There must be something wrong, something very wrong with her husband, or else he would not have welcomed his wife so coldly at the very moment of his arrival.
After a few moments, during which she heard her husband talking in an undertone with someone outside, he came in with his sword in his hand, and after seeming to look for something, he turned to Mariska:
“Have you the keys of your treasure-box?”
“Yes, they are in my secretaire.”
The Prince took the keys and withdrew.
Mariska breathed again. “Then it is only some money trouble after all,” she thought. “Thank God it is no worse. They have lost something in the camp, I suppose, or they are screwing some more tribute out of him.”
In a short time the Prince again returned, and stood there for a time as if he couldn’t make up his mind to speak. At last he said:
“Mariska, have you any money?”
“Yes, dear!” Mariska hastened to answer, “just ten thousand thalers. Do you want them?”
“No, no. But have them all ready to hand, and if you collected your jewels together at the same time you would do well.”
“What for, my husband?”
“Because,” stammered Ghyka, “because—we may—and very speedily, too—have to set out on our travels.”
“Have to travel—in my condition?” asked Mariska, raising a pathetic face up to her husband.
That look transfixed the very soul of Ghyka. His wife was in a condition nearer to death than to life.
“No, I won’t stir a stump,” he suddenly cried, beside himself with agitation, striking his sword so violently on the table that it flew from its sheath, “if heaven itself fall on me, I won’t go.”
“For God’s sake, my husband, what is the matter?” cried Mariska in her astonishment; whereupon the Prince proudly raised his eyebrows, approached her with a smile, and pressing his wife to his bosom, said reassuringly:
“Fear nothing. I had an idea in my head; but I have dismissed it, and will think of it no more. Take it that I have asked you nothing.”
“But your anxiety?”
“It has gone already. Ask not the reason, for you would laugh at me for it. Sleep in peace. I also will sleep upon it.”
The husband caressed and kissed his wife, and his hand trembled no longer, his face was no longer pale, and his lips were no longer so cold as before.
But the wife’s were now. When her husband tenderly kissed her eyes and bade her sleep, she pretended that she was satisfied; but as soon as he had withdrawn from her room, she arose, put on a dressing-gown, and calling one of her maids, descended with her into the hall, and sent for a faithful old servant of her husband’s, who was wont to accompany him everywhere, an old Moldavian courier.
“Jova!” she said, “speak the truth! What’s the matter with your master? What have you seen and heard?”
“It is a great trouble, my lady. God deliver us from it! We only escaped destruction at the battle of St. Gothard by not standing up against the Magyars. But what were we to do? Christian cannot fight against Christian, for then should we be fighting against God. The Turkish army was badly beaten there. And now the Vizier of Buda, that he may wash himself clean, for the Sultan is very wroth, wants to cast the whole blame of the affair on the head of the Prince.”
“Great Heaven! And what will be the result?”
“Well, it would not be a bad thing if your Highnesses were to withdraw somewhere or other for a time to give the Sultan’s wrath time to cool.”
“To my father’s, eh? in Wallachia?”
“Well, a little farther than that, I should say.”
“True, we might go to Transylvania; we have lots of good friends there.”
“Even there it might not be as well to stay. You would do well to make a journey to Poland.”
“Do you suppose the danger to be so great then?”
“God grant it be not so bad as I think it.”
“Thank you for your advice, Jova. I will tell my husband quite early in the morning.”
“My lady, you would do well not to wait till morning.”
The woman grew pale.
“What do you mean?”
“I mean that if you would take care of yourselves, you should take carriage this very night, this very hour. I will go before the horses with a lantern, and a courier shall be sent on ahead to have fresh relays of horses awaiting us at every station, so that by the time it begins to grow grey, we shall have left the last hill of this region out of sight.”
The terrified Princess returned to her bedchamber, and quickly packed up her most valuable things, making all the necessary preparations for a long journey. But the door leading to her husband’s room was locked, and she durst not call him, but with an indescribable sinking of heart awaited the endlessly distant dawn. She was unable to close her eyes the whole night. Wearied out in body and soul she rose as soon as she saw the light of dawn, sitting with her swimming head against the window, whence she could look down into the courtyard.
Gradually the courtyard awoke to life and noise again, and the hall was peopled with domestics hurrying to and fro. The grooms began walking the horses up and down, the peasant girls with pitchers on their heads were returning from the distant wells, a merry voice began singing a popular ditty in one of the outhouses. All this seemed as strange to the watchful lady as the life and the movement of the outside world seems to one condemned to death who gazes upon it from the window of his cell.
Then the door opened and her husband came out of his bedchamber and greeted his wife with a voice full of boisterous courage. He was dressed in a short stagskin jacket, which he generally wore when he went a-hunting, and wore big Polish boots with starlike spurs.
“Going a-hunting, eh?” asked Mariska,
