“Admire the sense of these birds. Only let it come to a battle in any place, straightway they will fly in from every side, as if someone had shaken them from a bag. But let the same army march alone, or go out to meet friends, the birds will not come; thus are these creatures able to divine the intentions of men, though no one assists them. The wisdom of nostrils is not sufficient in this case, and so we have reason to wonder.”
Meanwhile the birds, croaking louder and louder, approached considerably; therefore Pan Mushalski turned to the little knight and said, striking his palm on the bow, “Pan Commandant, will it be forbidden to bring down one, to please the lady? It will make no noise.”
“Bring down even two,” said Volodyovski, seeing how the old soldier had the weakness of showing the certainty of his arrows.
Thereupon the incomparable bowman, reaching behind his shoulder, took out a feathered arrow, put it on the string, and raising the bow and his head, waited.
The flock was drawing nearer and nearer. All reined in their horses and looked with curiosity toward the sky. All at once the plaintive wheeze of the string was heard, like the twitter of a sparrow; and the arrow, rushing forth, vanished near the flock. For a while it might be thought that Mushalski had missed, but, behold, a bird reeled head downward, and was dropping straight toward the ground over their heads, then tumbling continually, approached nearer and nearer; at last it began to fall with outspread wings, like a leaf opposing the air. Soon it fell a few steps in front of Basia’s pony. The arrow had gone through the raven, so that the point was gleaming above the bird’s back.
“As a lucky omen,” said Mushalski, bowing to Basia, “I will have an eye from a distance on the lady commandress and my great benefactress; and if there is a sudden emergency, God grant me again to send out a fortunate arrow. Though it may buzz near by, I assure you that it will not wound.”
“I should not like to be the Tartar under your aim,” answered Basia.
Further conversation was interrupted by Volodyovski, who said, pointing to a considerable eminence some furlongs away, “We will halt there.”
After these words they moved forward at a trot. Halfway up, the little knight commanded them to lessen their pace, and at last, not far from the top, he held in his horse.
“We will not go to the very top,” said he, “for on such a bright morning the eye might catch us from a distance; but dismounting, we will approach the summit, so that a few heads may look over.”
When he had said this, he sprang from his horse, and after him Basia, Pan Mushalski, and a number of others. The dragoons remained below the summit, holding their horses; but the others pushed on to where the height descended in wall form, almost perpendicularly, to the valley. At the foot of this wall, which was a number of tens of yards in height, grew a somewhat dense, narrow strip of brushwood, and farther on extended a low level steppe; of this they were able to take in an enormous expanse with their eyes from the height. This plain, cut through by a small stream running in the direction of Kalusik, was covered with clumps of thicket in the same way that it was near the cliff. In the thickest clumps slender columns of smoke were rising to the sky.
“Yon see,” said Pan Michael to Basia, “that the enemy is hidden there.”
“I see smoke, but I see neither men nor horses,” said Basia, with a beating heart.
“No; for they are concealed by the thickets, though a trained eye can see them. Look there: two, three, four, a whole group of horses are to be seen—one pied, another all white, and from here one seems blue.”
“Shall we go to them soon?”
“They will be driven to us; but we have time enough, for to that thicket it is a mile and a quarter.”
“Where are our men?”
“Do you see the edge of the wood yonder? The chamberlain’s squadron must be touching that edge just now. Mellehovich will come out of the other side in a moment. The accompanying squadron will attack the robbers from that cliff. Seeing people, they will move toward us, for here it is possible to go to the river under the slope; but on the other side there is a ravine, terribly steep, through which no one can go.”
“Then they are in a trap?”
“As you see.”
“For God’s sake! I am barely able to stand still!” cried Basia; but after a while she inquired, “Michael, if they were wise, what would they do?”
“They would rush, as if into smoke, at the men of the chamberlain’s squadron and go over their bellies. Then they would be free. But they will not do that, for, first, they do not like to rush into the eyes of regular cavalry; secondly, they will be afraid that more troops are waiting
