Andras, passionately, his lips trembling, his blood
surging through his veins. "Live buried in our Hungary, forgetting,
forgotten, hidden, unknown, away from all, away from Paris, away from
the noise of the world, in a life with me, which will be a new life!
Will you?"

She looked at him with staring, terrified eyes, believing his words to
be some cruel jest.

"Will you?" he said again, raising her from the floor, and straining
her to his breast, his burning lips seeking the icy ones of the Tzigana.
"Answer me, Marsa. Will you?"

Like a sigh, the word fell on the air: "Yes."

CHAPTER XXXIV. A NEW LIFE

The following day, with tender ardor, he took her away to his old
Hungarian castle, with its red towers still bearing marks of the ravages
of the cannon--the castle which he never had beheld since Austria had
confiscated it, and then, after long years, restored it to its rightful
owner. He fled from Paris, seeking a pure existence, and returned to his
Hungary, to the country of his youth, the land of the vast plains. He
saw again the Danube and the golden Tisza. In the Magyar costume, his
heart beating more proudly under the national attila, he passed before
the eyes of the peasants who had known him when a child, and had fought
under his orders; and he spoke to them by name, recognizing many of his
old companions in these poor people with cheeks tanned by the sun, and
heads whitened by age.

He led Marsa, trembling and happy, to the door of the castle, where
they offered him the wine of honor, drank from the 'tschouttora', the
Hungarian drinking-vessel, the 'notis' and cakes made of maize cooked in
cream.

Upon the lawns about the castle, the 'tschiko' shepherds, who had come
on horseback to greet the Prince, drank plum brandy, and drank with
their red wine the 'kadostas' and the bacon of Temesvar. They had come
from their farms, from their distant pusztas, peasant horsemen, like
soldiers, with their national caps; and they joyously celebrated the
return of Zilah Andras, the son of those Zilahs whose glorious history
they all knew. The dances began, the bright copper heels clinked
together, the blue jackets, embroidered with yellow, red, or gold,
swung in the wind, and it seemed that the land of Hungary blossomed with
flowers and rang with songs to do honor to the coming of Prince Andras
and his Princess.

Then Andras entered with Marsa the abode of his ancestors. And, in
the great halls hung with tapes