Chapter II: Part 2

"You needn't worry about money, Wenzel. The Government pay well those who are faithful to it." He leaned forward and his eyes narrowed. "Only see you do not fail, my friend, for otherwise you will find your own neck in a noose."

Wenzel burst into a bellow of raucous laughter. "I shall not fail. Don't you worry, comrade. This White Knight has bitten off more than he can chew. I'm the man you want. That's what I say. It's me you want."

"So be it." Bela Kun waved them away. "Don't forget, Comrade Wenzel, don't let him escape. You will hang heavier than the Count Bakocz!"

* * * * * *

Sunday! The day before the trial of Count Kalman Bakocz for treason. Trial! It was mockery to call the proceedings which occurred by this name.

Counter-revolutionaries, enemies of the proletariat; all such who were caught were imprisoned, and in due course, usually within twenty-four hours, brought before Korvin-Klein. Trial--judgment should be the word! There was no opportunity for defence, no witnesses brought forward for the defendant. Only prosecution and execution.

In the prisons of Hungary were _bourgeois_ hostages, held by the Communists against the possibility of hostile demonstrations from the people who groaned beneath the heel of the Soviet. Cast into prison, herded, many of them together, into small filthy cells, they barely subsisted.

Womenfolk were allowed to bring them what food they could obtain. Baskets, bags, packages of food were handed in at the prison gates by weeping women, for husbands, brothers, and sons.

The Red guards received the parcels and, when the women had gone, ate the food themselves and drank the wine. Occasionally, nay, more often than not, these hostages, these prisoners, died. That night there would be a stealthy procession to the waterside, and presently the waters of the Danube would part with a splash, and the body of the prisoner would float down, to disappear for evermore.

Food would still arrive, relations never hearing the tragedy of their loved ones, and the jeering Reds would gobble it up. What stories the grim walls of the Budapest prisons could tell of the Revolution of 1919, what tales of death and torture!

Count Bakocz was granted a cell to himself. The remorseless Soviet had determined he should die, and there was to be no mistake. So he was taken away from fellow-prisoners and thrown into solitary confinement, to see only the faces of his two jailers, one during the day, and one during the night.

Always the ghastly, repulsive features of Wenzel haunted him, asleep and awake. At times he could not sleep. Wenzel was for ever peeping through the grill, and every time the Communist gave his guttural laugh, and greeted him with rude, boisterous remarks.

"Well, my friend, still alive I see. Ho, ho! Too bad. Fancy, you have not been hanged or shot yet! Too bad. I must see what I can do for you.

"Wouldn't you like to escape, my little chicken? That wouldn't do at all, for little Wenzel would hang in your place." Then he would spit through the grill. "Pah! The more you _bourgeois_ hang the better pleased shall I be, that's what I say."

Three days, or rather three nights, Wenzel had guarded his prisoner, and still no attempt had been made to rescue the Count. Only Wenzel laughed; the Workers' Council was becoming nervous, for regularly each morning Bela Kun received a message from the White Knight.

Whence came the slips of paper he knew not, and once it was not a message, but a tiny white piece of carved wood--a white knight. Another time there were two knights, the white one untouched, but the red carved in two.

This, with the knowledge that his Government was merely resting on the brink of a volcano, gave Bela Kun no rest. On all sides the country was likely to be attacked, by Rumanians, by Czecho-Slovakians, and by Serbs.

His life became harassed, and he in his turn tightened the thumb-screws on the unfortunate _bourgeoisie_. New laws were made each day and flashed to every part of the country, there to be put into force by the local People's Commissaries and the local councils.

"More than two people never to meet together in the street." This, amazing as it may seem, was actually put into force, and innocent citizens were unable to stop and chat to friends for fear of counter-revolution, of plot, and counter-plot. Only Red soldiers could jest together, or those who wore the Red emblem, or those who met in Parliament Square to witness the execution of enemies of the proletariat.

When Wenzel went on duty Garami was there to meet him.

"Ho, Wenzel!" he said, "to-night's the last opportunity to rescue Count Bakocz. You must keep your eye open--that is, if this _bourgeois_ really intends to attempt a rescue."

Wenzel struck his chest. "Why worry, you? Do you believe that I shall let pass anyone? Bah! This is the last night our friend inside will ever live to see. I must see him fall to-morrow. Ha! Old skin and bones won't dent the ground overmuch, comrade. That's what I say."

Garami looked pleased. "Ay, comrade, it was a good thing I did for every one, was it not, to have you put as jailer here. You will not forget, eh?"

Wenzel grinned. "I shall not forget, friend. One tenth of what I make goes to you for the recommendation. Easy money, comrade. And what if I am offered a bribe?"

"Hush!" Garami looked round, startled, and reaching up he placed his hand over the other man's mouth. "Canst not keep a still tongue, chatterer?" He lowered his voice. "A tenth to me, Wenzel, a tenth to me."

"Ho! Ho! Ho!" Wenzel opened his huge throat and roared with laughter. "And will you share a tenth of the rope, Jew? Give me less money and less rope, that's what I say. Less money. My neck needs no gentle bandage, thank you, comrade."

Garami shrugged his shoulders. "I meant nothing," he muttered between his teeth. "Well, good night, Wenzel. There are soldiers within call, good Red comrades, who will not hesitate to run a _bourgeois_ through with bayonets. If there is anything wrong, shout."

"Yah! Anything wrong! What can be wrong? If anyone comes I will spit on them and they will run. Good night, comrade. Let no uneasy dreams disturb you. To-morrow Count Bakocz will--die." His eyes flashed joyfully, as if he were already watching the life blood draining away from the victim's body, and his gloating expression caused Garami to hurry the quicker away.

Ample preparations had been made to guard the prison well. Posted in different parts of the building were groups of Red soldiers. No one could enter without the knowledge of the guards, and even if intruders were successful in this there was still the huge Wenzel to overcome.

Garami breathed a little easier as he left the prison. He had been responsible for the appointment of Wenzel, and if anything should go wrong he was not too sure of his comrades' affability, that he would not hang side by side with his _protégé_.

That, therefore, was the position at ten o'clock on Sunday night, the night before the prisoner was to be tried, which was, of course, synonymous with death. If the White Knight failed the Count would die.

The hours wore on. The soldiers sang and ate, drank and joked, and Wenzel sat on his chair, outside the Count's cell, singing too, his huge voice echoing through the dim corridors so that prisoners in distant cells could not sleep.

At intervals he would open the grill to shout insults at the hapless prisoner, picturing the death that would overtake him in the morning, by all of which the Count remained unmoved.

He knew, just as every one else knew, that on the morrow he would die, and so he gave his last thoughts to the family left behind at Balassagyarmat. If a tear rolled down his cheek it was not because he was afraid of death. His poor Elizabeth, his poor Cecile! Only the seventeen-year-old Francis to guard and protect them, and such friends as could creep to them unseen.

What of his family at Balassagyarmat? Since the night Arnold Terhune had brought the news of the White Knight's oath they had heard nothing. When Sunday night arrived they did not attempt sleep. Cecile and Francis joined their mother, and in the darkness they held hands and comforted one another through the lonely hours.

With anxious hearts, with fear that the White Knight would fail counter-balancing their hope that he would succeed, could they, by some miracle, have seen the prison then, at two o'clock in the morning, they might have flinched with horror, for still nothing had happened.

The guards still talked and sang, Wenzel still sat on his stool. The only movement was that of a Red soldier who staggered about with bottles of wine, liberally dosing the guards with liquor.

From somewhere or other he produced yet more bottles. "Come along, comrades, some more," he cried, and the guards grinned and held out their mugs.

The soldier served them all. "Let us--let--let us drink a toast," he called out, "l-let us drink to the Revolution."

"Ay, ay," answered the men, and they drank deeply.

"Must take some to the others," muttered the proposer, and he staggered away.

The noisy rowdyism gradually died away as the potent wine took effect. The drink must have been stronger than usual, for the Reds found their heads nodding--nodding.... Ten minutes later every man was sound asleep, and when the soldier returned who had, in his generosity, visited the other guards all through the prison, and served out drink to toast the Revolution, he chuckled, and straightened up.

"Drunken swine," he muttered. It was Arnold Terhune.

The first part of his task completed, there was now the hardest part to perform.

With noiseless steps he traversed the corridors going in the direction of Count Bakocz's cell. At the actual corridor he came to a halt and listened. Round the corner he could hear the heavy breathing of Wenzel, who now seemed quieter.

With scarcely a movement Terhune leaned forward till he could see what was happening, and his heart leaped with joy as he noticed that Wenzel, though seated with his back to the cell, was just slightly turned away from him.

If he could but creep along without being seen or heard he hoped to succeed in getting near enough to use a chloroform pad which he had ready. He determined to try.

Squeezing his back against the wall, and moving with the utmost caution, he turned the corner. If Wenzel should glance only just slightly round now, he would be seen. Breathing a prayer that Wenzel would not move he advanced slowly forward.

Four feet, three feet, two feet. Another few paces and he could jump and catch the unconscious Wenzel unprepared, but at that moment Wenzel turned.

For a second or two Terhune seemed paralysed with astonishment, until Wenzel gave a roar, and would have jumped for him, but the Englishman was infinitesimally quicker, and even as Wenzel commenced to move he had quickly advanced the extra pace and with a dull thud brought a revolver butt down upon Wenzel's defenceless head, and the jailer collapsed with a groan.

Terhune worked with nightmare haste. From his pocket he produced a key, a duplicate of the original, and before Count Bakocz was even aware of what was happening, had opened the cell-door and was pulling the bewildered aristocrat away.

Terhune had not bargained on Wenzel's strength. No sooner had the echoing footsteps of the two men faded away in the distance than Wenzel raised his ponderous frame from the floor and stumblingly commenced the pursuit, blood pouring down his face and blinding his eyes.

Whatever drug it was with which Terhune had doctored the guards' wine, it could not have been a very powerful one, for even as the two men rushed past several of the guards sat up, rubbing their eyes in bewilderment, and by the time Wenzel was on the scene they were all sitting up from the positions into which they had fallen.

The sight of Wenzel, his face and clothes covered in blood, rushing into their midst, was their first intimation that anything was wrong.

"Dogs! Beasts!" furiously shouted Wenzel. "The prisoner has escaped!"

There was a dramatic silence while the stupefied guards gazed at one another, and observing this, Wenzel gabbled with rage. "Fools, dolts, idiots! follow them! follow me!" and rushing past them, kicking them as he went, he led the pursuit, and the guards, realizing at last what had happened, rushed pell-mell after him.

Wenzel was outside, staring up and down the street.

"Which way?" the guards cried, but Wenzel shook his head helplessly.

Some distance away two shadows darted across the dark street, but one of the guards saw. "That way, look!" he called; and the guards set off in a ragged group, Wenzel leading them.

Here and there against an occasional light they saw twin shadows fleeing from them, one stumbling and falling, the other pulling.

Gradually Wenzel and the guards caught up. Another moment and the two who were pursued would have been caught, but seeing this, they parted company, one to fall helplessly to the ground, where he lay without moving, and the other to speed still quicker away, till he was lost from sight.

Wenzel struck a match. The fallen one, his face smothered in the mud of the road, was the Count.

"Ho, ho, comrades!" hoarsely cried out Wenzel in triumph, "back to the jail with him. Get up!" he ordered, and kicked the man at his feet, but the Count did not move. "Fainted. Pah! the chicken. Come, friends, carry him back. I hope they will lash him for this."

The guards dragged the helpless man along the streets, till inside the prison they let him fall, and there he lay, cold and stiff.

Suddenly Wenzel gave a cry, and with his already filthy handkerchief wiped away the mud from the face of the prisoner, and having done so gazed with stupefaction at what he saw.

It was not Count Bakocz who lay there, but a two or three days' old corpse of another man, dressed in the Count's clothes.

The White Knight had won again.

_CHAPTER IV_

Because of the rigid censorship not one of the Budapest newspapers hinted at the escape of Count Bakocz; yet the news was passed on from mouth to mouth, was repeated and commented upon, until it finally percolated into the uttermost environs of the city. Disclaimed by the risen scum, in their requisitioned mansions, acclaimed in the sanctuaries of the refugees; by the first it was furtively believed but outwardly denied, and by the second inwardly discredited but optimistically confirmed.

At the Supreme Soviet Council, in permanent session at the Hapsburg Palace, questions and answers were flung to and fro across the table. Comrade blamed comrade, and easily aroused suspicions disfigured the already brutal faces.

Their prey, like a plucked goose, hot and sizzling from the spit, had been snatched from their watering mouths, and the anger of the rulers of the nation was unbounded. Their pride was insulted, their prestige threatened.

They turned their knit and scowling brows toward Szamuelly, who smiled banefully.

"Peace, comrades! What matters the loss of one chicken from such a well-filled run? Who misses a single grain of wheat from a bushel?"

"Ho," said Pogany, "but do hens only inhabit the roost? There are also cocks which crow."

"Yes, and from one grain of wheat may spring many other grains, remember, Comrade Szamuelly," cried another.

"Quite so, quite so, friends. I agree with you, and that is why I say--give me my way. Three days' loot and pillage and I swear there would be no cocks left to crow. Death to the _bourgeoisie_! Hang the magnates! Let them join the traitor Tisza. What say you, comrades?"

From several directions came affirmative cries. "Well said, Szamuelly! three days' sack." "Well said! 'Tis what I say too."

Pleased with the reception of his words Szamuelly continued, his voice rising higher as the prospect of the sanguinary feast for which he had long been working seemed appreciably nearer.

"Remember, friends, the world looks upon us as disciples of Russia to-day, to-morrow we may be leading other countries along the road to freedom. A glorious millennium is before us, yet there is still work to be done and done well. We have enemies working against us. Any moment may see a counter-revolution commencing. We must strike now, kill these pestilent rebels, and plant fear into the hearts of the waverers. As, in the past, we have been ruled by the whip, so now must we govern with a rod of iron. Kill, kill! Let the red blood spurting from the corpses of the _bourgeoisie_ carry its own message." He laughed. "There will be many who will be pleased to join our ranks afterwards."

He sat down, the big hall resounding with feverish applause, and only the chosen of Lenin, Bela Kun, President of the Council, remained silent. His hate for his superiors, his lust for power, were not one whit less than that of his bloodthirsty lieutenant, yet he feared to say the word which would permit the execution of a measure which might prove to be the blackest blot in the history of Hungary.

What streak of caution, what strange emotion restrained him, none can say. Perhaps he feared ghosts of the past, perhaps shadows of the Hapsburgs, aghast at the sacrilege of this invasion of their sacred domain, strung together his lips with spiritual threads. Whatever it may have been bleeding Budapest was spared; the ravenous wolves contented themselves with spasmodic raids and petty pilfery.

"Not yet, Comrade Szamuelly. The time is not yet. You must wait. Perhaps one day in the future----"

Szamuelly laughed scornfully. "Wait! Have we not waited all our lives for the emancipation of the workmen? Have we not planned and plotted to gather the reins of government into our own hands, to rid the country of the accursed gentry, the proud aristocracy? Are we all afraid?" He spread his arms dramatically.

From one came a growl. It was the sullen Pogany, the Minister for War. "Hold hard, Szamuelly! be careful whom you accuse of cowardice. Yet I agree with Bela Kun. 'Tis better to wait. We must be recognized as a government by the Entente that the world may know Communism is come to stay. Besides, it is possible that we may go too far----"

Szamuelly jumped up from his chair with a gesture of disgust. "Bah! A paltry excuse! It is not going far enough which we should fear. We must crush the dogs under our heels, grind them into the dust, till their backbones are broken and their brains jellied. It is a dead man who does not strike one in the back."

It was Kunfi, the ex-journalist, who next interrupted. "Very good, Szamuelly, but in the meantime--what of the White Knight? Can you crush his bones so that he rescues no more of the _bourgeoisie_? Can you hang him in Parliament Square?"

There was a brief silence, and Szamuelly became, once again, the centre of interest.

"If the rope does not break, comrades," he boasted.

Bela Kun smiled softly. "Not so quickly, friend Szamuelly. I have now sent for one Wenzel who claimed to be a better man than the White Knight, and yet--I am afraid Comrade Wenzel must hang. At any moment now he may arrive, and you shall hear, before he dies, how he fared."

"In the meantime----?"

"We will discuss affairs of State. For instance, I am informed by Comrade Agoston that there are treasures still untouched in the Castle Gisella. We ought to teach its occupants the meaning of the word Communism. What say you, friends?"

"Ay, ay." The confirmation was unanimous.

Before anyone could speak again there was an interruption. The doors of the council chamber swung open and an officer of the Red Army entered.

"Well!" Annoyed by the intrusion, Bela Kun turned to the man, who stood there, unshaven, dirty, and utterly disreputable. Once he had been a refractory private; but on the strength of a long record of disciplinary breaches and subsequent punishment he was considered worthy of a better rank in the proletarian army.

"Comrade Wenzel has disappeared."

Kunfi laughed gutturally. "He took your threat to heart, comrade."

Bela Kun ignored his fellow-councillor and frowned at the officer.

"Friend, I gave you orders to arrest Comrade Wenzel. How mean you he has disappeared?"

The other shrugged his shoulders. "Merely that when I arrived Comrade Wenzel was not there. Neither had he been at his room for several days. One cannot arrest an absent man." He laughed slightly, as if memory of the past tickled his sense of humour.

"Did you search his room?"

"Yes, and found----"

"What?" Impatiently Bela Kim leaned forward.

The soldier stretched out his right hand, which was clenched. Slowly he opened his fingers, exposing on his palm something which made the Communist sit upright with a slight start. That at which he looked was a white knight.

* * * * * *

The Great Hungarian Plain, awe-inspiring in its rugged splendour, rises here and there to rocky peaks and granite eminences, upon many of which stately castles and impregnable fortresses proudly rear their turrets, for the Great Plain has been, for past centuries, the Armageddon of Europe. Here the fierce Magyars have stemmed the invasion of the Turkish hordes, have battled and died for the Cross. Here, too, at different times have the Roman Empire, Byzantium, Friuli, and Saxony all paid tribute to the unconquerable fighters of Hungary.

Now once again, not yet recovered from the ravages of the Great War, it was to be the scene of a tussle, perhaps not so bloody in its action, yet none the less significant in its outcome. As Hungary, in the past, had withstood the onslaught of the fanatics of the Crescent, saved Europe from Mahomet, now in 1919 it was to fight for Europe once again, for here, on the Plain, the encroaching Bolsheviks were encountering the indomitable peasants, the tillers of the soil, the defenders of the country.

The battle was not of swords, of guns, or of cannon, but of insidious propaganda undermining common sense, of bombastic promises, impossible innovations, promiscuous hangings, against all of which only tradition and unswerving loyalty to the Fatherland made stand.

The saga of the Great Plain is unsung, the epic of its peasantry unwritten, but the time will come when the world will awaken to its obligations, and in all gratitude repay the debt it owes in story, song, and history. As yet, however, stunned by the years of travail, bewildered by defeat, hypnotized by the imported emissaries of Lenin and Trotsky, the peasants listened to the rantings of the Communists, and slowly absorbed their teachings. Twenty-five acres of land free for each man--the prospect was enticing--to those who had worked the day long for the big magnates, the autocratic landowners of Hungary, as had their fathers, even their grandfathers, before them. They listened, and in the end their brows frowned, their faces creased into ugly lines, and they looked toward the castles and the fortresses and growled....

The Gisella Castle stood alone in its grandeur, the nearest town three miles away. Built many hundred years ago, its solid sides seemed untouched by the passage of time. If the outer walls were green with moss they were nevertheless as formidable and unapproachable as ever, prepared to yield only to modern high-powered explosives.

Here lived Imre Kiss and his daughter Elizabeth, all unconscious that away in Budapest Bela Kun and Company had cast envious eyes upon its splendours; and so, on a sparkling spring morning, when all nature seemed to sing with joy, they peacefully broke the fast.

Even Imre, conquering his fading sight only with the aid of _pince-nez_, could not fail to notice an air of elation in Elizabeth's manner as she joyfully partook of her meal.

"Why, daughter, what witchery are you up to this morning? It is a long time since I have seen you so happy."

Elizabeth glanced at him lovingly and smiled. "Father dear, you have not forgotten?"

"Forgotten!" The old man wrinkled his forehead and peered at her with a puzzled expression upon his face. "Have I forgotten something? Does Francis, your cousin, visit us this day?"

She laughed crooningly, so that its music rippled and echoed round the panelled hall. "Father dear, it is the fifteenth to-day. Does that date mean nothing to you?"

He looked at her, dismayed. "Bless my heart, child, it is your birthday! Dear, dear! Then to-day you are twenty-three years of age--and--and--" across the table his glance rested steadily upon her, longer than it had done for many years, "--why, dearest child, you are more beautiful than ever."

He gazed entranced upon the picture she presented. Through the leaded windows the sun was throwing a golden gleam, in the path of which she sat, so that she was bathed in its brilliancy.

"My child--twenty-three to-day." Murmuringly the words escaped; they were but thoughts which passed through his mind. "Just twenty years ago--she--died, and now--yet did she die? Is not my daughter Elizabeth she, the other Elizabeth? Are not those big, dark eyes, so full of pride and sympathy too, her eyes? It was when I first looked into them that I worshipped her. It is her chin you lift so proudly, dear; there is no doubt that you are born and bred a Magyar. You love Hungary too, don't you, daughter?"

At the mention of the word Elizabeth's face changed yet again, just as her expressions had altered following the trend of his reverie. From joy and happiness to naïve pleasure at his praise, then sadness, and a vague, indefinable longing. Then once more her features mirrored her thoughts. Pride of birth, of race, of country! Imre needed no affirmation to his question.

He shook his head from side to side. "But now, your birthday has arrived and I have no present for you. Tut, tut! My memory is becoming execrable. Perhaps it is my work--I devote too much time to it."

He looked away, out of the window, dreaming of his lifelong work, his chosen task. Once he had been a soldier, but that was many years ago. He married late, and when his beloved wife died he became a scholar. He dipped and delved into the past, until slowly there was born within him a passion to write of the lives of the kings of Hungary. So he began when Elizabeth was but a child of ten.

Soon now, perhaps in two or three years, he would write "Finis," but at times he feared, frightened that the Reaper would forestall him in his cherished ambition.

Of late the apprehension had become deeper; it seemed to him that there were moments when his heart fluttered strangely, and so he flung himself into his work, studying from morning till night. Thus he had forgotten an important anniversary, and he chided himself.

He need not have done so. Elizabeth understood and sympathized. She left her chair and knelt by his side, laying her head on his knees.

"Father darling, you must not say that. Your work means as much to me. I long for the time when your name will ring throughout Hungary, echo from town to town, and later trumpet to the world the glories of our saintly kings, and all they have done for mighty Europe."

Bending forward so that his thick, snow-white locks swept over his forehead, he placed his lips upon the masses of her black hair, after which he ran his fingers through its tresses, lovingly caressing the silky texture, admiring the healthy sheen.

"Well, well, child, let us hope that the time will come very soon. But now, what news to-day from Budapest? How proceeds the Peace Conference in Paris? Assuredly the Entente will be merciful to broken Hungary. England and America will not forget us."

Elizabeth frowned. "Again there are no papers, Father. I do not understand their absence and I am nervous."

"Nervous! God bless my soul! What nonsense are you talking? Why should you be nervous?"

She sighed. "I do not know. It may be merely a vague impression, yet since King Charles was dethroned----"

"Tut, tut, child! Do you not believe that it was diplomacy on the part of Count Michael Karolyi? The Government is in his hands. He is inclined to the Left. His Radical tendencies, we admit, are pronounced, but he could not stab his friends in the back. He is one of our class, one of our own people. Is not his wife the daughter of our greatest statesman? Fear not, child; rest your faith on Count Karolyi."

For his sake she smiled suddenly and gaily jumped to her feet. Yet the worry was not altogether driven from Elizabeth's mind by her father's optimism.

"Come, Father, to work."

"To work! Ah!" Imre's lined face softly wreathed into smiles, and his eyes brightened. Once more he would pick up his beloved pen, to write in words of gold of past glories, all unaware of the ghastly present.

Carefully, with the aid of a stick which now never left his side, he rose to his feet, and made his way to the window. Throwing it open he gazed at the glorious vista before him, breathing in the pure air of the Great Plain.

"What a morning! Come, child, stand by me and tell me what you see. Does the town still stand enshrouded by the filthy smoke of industrialism?"

Elizabeth did not reply, and Imre became conscious that her grip upon his arm was tightening.

"What is the matter, Elizabeth?" he asked, surprised.

"Father, there is a man riding towards us as if he were pursued by a demon."

"Pshaw! Do not all our horsemen ride thus? Perhaps he brings us the newspapers."

Elizabeth endeavoured to believe in this supposition, but receptive to occult influence, a heritage of gipsy blood, she had a premonition that the rapidly approaching rider bore news of ill-omen, and her heart beat quicker with anxiety.

At last, after an apparently interminable period, he reached the massive iron gates of the castle, and a moment later the clang of a deep-toned bell resounded throughout the purlieus of the walls.

A brief interval, hurrying footsteps, and then Peczkai, from the village, was shown in.

His face was covered with sweat and streaked with dirt, his clothes were white with dust. Gasping for breath he turned to the old man.

"Excellency!" He could say no more, and Imre motioned him to be quiet. His hoarse breathing became easier.

"Excellency, the Communists are on their way here!"

"Communists!" Imre gazed at the peasant in bewilderment. "What mean you? I do not understand."

"The Communists, Excellency, are coming here, by order of the Soviet."

"Soviet!" The old man choked and a hastily aroused temper began to display itself. Seeing him thus Elizabeth spoke to the man.

"You must tell us more, Peczkai. What you have said to us is a mystery. We have had no news for some time now, our newspapers have not arrived."

"God help you, then, when you hear the news. The Karolyi Government has resigned, and the country has been taken over by a group of Jews who call themselves the Dictatorship of the Proletariat. Hungary is Bolshevik, Red. The _bourgeoisie_ and the aristocracy are fleeing for their lives. Everything is nationalized, the property of the country, and anyone may take what they please. It is bloody revolution, Excellency!"

They looked at the man incredulously, hesitating to believe a word he said. Yet Elizabeth was the first to realize the truth.

"Oh, Mother in Heaven!" she whispered to herself, yet the sound pierced the stillness of the room with a sharp echo.

Imre, after a moment's hesitation, remained unmoved. "Impossible!" he announced, and his eyes flashed. "Hungary turned Bolshevik! Impossible!" Proudly he lifted his head and met the peasant's steady gaze.

Peczkai groaned. "Excellency, I could not believe until I saw, with my own eyes. Red guards are everywhere, pillaging and looting in the name of the Soviet. Rumours have reached us from Budapest of death, of mysterious disappearances. Our late Prime Minister and many others have been thrown into prison. Excellency, you must believe! The Communists are on the way here now! Any moment they may arrive. You must flee; it will be better so."

Hesitation to believe battled with a hopeless recognition of the truth in Imre's heart. He did not move or speak; just stood still while the blood receded from his face and his eyes became shadowed with an overwhelming horror.

While he wrote of Hungary's greatness, this, this unspeakable sacrilege was taking place. Hungary Red! The country of St Stephen, the birthplace of a long list of valiant warriors--Bolshevik!

"A chair, Elizabeth," he gasped weakly as, unable to bear the sudden weight of sorrow, he felt his knees tottering. Quicker than Elizabeth Peczkai was beside him, holding the older man up in his strong arms.

"Excellency, a short rest only. Then you must go. See, I will take you, guide you to a safe place."

"Go! Go!" Slowly the bowed shoulders straightened, the head lifted, and Peczkai saw Imre's eyes blazing with a kindled fire. "Go! Never! Who are these Communists that I should leave my home, the home of my father, and his father before him? Who are these dogs that I should forsake my castle? Never! Let them come. I will horsewhip them. Not yet is my arm too weak to defend myself and my daughter. Go you, Peczkai, and dare these Bolsheviks to come near."

Despairingly the peasant glanced at Elizabeth, but vainly. As she stood there she smiled slightly, haughtily, disdainfully. The spirit of the fighting Magyars revealed itself in her womanly grace; daughter of a generation of warriors, she feared neither friend nor foe. Once again Peczkai groaned.

"Excellency..." He spread out an arm appealingly.

Imre smiled softly. "God bless you, Peczkai." There was much in his voice which even the uncultured peasant recognized--gratitude, tenderness, scorn, but above all, inflexible decision.

Peczkai, with a bowed head, helped Imre to a chair, and left the room. Bowed, for in the corner of each eye trickled a tear. When the awakening came... He felt an infinite pity for them.

It was soon to come. Even as Elizabeth went to the window to watch the return of Peczkai to the village she saw in the distance the approaching Communists. Her lips curled scornfully. There were many of them, perhaps two dozen, or three--as they came nearer she realized that even this estimate was too low.

"They come, Father."

She looked round. He sat as if he had not heard.

So she waited at the windows, and the Communists came nearer till she was able to see their faces, and for the first time feared. Most of them were villagers, led by a sprinkling of strangers, but the vanguard was packed with cruel faces and criminal countenances. Even many of these men she knew, recognized them as incorrigibles, vagabonds, ne'er-do-wells, every one of them an _habitué_ of prison.

Where were the police that these convicts were let loose? She experienced a thrill of horror: there, side by side with the misdemeanants, walked the renegade police, no longer spick-and-span in their uniforms, but dirty and dissolute, wearing conspicuously their ensign of shame, the Red cockade.

"Oh, Mother in Heaven!" she breathed.

The awakening at last! "Father, the gates! we must close them! Then we can defy them, snap our fingers at them."

Before he had time to reply she hurried from the room and called the servants as she ran.

In the courtyard Joseph and Eugene the coachmen were watching the Communists, whispering to each other in an undertone. Then Elizabeth was before them.

"Joseph, Eugene, the Bolsheviks are coming to occupy the castle. Shut to the gates."

Neither man moved, just glanced uneasily at one another.

"Eugene, do you hear?" The other servants were joining them, all but the women.

The man looked up and scowled. "Yes, mistress, I hear," but he made no attempt to move. Fear tugged at Elizabeth's heart, but the servants did not suspect it, as before her burning looks their own gaze gave way and fell.

"Then obey. Shut to the gates and keep that rabble at a distance."

From the back a voice shouted: "Hold hard, mistress! Don't you call our friends names." Elizabeth endeavoured to locate the voice, but the man had hidden himself behind another servant.

"Friends!" Her voice rang with contempt. "Do you call those men your friends? Do you, Eugene, and you, George, or you, Bela?"

Only Eugene had the pluck to answer. "I choose my own friends, mistress. Times are different now. We are all alike, you and me and Joseph." He laughed coarsely. "You are not our mistress now. You and me are comrades. This castle belongs to the country, and me and Joseph and all of us are going to share it."

Elizabeth did not waste time in words. She stepped forward and flung her hand across his face, and the force of it first whitened the skin then left a livid weal.

There was a deadly silence. One or two of the more timid servants shrank back, still amenable to authority, but Eugene the coachman, his face diffused with evil, stepped forward. "You----" He raised his arm, but Joseph caught hold of it.

"Wait, Eugene, wait for the others. In a few minutes our pretty mistress will soon realize who governs the country now. Comrade Grocz knows how to deal with the _bourgeoisie_. Besides..." he whispered in the other's ear, and afterward they both grinned evilly.

For Elizabeth the end of the world might have come. The servants to revolt, the men who had been in their employ for years, whom she could have sworn would be faithful to death! She looked at the gates. Too late now to close them, for the villagers were on the threshold. She felt a sob rising in her throat at the treachery of the men, but repressed it, and running to the gates stood in the entrance, her arms spread.

Obedient to impulses not yet entirely driven from them the villagers stopped. Only the Communists from Budapest had the courage to advance, and headed by Comrade Grocz they moved forward till they stood in front of her.

"Well, my pretty miss, what do you want?" Grocz laughed and spat on the ground.

Elizabeth looked at him, a fierce anger blazing from her eyes. "Dog!" she cried. "Get back to your kennel."

Some one laughed, otherwise the silence was intense. Elizabeth appreciated the moment, took advantage of it. Coolly ignoring the strangers, she spoke to the villagers, among whom she had been brought up since childhood, and her young voice clearly rang through the air, reaching every man in the crowd.

"Men, what do you want? Why come you here to-day? Are you to be turned into a crowd of barbarians at the command of a handful of Jews from Budapest? Are you so forgetful of your own independence that you must blindly follow on the heels of a few mischief-makers who seek only their own advancement? Have you forgotten the four long years of war? Did you sacrifice yourselves for this?"

Perhaps her words might have had effect, but unconsciously she touched upon the wrong topic.

"Bah! Who started the War, who plunged us peasants into the hell of battle? You magnates, you landowners and blood-suckers. You, who fatten on the work we do for you at starvation pay; you, all of you, started the War to grind us down more than ever!"

The words were greeted by a chorus of affirmative growls. The tide had turned and none knew it better than Comrade Grocz.

"Out of the way! We cannot stand arguing here all day long. Three cheers for the Dictatorship of the Proletariat! Long live Bela Kun! Come along, comrades, worthy Bela Kun has given us Castle Gisella. Shall we let a little chit of a girl stand in our way?"

There was a restless movement. "No, no, move on!"

Out of the corner of her eyes Elizabeth saw Imre approaching, and it seemed to her that he leaned more heavily than usual upon his supporting stick. At all costs she felt she must keep the mob away.

"Back, back!" She faced them desperately, and her dauntless bearing impressed the villagers, so that once again they stopped. It did more: wavering servants, already ashamed of their deviation from loyalty, lined up behind her, heedless of Eugene's cajoleries and threats.

Unseen, unnoticed, Lenin's shadow fell across the _tableau_; the ghastly influence of Bela Kun, the example of Tibor Szamuelly, reached even here. Sneering slightly, an ex-policeman, now a Red guard, sighted his rifle and pulled the trigger.

The shot went wide, but only just, so that its flight whistled past Elizabeth's ear. The blood drained from her face, but she did not move, and at this first sign of open hostility her courage deepened. Nor was it without effect on the invaders. Like a bone thrown into the midst of a pack of starving wolves the shot released a flood of pent-up passion. Gone in a moment were memories of the past; tradition, gratitude, and common sense, all were forgotten.

Jostling, pushing, and shouting out insulting epithets, the mob advanced, led by Comrade Grocz. Some one, she never knew whom, caught her roughly by the shoulders, and she was flung aside like a sack of coal, her dress tearing down to the waist and revealing her underclothing. Even then she might have stood up to them, but a pair of arms weakly encircled her and held her back.

"My daughter, my child! Elizabeth, you are not hurt? The beasts, the cowards! Would that I were twenty, even ten years younger and I would flog them out of the castle on their knees. May I be cursed that my limbs fail me, may I----"

She put her lingers to his lips, and mutely they stood still, helplessly watching the Communists brush past, and the castle which had withstood Mongols, Frenchmen, Germans, Turks, and Austrians fall to the disciples of Karl Marx and Lenin.

* * * * * *

An hour later they ventured in again. In the meantime they had hidden in an outhouse, where one of the female servants found them. To Elizabeth she brought another dress, though, when she looked, Elizabeth did not recognize it.

"This is one of your own?" she said.

"Yes, mistress."

"But why did you not bring me one of mine?"

Looking everywhere but at her mistress the maid stammered an answer: "I--I was afraid of the--the men, mistress."

Decently dressed again Elizabeth decided that her father and she ought to return to the castle, and leaving the shelter of the outhouse they crossed the courtyard. No one was to be seen.

They entered, only to stop, aghast. No wonder the maid had not looked Elizabeth in the eye. On every hand were damage and destruction, from every corner ascended a stench of vile, unwashed humanity. The Communists were everywhere, lounging about, smoking Imre's cigars and cigarettes, spitting on the floor, exchanging obscene jokes.

Elizabeth closed her eyes to shut out the ghastly scene, and Imre sobbed aloud. His grand old castle, full of heirlooms, priceless antiques, and less valuable pieces of furniture which had become dear to the heart from long familiarity, ruined and desecrated by the filthy hands of the vandals!

Mechanically they moved on. Everywhere it was the same. Destruction abounded. Tiny _objets d'art_ thrown into the grate, exquisite tapestry pulled off the walls to clean the boots of the proletariat.

In due course Comrade Grocz saw them.

"Hullo, comrade! hullo, sister!" He greeted them familiarly. "Jolly little place you have had here in the past. So nice in fact that it is a pity you have not had an opportunity of sharing it before. By order of the Dictatorship of the Proletariat your jewellery is confiscated, together with all other objects of value. Your castle will be shared by good Communists. I have allotted you two rooms to yourselves, out of my generosity. The rest will be common rooms. Pass on, comrades; remember the Dictatorship of the Proletariat has come to stay." He moved, laughing harshly.

Dismayed, bewildered, Elizabeth and her father falteringly stumbled along the passage. Communists passed, bearing in their arms bundles of clothes, pieces of furniture, cushions, pillows, but not one appeared to notice them. Were they not all equal now?

At last they found their rooms, traced them in that they were unoccupied, and that on the floor were tossed their clothes, a paltry few, transferred from their proper wardrobes by order of Comrade Grocz. Just two rooms; a bedroom each to the father and daughter who, but a few hours ago, had owned the whole castle.

"I--I will go in--for a rest." Keeping his face sedulously hidden from his daughter, Imre mumbled the words beneath his breath and tottered into his new bedroom. She followed and caught hold of his arm in support, but he waved her away. "Go, my child--I want--want to be alone." There was a break in his voice, and hearing it Elizabeth choked, conscious that there was a suspicious lump in her own throat.

Imre sank into a chair, his head bowed. Elizabeth tiptoed from the room and quietly shut the door.

Not far away was a bathroom. She would have washed, but she found the bolt wrenched off. Under the Bolshevik _régime_ there was to be no privacy. It was part of their policy, a Communistic theory, that the sexes be thrown promiscuously together. Even modesty was to be State-owned.

Hardly conscious of her actions she returned to her room. It seemed hot, stuffy, and smelly from contact with the Communists. She crossed to the window and flung it open, breathing in the spring air with deep gasps. That at least was pure, perhaps the only pure thing left in unhappy Hungary.

Somehow it surprised Elizabeth that Nature still smiled. It did not seem possible for anyone or anything to smile now. Yet it was so. The gentle breeze whispered its lullaby, the sun shone gaily, and the fleecy clouds, leisurely wafting along, served to emphasize the sparkling sapphire hue of the sky.

Below her, a sheer drop of fifty feet, the broad Danube flowed, undisturbed in its course by human outrage. Elizabeth was fascinated by its tranquillity, its absolute disinterestedness. It did not dash more fiercely against its rock-bound walls, nor sing its song the louder. What meant war or revolution, massacre or murder to it? Inexorably its waters flowed onward, unheeding mankind's plight. Cruel Nature, heartless Danube!

In the meantime Imre, in the next room, suffered. Though of late years he had remained away from the wide world, given up the last years of his life to scholarly pursuits, there had been a time when he was young, when he had sipped of its pleasures, tasted lightly of its vices. As then he had known the world, and mankind in particular, so now he trembled for his daughter.

What would happen when the wine cellar was opened, when the mellow Tokay stirred up the passions of the men? God! he dared not think. Yet he knew he must think, and plan escape for Elizabeth. What were his castle, his lands, his money, compared to her?

He must be polite to the Communists; escape would be easier if they did not suspect him. He must think--carefully. He gazed around, and the scene--the clothes on the floor, the missing ornaments, the disturbed bed--angered him, and he felt his temper bubbling over, blinding his clarity of vision.

There was only one place to which he could go--his beloved study. So he made his way there, keeping guard on himself, and ignoring the jeering Communists. Once there he knew its atmosphere would assist him to think more coherently, to plan a way to get the better of the scum.

The study door was closed and no one about. With a quick movement, which twisted his lips with pain, he entered, and shut the door behind him, breathing with relief.

So the _tableau_ was set, Imre Kiss by the door, leaning on his stick, and Comrade Grocz by a massive desk, a bundle of manuscript in one hand, a lighted match in the other.

And Imre--for the moment he did not fully comprehend the significance of what he saw. His brain was blank, chilled by the disappointment at finding even here the sacrilegious presence of Communists.

Then the devouring flame of realization fired his blood. His papers, his sacred manuscripts, the work of years about to be destroyed! Another few seconds and the match would have been applied. There was no fear within him at that moment, only a consuming rage, a murderous hate, and a flaming, unquenchable spirit which oiled his limbs, swept aside for the moment the ravages of time. With a bellow of rage he raised aloft his heavy walking-stick, and, rushing forward, crashed it down upon the skull of the Communist.

Without a sound Comrade Grocz dropped to the ground.

By the time he came round again the papers were hidden where no Communist's hands would ever find them, but the black soul of Grocz shrieked for revenge.

It was nothing to him that, the precious manuscripts saved, gentle-hearted Imre was bathing the Communist's head. He only saw the man who had stunned him. He rose quickly to his feet, leaving Imre on his knees. Now was his chance. He swung his foot forward. His heavy-soled boot crashed into the old man's face, and Imre, racked with pain, gently slid backward to the floor with a groan.

_CHAPTER V_

Budapest, and Comrade Grocz pleading to Bela Kun for satisfaction.

Bela Kun was sympathetic. "Of course, comrade. An insult to you is an insult to the Soviet. Go back to Castle Gisella and hang the old man. Do just as you like, but do not let him escape." His eyes flashed. "Remember, Grocz, I shall hold you responsible. The _bourgeoisie_ must be exterminated."

Grocz smiled savagely. "Thank you, comrade. Do not fear. I know of a very good method of hanging. It does it gradually. But, comrade, there is another matter. There is a daughter."

"Ha! A daughter. Is she young?"

"Deliciously so."

"And pretty?"

"None more so."

Bela Kun grinned all over his misshapen face. "Comrade Grocz, if I were you----"

Grocz nodded his head. "And afterwards?"

Bela Kun frowned. "Let her join her pig of a father in Hell."

Grocz was confident. "Leave that to me, comrade."

The train back was not due to leave for another hour, so Grocz sat at the station buffet, surrounded by friends, whiling away the time. It was good that his old chum Brody came along. There was a tale to tell, so he told it, and in its recital it lost nothing of the drama. As the cluster around him grew larger so his voice boomed louder. It was pleasing to be thus a centre of interest.

All the same he kept his eye on the clock. There was work to be done. He wanted to see the old man at the end of a rope, his legs kicking--better still there was Elizabeth....

At last the train puffed out, crowded to double its capacity, as were all trains in those days, but Grocz saw to it that he had plenty of room. There was one window seat occupied by an old woman. He thrust her out of it, and then took her place, stretching his long legs across to the opposite side. Having settled himself comfortably he pulled from his pocket a large cigar which had once belonged to Imre Kiss, and read _The People's Voice_.

Little did he know that in the same train travelled Nemesis, that among the group of Reds to whom he had boasted of what was to happen later that night were Arnold Terhune and his mysterious leader, the White Knight.

They did not speak to one another, the two Englishmen; each had thoughts of his own. But then it was not safe to talk of anything but trivialities: for instance, the man in the opposite corner, with his hawk nose, his cunning eyes, and close-cropped head might have been a detective.

Dressed in the filthiest of rags, gathered from a garbage heap, wearing the inevitable Red cockade, behaving like a bully and a brute, Terhune was not conspicuous in any respect; but the same could not be said of the White Knight. Towering above many of the tallest men, Geoffrey Templeton, alias Istvan Wenzel, could not disguise his height, his rugged strength, nor even his hideous ugliness, from which even the bestial Reds glanced away in disgust.

With his livid wounds Wenzel was a veritable ogre, an inhuman monstrosity, terrifying in appearance. There were times when Terhune turned away his own eyes, retching at the sight of his leader.