Eight years passed before I saw the Orzo home again.  At Balint’s urgent, sudden invitation I had hurriedly journeyed back to my rocky fatherland.

I had scarcely stepped on the wide stone stairway leading from the terrace in the front of the castle, when someone shouted that the honorable master was near!  He came galloping in on a foaming horse.  I looked at him and started, as if I had seen a ghost, for this thin, tall rider was the perfect resemblance of his father.  The same knotty hair and bearded head, the same densely furrowed face, the same deep, calm, gray eyes.  And his hair and beard were almost as white as his father’s!

He came galloping through the gate, pulled the bridle with a sudden jerk, and the next moment was on the paving; then with one bound he reached the terrace, and had me in his strong arms.  With wild eagerness he showed me into the castle and at the same time kept talking and questioning me without ceasing.  Then he thrust me into my room and declared that he gave me fifteen minutes—­no more—­to dress.

The time had not even expired, when he came, like a whirlwind, embraced me again and carried me into the dining-room.  There chandeliers and lamps were already lit; the table was elaborately decorated, and bore plenty of wine.

At the meal he spoke again.  Nervously jerking out his words, he was continually questioning me on one subject and then another, without waiting for the answer.  He laughed often and harshly.  When we came to the drinking, he winked to the servants, and immediately five Czigany musicians entered the room.  Balint noticed the astonishment on my face, and half evasively said: 

“I have sent to Iglo for them in honor of you.  Let the music sound, and the wine flow; who knows when we will see each other again?”

He put his face into his palm.  The Cziganys played old Magyar songs.  Balint glanced at me now and then, and filled the glasses; we clinked them together, but he always seemed to be worried.

It was dawning.  The soft sound of a church bell rose to us.  Balint put his hand on my shoulder and bent to my ear.

“Do you know how my father died?” he asked in a husky voice.  “He killed himself.”

I looked at him with amazement; I wanted to speak, but he shook his head, and grasped my hand.

“Do you remember my father?” he asked me.  Of course; while I looked at him it seemed as if his father were standing before me.  The very fibrous, skinny figure, the muscles and flesh seeming peeled off.  Even through his coat arm I felt the naked, unveiled nerves.

“I always admired and honored my father, but we were never true intimates; I knew that he loved me, but I felt as if it was not for my own sake; as if he loved something in my soul that was strange to me.  I never saw him smile; sometimes he was so harsh that I was afraid of him; at another time he was unmanageable.”