“As God is good to me, that is the best idea in the world! Such a man is needed there, and such troops. If only the horses are rested.”
Here Oskyerko was stopped, for the officer of orderlies entered the room again.
“Serene great mighty hetman!” said he.
Sapyeha slapped his knees and exclaimed. “They have news! Admit them.”
After a while two light-horsemen entered, tattered and muddy.
“From Horotkyevich?” asked Sapyeha.
“Yes.”
“Where is he now?”
“Killed, or if not killed, we know not where he is.”
The hetman rose, but sat down again and inquired calmly, —
“Where is the squadron?”
“Swept away by Prince Boguslav.”
“Were many lost?”
“We were cut to pieces; maybe a few were left who were taken captive like us. Some say that the colonel escaped; but that he is wounded I saw myself. We escaped from captivity.”
“Where were you attacked?”
“At Tykotsin.”
“Why did you not go inside the walls, not being in force?”
“Tykotsin is taken.”
The hetman covered his eyes for a moment with his hand, then he began to pass his hand over his forehead.
“Is there a large force with Boguslav?”
“Four thousand cavalry, besides infantry and cannon; the infantry very well trained. The cavalry moved forward, taking us with them; but luckily we escaped.”
“Whence did you escape?”
“From Drohichyn.”
Sapyeha opened wide his eyes. “You are drunk. How could Boguslav come to Drohichyn? When did he defeat you?”
“Two weeks ago.”
“And is he in Drohichyn?”
“His scouting-parties are. He remained in the rear himself, for some convoy is captured which Pan Kotchyts was conducting.”
“He was conducting Panna Borzobogati!” cried Kmita.
A silence followed. Boguslav’s success, and so sudden, had confused the officers beyond measure. All thought in their hearts that the hetman was to blame for delay, but no one dared say so aloud.
Sapyeha, however, felt that he had done what was proper, and had acted wisely. Therefore he recovered first from the surprise, sent out the men with a wave of his hand, and said, —
“These are ordinary incidents of war, which should confuse no one. Do not think, gentlemen, that we have suffered any defeat. Those regiments are a loss surely; but the loss might have been a hundred times greater if Boguslav had enticed us to a distant province. He is coming to us. We will go out to meet him like hospitable hosts.”
Here he turned to the colonels: “According to my orders all must be ready to move?”
“They are ready,” said Oskyerko. “Only saddle the horses and sound the trumpet.”
“Sound it to-day. We move in the morning at dawn, without fail. Pan Babinich will gallop ahead with his Tartars, and seize with all haste informants.”
Kmita had barely heard this when he was outside the door, and a moment later hurrying on as his horse could gallop to Rokitno.
And Sapyeha also did not delay long.
It was still night when the trumpets gave out their prolonged sounds; then cavalry and infantry poured forth into the field; after them stretched a long train of squeaking wagons. The first gleams of day were reflected on musket-barrels and spear-points.
And they marched, regiment after regiment, squadron after squadron, in great regularity. The cavalry sang their matins, and the horses snorted sharply in the morning coolness, from which the soldiers predicted sure victory for themselves.
Their hearts were full of consolation; for the knighthood knew from experience that Sapyeha weighed everything, that he labored with his head, that he considered every undertaking from both sides, that when he began a thing he would finish it, and when he moved he would strike.
At Rokitno the lairs of the Tartars were cold; they had gone the night before, hence must have pushed far in advance. It surprised Sapyeha that along the road it was difficult to learn anything of them, though the division, numbering, with volunteers, several hundred, could not pass without being seen.
The most experienced officers wondered greatly at this march, and at Pan Babinich for being able to lead in such fashion.
“Like a wolf he goes through the willows, and like a wolf he will bite,” said they; “he is as if born for the work.”
But Oskyerko, who, as has been said, knew who Babinich was, said to Sapyeha, —
“It was not for nothing that Hovanski put a price on his head. God will give victory to whom he chooses; but this is sure, that war with us will soon be bitter for Boguslav.”
“But it is a pity that Babinich has vanished as if he had fallen into water,” answered the hetman.
Three days passed without tidings. Sapyeha’s main forces had reached Drohichyn, had crossed the Bug, and found no enemy in front. The hetman began to be disturbed. According to the statements of the light horse, Boguslav’s scouts had reached Drohichyn; it was evident therefore that Boguslav had determined to withdraw. But what was the meaning of this withdrawal? Had Boguslav learned that Sapyeha’s forces were superior, and was he afraid to measure strength with him, or did he wish to entice the hetman far toward the north, to lighten for the King of Sweden his attack on Charnyetski and the hetmans of the kingdom? Babinich was to find an informant and let the hetman know. The reports of the light horse as to the number of Boguslav’s troops might be erroneous; hence the need of precise information at the earliest.
Meanwhile five days more passed, and Babinich gave no account of himself. Spring was coming; the days were growing warmer; the snow was melting. The neighborhoods were being covered with water, under which were sleeping morasses which hindered the march in an unheard of degree. The greater part of the cannons and wagons the hetman had to leave in Drohichyn, and go farther on horseback. Hence great inconvenience and murmuring, especially among the general militia. In Bransk they came upon such mud that even the infantry could not march farther. The hetman collected on the road horses from peasants and small nobles, and seated musketeers on them. The light cavalry took others; but they had gone too far already, and the hetman understood that only one thing remained, — to advance with all speed.
Boguslav retreated unceasingly. Along the road they found continual traces of him in villages burned here and there, in corpses of men hanging on trees. The small local nobles came every little while with information to Sapyeha; but the truth was lost, as is usual in contradictory statements. One saw a single squadron, and swore that the prince had no more troops; another saw two; a third three, a fourth an army five miles long. In a word they were fables such as men tell who know nothing of armies or war.
They had seen Tartars, too, here and there; but the stories concerning them seemed most improbable, for it was said that they were seen not behind the prince’s army, but in front, marching ahead. Sapyeha panted angrily when any one mentioned Babinich in his presence, and he said to Oskyerko, —
“You overrated him. In an evil hour I sent away Volodyovski, for if he were here I should have had long ago as many informants as I need; but Babinich is a whirlwind, or even worse. Who knows, he may in truth have joined Boguslav and be marching in the vanguard.”
Oskyerko himself did not know what to think. Meanwhile another week passed; the army had come to Byalystok.
It was midday.
Two hours later the vanguard gave notice that some detachment was approaching.
“It may be Babinich!” cried the hetman. “I’ll give him Pater Noster!”
It was not Babinich himself. But in the camp there rose such commotion over the arrival of this detachment that Sapyeha went out to see what was taking place.
Meanwhile officers from different squadrons flew in, crying, —
“From Babinich! Prisoners! A whole band! He seized a crowd of men!”
“What kind of men are they?” asked the hetman.
“Boguslav’s troops!” answered one of Kmita’s volunteers who had brought the prisoners together with the Tartars.
“But where did you get so many?”
“Nearly half as many more fell on the road, from exhaustion.”
With this an old Tartar, a sergeant in the horde, approached, and beating with the forehead, gave a letter from Kmita to Sapyeha.
The hetman, without delay, broke the seal and began to read aloud: —
“Serene great mighty hetman! If I have sent neither news nor informants with news hitherto, it is because I went in front, and not in the rear of Prince Boguslav’s army, and I wished to learn the most possible.”
The hetman stopped reading.
“That is a devil!” said he. “Instead of following the prince, he went ahead of him.”
“May the bullets strike him!” added Oskyerko, in an undertone.
The hetman read on.
“It was dangerous work, as Boguslav’s scouts marched in a wide front; but after I had cut down two parties and spared none. I worked to the van of the army, from which movement great confusion came upon the prince, for he fell to thinking at once that he was surrounded, and as it were was crawling into a trap.”
“That is the reason of this unexpected withdrawal!” cried the hetman. “A devil, a genuine devil!” He read on with still more curiosity, —
“The prince, not understanding what had happened, began to lose his head, and sent out party after party, which we cut up notably, so that none of them returned in the same number. Marching in advance, we seized provisions, cut dams, destroyed bridges, so that Boguslav’s men advanced with great trouble, neither sleeping nor eating, having rest neither day nor night. They could not stir from the camp, for the Tartars seized the unwary; and when the camp was sleeping, the Tartars howled terribly in the willows; so the enemy, thinking that a great army was moving on them, had to stand under arms all night. The prince was brought to great despair, not knowing what to begin, where to go, how to turn, — for this reason it is needful to march on him quickly, before his fear passes. He had six thousand troops, but has lost nearly a thousand. His horses are dying. His cavalry is good; his infantry is passable; God, however, has granted that from day to day it decreases, and if our army comes up it will fly apart. I seized in Byalystok the prince’s carriages, some of his provision chests and things of value, with two cannons; but I was forced to throw most of these into the river. The traitor from continual rage has grown seriously ill, and is barely able to sit on his horse; fever leaves him neither night nor day. Panna Borzobogati is taken, but being ill the prince can make no attack on her honor. These reports, with the account of Boguslav’s desperation, I got from the prisoners whom my Tartars touched up with fire, and who if they are touched again will repeat the truth. Now I commend my obedient services to you, serene great mighty hetman, begging for forgiveness if I have erred, the Tartars are good fellows, and seeing a world of plunder, serve marvellously.”
“Serene great mighty lord,” said Oskyerko, “now you surely regret less that Volodyovski is away, for he could not equal this devil incarnate. Oh, he is an ambitious piece; he even hurled the truth into the eyes of Prince Yanush, not caring whether it was pleasant or unpleasant for that hetman to hear it. This was his style with Hovanski, but Hovanski had fifteen times more troops.”
“If that is true, we need to advance at the greatest speed,” said Sapyeha.
“Before the prince can collect his wits.”
“Let us move on, by the dear God! Babinich will cut the dams, and we will overtake Boguslav!”
Meanwhile the prisoners, whom the Tartars had kept in a group in front of Sapyeha, seeing the hetman, fell to groaning and weeping, showing their misery and calling for mercy in various tongues; for there were among them Swedes, Germans, and the Scottish guards of Prince Boguslav. Sapyeha took them from the Tartars, and gave command to feed them and take their testimony without torture. Their statements confirmed the truth of Kmita’s words; therefore the rest of Sapyeha’s army advanced at great speed.
CHAPTER XXIV.
Kmita’s next report came from Sokolka, and was brief:
“The prince, to mislead our troops, has feigned a march toward Shchuchyn, whither he has sent a party. He has gone himself with his main force to Yanov, and has received there a reinforcement of infantry, led by Captain Kyritz, eight hundred good men. From the place where we are the prince’s fires are visible. In Yanov he intends to rest one week. The prisoners say that he is ready for battle. The fever is shaking him continually.”
On receipt of this statement Sapyeha, leaving the remainder of his cannon and wagons, moved on with cavalry to Sokolka; and at last the two armies stood eye to eye. It was foreseen too that a battle was unavoidable; for on one side they could flee no longer, the others pursuing. Meanwhile, like wrestlers who after a long chase are to seize each other by the bodies, they lay opposite each other, catching breath in their panting throats, and resting.
When the hetman saw Kmita he seized him by the shoulders, and said, —
“I was angry with you for not giving an account of yourself for so long, but I see that you have accomplished more than I could hope for; and if God gives victory, not mine but yours will be the merit. You went like an angel guardian after Boguslav.”
An ill-omened light gleamed in Kmita’s eyes. “If I am his angel guardian, I must be present at his death.”
“God will order that,” said the hetman, seriously; “but if you wish the Lord to bless you, then pursue the enemy of the country, not your own.”
Kmita bowed in silence; but it could not be learned whether the beautiful words of the hetman made any impression on him. His face expressed implacable hatred, and was the more threatening that the toil of pursuit after Boguslav had emaciated it still more. Formerly in that countenance was depicted only daring and insolent wildness; now it had become also stern and inexorable. You could easily see that he against whom that man had recorded vengeance in his soul ought to guard himself, even if he were Radzivill.
He had, in truth, avenged himself terribly. The services he had rendered in that campaign were immense. By pushing himself in front of Boguslav he had beaten him from the road, had made his reckoning false, had fixed in him the conviction that he was surrounded, and had forced him to retreat. Further he went before him night and day. He destroyed scouting-parties; he was without mercy for prisoners. In Syemyatiche, in Botski, in Orel and Byelsk he had fallen in the dark night on the whole camp.
In Voishki, not far from Zabludovo, in a purely Radzivill country, he had fallen like a blind hurricane on the quarters of the prince himself, so that Boguslav, who had just sat down to dinner, almost fell into his hands; and thanks to Sakovich alone, did he take out his head alive.
At Byalystok Kmita seized the carriages and camp-chests of Boguslav. He wearied, weakened, and inflicted hunger on Boguslav’s troops. The choice German infantry and Swedish cavalry which the prince had brought with him were like walking skeletons, from wandering, from surprises, from sleeplessness. The mad howling of the Tartars and Kmita’s volunteers was heard in front of them, at the flanks, and in the rear. Scarcely had a wearied soldier closed his eyes when he had to seize his weapons. The farther on, the worse the condition.
The small nobility inhabiting those neighborhoods joined with the Tartars, partly through hatred of the Radzivills of Birji, partly through fear of Kmita; for he punished beyond measure those who r
esisted. His forces increased therefore; those of Boguslav melted.
Besides, Boguslav himself was really ill; and though in the heart of that man care never had its nest long, and though the astrologers, whom he believed blindly, had foretold him in Prussia that his person would meet no harm in that expedition, his ambition suffered harshly more than once. He, whose name had been repeated with admiration in the Netherlands, on the Rhine, and in France, was beaten every day in those deep forests by an unseen enemy, and overcome without a battle.
There was, besides, in that pursuit such uncommon stubbornness and impetuosity passing the usual measure of war, that Boguslav with his native quickness divined after a few days that some inexorable personal enemy was following him. He learned the name Babinich easily, for the whole neighborhood repeated it; but that name was strange to him. Not less glad would he be to know the person; and on the road in times of pursuit he arranged tens and hundreds of ambushes, — always in vain. Babinich was able to avoid traps, and inflicted defeats where they were least expected.
At last both armies came to the neighborhood of Sokolka. Boguslav found there the reinforcement under Kyritz, who, not knowing hitherto where the prince was, went to Yanov, where the fate of Boguslav’s expedition was to be decided.
Kmita closed hermetically all the roads leading from Yanov to Sokolka, Korychyn, Kuznitsa, and Suhovola. The neighboring forests, willow woods, and thickets were occupied by the Tartars. Not a letter could pass; no wagon with provisions could be brought in. Boguslav himself was in a hurry for battle before his last biscuit in Yanov should be eaten.
But as a man of quick wit, trained in every intrigue, he determined to try negotiations first. He did not know yet that Sapyeha in this kind of intrigue surpassed him greatly in reasoning and quickness. From Sokolka then in Boguslav’s name came Pan Sakovich, under-chamberlain and starosta of Oshmiana, the attendant and personal friend of Prince Boguslav, with a letter and authority to conclude peace.
This Pan Sakovich was a wealthy man, who reached senatorial dignity later in life, for he became voevoda of Smolensk and treasurer of the Grand Principality; he was at that time one of the most noted cavaliers in Lithuania, famed equally for bravery and beauty. Pan Sakovich was of medium stature; the hair of his head and brows was black as a raven’s wing, but he had pale blue eyes which gazed with marvellous and unspeakable insolence, so that Boguslav said of him that he stunned with his eyes as with the back of an axe. He wore foreign garments which he brought from journeys made with Boguslav; he spoke nearly all languages; in battle he rushed into the greatest whirl so madly that among his enemies he was called “the doomed man.” But, thanks to his uncommon strength and presence of mind, he always came out unharmed. It was said that he had strength to stop a carriage in its course by seizing the hind wheel; he could drink beyond measure, could toss off a quart of cream in vodka, and be as sober as if he had taken nothing in his mouth. With men he was morose, haughty, offensive; in Boguslav’s hand he was as soft as wax. His manners were polished, and though in the king’s chambers he knew how to bear himself, he had a certain wildness in his spirit which burst forth at times like a flame.
Complete Works of Henryk Sienkiewicz Page 197