Pan Michael

"Oh, but poor Michael will be in despair! Ei, ei!"

Then she implored him, saying that it was not her fault.

"Michael," said she, putting her arms around his neck, mentally, "I did all in my power; but, my dear, it was difficult. The Lord G.o.d did not will it."

And that moment such a heartfelt love for Michael possessed her, such a wish even to die near that dear head, that, summoning every force she had, she rose from the bank and walked on.

At first it was immensely difficult. Her feet had become unaccustomed to walking during the long ride; she felt as if she were going on stilts. Happily she was not cold; she was even warm enough, for the fever had not left her for a moment.

Sinking in the forest, she went forward persistently, remembering to keep the sun on her left hand. It had gone, in fact, to the Moldavian side; for it was the second half of the day,--perhaps four o'clock.

Basia cared less now for approaching the Dniester, for it seemed to her always that she was beyond Mohiloff.

"If only I were sure of that; if I knew it!" repeated she, raising her blue, and at the same time inflamed, face to the sky. "If some beast or some tree would speak and say, 'It is a mile to Hreptyoff, two miles,'--I might go there perhaps."

But the trees were silent; nay more, they seemed to her unfriendly, and obstructed the road with their roots. Basia stumbled frequently against the knots and curls of those roots covered with snow. After a time she was burdened unendurably; she threw the warm mantle from her shoulders and remained in her single coat. Relieving herself in this way, she walked and walked still more hurriedly,--now stumbling, now falling at times in deeper snow. Her fur-lined morocco boots without soles, excellent for riding in a sleigh or on horseback, did not protect her feet well against clumps or stones; besides, soaked through repeatedly at crossings, and kept damp by the warmth of her feet now inflamed from fever, these boots were torn easily in the forest.

"I will go barefoot to Hreptyoff or to death!" thought Basia.

And a sad smile lighted her face, for she found comfort in this, that she went so enduringly; and that if she should be frozen on the road, Michael would have nothing to cast at her memory.

Therefore she talked now continually with her husband, and said once,--

"Ai, Michael dear! another would not have done so much; for example, Eva."

Of Eva she had thought more than once in that time of flight; more than once had she prayed for Eva. It was clear to her now, seeing that Azya did not love the girl, that her fate, and the fate of all the other prisoners left in Rashkoff, would be dreadful.

"It is worse for them than for me," repeated she, from moment to moment, and that thought gave fresh strength to her.

But when one, two, and three hours had pa.s.sed, this strength decreased at every step. Gradually the sun sank behind the Dniester, and flooding the sky with a ruddy twilight, was quenched; the snow took on a violet reflection. Then that gold and purple abyss of twilight began to grow dark, and became narrower every moment, from a sea covering half the heavens it was changed to a lake, from a lake to a river, from

Night came.

An hour pa.s.sed. The pine-wood became black and mysterious; but, unmoved by any breath, it was as silent as if it had collected itself, and were meditating what to do with that poor, wandering creature. But there was nothing good in that torpor and silence; nay, there was insensibility and callousness.

Basia went on continually, catching the air more quickly with her parched lips; she fell, too, more frequently, because of darkness and her lack of strength.

She had her head turned upward; but not to look for the directing Great Bear, for she had lost altogether the sense of position. She went so as to go; she went because very clear and sweet visions before death had begun to fly over her.

For example, the four sides of the wood begin to run together quickly, to join and form a room,--the room at Hreptyoff. Basia is in it; she sees everything clearly. In the chimney a great fire is burning, and on the benches officers are sitting as usual: Pan Zagloba is chaffing Pan Snitko; Pan Motovidlo is sitting in silence looking into the flames, and when something hisses in the fire he says, in his drawling voice, "Oh, soul in purgatory, what needst thou?" Pan Mushalski and Pan Hromyka are playing dice with Michael. Basia comes up to them and says: "Michael, I will sit on the bench and nestle up to you a little, for I am not myself." Michael puts his arm around her. "What is the matter, kitten? But maybe--" And he inclines to her ear and whispers something.

But she answers, "Ai, how I am not myself!" What a bright and peaceful room that is, and how beloved is that Michael! But somehow Basia is not herself, so that she is alarmed.

Basia is not herself to such a degree that the fever has left her suddenly, for the weakness before death has overcome it. The visions disappear; presence of mind returns, and with it memory.

"I am fleeing before Azya," said Basia to herself; "I am in the forest at night. I cannot go to Hreptyoff. I am dying."

After the fever, cold seizes her quickly, and goes through her body to the bones. The legs bend under her, and she kneels at last on the snow before a tree.

Not the least cloud darkens her mind now. She is terribly sorry to lose life, but she knows perfectly that she is dying; and wis.h.i.+ng to commend her soul to G.o.d, she begins to say, in a broken voice,--

"In the name of the Father and the Son--"

Suddenly certain strange, sharp, shrill, squeaking voices interrupt further prayer; they are disagreeable and piercing in the stillness of the night.

Basia opens her mouth. The question, "What is that?" is dying on her lips. For a moment she places her trembling fingers to her face, as if not wis.h.i.+ng to lend belief, and from her mouth a sudden cry is wrested,--

"O Jesus, O Jesus! Those are the well-sweeps; that is Hreptyoff! O Jesus!"

Then that being who was dying a little before springs up, and panting, trembling, with eyes full of tears, and with swelling bosom runs through the forest, falls, rises again, repeating,--

"They are watering the horses! That is Hreptyoff! Those are our well-sweeps! Even to the gate, even to the gate! O Jesus!

Hreptyoff--Hreptyoff!"

But here the forest grows thin, the snow-fields open, and with them the slope, from which a number of glittering eyes are looking on the running Basia.

But those were not wolves' eyes,--ah, those were Hreptyoff windows looking with sweet, bright, and saving light! That is the "fortalice"

there on the eminence, just that eastern side turned to the forest!

There was still a distance to go, but Basia did not know when she pa.s.sed it. The soldiers standing at the gate on the village side did not know her in the darkness; but they admitted her, thinking her a boy sent on some message, and returning to the commandant. She rushed in with her last breath, ran across the square near the wells where the dragoons, returning just before from a reconnoissance, had watered their horses for the night, and stood at the door of the main building.

The little knight and Zagloba were sitting just then astride a bench before the fire, and drinking krupnik.[27] They were talking of Basia, thinking that she was down there somewhere, managing in Rashkoff. Both were sad, for it was terribly dreary without her, and every day they were discussing about her return.

"G.o.d ward off sudden thaws and rains. Should they come. He alone knows when she would return," said Zagloba, gloomily.

"The winter will hold out yet," said the little knight; "and in eight or ten days I shall be looking toward Mohiloff for her every hour."

"I wish she had not gone. There is nothing for me here without her in Hreptyoff."

"But why did you advise the journey?"

"Don't invent, Michael! That took place with your head."

"If only she comes back in health."

Here the little knight sighed, and added,--

"In health, and as soon as possible."

With that the door squeaked, and a small, pitiful, torn creature, covered with snow, began to pipe plaintively at the threshold:--

"Michael, Michael!"

The little knight sprang up, but he was so astonished at the first moment that he stopped where he stood, as if turned to stone; he opened his arms, began to blink, and stood still.

"Michael!--Azya betrayed--he wanted to carry me away; but I fled, and--save--rescue!"

When she had said this, she tottered and fell as if dead, on the floor; Pan Michael sprang forward, raised her in his arms as if she had been a feather, and cried shrilly,--

"Merciful Christ!"