uth step by step, and when, at last, she had
discovered him, she had devoted all the ingenuity of a loving heart to
the desperate task of saving him.

The enthusiastic words of the girl had electrified Cornelia Vertessy;
indeed, she, the gentler, calmer of the two, was quite carried away by
Maria's courage, energy, readiness of resource and impulsive
enthusiasm, so that she considered the most fantastic projects which the
Polish lady elaborated on the spur of the moment with the rapidity of
cloud formation, as perfectly natural and feasible.

They agreed between them that old Hetfalusy and his son-in-law should be
brought together to the General's, that Cornelia, at the same time,
should present to them the child who was believed to have perished,
Maria undertaking to get it from its adopted father. They argued that
the scene which would ensue, when the father and grandfather recognised
the child they so ardently longed to see could not fail to touch the
heart of the General, who at the same instant, when the grandfather
recovered his grandchild, would complete the old man's joy by presenting
him with his son also.

The dear conspirators had calculated all contingencies, and the whole
thing seemed to them as feasible as it was romantic, and therefore bound
to succeed ... but they forgot that Fate was, after all, mine host, and
that the reckoning was in mine host's own hands and not in theirs.

Nevertheless, Maria, dressed in her masculine attire, which best suited
her present purpose, mounted her nag again, and hastened off towards
Hetfalu. On her way she posted a letter in which she instructed old
Hetfalusy to get into his carriage and hasten to town as soon as
possible, she herself meant to go straight to the headsman's dwelling.

It was already late when she turned into the main-road. The sun had
already sunk, and there was in the sky that red glare, so trying to the
eyes, which envelops every object in a yellow light and obliterates
every shadow. In the western sky blood-red rays, like the spokes of a
wheel, cut up the oddly-coloured sky into segments; while in the
opposite, eastern firmament, solar rays of a similar description rose
brown and lofty, like the horns of the crown of an avenging angel.

There was a sombre air of homelessness about the whole region. Not a
bird was flying in the air, no cattle were grazing in the fields, even
the merry chirp of the crickets was no longer to be heard in the wayside