The Yellow Rose Part 2

"Oh! I believe you."

The great tabby Tom, who had been was.h.i.+ng his face by the stove, rose at this moment, stretched himself, arched his back, jumped down, and going to the csikos, measured his claws on his boots, showing how high the snow would lie next winter.

Then he sprang into his friend's arms, rubbing and pus.h.i.+ng his head against his hand, and slowly licking every one of the five fingers. At last he lay down and began purring.

"Look how the cat is trying to coax you," said Klari.

"I am not going to ask him whose arms he purred in yesterday. How much do I pay for the 'Back Hendli'?"

"_You!_ Nothing, of course, somebody else did that. But where are you off to in such a terrible hurry?"

"To the vet, on the Mata puszta--I am taking him a letter."

"You won't find him at home, for he pa.s.sed here at three this morning, looking for those gentlemen. When he heard they had gone, he went jogging on in his gig to the Zam puszta. One gentleman was the steward of a Moravian Count, who wants to buy some of our cattle to breed on his estate; the other German was an artist. He drew me in his little book, and the cowherd also."

"So the cowherd was here also?"

"Of course he was here, since he was sent to show the gentlemen across the puszta to the Zam Herd."

"Only it seems funny to me," remarked the csikos, "that the cowboy left an hour later than the gentlemen he was meant to guide."

"Dear me! You can cross-examine like the district judge! Well, he came to bid me good-bye. He is going far away, and we will never see him any more."

As if to prove the truth of her words, a real s.h.i.+ning tear dropped from the girl's eyes, though she tried her best to hide it. Not that the csikos minded that, for it was an honest tear, at any rate, and he preferred to turn his head aside when she dried her eyes with her ap.r.o.n.

Then he stuck his short clay pipe in his mouth. A pipe in the mouth signifies no kisses.

"And what takes the cowboy so far away?" he inquired.

"He is going to Moravia as head herdsman to the cattle which they are buying at Zam. He is to get a stone house, so much corn, and six hundred florins as wages. He'll be quite the gentleman! And they will respect him there, because only a Hungarian herdsman can manage a Hungarian herd."

"And you? Aren't you going to Moravia as head herdsman's wife?"

"You rascal!" said the girl. "You know I'm not. You know, quite well, I love no one but you. I might if I weren't chained fast to you and to this puszta. Why, I am your slave."

"Not exactly," said the man. "You know it is not like that; but whoever you have bewitched with those eyes of yours must come back from the ends of the earth to you. You give him a charm to drink that compels him to think of you. Or you sew one of your hairs in his s.h.i.+rt sleeve, that you may draw him back, even from beyond the stars. It's just the same with me! Since I looked into your eyes I have been made a fool of."

"And have I not been fool enough?" she asked. "Haven't I often wondered what would become of me! Whom did I ask to melt lead with me on Christmas Eve? Whose kerchief did I wear, though he never said it was a betrothal gift? Did I ever go spying after you when you danced with other girls and giddy young wives at ujvaros Fair?"

"If only you had not put the rose in his cap!"

"Well, give me yours, and here is a match to it, which is easily stuck in!"

"No," said the lad. "I want _that_ rose which you gave to the cowherd, and I will never rest till I have it in my hands."

At that the girl clasped her hands imploringly.

"Sandor! Sandor! Don't talk like that. You two must not fight about me--_about a yellow rose_!"

"It must be. Either he kills me, or I him, but one of us must fall."

"And that is what _you_ call telling the truth!" cried the girl. "You who have just promised not to be angry with me any more?"

"With you, yes. A girl can't help forgetting, but a man should bear in mind."

"G.o.d knows, I never forgot you."

"Perhaps not; like in the song:--

"'Whome'er within my arms I pressed, Yet in my heart I loved thee best.'

"No, dearest, I am not a hard man, and I did not come to quarrel with you, but only to show you that I am alive, and not dead, though I know how happy you would be if I were."

"Sandor! Then you want me to go and buy matches?"

"Matches, is it?" said the man. "That's the way with you girls. If you fall into the ditch, then it's three boxes of matches from the Jew, a cup of hot coffee, and it is all over. But surely the wiser plan would be to avoid the ditches altogether!"

"Don't speak about it. Do you remember," the girl asked, "how, when first we met, we were playing that game, 'I fell into the well. Who pulled you out? Sandor Decsi!' And you did pull me out!"

"But if I had thought it was for someone else . . . !"

"Heigho!" sighed the herdsman, "that was long ago. Before ever the Dorozsma Mill was sung about."

"Is that something new?" The girl stooped over the bench closer to the lad. "Sing it first, and then I will learn it."

So Sandor Decsi set his back against the wall, put one hand to his cap and the other on the table and commenced the tune, the sad air suiting the sadness of its words:--

"Dorozsma's mill, Dorozsma's mill, The wind has dropped, 'tis standing still.

Ah! faithless thou hast flown, my dove!

Another claims thy life, thy love, This is the reason, if you will, Why turns no more Dorozsma's mill."

Such a song it was as is born on the plains and blown hither and thither like the thistledown scattered by the wind. The girl tried the air after him, and where she failed the csikos helped her, and so it went on till they both knew it, and sang it together perfectly. And then, at the finish, they kissed each other. This was the end of the song.

But hardly had Klari sung the last note before Sandor Decsi had stuck the short clay pipe in his mouth again.

"There you go, putting that horrid pipe in your mouth!" she exclaimed sulkily.

"Well, it matches me, I'm horrid too," said the lad.

"You are, just a horrid rascal! A lad like you is good for nothing else but to be turned into a distaff, and stuck up behind the door!"

So saying she gave him a shove with her elbow.

"Now what are you coming round me for?" he asked.

"I coming round you? Do I want you! If lads like you were sold by the dozen, never a one would I buy. I was blind and cracked for sure to have loved you? Why, I could have ten such lads as you for every one of my ten fingers!"

She stormed in so genuine a manner that at last even Bodri was deceived, and believing that his mistress was offended with this horrid man, jumped up and began growling at him. It made the girl laugh heartily, but the csikos neither caught her merriment nor saw any cause for laughter. He just sat there, moody and silent, holding his pipe between his teeth. The pipe was not alight, for indeed it was empty.

Then the girl tried teasing him.