Manasseh | Page 9

stir from his seat, nor will he even look out of the window," added Manasseh, with as much confidence as if he had acquired a talisman which enabled him to control the other's actions.
As the train rolled out of the station the artist rejoined his party, with the welcome assurance that their enemy was now out of their way.
"Is there a mysterious relation of some sort between you two?" asked Blanka.
"Yes--one of fear: I tremble every time I see the man."
"You tremble?"
"Yes; I am afraid I shall kill him some day."
With that, and as if regretting that he had said so much, he hurried away to engage a carriage to take them to Vergato. During his absence the advocate explained to his client that the Unitarians have an especial horror of bloodshed. He declared that some of them shrank from taking even an animal's life and abstained entirely from the use of meat.
Blanka shook her head incredulously. She could not conceive of a gentleman's being forbidden by his scruples to use arms when the occasion demanded. How else, she asked, could he defend his honour, his loved ones, the women entrusted to his charge?
When the four were seated in their carriage, the gentlemen facing the ladies, Blanka led the conversation back to the point at which Manasseh had dropped it.
"You said you feared you should kill that young man some day," she began. "Does your religion forbid you to kill a man--under any circumstances?"
"With a single exception," he replied; "but that exception is out of the question in this instance."
Blanka wondered what the single exception could be, but refrained from asking. "Are you well acquainted with Mr. Vajdar?" she inquired presently.
"We have known each other from childhood," was the reply. "Whatever I possessed was shared with him. His father was my father's steward; and when the steward proved false to his trust and gambled away a large sum of money committed to his care, and then shot himself, my father adopted the little orphan, and always treated him exactly as he did his own children. He grew up to be a bright and promising young man, and never failed to win a stranger's favour and confidence. But woe to those that thus confided in him! My poor sister, my dear, good little Anna, trusted him, and all was ready for their wedding when he disappeared, deserting her at the very altar."
Even the shades of approaching nightfall could not hide the expression of pain on the speaker's face.
"When did this occur?" asked Blanka, gently.
"Last year--in February."
"The date of my marriage, and of my first seeing that man," was Blanka's silent comment. She pondered the possible connection between the two circumstances. Benjamin Vajdar had left his affianced bride soon after seeing Princess Cagliari; he had then entered Cagliari's service as private secretary, and, a little later, divorce proceedings had been begun by the prince against his young wife.
"Was it Mr. Vajdar's troubled conscience that made him leave us the moment you appeared?" she asked, after a pause.
"No," said Manasseh; "he has no conscience. When he has an object in view, all means are legitimate with him. He knows neither consideration for others nor shame for his own misdeeds."
"And yet he certainly played the coward before you."
"Because he knows that I possess certain information, certain documentary evidence, by which, if I chose, I could hurl him down in confusion and disgrace from any height, however lofty, which he might succeed in attaining."
"And you refrain from using this evidence against him?"
"To use it would be revenge," replied the young man, calmly.
"Is revenge forbidden where you live?"
"Yes."
"Has your sister never found a balm for her wounded affections?"
"Never. My people are of the kind that loves but once."
"Pray tell me where it is that your people have their home," urged the princess. "Is it on an island in the moon?"
"Indeed, princess, it is not unlike those glimpses of the moon that we get through a large telescope when we examine, for instance, the rocky island known to astronomers as 'Plutarch,' or that named 'Copernicus.' Everything where I live would seem to you to savour of another planet. On the maps the place is put down as 'Toroczko.' It is in a mountain gorge, entered by a narrow path along the riverside and through a cleft in the rocks. The northern side of this narrow ravine, being in some measure exposed to the southern sun, is clothed with woods; the southern is a great wall of bare rock rising in terraces, or giant steps, that might well suggest the dreariness and desolation of a landscape in the moon. This barren expanse of naked rock is called the Szekler Stone, and was formerly surmounted by the castle of a Hungarian vice-voivode. Its ruins are still to be seen