"Lanyi," commanded Manasseh, in quick, energetic tones, "take hold of one end of this beam, and we will batter the door down."
"I'm your man!" responded the gipsy, with alacrity. He was small of person, but every sinew in his wiry frame was of steel. He grasped the beam behind while Manasseh carried the forward end, and so they converted it into a Roman battering-ram.
The booming of cannon was drowned now by the pounding on the iron door. The two prisoners wondered that no one in the house seemed to hear them. But those who might before have heard were engaged elsewhere, while to those outside the noises in the street drowned all tumult in the cellar.
At length the lock gave way under the tremendous battering to which it was subjected, and soon the door flew open. The outer door was of wood, and yielded readily.
"Hold on, stand back!" cried the gipsy, as Manasseh was about to run up the stairs. "Wait until I take a peep and see if the coast is clear. I'll mayhap find a gun that some one has thrown down."
"But I can't wait," returned the other, brushing him aside. "I need no gun. The first man that dares get in my way shall furnish me with arms. I am going to seek my wife! Let him who values his life run from before me!"
He burst through the door, and sprang up the steps. No sooner was he in the open air than an armed figure confronted him. But Manasseh did not strike down this person, for it was a woman,--Zenobia. A dirk and a brace of pistols were stuck in her belt.
"Take care!" she cried to Manasseh, and she made as if to shield him from view with her cloak. "Stay where you are!"
But Manasseh seized her by the wrist and shouted hoarsely in her ear:
Zenobia understood his tone and the frenzy with which he grasped her arm. With a sad smile she made answer:
"Calm yourself. They are well cared for. They are at home in their own house, where no one can harm them."
He looked at her, in doubt as to her meaning. Zenobia handed him her weapons.
"Here, take these," she commanded. "You may need them. I have no further use for them." Thus, disarmed and in Manasseh's power, she stood calmly before him. "Now be quiet and listen to me," she went on.
The cannon thundered on the Szekler Stone in one continuous roar, while fiery rockets shot from Hidas Peak in a wide curve and fell into the valley below, hastening the mad flight of routed and panic-stricken men, who fled as if for their lives to Gyertyamos, Kapolna, and Bedellö, to the woods, and into the mountain defiles. The burning village of St. George no longer offered them an asylum, and its streets were by this time nearly deserted.