The ladies at such times are shelved altogether.
During the actual hunting season the men are not to be seen for whole weeks at a time, but off they go to the woods and stalk or lurk for their prey in the midst of water and ice, and the ladies think it nothing extraordinary if their husbands or lovers, as the case may be, come back, or are carried back, drenched with rain, invisible for mud, with their garments torn to shreds and their limbs mangled; for after all it is the only manly diversion--the only diversion really fit for a gentleman.
When the bear-hunting began, that heroic cripple, Squire Gerzson, also appeared with Count Kengyelesy and numerous other familiar faces from distant counties, who had all met together on the day after Henrietta's wedding, and who regularly made Hidvar their autumn trysting-place.
Count Kengyelesy did not bring his wife with him: the little rogue on her husband's departure declared that she was ill and remained behind--_verbum sap_! Henrietta was very much occupied by the duties of hospitality.

She took a pride in anticipating the wants of all her guests, and at the evening _soirees_ she played the part of hostess with becoming _aplomb_.
One day the gentlemen with their beaters, rangers, dogs, and carts, had all gone off to the forest as usual, and Henrietta was left alone in the castle with Clementina, Margari, and the domestics.

As for Margari, he would not have gone to the woods for all the bears in the world.
Clementina, solemnly cackling gossip as usual, imparted to Henrietta that the night before, when the gentlemen played at cards, the luck had run dead against Hatszegi: Count Kengyelesy had won back from him the whole of the Kengyelesy estate.

"Thank God!" sighed Henrietta at this glad intelligence.

This was one of the things that had weighed down her heart like a nightmare, one of the partition-walls, so to speak, which had hitherto separated her from her husband.