CHAPTER XXXIII.
When the points in Raby's indictment had mounted up to eighty, hethought it time to make his protest to the presiding judge:
"I am shattered in mind and body alike; I desire to withdraw theaccusation I have made, seeing it in no wise profits the oppressedpeople in whose interests I lodged it, but rather tends to their furtherhurt."
"That avails nothing," was the answer. "The accusation has beenpresented to the Emperor, and the complainant must justify it. Is thetreasure to which the impeachment relates, found, a third of it falls tothe informer; is the information thus lodged proved to be false, theinformer forfeits his head forthwith. So out with your proofs!"
"Proofs? How can I furnish them I should like to know, fettered as I am,from a dungeon?" cried Raby in desperation. "Are not all my documents inthe hands of my enemies? Have not the archives of Szent-Endre beendestroyed, and my private papers abstracted, so that I am denied allmeans of procuring the proofs I need?"
"How do you know that?" asked the judge, dumbfoundered.
"I know it only too well. Nay, I know too, it happened at theinstigation of the authorities."
"This is the gravest evidence we have yet had of your guilt," cried thejudge; "this shows you have held intercourse with the outside world,although forbidden by the law to do so."
"It only proves I am right," retorted the prisoner.
"Pray who are your accomplices who helped you in your correspondence?"demanded his accuser angrily.
"No one and everyone body. The bare walls, the air itself, the irondoor, my fetters, my guards--all are my accomplices if you like to callthem so."
"Well, we will just make your chains a little faster so you can't moveabout quite so easily, my friend, that's all."
"That avails you nothing," exclaimed Raby. "Their clanking sounds evennow in the ears of one who is your imperial lord and master, and willshortly be here in his city of Pesth to sit in judgment upon you. Letthe guilty tremble before him, I have no need to do so."
These bold words enraged the judge beyond measure. How did Raby knowthat the Emperor was about to come to Pesth for the military manoeuvres,and there review the troops in person. Did he know as well that theSzent-Endre people were only biding their time to send a deputation tothe Kaiser to ask for Raby's release, and to demand an inquiry into theconduct of the Pesth authorities in imprisoning him. It never occurredto them that an ordinary water-pitcher with a false bottom held theletters which Raby wrote and received, and that each heyduke who carriedit, was an involuntary courier.
In vain did they interrogate the heyduke who brought it, and ordered himto be beaten; for each stroke the man received, he was sent by someunknown hand a gold piece, so he was not inclined to complain.
When the Emperor did arrive in Pesth, the following August, he learnedwith surprise that his emissary was still detained in prison. Hestraightway sent for the head magistrate, expressed his displeasure, andordered Raby's immediate release on pain of all the authorities of thecity being dismissed from office. This was an order which had to beobeyed.
So forthwith in the Emperor's presence, the mandate was sent thatMathias Raby be immediately released from custody. The command wasperemptory and admitted of no evasion.
But the next night someone thrust under the door of Raby's cell, a notecontaining these words:
"Be ready this night! Your true friends are coming to fetch you away.They will overpower the gaoler, take away the keys from him, and set youfree."
"But it is evident," reflected Raby, "this is not from my friends; wedon't conduct our correspondence like this. They have heard the Emperorhas ordered my release, and now they want to convict me of trying toescape by force." And he gave the letter to the gaoler.
But, alas, it only made an excuse for a fresh inquisition, and theybased on it the pretence of "a plot against the public safety."Moreover, it was held to justify a still more rigorous treatment of theprisoner, who on this fresh charge of conspiring with bandits, wasdeclared to have merited imprisonment anew. And the inquiry whichfollowed lasted late into the autumn, whilst the Emperor was too muchoccupied in his fresh war with the Turks to be aware of this new turn ofaffairs.
And Raby's fetters were meantime rivetted more closely than ever, sothat he could not write any more, and his wretched prison fare grewworse and worse. The winter too had come, and the prisoner was well-nighfrozen in his cell, for the dungeon was not warmed, and he had only hissummer clothing which was now in tatters. On his complaining of the coldto the judges, they gave orders that Raby's cell should be heated threetimes a day.
The end of it was that they placed a stove in the cell which was soviolently overheated that it burst, and Raby had to press his face tothe wall in desperation to cool his scorched brow. Yet he could haveescaped had he chosen, for the door of his cell was often left open, asif to abet his flight. But Raby, when he did leave prison, meant toleave it proudly and fearlessly, as an innocent man who is rightfullyacquitted before his country's tribunal, not as a fugitive.
One day the gaoler came in to say that permission had been given for theprisoner to be shaved, and for his irons to be removed--a grace forwhich Raby hardly knew how to be thankful enough. It was a deadly pale,if clean-shaven face that the barber's mirror reflected, but smallwonder, seeing that Raby had not seen the sunlight for a year and ahalf. This luxury was followed by an amelioration of his prison fare,and fresh bedding, for both of which benefits, especially the last, hewas duly grateful, for it meant a good night's rest.
However, that very night, Raby was awakened from his first sleep by atremendous rattling at his cell door, and the next minute it was burstopen, and the light of the full moon flooded his dungeon. The prisonerthought he must be dreaming, but the same instant the cell was suddenlyfilled by a band of masked men in Turkish attire, with huge turbans ontheir heads, and armed with an array of weapons, including swords andmuskets.
Raby was wondering in what language to address his strange visitors,when one of them accosted him in Serb, and then Hungarian.
"Fear nothing, Mr. Raby. We are true friends from Szent-Endre, and havebribed the guard and occupied the Assembly House. We have come to setyou free from this wretched dungeon by the Emperor's orders."
"But I do not wish to purchase my freedom by force," answered thecaptive, "and if the Emperor wished to deliver me, it would surely notbe by masqueraders sent by night, but by his accredited emissaries inthe full light of day."
"Here's the order signed by the Emperor," and the head of the band ofmaskers handed Raby a document which contained detailed and definiteinstructions anent the Szent-Endre affair, set forth in Serb, which wasthe Emperor's favourite language.
Raby protested against the idea of flight, but they overpowered hisresistance, and made a show of armed force. "Silence, or you are a deadman," was their only answer to his protestations, and the prisoner, weakand enfeebled as he was by his privations, and dazed by the suddensurprise which had thus overtaken him, fell at last in a dead faint andlost all consciousness.
When he came to himself, he was dressed as a woman, in the colouredbodice and embroidered apron of the Serb peasant girl, and his hair tiedwith gay ribbons; it was for this, no doubt, that he had been shaven.
Raby's entreaties availed nothing. In vain he implored them to desist,and reminded them the military would be sent to overtake them, and thenall would be over! His representations achieved nothing with hisrescuers, and finally a rough, but powerful-looking fellow of the partyseized Raby and carried him off on his back out of the cell, followedby the whole crew shouting and howling. The inhabitants of the AssemblyHouse must have been stone deaf, had they not been aroused by thetumult. The band dashed in the moonlight through the court and gateway,past the guard-room where four-and-twenty were wont to sleep, withoutbeing questioned by a single soul as to their escapade.
It was towards the Kecskemet gate that they hurried, as the likeliestone to be open, so as to get off thus with least delay, and the
nce awayto the river-bank.
At that time, communication with the other side of the Danube was keptup by a so-called "flying-bridge," that was a work of art in its archaicway, consisting of a flat raft-like contrivance, whereto was attached athick cable, which half a dozen small boats served to keep out of thewater. Behind the last boat, at the so-called "Nun's Ferry," below HareIsland, the cable was fast anchored. Linked to this cable, the raft wastowed by a single oar to and fro. At night the ferry was not generallyused and the ferry-men were not there, but this time they were at theirposts ready for the expected passengers. The masked Turks took theirplaces on it without delay, and off they drifted.
Poor Raby was trembling in every limb, principally from the bitter coldof the December night, which, after his long confinement from the outerair, struck his senses with the sharpness of a knife. Moreover, he wasnot quite sure that these strange rescuers would not throw himoverboard into the river, to find there an unknown and unhonoured grave.
However, they did nothing of the kind, but the party reached the otherside safely. There horses, ready saddled, awaited them, and a coach andfour. Three of the sham Turks sprang into the vehicle, and dragged Rabywith them. The rest mounted the horses, and they took the way along theOld Buda road.
One of the escort had the kindness to throw his cloak over the freezingprisoner, the coach leading the way, the riders following. But graduallythe horsemen dropped off till, when they reached Vorosvar, not one wasto be seen.
By this time the released prisoner had succumbed to the unaccustomedstrain on his already exhausted and overwrought nerves, and had lost allconsciousness of what was going on around him, so that he had to belifted out of the carriage in a swoon when they stopped at an inn.
When he awoke from his stupor late the next morning, he was in acomfortable bed. Only two of his late companions were to be seen, andthey no longer wore Turkish dress, but the garb of the well-to-do Serbpeasant, and, indeed, turned out to be respectable peasant-proprietorsof Szent-Endre.
Yet neither their names nor faces were known to Raby.
For the rest, his two guardians showed themselves full of considerationfor their patient. They procured him warm clothing, caused lightinvalid food to be prepared for him, and begged him not to be tooanxious to try his strength with the journey. When Raby had sufficientlyrested, the coachman received orders to drive slowly, so that it mightnot exhaust the traveller, and they set out again, not without manymisgivings from the fugitive as to whether they could not be overtakenand their flight intercepted.
One of his companions, who told him his name was Kurovics, besought himto make his mind easy on this score. He pointed out how they would getthe start of the authorities before these could mobilise their forces.Then no one knew of the disguise in which Raby had escaped; from thedescription which the Pesth court would issue for his recovery, no onewould recognise him, so he had no cause for fear.
They only made two stages a day, so that the journey to Pozsony (whichwas their goal,) lasted eight days, through resting at the inns on theroad. His companions gave themselves out as pig-dealers, and said Rabywas their cousin. The third day they fell in with a party of armedheydukes who were searching for their charge. They stopped thecavalcade, and told them of their quest. At each wayside inn Raby couldread the notice which posted him up as a criminal and outlaw, for whoseidentification a reward of two hundred ducats was offered. To hisrelief, the description of him corresponded to the appearance he hadpresented in prison, with an over-grown beard, tangled hair, and paleface, wearing a faded silk coat. Little did his pursuers imagine that inthe shy Serb maiden, with her cheeks painted red, who understood nothingbut her native tongue, that the fugitive they sought stood before them.More than once it even happened that Raby and his pursuers slept underthe same roof.
Meantime, he became more and more attached to his two friends, whoseworth he began to realise increasingly.