Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 60, No. 370, August 1846Various
History
Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 60, No. 370, August 1846
Various
England -- Periodicals; Scotland -- Periodicals
"Farewell, my lord! Good wishes, praise, and prayers,
Shall Suffolk ever have of Margaret.
Farewell, sweet madam!"
_Idem._
In a small room on the first floor of the old house occupied by the Jew
druggist, sat Otmar once more, on the evening of the important day which
had decided the fortunes of Maria Theresa. He had returned to the
temporary home from which he had been so inhospitably driven, in order to
direct the removal of his scanty baggage, and the few relics that reminded
him of happier times, and the brighter days of his childhood, and which,
during the day, his old attendant had collected together.
The room was wainscoted with blackened oak, the sombre shades of which
were unrelieved by any ornament; and at a table, near the heavy
casement-window, a part of which was open, rather to admit the fading
light of day into the dark apartment than the autumn air of the chill
evening, sat the young noble, tracing slowly the lines of a letter, which
he seemed to compose with difficulty, and not without many a hesitation
and many a heavy sigh.
Upon a packed portmanteau, in the middle of the room, sat Farkas, puffing
from a short pipe small clouds of smoke, which issued in regular but
uneasy jerks from beneath his thick overhanging moustache. From time to
time he nodded his head impatiently, with a sideward movement, and
murmured between his teeth, without interrupting his employment, words
that accompanied his intermittent puffs, like the distant rumbling which
follows the smoke of the cannon on the far-off battle-field.
"_Teremtette!_" he muttered angrily. "I shall not be easy until I am quit
of this den of the old hyena, who has turned my lord out of doors like a
gipsy beggar-boy--and why? The foul fiend only knows. I should like to
wring the old ruffian's neck for him, like a carrion-crow, _eb adta_!"
At length the young noble threw down his pen.
"It is done!" he exclaimed with a sigh. "I have written to the old
advocate at Buda to send me the papers I require. I must not think on my
own fortunes. My father's honour must be saved; and my own beggary shall
be signed before I leave this country."
"Too honest by half to such rascals as those villanous cheating
money-lenders, whoever they may be, _eb adta_!" muttered Farkas again
unheard, with a vexed shrug of the shoulders.
"Is all prepared?" said Otmar, turning to his attendant.
"There is nothing but what I can take upon my own shoulders," answered the
old man with a sigh; "and they are broad enough to bear twice the
weight." And rising from his temporary seat, he jerked it on to his back.
Then seizing up another small valise in his hand, he stood ready for
departure.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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