“I do not indeed know how to thank you,” said Zagloba, sitting at a distance with Pan Michael’s sister, and kissing her hands, “for coming yourself and bringing with you such elegant maidens that the Graces themselves might heat stoves for them. Especially does that little haiduk please my heart, for such a rogue drives away sorrow in such fashion that a weasel could not hunt mice better. In truth, what is grief unless mice gnawing the grains of joyousness placed in our hearts? You, my benefactress, should know that our late king, Yan Kazimir, was so fond of my comparisons that he could not live a day without them. I had to arrange for him proverbs and wise maxims. He used to have these repeated to him before bedtime, and by them it was that he directed his policy. But that is another matter. I hope too that our Michael, in company with these delightful girls, will forget altogether his unhappy misfortune. You do not know that it is only a week since I dragged him out of the cloister, where he wished to make vows; but I won the intervention of the nuncio himself, who declared to the prior that he would make a dragoon of every monk in the cloister if he did not let Michael out straightway. There was no reason for him to be there. Praise be to God! Praise be to God! If not today, tomorrow some one of those two will strike such sparks out of him that his heart will be burning like punk.”
Meanwhile Krysia sang on:—
“If shields cannot save
From darts a strong hero,
How can a fair head
Guard her own weakness?
Where can she hide!”
“The fair heads have as much fear of those shafts as a dog has of meat,” whispered Zagloba to Pan Michael’s sister. “But confess, my benefactress, that you did not bring these titmice here without secret designs. They are maidens in a hundred!—especially that little haiduk. Would that I were as blooming as she! Ah, Michael has a cunning sister.”
Pani Makovetski put on a very artful look, which did not, however, become her honest, simple face in the least, and said, “I thought of this and that, as is usual with us; shrewdness is not wanting to women. My husband had to come here to the election; and I brought the maidens beforehand, for with us there is no one to see unless Tartars. If anything lucky should happen to Michael from this, I would make a pilgrimage on foot to some wonder-working image.”
“It will come; it will come!” said Zagloba.
“Both maidens are from great houses, and both have property; that, too, means something in these grievous times.”
“There is no need to repeat that to me. The war has consumed Michael’s fortune, though I know that he has some money laid up with great lords. We took famous booty more than once, gracious lady; and though that was placed at the hetman’s discretion, still, a part went to be divided ‘according to sabres,’ as the saying is in our soldier speech. So much came to Michael’s share more than once that if he had saved all his own, he would have today a nice fortune. But a soldier has no thought for tomorrow; he only frolics today. And Michael would have frolicked away all he had, were it not that I restrained him on every occasion. You say, then, gracious lady, that these maidens are of high blood?”
“Krysia is of senatorial blood. It is true that our castellans on the border are not castellans of Krakow, and there are some of whom few in the Commonwealth have heard; but still, whoso has sat once in a senator’s chair bequeaths to posterity his splendor. As to relationship, Basia almost surpasses Krysia.”
“Indeed, indeed! I myself am descended from a certain king of the Massagetes, therefore I like to hear genealogies.”
“Basia does not come from such a lofty nest as that; but if you wish to listen—for in our parts we can recount the relationship of every house on our fingers—she is, in fact, related to the Pototskis and the Yazlovyetskis and the Lashches. You see, it was this way.” Here Pan Michael’s sister gathered in the folds of her dress and took a more convenient position, so that there might be no hindrance to any part of her favorite narrative; she spread out the fingers of one hand, and straightening the index finger of the other, made ready to enumerate the grandfathers and grandmothers. “The daughter of Pan Yakob Pototski, Elizabeth, from his second wife, a Yazlovyetski, married Pan Yan Smyotanko, banneret of Podolia.”
“I have caulked that into my memory,” said Zagloba.
“From that marriage was born Michael Smyotanko, also banneret of Podolia.”
“H’m! a good office,” said Zagloba.
“He was married the first time to a Dorohosto—no! to a Rojynski—no! to a Voronich! God guard me from forgetting!”
“Eternal rest to her, whatever her name was,” said Zagloba, with gravity.
“And for his second wife he married Panna Lashch.”
“I was waiting for that! What was the result of the marriage?”
“Their sons died.”
“Every joy crumbles in this world.”
“But of four daughters, the youngest, Anna, married Yezorkovski, of the shield Ravich, a commissioner for fixing the boundaries of Podolia; he was afterward, if I mistake not, sword-bearer of Podolia.”
“He was, I remember!” said Zagloba, with complete certainty.
“From that marriage, you see, was born Basia.”
“I see, and also that at this moment she is aiming Ketling’s musket.” In fact, Krysia and the little knight were occupied in conversation, and Basia was aiming the musket at the window for her own amusement.
Pani Makovetski began to shake and squeak at sight of that. “You cannot imagine what I pass through with that girl! She is a regular haydamak.”
“If all the haydamaks were like her, I would join them at once.”
“There is nothing in her head but arms, horses, and war. Once she broke out of the house to hunt ducks with a gun. She crept
