"Yes, indeed, he's there; but I took good care not to go near him. I was glad enough to be off before dog or cat could see me. The devil take the money! Rideghváry would have paid me in coin that I had no use for." Ödön felt lighter of heart. If Rideghváry was in Várad, he himself owed his life a second time to Leonin Ramiroff; for had not the latter arrested him, he would have run into the arms of the former. What if Leonin had foreseen this and stopped him on purpose? Perhaps, too, his escape was really all of his friend's planning, and he had thus shown himself a true friend after all. Whether it was so or not, Ödön clung to the belief that Leonin had behaved with noble generosity toward his old friend. "I am very grateful to you," said he, "for telling me where Rideghváry is at present. In all the world there is no one I am so anxious to avoid." "But what are your plans?" asked Boksa. "I shall go to the very first Austrian officer I can find and tell him who I am. He shall do what he chooses with me. I am going to face the music." This proposal by no means met with the other's approval. "That is not wise on your part," he remonstrated. "No, indeed! I am a simple man, but I can't approve of your course. When the conqueror is in his first frenzy, I say, keep out of his way, for he is sure to show no mercy to his first victims. Why, then, such haste?" "You don't suppose I care to lie hidden in the woods month after month, or wander about like a tramp and be hunted from one county to another?" "No, no," returned Gregory, "I don't say you should do that, though for myself I don't expect anything better. But you are a nobleman with an estate of your own; go home and take your ease, as becomes a man of your station, until they choose to send for you." "And so make my hard fate all the harder to bear, after seeing again those that are dearest to me in the world? No; both for their sakes and for my own I must refuse to follow any such advice." "When did you last see your family?" "It is now four months since I left Nemesdomb." "And when did you last visit Körös Island?" "I have never been there at all. My father bought that summer residence while I was abroad, and since my return I have had no leisure for summer vacations."