Old Zakhar went back to Kieff after a few days' rest, and then came
tidings that the commissioners had no great hopes of peace, or in fact
almost despaired of it. They were able to obtain merely an armistice
till the Russian Whitsuntide, in accordance with which a new commission
was to begin, with plenary powers. But the demands and conditions put
forth by Hmelnitski were so exorbitant that no one believed that the
Commonwealth could agree to them. Vigorous arming was commenced
therefore on both sides. Hmelnitski sent envoy after envoy to the Khan
to hasten at the head of all his forces; he sent also to Stamboul,
where Pan Bechinski, on behalf of the king, had resided for a
considerable time. In the Commonwealth writs for the national militia
were expected every moment. News came of the appointment of fresh
leaders,--the cup-bearer, Ostrorog, Lantskoronski, and Firlei,--and the
complete removal from military affairs of Yeremi Vishnyevetski, who was
able to shield the country only at the head of his own forces. Not
merely the soldiers of the prince, not merely the nobles of Russia, but
also the partisans of the former commanders were indignant at such a
selection and such disfavor, declaring justly that if there had been
political reasons for sacrificing Yeremi while there was hope of
concluding a treaty, his removal in presence of war was a great, an
unpardonable blunder; for he alone was able to meet Hmelnitski, and
conquer that famous leader of rebellion. Finally the prince himself
came to Zbaraj for the purpose of assembling as many forces as
possible, to stand in readiness on the borderland of the conflict.
An armistice had been concluded, but at every moment it proved of no
avail. Hmelnitski ordered, it is true, the execution of some colonels
stationed here and there in camps, who in spite of the armistice had
permitted themselves to attack castles, and squadrons encamped in
various places; but he was unable to restrain the masses of the people,
and the numerous independent bands, who either had not heard of the
armistice, or who knew not even the meaning of the word. They attacked
therefore continually the boundaries secured by the agreement, thus
breaking every engagement made by the hetman. On the other hand, the
troops of private persons and of the king in pursuing robbers
frequently passed the Pripet and the Goryn in the province of Kieff,
continued into the depth of the province of Bratslav, and there,
attacked by the Cossacks, fought regular battles, not infrequently
bloody and stubborn. Hence continual complaints from the Cossacks and
Poles of the violation of the armistice, which it was indeed beyond the
power of man to observe. The armistice existed therefore so far as
Hmelnitski on one side, and the king and hetmans on the other, had not
moved into the field; but the war was raging, in fact, before the main
forces had rushed to the combat, and the first warm rays of spring
shone again upon burning villages, towns, cities, and castles, giving
light to slaughter and human misfortune.
Parties from the neighborhood of Bar, Hmelnik, and Makhnovka appeared
around Zbaraj, slaying, robbing, burning. Yeremi dispersed these with
the hands of his colonels; but he took no part in this small warfare
himself, as he intended to move with his whole division when the
hetmans should be already in the field.
He sent out therefore detachments with orders to pay for blood with
blood, for robbery and murder with the stake. Podbipienta went with
others and gained a victory at Cherni Ostroff; but he was a knight
terrible only in battle,--to prisoners taken with arms in their hands
he was too indulgent; therefore he was not sent a second time. But in
expeditions of this kind Volodyovski distinguished himself; as a
partisan he had no rival save Vershul alone, for no one accomplished
such lightning marches. No one knew how to approach the enemy so
unexpectedly, break them up with such wild onset, scatter to the four
winds, and exterminate by hunting down, hanging, and slaughtering; soon
he was invested with terror and the favor of the prince. From the end
of March to the middle of April Volodyovski dispersed seven independent
parties, each one of which was three times stronger than his own; and
he did not grow weary in his work, but showed a continually increasing
eagerness, as if gaining it from the blood he was shedding.
The little knight, or rather the little devil, teased Zagloba to
accompany him in these expeditions, for he loved his company above all
things; but the worthy noble opposed every suggestion, and thus
explained his inactivity:--
"My stomach is too big, Pan Michael, for these struggles and
encounters; and besides, each man has his special power. To strike with
hussars in the thick of the enemy in the open day, break through a
camp, capture standards,--that's my forte, the Lord God created and
fitted me for that; but to hunt a rabble in the night through the
brush,--I leave that to you, who are as slender as a needle, and can
easily push through everywhere. I am a knight of ancient date, and I
prefer to tear through as the lion does, rather than creep along like a
bloodhound on trails. Besides, after the evening milking I must to bed,
for that is my best time."
Volodyovski therefore went alone, and alone conquered, till a certain
time when, going out toward the end of April, he returned in the middle
of May, as woe-begone and gloomy as if he had met a defeat and wasted
his men. Thus it appeared to all; but in that long and difficult
expedition Volodyovski had gone beyond Ostrog to the neighborhood of
Golovna, and had defeated there, not a common band made up of the
rabble, but several hundred Zaporojians, half of whom he killed and the
other half captured. The more astonishing, therefore, was the profound
gloom which as a fog covered his face, joyous by nature. But Pan
Volodyovski said not a word to any man; scarcely had he dismounted when
he went for a long conversation with the prince, taking two unknown
knights, and then, in company with them, went to Zagloba without
stopping, though those eager for news seized him by the sleeve along
the way.
Zagloba looked with a certain astonishment on the two gigantic
men, whom he had never seen before, and whose uniform, with gilt
shoulder-knots, showed that they served in the Lithuanian army.
Volodyovski said,--
"Shut the door, and give orders to admit no one, for we have to speak
on affairs of importance."
Zagloba gave the order to the servant; then he began to look unquietly
on the strangers, noting from their faces that they had nothing good to
tell.
"These are," said Volodyovski, pointing to the young man, "the Princes
Bulygi Kurtsevichi, Yuri and Andrei."
"The cousins of Helena!" cried Zagloba.
The princes bowed and said both at once: "Cousins of the deceased
Helena."
The ruddy face of Zagloba became pale blue in a moment. He began to
beat the air with his hands as if he had been struck with a bullet. He
opened his lips, unable to catch breath, rolled his eyes, and said or
rather groaned: "How?"
"There is news," answered Volodyovski, gloomily, "that the princess was
murdered in the monastery of Nikolai the Good."
"The mob suffocated with smoke in a cell twelve young ladies and some
nuns, among whom was our cousin," added Prince Yuri.
This time Zagloba's countenance, formerly blue, became so red that
those present were afraid of apoplexy. Slowly his lids dropped over his
eyes; he covered them with his hands, and from his mouth came a fresh
groan: "Oh, world! world! world!" Then he was silent.
But the princes and Volodyovski began to complain.
"Oh, good lady, we your friends and relatives gathered together,--we
who wished to go to save you," said the young knight, sighing time
after time; "but it is evident that we were late with our aid. Our
willingness was in vain, in vain our sabres and our courage; for you
are in another and better than this bad world, waiting upon the Queen
of Heaven."
"Oh, cousin," cried the gigantic Yuri, who in grief seized his hair
anew, "forgive us our faults, and for every drop of your blood we will
pour out three gallons."
"So help us God!" responded Andrei.
The two men stretched their hands to heaven. Zagloba rose from his
seat, advanced a few steps toward the bed, tottered like one drunk, and
fell on his knees before the image.
After a moment the bells in the castle sounded for midday,--sounded as
gloomily as if they were death-bells.
"She is no more!" said Volodyovski again. "The angels have taken her to
heaven, leaving us tears and sighs."
Sobbing shook the heavy body of Zagloba, and it trembled; but they
complained without ceasing, and the bells were tolling.
At last Zagloba calmed himself; they had thought indeed that perhaps
wearied by pain he had fallen asleep on his knees. After a time,
however, he rose, stood up, sat on the bed; but he had become as it
were another man. His eyes were red, bloodshot; his head drooping; his
lower lip hung upon his beard; imbecility had settled on his face, and
a certain unexampled decrepitude, so that it might in truth appear that
the former Zagloba, lively, jovial, full of fancy, had died, and there
remained only an old man weighted and wearied with years.
Meanwhile, in spite of the protests of the servant at the door,
Podbipienta entered; and again began complaints and regrets. The
Lithuanian called to mind Rozlogi, and the first meeting with the
princess,--her sweetness, youth, beauty. At length he remembered that
there was some one more unhappy than any of them,--her betrothed, Pan
Skshetuski,--and he began to ask the little knight about him.
"Skshetuski is with Prince Koretski, at Korets, to which place he came
from Kieff; and he lies there in illness, unconscious of God's world,"
said Volodyovski.
"Should not we go to him?" asked the Lithuanian.
"There is no reason to go," replied Volodyovski. "The prince's
physician answers for his health. Pan Sukhodolski--one of Prince
Dominik's colonels, but a great friend of Skshetuski--is there, and our
old Zatsvilikhovski; they both have him in care and watchfulness. He
lacks for nothing, and that delirium does not leave him is the better
for him."
"Oh, God of power!" said the Lithuanian, "have you seen Skshetuski with
your own eyes?"
"I saw him; but if they had not told me that that was he, I should not
have known him, pain and sickness have so devoured him."
"Did he recognize you?"
"He knew me undoubtedly, though he said nothing, for he smiled and
nodded his head. Such pity possessed me that I could stay no longer.
Prince Koretski wishes to come here with his squadron. Zatsvilikhovski
will come with him, and Pan Sukhodolski swears that he will come too,
even if he has an order to the contrary from Prince Dominik. They will
bring Pan Yan unless disease gets the better of him."
"And whence have you tidings of the princess's death?" asked Pan
Longin. "Have these young men brought it?" added he, pointing to the
princes.
"No. These knights learned all by chance in Korets, where they had come
with messages from the voevoda of Vilna, and came here with me, for
they had letters from the voevoda to our prince. War is certain, and
nothing will come of the commission."
"We know that already ourselves, but tell us who informed you of the
death of the princess?"
"Zatsvilikhovski told me, and he knows it from Skshetuski. Hmelnitski
gave Skshetuski permission to search for her in Kieff, and the
metropolitan himself had to assist. They searched mainly in the
monasteries, for those of our people who remained in Kieff are secreted
in them. And they thought surely that Bogun had placed the princess in
some monastery. They sought and sought and were of good heart, though
they knew that the mob had suffocated twelve young ladies with smoke at
Nikolai the Good. The metropolitan contended that they would not have
attacked the betrothed of Bogun, but it has turned out otherwise."
"Then she was at the convent of Nikolai the Good?"
"She was. Skshetuski met Pan Yoakhim Yerlich, who was hiding in a
monastery; and as he had asked every one about the princess, he asked
him too. Pan Yerlich said that there were certain young ladies whom the
Cossacks had taken, but at Nikolai the Good twelve remained, whom
afterward they suffocated with smoke,--among them Kurtsevichovna.
Skshetuski, since Yerlich is a hypochondriac and only half-witted from
continual terror, did not believe him, and hurried off immediately a
second time to Nikolai the Good to inquire. Unfortunately the nuns,
three of whom were suffocated in the same cell, did not know the names,
but hearing the description which Skshetuski gave, they said that she
was the one. Then Skshetuski went away from Kieff and straightway fell
ill."
"The only wonder is that he is still alive."
"He would have died undoubtedly but for that old Cossack who nursed him
during captivity in the Saitch, and then came here with letters from
him, and when he had returned, helped him again in his search. He took
him to Korets and gave him into the hands of Zatsvilikhovski."
"May God protect him, for he has never yet consoled him!" said
Podbipienta.
Volodyovski ceased, and a silence of the grave reigned over all. The
princes resting upon their elbows sat motionless with frowning brows;
Podbipienta raised his eyes to heaven, and Zagloba fixed his glassy
gaze on the opposite wall as if sunk in the deepest thought.
"Rouse yourself!" said Volodyovski, shaking him by the shoulder. "Of
what are you thinking so? You will not think out anything, and all your
stratagems will be useless."
"I know that," answered Zagloba, with a broken voice. "I am thinking
that I am old, that I have nothing to do in this world."