of the mansion, but
not choosing to follow it along its whole length, he waited till he saw
the pinnacles of the castle, and then took a short cut over hedge and
ditch, dashing along straight before him heedless of everything.

* * * * *

The infuriated mob which, after being cowed by the mere show of
resistance, became all the more brutal at the first symptom of
surrender, after Hetfalusy had laid down his arms, was able to glut its
brutal rage, at will, on the old gentleman who had thus become its
victim.

But it was lost labour.

What satisfaction can there be in the torturing of a withered stump
which is dumb to all outrage?--it is as fruitless a business as flogging
a corpse!

The old squire did not demean himself by a single outcry of pain.

When they wanted him to confess that the gentry had banded together to
extirpate the peasantry, he coldly replied:

"That is not true."

Every denial on his part was followed by inhuman tortures. But they were
but tormenting a frigid skeleton insensible to pain, who only replied,
again and again:

"That is not true!"

The invading mob, after breaking everything in the castle it could lay
its hands upon, began searching for young Szephalmi and the doctor.

They must have hidden well, for nowhere could they be found. The mob
turned all the rooms upside down, and yet it could not find them.

The old man must certainly know where they were stowed away.

But Hetfalusy would not betray his son-in-law or the doctor.

Amongst his executioners shaggy Hanak particularly distinguished himself
by his fiendish ingenuity, but the squire only remarked to him in a
gentle voice:

"Do you recollect, Hanak, how last year, you were bedridden, and I
supported your whole family? And when your biggest lad was taken by the
recruiting sergeant, did I not buy him out? And when the hail destroyed
your crops, did I not give you the corn on which you and your whole
family lived comfortably during the winter?"

But at this mild reproach, stubbly Hanak only wiped his bloody mouth,
and bellowed with bestial pride:

"There's no Hanak here! I'm Hanak no longer. I'm a rebel patriot, that's
what I am!"

The poor Leather-bell was quite unable to help his master. He could only
implore the rioters to torture him if they liked rather than Hetfalusy.
He knew he was the cause of it all because he had talked about the
poison. He wished now that he had eaten of the