order in the district."

Then turning to the Senators, he went on:

"It is only an hour since I sent the crier round the town, and here we
have the earring. They couldn't manage that in Budapest!"

Just then he noticed that the stranger was preparing to leave.

"Why, you surely don't mean to leave us already, sir? There is a reward
offered for the finding of this earring."

"I do not want the reward, thank you."

"Oh, come, don't talk like that, young man, don't run away from luck
when it comes in your way. You know the story of the poor man who gave
his luck away to the devil without knowing it, and how sorry he was for
it afterward?"

"Yes, he was sorry for it," answered the lawyer, smiling, as he
remembered the fable, "but I don't think we can compare this case with
that."

"I am sure you have no idea to whom the earring belongs?"

"Not the slightest. Whose is it?"

"It belongs to the sister of the Glogova priest."

Gyuri screwed up his mouth doubtfully.

"Don't be too quick in your conclusions; just come here a minute; you
won't repent it."

"Where am I to go?"

"Come into the next room."

The mayor wanted to keep him there at any cost, so as to gain time
before deciding as to the dead man's future.

"But, my dear sir, I have important business to get through."

"Never mind, you must come in for a minute," and with that he opened the
door and all but pushed the young man into the other room.

"My dear young lady," he called out over Gyuri's shoulder, "I have
brought you your earring!"

At these words a young girl turned from her occupation of putting
cold-water bandages on the shoulder of an elderly lady, lying on a sofa.
Gyuri was not prepared for this apparition, and felt as confused and
uncomfortable as though he had committed some indiscretion. The elder
woman, partly undressed, was lying on a sofa, her wounded right shoulder
(a remarkably bony one) was bare. The young man at the door stammered
some apology, and turned to go, but Mravucsan held him back.

"Don't go," he said, "they won't bite you!"

The young girl, who had a very pretty attractive face, hastened to throw
a cloak over her companion, and sprang up from her kneeling position
beside the lady. What a figure she had! It seemed to Gyuri as though a
lily, in all its simple grandeur, had risen before him.

"This gentleman has found your earring, and brought it you back, my
dear."

A smile broke over her face (it was as thou