“The , your highness.”
“God be merciful to my soul! I shall not live to the . Long ago it was foretold me that every fifth year death is near me.”
“God is kind, your highness.”
“God is with Sapyeha,” said the prince, gloomily.
All at once he looked around and said: “Cold comes to me from it. I do not see it, but I feel that it is here.”
“What is that, your highness?”
“Death!”
“In the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost!”
A moment of silence followed; nothing was heard but the whispered “Our Father,” repeated by Pani Yakimovich.
“Tell me,” said the prince, with a broken voice, “do you believe that outside of your faith no one can be saved?”
“Even in the moment of death it is possible to renounce errors,” said Kharlamp.
The sound of shots had become at that moment more frequent. The thunder of cannon began to shake the windowpanes, which answered each report with a plaintive sound.
The prince listened a certain time calmly, then rose slightly on the pillow; his eyes began slowly to widen, his pupils to glitter. He sat up; for a moment he held his head with his hand, then cried suddenly, as if in bewilderment—
“Boguslav! Boguslav! Boguslav!”
Kharlamp ran out of the room like a madman.
The whole castle trembled and quivered from the thunder of cannon.
All at once there was heard the cry of several thousand voices; then something was torn with a ghastly smashing of walls, so that brands and coals from the chimney were scattered on the floor. At the same time Kharlamp rushed into the chamber.
“Sapyeha’s men have blown up the gate!” cried he. “The Swedes have fled to the tower! The enemy is here! Your highness—”
Further words died on his lips. Radzivill was sitting on the sofa with eyes starting out; with open lips he was gulping the air, his teeth bared like those of a dog when he snarls; he tore with his hands the sofa on which he was sitting, and gazing with terror into the depth of the chamber, cried, or rather gave out hoarse rattles between one breath and another—
“It was Radzeyovski—Not I—Save me!—What do you want? Take the crown!—It was Radzeyovski—Save me, people! Jesus! Jesus! Mary!”
These were the last words of Radzivill.
Then a terrible coughing seized him; his eyes came out in still more ghastly fashion from their sockets; he stretched himself out, fell on his back, and remained motionless.
“He is dead!” said the doctor.
“He cried Mary, though a Calvinist, you have heard!” said Pani Yakimovich.
“Throw wood on the fire!” said Kharlamp to the terrified pages.
He drew near to the corpse, closed the eyelids; then he took from his own armor a gilded image of the Mother of God which he wore on a chain, and placing the hands of Radzivill together on his breast, he put the image between the dead fingers.
The light of the fire was reflected from the golden ground of the image, and that reflection fell upon the face of the voevoda and made it cheerful so that never had it seemed so calm.
Kharlamp sat at the side of the body, and resting his elbows on his knees, hid his face in his hands.
The silence was broken only by the sound of shots.
All at once something terrible took place. First of all was a flash of awful brightness; the whole world seemed turned into fire, and at the same time there was given forth such a sound as if the earth had fallen from under the castle. The walls tottered; the ceilings cracked with a terrible noise; all the windows tumbled in on the floor, and the panes were broken into hundreds of fragments. Through the empty openings of the windows that moment clouds of snow drifted in, and the whirlwind began to howl gloomily in the corners of the chamber.
All the people present fell to the floor on their faces, speechless from terror.
Kharlamp rose first, and looked directly on the corpse of the voevoda; the corpse was lying in calmness, but the gilded image had slipped a little in the hands.
Kharlamp recovered his breath. At first he felt certain that that was an army of Satans who had broken into the chamber for the body of the prince.
“The word has become flesh!” said he. “The Swedes must have blown up the tower and themselves.”
But from without there came no sound. Evidently the troops of Sapyeha were standing in dumb wonder, or perhaps in fear that the whole castle was mined, and that there would be explosion after explosion.
“Put wood on the fire!” said Kharlamp to the pages.
Again the room was gleaming with a bright, quivering light. Round about a deathlike stillness continued; but the fire hissed, the whirlwind howled, and the snow rolled each moment more densely through the window openings.
At last confused voices were heard, then the clatter of spurs and the tramp of many feet; the door of the chamber was opened wide, and soldiers rushed in.
It was bright from the naked sabres, and more and more figures of knights in helmets, caps, and kolpaks crowded through the door. Many were bearing lanterns in their hands, and they held them to the light, advancing carefully, though it was light in the room from the fire as well.
At last there sprang forth from the crowd a little knight all in enamelled armor, and cried—
“Where is the voevoda of Vilna?”
“Here!” said Kharlamp, pointing to the body lying on the sofa.
Volodyovski looked at him, and said—
“He is not living!”
“He is not living, he is not living!” went from mouth to mouth.
“The traitor, the betrayer is not living!”
“So it is,” said Kharlamp, gloomily. “But if you dishonor his body and bear it apart with sabres, you will do ill, for before his end he called on the Most Holy Lady, and he holds Her image in his hand.”
These words made a deep impression. The shouts were hushed. Then the soldiers began
