Halim thrust his head down between his shoulders, and on his beast-like face an ominous smile appeared. “Allah! And that to the Little Falcon?”
“That to him first.”
“And then to the Sultan’s dominions?”
“To the Sultan’s dominions—with her.”
XXXII
A fierce winter covered the forests with heavy snow-clusters and icicles, and filled ravines to their edges with drifts, so that the whole land seemed a single white plain. Great, sudden storms came, in which men and herds were lost under the pall of snow; roads grew misleading and perilous: still, Pan Bogush hastened with all his power to Yavorov to communicate Azya’s great plans to the hetman as quickly as possible. A noble of the border, reared in continual danger of Cossacks and Tartars, penetrated with the thought of perils which threatened the country from insurrections, from raids, from the whole power of the Turks, he saw in those plans almost the salvation of the country; he believed sacredly that the hetman, held in homage by him, and by all men of the frontier, would not hesitate a moment when it was a question of the power of the Commonwealth: hence he rode forward with joy in his heart, in spite of snowdrifts, wrong roads, and tempests.
He dropped in at last on a Sunday, together with snow, at Yavorov, and having the good fortune to find Pan Sobieski at home, announced himself straightway, though attendants informed him that the hetman, busied night and day with expeditions and the writing of despatches, had barely time to take food. But beyond expectation, the hetman gave command to call him at once. Therefore, after he had waited only a short time, the old soldier bowed to the knees of his leader.
He found Pan Sobieski changed greatly, and with a face full of care; for those were well-nigh the most grievous years of his life. His name had not thundered yet through every corner of Christendom; but the fame of a great leader and a terrible crusher of the Mussulman encircled him already in the Commonwealth. Owing to that fame, the grand baton was confided to him in time, and the defence of the eastern boundary; but with the dignity of hetman they had given him neither money nor men. Still, victory had followed his steps hitherto as faithfully as his shadow follows a man. With a handful of troops he had won victory at Podhaytse; with a handful of troops he had passed like a flame through the length and the breadth of the Ukraine, rubbing into dust chambuls of many thousands, capturing insurgent cities, spreading dread and terror of the Polish name. But now there hung over the Commonwealth a war with the most terrible of the powers of that period, for it was a war with the whole Mussulman world. It was no longer a secret for Sobieski that since Doroshenko had given up the Ukraine and the Cossacks to the Sultan, the latter had promised to move Turkey, Asia Minor, Arabia, and Egypt as far as the interior of Africa, to proclaim a sacred war, and go in his own person to demand the new “pashalik”22 from the Commonwealth. Destruction, like a bird of prey, was floating over all Southern Russia, and meanwhile there was disorder in the Commonwealth; the nobles were uproarious in defence of their incompetent king, and, assembled in armed camps, were ready for civil war, if for any. The country, exhausted by recent conflicts and military confederations, had become impoverished; envy was storming in it; mutual distrust was rankling in men’s hearts.
No one wished to believe that war with the Mussulman power was imminent; and they condemned the great leader for spreading news about it purposely to turn men’s minds from home questions. He was condemned greatly for this also—that he was ready himself to call in the Turks, if only to secure victory to his adherents. They made him simply a traitor; and had it not been for the army, they would not have hesitated to impeach him.
In view of the approaching war, to which thousands of legions of wild people would march from the East, he was without an army—he had merely a handful, so small that the Sultan’s court counted more servants; he was without money, without means of repairing the ruined fortresses, without hope of victory, without possibility of defence, without the conviction that his death, as formerly the death of Jolkyevski, would rouse the torpid country and give birth to an avenger. That was the reason that care had settled on his forehead; and the lordly countenance, like that of a Roman conqueror with a forehead in laurels, bore traces of hidden pain and sleepless nights. But at sight of Bogush a kindly smile brightened the face of the hetman; he placed his hands on the shoulders of the man inclining before him, and said—
“I greet you, soldier, I greet you! I had not hoped to see you so soon; but you are the dearer to me in Yavorov. Whence do you come—from Kamenyets?”
“No, serene, great, mighty lord hetman, I have not even been at Kamenyets. I come straightway from Hreptyoff.”
“What is my little soldier doing there? Is he well, and has he cleared the wilds of Ushytsa even somewhat?”
“The wilds are so peaceful that a child might pass through them in safety. The robbers are hanged, and in these last days Azba Bey with his whole party was cut to pieces, so that even a witness of the slaughter was not left. I arrived there on the very day of their destruction.”
“I recognize Volodyovski: Rushchyts in Rashkoff
