, burst forth with loud cries, and placed themselves on either side of the road.
The passenger inside the carriage he did not recognise; neither could he make out what it was the mob were shouting to him. But their tone was sufficiently menacing. As the equipage dashed between the rows of people, the yells became still louder, whilst fists were raised and sticks were brandished threateningly. The carriage did not stop, but cleared the mob till it had left it far behind.
When the carriage reached Ráby, he saw the surveyor cowering on the back seat. Now he gathered what the people's cries had meant. But he did not understand what it was till the carriage pulled up close to him, and he recognised in the driver, Dacsó Marczi.
"Your very humble servant," exclaimed the surveyor to Ráby. "Did you hear the infernal row they made? That's the way they receive me everywhere. If Marczi had not been my coachman, I should have had stones thrown at my head."
"Your worship," cried Marczi, in a voice already thick with wine; "is there still some brandy in the flask?"