Carefully, with the aid of a stick which now never left his side, he rose to his feet, and made his way to the window. Throwing it open he gazed at the glorious vista before him, breathing in the pure air of the Great Plain. "What a morning! Come, child, stand by me and tell me what you see. Does the town still stand enshrouded by the filthy smoke of industrialism?" Elizabeth did not reply, and Imre became conscious that her grip upon his arm was tightening. "What is the matter, Elizabeth?" he asked, surprised. "Father, there is a man riding towards us as if he were pursued by a demon." "Pshaw! Do not all our horsemen ride thus? Perhaps he brings us the newspapers." Elizabeth endeavoured to believe in this supposition, but receptive to occult influence, a heritage of gipsy blood, she had a premonition that the rapidly approaching rider bore news of ill-omen, and her heart beat quicker with anxiety. At last, after an apparently interminable period, he reached the massive iron gates of the castle, and a moment later the clang of a deep-toned bell resounded throughout the purlieus of the walls. A brief interval, hurrying footsteps, and then Peczkai, from the village, was shown in. His face was covered with sweat and streaked with dirt, his clothes were white with dust. Gasping for breath he turned to the old man. "Excellency!" He could say no more, and Imre motioned him to be quiet. His hoarse breathing became easier. "Excellency, the Communists are on their way here!" "Communists!" Imre gazed at the peasant in bewilderment. "What mean you? I do not understand." "The Communists, Excellency, are coming here, by order of the Soviet." "Soviet!" The old man choked and a hastily aroused temper began to display itself. Seeing him thus Elizabeth spoke to the man. "You must tell us more, Peczkai. What you have said to us is a mystery. We have had no news for some time now, our newspapers have not arrived." "God help you, then, when you hear the news. The Karolyi Government has resigned, and the country has been taken over by a group of Jews who call themselves the Dictatorship of the Proletariat. Hungary is Bolshevik, Red. The _bourgeoisie_ and the aristocracy are fleeing for their lives. Everything is nationalized, the property of the country, and anyone may take what they please. It is bloody revolution, Excellency!" They looked at the man incredulously, hesitating to believe a word he said. Yet Elizabeth was the first to realize the truth. "Oh, Mother in Heaven!" she whispered to herself, yet the sound pierced the stillness of the room with a sharp echo. Imre, after a moment's hesitation, remained unmoved. "Impossible!" he announced, and his eyes flashed. "Hungary turned Bolshevik! Impossible!" Proudly he lifted his head and met the peasant's steady gaze.