With these words he rushed from the summerhouse, and hurried with open arms toward Pan Kharlamp. But first Pan Kharlamp bowed low to Olenka, whom he had seen in old times at the court of Kyedani; then he pressed her hand to his enormous mustache, and casting himself into the embraces of Kmita, sobbed on his shoulder.
“For God’s sake, what is the matter?” cried the astonished host.
“God has given happiness to one and taken it from another,” said Kharlamp. “But the reasons of my sorrow I can tell only to you.”
Here he looked at Olenka; she, seeing that he was unwilling to speak in her presence, said to her husband, “I will send mead to you, gentlemen, and now I leave you.”
Kmita took Pan Kharlamp to the summerhouse, and seating him on a bench, asked, “What is the matter? Are you in need of assistance? Count on me as on Zavisha!”3
“Nothing is the matter with me,” said the old soldier, “and I need no assistance while I can move this hand and this sabre; but our friend, the most worthy cavalier in the Commonwealth, is in cruel suffering. I know not whether he is breathing yet.”
“By Christ’s wounds! Has anything happened to Volodyovski?”
“Yes,” said Kharlamp, giving way to a new outburst of tears. “Know that Panna Anna Borzobogati has left this vale—”
“Is dead!” cried Kmita, seizing his head with both hands.
“As a bird pierced by a shaft.”
A moment of silence followed—no sound but that of apples dropping here and there to the ground heavily, and of Pan Kharlamp panting more loudly while restraining his weeping. But Kmita was wringing his hands, and repeated, nodding his head—
“Dear God! dear God! dear God!”
“Your grace will not wonder at my tears,” said Kharlamp, at last; “for if your heart is pressed by unendurable pain at the mere tidings of what happened, what must it be to me, who was witness of her death and her pain, of her suffering, which surpassed every natural measure?”
Here the servant appeared, bringing a tray with a decanter and a second glass on it; after him came Kmita’s wife, who could not repress her curiosity. Looking at her husband’s face and seeing in it deep suffering, she said straightway—
“What tidings have you brought? Do not dismiss me. I will comfort you as far as possible, or I will weep with you, or will help you with counsel.”
“Help for this will not be found in your head,” said Pan Andrei; “and I fear that your health will suffer from sorrow.”
“I can endure much. It is more grievous to live in uncertainty.”
“Anusia is dead,” said Kmita.
Olenka grew somewhat pale, and dropped on the bench heavily. Kmita thought that she would faint; but grief acted more quickly than the sudden announcement, and she began to weep. Both knights accompanied her immediately.
“Olenka,” said Kmita, at last, wishing to turn his wife’s thoughts in another direction, “do you not think that she is in heaven?”
“Not for her do I weep, but over the loss of her, and over the loneliness of Pan Michael. As to her eternal happiness, I should wish to have such hope for my own salvation as I have for hers. There was not a worthier maiden, or one of better heart, or more honest. O my Anulka!4 my Anulka, beloved!”
“I saw her death,” said Kharlamp; “may God grant us all to die with such piety!”
Here silence followed, as if some of their sorrow had gone with their tears; then Kmita said, “Tell us how it was, and take some mead to support you.”
“Thank you,” said Kharlamp; “I will drink from time to time if you will drink with me; for pain seizes not only the heart, but the throat, like a wolf, and when it seizes a man it might choke him unless he received some assistance. I was going from Chenstohova to my native place to settle there quietly in my old age. I have had war enough; as a stripling I began to practise, and now my mustache is gray. If I cannot stay at home altogether, I will go out under some banner; but these military confederations to the loss of the country and the profit of the enemy, and these civil wars, have disgusted me thoroughly with arms. Dear God! the pelican nourishes its children with its blood, it is true; but this country has no longer even blood in its breast. Sviderski5 was a great soldier. May God judge him!”
“My dearest Anulka!” interrupted Pani Kmita, with weeping, “without thee what would have happened to me and to all of us? Thou wert a refuge and a defence to me! O my beloved Anulka!”
Hearing this, Kharlamp sobbed anew, but briefly, for Kmita interrupted him with a question, “But where did you meet Pan Michael?”
“In Chenstohova, where he and she intended to rest, for they were visiting the shrine there after the journey. He told me at once how he was going from your place to Krakow, to Princess Griselda, without whose permission and blessing Anusia was unwilling to marry. The maiden was in good health at that time, and Pan Michael was as joyful as a bird. ‘See,’ said he, ‘the Lord God has given me a reward for my labor!’ He boasted also not a little—God comfort him!—and joked with me because I, as you know, quarrelled with him on a time concerning the lady, and we were to fight a duel. Where is she now, poor woman?”
Here Kharlamp broke out again, but briefly, for Kmita stopped him a second time: “You say that she was well? How came the attack, then, so suddenly?”
“That it was sudden, is true. She was lodging with Pani Martsin Zamoyski, who, with her husband, was spending some time in Chenstohova. Pan Michael used to sit all the day with her; he complained of delay somewhat, and said they
