I cannot live without him."

The storm became calm: they again made peace with me. Mother, some
minutes later, fell asleep, and slumbered sweetly. Grandmother motioned
to Fanny and to me to leave her to herself.

We let down the window-blinds and left the room.

As we stepped out, I said to Fanny:

"Remember, my honor has been put into your hands."

The girl gazed into my eyes with ardent enthusiasm and said:

"I shall guard it as I guard mine own."

That was no child's answer, but the answer of a maiden.

CHAPTER XII

A GLANCE INTO A PISTOL-BARREL

The weather changed very rapidly, for all the world as if two evil
demons were fighting for the earth: one with fire, the other with ice.
It was the middle of May; it had become so sultry that the earth, which
last week had been frozen to dry bones, now began to crack.

The wanderer who disappeared from our sight we shall find on that plain
of Lower Hungary, where there are as many high roads as cart-ruts.

It is evening, but the sun had just set, and left a cloudless ruddy sky
behind it. On the horizon two or three towers are to be seen so far
distant that the traveller who is hurrying before us cannot hope to
reach any one of them by nightfall.

The dust had not so overlaid him, nor had the sun so tanned his face
that we cannot recognize in these handsome noble features the pride of
the youth of Pressburg, Lorand.

The long journey he has accomplished has evidently not impaired the
strength of his muscles, for the horseman who is coming behind him, has
to ride hard to overtake him.

The latter leaned back in his shortened stirrups, after the manner of
hussars, and wore a silver-buttoned jacket, a greasy hat, and ragged red
trousers. Thrown half over his shoulders was a garment of wolf-skins;
around his waist was a wide belt from which two pistol-barrels gleamed,
while in the leg of one of his boots a silver-chased knife was thrust.
The horse's harness was glittering with silver, just as the ragged,
stained garments of its master.

The rider approached at a trot, but the traveller had not yet thought
it worth while to look back and see who was coming after him. Presently
he came up to the solitary figure, trudging along, doggedly.

"Good evening, student."

Lorand looked up at him.

"Good evening, gypsy."

At these words the horseman drew aside his skin-mantle that the student
might see the pistol-barrels, and consider that even if he were