With Fire and Sword - Henryk Sienkiewicz (ink book reader .TXT) 📗

last adventure I would follow him anywhere, for he is not a friend to leave one in distress. He is a wasp! In one minute he stung three! If at least I had that wineskin with me! But those devils have surely taken it, or the horses have trampled it. Besides insects are devouring me in this ditch! What’s that?”

The shouts and discharges of musketry began to recede in the direction of the field and the first forest.

“Ah, ah!” thought Zagloba, “they are on their necks. Oh, dog-brothers, you could not hold out! Praise be to God in the highest!”

The shouts receded farther and farther.

“They ride lustily,” muttered he. “But I see that I shall have to sit in this ditch. It only remains now for the wolves to eat me. Bogun to begin with, then the Tartars, and wolves at the end! God grant a stake to Bogun and madness to the wolves! Our men will take care of the Tartars not in the worst fashion. Pan Michael! Pan Michael!”

Silence gave answer to Zagloba; only the pines murmured, and from afar came the sounds fainter and fainter.

“Shall I lie down to sleep here, or what? May the devil take it! Pan Michael!”

But Zagloba’s patience had a long trial yet, for dawn was in the sky when the clatter of hoofs was heard again on the road and lights shone in the forest.

“Pan Michael, I am here!”

“Crawl out.”

“But I cannot.”

Volodyovski with a torch in his hand stood over the hole, and giving his hand to Zagloba, said: “Well, the Tartars are gone; we drove them to the other forest.”

“But who came up?”

“Kushel and Roztvorovski, with two thousand horse. My dragoons are with them too.”

“Were there many of the Pagans?”

“A couple of thousand.”

“Praise be to God! Give me something to drink, for I am faint.”

Two hours later Zagloba, having eaten and drunk what he needed; was sitting on a comfortable saddle in the midst of Volodyovski’s dragoons, and at his side rode the little knight, who said⁠—

“Do not worry; for though we shall not come to Zbaraj in company with the princess, it would have been worse if she had fallen into the hands of the heathen.”

“But perhaps Jendzian will come back yet to Zbaraj.”

“He will not. The highway will be occupied; the party which we drove back will return soon and follow us. Besides Burlai may appear at any moment before Jendzian could come in. Hmelnitski and the Khan are marching on the other side from Konstantinoff.”

“Oh, for God’s sake! Then he will fall into a trap with the princess.”

“Jendzian has wit enough to spring through between Zbaraj and Konstantinoff in time, and not let the regiments of Hmelnitski nor the parties of the Khan catch him. You see I have great confidence in his success.”

“God grant it!”

“He is a cunning lad, just like a fox. You have no lack of stratagem, but he is more cunning. We split our heads a great deal over plans to rescue the girl, but in the end our hands dropped, and through him the whole has been directed. He’ll slip out this time like a snake, for it is a question of his own life. Have confidence⁠—for God, who saved her so many times, is over her now; and remember that in Zbaraj you bade me have confidence when Zakhar came.”

Zagloba was strengthened somewhat by these words of Pan Michael, and then fell into deep thought.

“Pan Michael,” he said after a time, “have you asked Kushel what Skshetuski is doing?”

“He is in Zbaraj, and well; he came from Prince Koretski’s with Zatsvilikhovski.”

“But what shall we tell him?”

“Ah, there is the rub!”

“Does he think yet that the girl was killed in Kiev?”

“He does.”

“Have you told Kushel or anyone else where we are coming from?”

“I have not, for I thought it better to take counsel first.”

“I should prefer to say nothing of the whole affair. If the girl should fall again into Cossack or Tartar hands (which God forbid!), it would be a new torture, just as if someone were to tear open all his wounds.”

“I’ll give my head that Jendzian takes her through.”

“I should gladly give my own to have him do so; but misfortune rages now in the world like a pestilence. Better be silent, and leave everything to the will of God.”

“So let it be. But will not Podbipienta give the secret to Skshetuski?”

“Don’t you know him? He gave his word of honor, which for that Lithuanian is sacred.”

Here Kushel joined them. They rode on together, talking, by the first rays of the rising sun, of public affairs, of the arrival at Zbaraj of the commanders in consequence of Yeremi’s wishes, of the impending arrival of the prince himself, and the inevitable and awful struggle with the whole power of Hmelnitski.

LVII

Volodyovski and Zagloba found all the forces of the Crown assembled at Zbaraj, and waiting for the enemy. The cupbearer of the Crown, Ostrorog, who had come from Konstantinoff, was there, and Lantskoronski, castellan of Kamenyets, who had gained the first victory at Bar; the third commander, Pan Firlei of Dombrovitsa, castellan of Belsk, and Andrei Serakovski, secretary of the Crown; Konyetspolski, the standard-bearer, and Pshiyemski, commander of the artillery, a warrior specially expert in the capture and defence of towns; and with them ten thousand troops, not counting a number of Prince Yeremi’s squadrons previously quartered at Zbaraj.

Pan Pshiyemski, on the southern side of the town and the castle and the two ponds, had laid out a strong camp, which he fortified in foreign fashion, and which it was only possible to capture in front; for at the rear and two sides it was defended by the ponds, the castle, and the river. In this camp the commanders intended to offer resistance to Hmelnitski, and delay his avalanche till the king, with the rest of the forces and the national militia of all the nobility, should come. But was that plan possible of execution in