by Mór Jókai
CHAPTER IV.
A DIVINE VISITATION.
The whole region was pitch black, half the night was over, there was nosign of life anywhere.
But slumber was no dweller in _that_ darkness, the terrible voice of Goddrove it far away from the eyes of men--Heaven was thundering as if itwould have smashed this nebulous star of ours here below into fragments.Who could sleep at such a time?
One thunderbolt followed hard upon another. Whenever the crashing uproarceased for an instant one could hear the ringing of bells, which thesuperstitious peasantry set a-going to charm away the terrifyingtempest.
At such times every soul of man prays silently in its quiet place ofrest. Not a single light is burning in any of the windows, the awakenedsleeper lies with fast-closed eyes beneath his coverlet, all his sinsrise up before him, all his sins and their punishment--death!
In one house, and one house only, nobody has gone to rest. Every livingthing there is wakeful, from the master of the house to the watch-dog.It is the squire's house. All its windows are lit up and all its doorsare locked.
In the room looking out upon the garden, the mother is alone with thesick child.
The child is delirious, he is gabbling terrible things, his featureswear a different expression every instant.
And his mother understands every word of that mortal fever-bornnightmare; she guesses at every thought which underlies all thosevarying expressions of countenance, the sight of whose horriblecontortions are enough to make even the heart of a strong man breakdown.
How she must suffer!
He who takes poison dies a terrible death, his veins burst asunder oneby one; his nerves and muscles strain and crack, his very marrow seemsto be on fire. But, oh! what is all that compared to the death of apoisoned soul! A remedy may be found perhaps for bodily venom, but thereis no remedy against spiritual venom. The grave may close upon theformer, but never upon the latter. Both here and hereafter recollectionand reprobation wait upon it.
God visits the sins of the fathers upon the children even to the fourthgeneration. They graft the evil qualities of their blood upon theirsons; one generation passes on its wickedness to the next; man isvitiated when he is born; he sins as soon as he is conscious of hisexistence and he dies accursed.
The sweat streamed from the child's temples; for the last three days hehas had the mark of death upon him.
The doctors say he may live, but if he lives he will be weak-witted.
What a future for a four-year-old child! A burden to the world, a burdento himself, to live on for years after the mind is dead! To be an idiotfor ever! It would be good for him if he could be made away with,surely.
Will God take him? Or is it the Divine Will that he should live on as anexample of a living curse, as a witness of the Almighty's chastisingarm?
Does he bear so much suffering by way of ransom for the sins of hisfather, his mother, and his grandfather?--or must the years ofpunishment be as many as the years of sin?
Who will be merciful enough to put an end to his sufferings?
His mother sits silent and watchful at the head of the bed.
No, she cannot do it!
After all she is his mother. The roots of that young flower are stillbut half detached from the soil of her heart. Death would be a benefitto him. Perchance it might be easier to forget him if he were under thesod. But man who does not endow with life, must not distribute death.Man must wait till the last of his allotted days has come.
And yet only a few words would bring it to pass.
The "death-bird" has whispered the magic spell, and Death will obey thesummons.
Yet she lacks the courage to summon him at a time when the veryfoundations of the earth are trembling at the voice of Heaven's thunder!
Poor woman!
It is a marvel that she also is not mad. She cannot even weep now thoughher bosom heaves tumultuously--it were not good for a man to know hersecret thoughts at this moment.
"They are calling me, they are calling me," stammers the child.... "Menwithout heads ... they are running after me ... the black dog isscratching up the ground ... the hand of the dead body is stickingout.... Poor Emma!"
The poor lady, all trembling, rose from her seat, very softly lest sheshould make a noise, she gets up, she cannot blow out the night lamp onthe table, her breath is too feeble for that, she puts it out by castingit out of the room.
Then she approaches the window in the darkness to see whether thecurtains are closely drawn, or whether anyone can look into the roomfrom the outside. What a flashing past there was of fiery eyes amid thedarkness of the night--Hah! What a blinding flash that was!--And thenblack darkness again.--No, nobody could see her--nobody--.
Can she make up her mind?
She goes slowly back to the bed. The lad is moaning fearfully. He isbabbling dreadful words and his throat rattles painfully. "How blue...?her mouth ... how bloody ... her forehead ... poor little Emma."
The lady bends down over the bed. The ghost of a pale little face comesinto sight now and then as the lightning flashes quiver past thewindows.
Can she make up her mind?
"Poor little Emma," wails the lad.
This last pathetic wail was too much for her. The unhappy woman crossedherself three times and, in a dry, half-suffocated voice exclaimed:"Don't bury me, Neddy, little Emma won't cry!"
The lad uttered a cry like the scream of a wild bird when it is shotthrough the heart--then he drew a long deep sigh and was quite still.
"Oh!" cried the desperate mother, as if suddenly throwing off theoppressive influence of some magic trance, "help, help!" and like a madcreature she rushed towards the bell-rope which hung beside the hearth.
She seized the golden tassel, the bell rang out like a ghostly chime,when suddenly a fearful crash was heard, a thunderbolt came down thechimney, zig-zagging through the room like a fiery serpent, fusing themetal of the bell in its passage and flashing down the bell-rope to thegolden tassel with a blinding glare, finally vanishing with a dullcrackling sound.
The whole family rushed at once to the scene of this fearful crash.
With ghastly, frightened faces they came rushing in one by one, huddledup in sheets and counterpanes or whatever else came first to hand, likeso many spectres in white mourning.
In the room lay two corpses, the mother and the child.
Bitter lamentations resounded through the house.
The father and the grandfather came hurrying along.
Howling and screaming like some wild beast never seen before, the fatherflung himself upon his dead, turning frantically from the mother to thechild, and from the child to the mother, kissing and squeezing themconstantly. And then he pressed them to his bosom and literally howledlike one beyond the reach of the mercy of God.
But the grandfather groped his way along in silence, looking in hiswhite nightdress and his dishevelled silvery locks like some spectralthing.
He could not speak. His palsied tongue could not utter a single cry forthe relief of his agony. He knelt down in front of the dead bodies andraised his eyes aloft. Oh! how he strove to give expression to hisgrief, to utter one word, if only one, which might pierce Heaven itself.But he could not. He was dumb, his mouth moved as if it would speak, buthis tongue was tied.
Oh! how much this family must have sinned, to suffer so much.
