“What regiment do you prefer?”
“The hussars,” said she, looking at his shoulders.
“Because of the wings?”
“Yes. Once I saw hussars and thought them a heavenly army. I dreamt of them afterward two nights in succession.”
“I know not whether I shall dream when a hussar, but I know that I shall dream of you earlier, and of wings also.”
“Why is that?”
“I should dream of a real angel.”
Panna Anulka dropped her eyes till a shade fell on her rosy cheeks from her eyelids.
“Be a hussar,” said she, after an interval.
Yatsek gritted his teeth, drew his palm over his moistened forehead, and during the supper he did not get word or look from the lady. Only when they had risen from the table did a sweet, beloved voice sound at his ear.
“But will you go to this war with the others?”
“To die! to die!” answered Yatsek.
And in that answer there was such a genuine, true groan of anguish that the voice was heard again, as if in sympathy, —
“Why sadden us?”
“No one will weep for me.”
“How know you that?” said the voice now a third time.
Then she slipped away to the other guests as swiftly as a dream vision, and bloomed, like a rose, at the other end of the drawing-room.
Meanwhile, the two elder men sat after the meal over goblets of mead, and when they had discussed public questions sufficiently they began to chat about private ones. Pan Grothus followed Panna Anulka with tender eyes for a time, and then said to Pan Gideon, —
“That is a brilliant spot over there. Just look at those young people who are flying like moths round a candle. But that is no wonder, for were we not in years we too should be flying.”
Pan Gideon waved his hand in displeasure.
“Swarms they are, — rustics, homespuns, nothing better.”
“How so? Tachevski is not a homespun.”
“No, but he is poor. The Bukoyemskis are not homespuns; they even declare that they are kinsmen of Saint Peter, which may help them in heaven, but on earth they are nothing but foresters in the king’s wilderness.”
Pan Grothus wondered at the relationship of the Bukoyemskis no less than had Pan Gideon when he heard of it the first time, so he fell to inquiring in detail, till at last he laughed heartily, and added, —
“Saint Peter was a great apostle, and I have no wish to detract from his honor; all the more, since feeling old, I shall soon need his influence. But between you and me, there is not much in this kinship to boast of — no, he was merely a fisherman. If you speak of Joseph, who came from King David, — well, you may talk to me.”
“I say only that there is no one here fit for the girl, either among those whom you see now under my roof, or in the whole neighborhood.”
“But he who is sitting near Pani Vinnitski seems a nice gentleman.”
“Tsyprianovitch? Yes, he is; but Armenian by origin and of a family noble only three generations.”
“Then why invite them? Cupid is traitorous, and before there is time to turn once the pudding may be cooked for you.”
Pan Gideon, who, in presenting the young men had stated how much he owed them, explained now in detail about the wolves and the assistance, because of which he was forced to invite the young rescuers to his mansion through gratitude simply.
“True, true,” said Pan Grothus, “but in his own way Amor may cook the pudding before you have noticed it. This girl’s blood is not water.”
“Ai! she is a slippery weasel,” said Pan Gideon. “She can and will bite, but she will twist out besides from between a man’s fingers, and no common person could catch her. Great blood has this inborn quality that it yields not, but rules and regulates. I am not of those who are led by the nose very easily, still, I yield to her often. It is true, that I owe much to the Sieninskis, but even if I did not there would be only slight difference. When she stands before me and puts a tress from one shoulder to the other, inclines her head to me, and glances, she gets what she wishes most frequently. And more than once do I think, what a blessing of God, what an honor, that the last child, the last heiress of such a famed family, is under my roof tree. Of course you know of the Sieninskis — once all Podolia was theirs. In truth, the Sobieskis, the Daniloviches, the Jolkevskis grew great through them. It is the duty of His Grace the King to remember this, all the more since now almost nothing remains of those great possessions; and the girl, if she has any property, will have only that which remains after me to her.”
“But what will your relatives say in this matter?”
“There are only distant Pangovskis, who will not prove kinship. But often my peace is destroyed by the thought that after me may come quarrels, with lawsuits and wrangling, as is common in this country. The relatives of my late wife are for me the great question. From my wife comes a part of my property, namely: the lands with this mansion.”
“I shall not appear with a lawsuit,” said Pan Grothus, “but I would not guarantee as to others.”
“That is it! That is it! I have been thinking of late to visit Warsaw and beg the king to be a guardian to this orphan, but his head is full now of other questions.”
“If you had a son it would be a simple matter to give the girl to him.”
Pan Gideon gazed at the starosta with a look so full of pain that the other stopped speaking. Both men were silent for a long time, till Pan Gideon said with emotion, —
“To you I might say, my lord brother, with Virgil, infandum jubes renovare dolorem (thou commandest me to call up unspeakable sorrow). That marriage would be simple — and I will tell you that had it not been for this simple method I should have died long ago perhaps. My son while in childhood was stolen by the Tartars. People have returned more than once from captivity among pagans when the memory of them had perished. Whole years have I looked for a miracle — whole years have I lived in the hope of it. To-day even, when I drink something I think to myself we, perhaps now! God is greater than human imagining. But those moments of hope are very shortlived, while the pain is enduring and daily. No! Why deceive myself? My blood will not be mingled with that of the Sieninskis, and, if relatives rend what I have into fragments, this last child of the family to which I owe everything, will be without bread to nourish her.”
Both drank in silence again. Pan Grothus was thinking how to milden the pain which he had roused in Pan Gideon unwittingly, and how to console the man in suffering. At last an idea occurred to him which he considered very happy. “Ai!” exclaimed he, “there is a way to do everything, and you, my lord brother, can secure bread for the girl without trouble.”
“How?” asked Pan Gideon, with a certain disquiet.
“Does it not happen often that old men take as wives even girls not full grown yet? An example in history is Konietspolski the grand hetman, who married a green girl, though he was older than you are. It is true also, that, having taken too many youth-giving medicines, he died the first night after marriage, but neither Pan Makovski, pocillator of Radom, nor Pan Rudnitski lost their lives, though both had passed seventy. Besides, you are sturdy. Should the Lord again bless you, well, so much the better; if not, you would leave in sufficiency and quiet the young widow, who might choose then the husband that pleased her.”
Whether such an idea had ever come to Pan Gideon we may not determine; it suffices, that, after these words of Pan Grothus, he was greatly confused, and, with a hand trembling somewhat, poured mead to the starosta till it flowed over the goblet, and the generous liquor dropped down to the floor after passing the table.
“Let us drink to the success of Christian arms!” said he.
“That in its time,” said Pan Grothus, following the course of his own thoughts still further; “and dwell in your own way on what I have said to you, for I have struck, as I think, the true point of the question.”
“But why? What reason is there? Drink some more—�
��
Further words were interrupted by the movement of chairs at the larger table. Pani Vinnitski and Panna Anulka wished to retire to their chamber. The voice of the young lady, as resonant as a bell made of silver, repeated: “Good-night, good-night;” then she courtesied prettily to Pan Grothus, kissed the hand of Pan Gideon, touched his shoulder with her nose and her forehead cat fashion, and vanished. Pan Stanislav, the Bukoyemskis, and Yatsek went out soon after the ladies. The two older men only remained in the dining-room and conversed long in it, for Pan Gideon commanded to bring still better mead in another decanter.
CHAPTER II
Whether by chance or a trick of the young lady is unknown to us; it suffices, however, that the four Bukoyemskis received a large chamber in an outbuilding, and Pan Stanislav with Yatsek a smaller one near it. This confused the two men no little, and then, so as not to speak to each other, they began straightway the litany and continued it longer than was usual. But when they had finished there followed a silence which annoyed both of them, for though their feelings toward each other were unfriendly, they felt that they might not betray them, and that they should for a time, and especially at the house of Pan Gideon, show politeness.
Yatsek ungirded his sabre, drew it out of the scabbard, looked at the edge by the light of the chimney, and fell to rubbing the blade with his handkerchief.
“After frost,” said he half to himself, half to Stanislav, “a sabre sweats in a warm chamber, and rust appears on it straightway.”
“And last night it must have frozen solidly,” said Stanislav.
He spoke without evil intention, and only because it occurred to him that Tachevski had been in a splitting frost all the night previous; but Yatsek placed the point of his blade on the floor, and looked quickly into the eyes of the other man.
“Are you referring to this, — that I sat on a pine tree?”
“Yes,” replied Stanislav, with simplicity; “of course there was no stove there.”
“But what would you have done in my position?”
Stanislav wished to answer “the same that you did,” but the question was put to him sharply, so he answered, —
“Why break my head over that, since I was not in it?”
Anger flashed for an instant on the face of Pan Yatsek, but to restrain himself he began to blow on the sabre and rub the blade with still greater industry. At last he returned it to the scabbard, and added, —
“God sends adventures and accidents.”
And his eyes, which one moment earlier had been gleaming, were covered again with the usual sadness, for just then he remembered his one friend, the horse, which those wolves had torn to pieces.
Meanwhile the door opened and the four Bukoyemskis walked into the chamber.
“The frost has weakened, and the snow sends up steam,” said Mateush.
“There will be fog,” added Yan.
And then they took note of Yatsek, whom they had not seen the first moment.
“Oh art thou in such company?” asked Lukash, as he turned to Stanislav.
All four brothers put their hands on their hips and cast challenging glances at Yatsek.
Yatsek seized a chair and, pushing it to the middle of the chamber, turned to the Bukoyemskis with a sudden movement; then he sat astride of the chair, as on horseback, rested his elbows on the back of it, raised his head, and answered with equally challenging glances. Thus were they opposed then; he, with feet stretching widely apart in his Swedish boots, they, shoulder to shoulder, quarrelsome, threatening, enormous.
Stanislav saw that it was coming to a quarrel, but he wished to laugh at the same time. Thinking that he could hinder a collision at any instant he let them gaze at one another.
“Eh, what a bold fellow,” thought he of Yatsek, “nothing confuses him.”
The silence continued, at once unendurable and ridiculous. Yatsek himself felt this, also, for he was the first man to break it.
“Sit down, young sirs,” said he, “not only do I invite, but I beg you.”
The Bukoyemskis looked at one another with astonishment, this new turn confused them.
“How is this? What is it? Of what is he thinking?”
“I beg you, I beg you,” repeated Yatsek, and he pointed to benches.
“We stay as we are, for it pleases us, dost understand?”
“Too much ceremony.”
“What ceremony?” cried Lukash. “Dost thou claim to be a senator, or a bishop, thou — thou Pompeius!”
Yatsek did not move from the chair, but his back began to quiver as if from sudden laughter.
“But why call me Pompeius?” inquired he.
“Because the name fits thee.”
“But it may be because thou art a fool,” replied Yatsek.
“Strike, whoso believes in God!” shouted Yan.
Evidently Yatsek had had talk enough also, for something seemed to snatch him from the chair on a sudden, and he sprang like a cat toward the brothers.
“Listen, ye road-blockers,” said he with a voice cold as steel, “what do ye want of me?”
“Blood!” cried Mateush.
“Thou wilt not squirm away from us this time!” shouted Marek. “Come out at once,” said he, grasping toward his side for a sabre.
But Stanislav pushed in quickly between them.
“I will not permit,” cried he. “This is another man’s dwelling.”
“True,” added Yatsek, “this is another man’s dwelling, and I will not injure Pan Gideon. I will not cut you up under his roof, but I will find you to-morrow.”
“We will find thee to-morrow!” roared Mateush.
“Ye have sought conflicts and raised pretexts all day, why, I cannot tell, for I have not known you, nor have ye known me, but ye must answer for this, and because ye have insulted me I would meet not four men but ten like you.”
“Oho! oho! One will suffice thee. It is clear,” cried out Yan, “that thou hast not heard of the Bukoyemskis.”
“I have spoken of four,” said Yatsek, turning on a sudden to Stanislav, “but perhaps you will join with these cavaliers?”
Stanislav bowed politely.
“Since you make the inquiry—”
“But we first, and according to seniority,” said the Bukoyemskis. “We will not withdraw from that. We have settled it, and will cut down any man who interferes with us.”
Yatsek looked quickly at the brothers, and in one moment divined, as he thought, the arrangement, and he paled somewhat.
“So that is it!” said he again to Stanislav; “thou hast hirelings, and art standing behind them. By my faith the method seems certain, and very safe, but whether it is noble and knightly is another point. In what a company do I find myself?”
On hearing this opinion which disgraced him, Stanislav, though he had a mild spirit by nature, felt the blood rush to his visage. The veins swelled on his forehead, lightning flashed from his eyes, his teeth were gritting terribly, and he grasped the hilt of his sabre.
“Come out! Come out this instant!” cried he in a voice choked with anger.
Sabres flashed; it was bright in the chamber, for light fell on the steel blades from a torch in the chimney. But three of the Bukoyemskis sprang between the opponents and stood in a line there, the fourth caught Stanislav by the shoulders.
“By the dear God, restrain thyself, Stashko! We are ahead of thee!”
“We are ahead of thee!” cried the three others.
“Unhand me!” screamed Stanislav, hoarsely.
“We are ahead!”
“Unhand me!”
“Hold Stashko, ye, and I will settle with this man while ye are holding him,” shouted Mateush; and seizing Yatsek he dragged him aside to begin at him straightway, but Yatsek with presence of mind pulled himself free of Mateush, and sheathed his sword, saying, —
“I choose the man who is to fight first and the time. So I tell you to-morrow, and in Vyrambki, not here.”
“Oh thou wilt not sneak away
from us! Now! now!”
But Yatsek crossed his arms on his breast. “Ha, if ye wish without fighting to kill me under the roof of our host, let me know it.”
At this rage seized the brothers; they stamped the floor with their boot-heels, pulled their mustaches, and panted like wild bears. But since they feared infamy no man of them had the daring to rush at Tachevski.
“To-morrow, I tell you! Say to Pan Gideon that ye are going to visit me, and inquire for the road to Vyrambki. Beyond the brook stands a crucifix since the time of the pestilence. There I will wait for you at midday to-morrow, and there, with God’s help I will finish you!”
He uttered the last words as if with sorrow, then he opened the door and walked out of the chamber. In the yard the dogs ran around Yatsek, and knowing him well, fondled up to him. He turned without thinking toward the posts near the windows, as if looking for his horse there; then, remembering that that horse was no longer alive, he sighed, and, feeling the cool breath of air, repeated in spirit, —
“The wind is blowing always in the eyes of the poor man. I will walk home.”
Meanwhile, Stanislav was wringing his hands from fierce pain and anger, while saying to the Bukoyemskis, with terrible bitterness, —
“Who asked you to do this? My worst enemy could not have hurt me more than have you with your service.”
They pitied him immensely, and fell to embracing him, one after the other.
“Stashko,” said Mateush. “They sent us a decanter for the night; give thyself comfort for God’s sake.”
CHAPTER III
The world was still gray when Father Voynovski was clattering along through deep snow with a lantern to the doves, partridges, and rabbits which he kept in his granary in a special enclosure. A tame fox with bells on her neck followed his footsteps; at his side went a Spitz dog and a porcupine. Winter sleep did not deaden the latter in the warm room of the priest’s house. The beasts and their master, when they had crossed the yard slowly, stopped under the out-jutting straw eaves of the granary, from which long icicles were hanging. The lantern swayed, the key was heard in the lock, the bolt whined, the door squeaked louder than the key, and the old man went in with his animals. After a while he took his seat on a block, placed his lantern on a second block, and put between his knees a linen bag holding grain and also cabbage leaves. He began then to yawn aloud and to empty the bag on the floor there in front of him.
Complete Works of Henryk Sienkiewicz Page 556