On the Field of Glory

"Thou," whispered he, "art as that blood which gives life to me, as that sun in the heavens. The mercy of God is upon me, that I see thee once more- O beloved! beloved!"

And it seemed to her that Yatsek was singing some marvellous song at that moment. Her eyes were filled with a wave of tears then, and a wave of happiness flooded her heart. Again there was silence between them; but she wept long with such a sweet weeping as she had never known in her life till that morning.

"Yatsek," said she at last, "why have we so tormented each other?"

"God has rewarded us a hundred fold," said he in answer.

And for the third time there was silence between them; only the wagon squeaked on, pushing forward slowly over the ruts of the roadway. Beyond the forest they came out onto great fields bathed in sunlight; on those fields wheat was rustling, dotted richly with red poppies and blue star thistles. There was great calm in that region. Above fields on which the grain had been reaped, here and there skylarks were soaring, lost in song, motionless; on the edges of the fields sickles glittered in the distance; from the remoter green pastures came the cries and songs of men herding cattle. And to both it seemed that the wheat was rustling because of them; that the poppies and star thistles were blooming because of them; that, the larks were singing because of them; that the calls of the herdsmen were uttered because of them; that all the sunny peace of those fields and all those voices were simply repeating their ecstasy and happiness.

They were roused from this oblivion by Father Voynovski, who had pushed up unnoticed to the wagon.

"How art thou, Yatsus?" asked he.

Yatsek trembled and looked with shining eyes at him, as if just roused from slumber.

"What is it, benefactor?"

"How art thou?"

"Eh! it will not be better in paradise!"

The priest looked seriously first at him, then at the young lady.

"Is that true?" asked he.

And he galloped off to the company. But the delightful reality embraced them anew. They began to look on each other, and sink in the eyes of each other.

"O, thou not-to-be-looked-at-sufficiently!" said Yatsek.

But she lowered her eyes, smiled at the corners of her mouth till dimples appeared in her rosy cheeks, and asked in a whisper, -

"But is not Panna Zbierhovski more beautiful?"

Yatsek looked at her with amazement.

"What, Panna Zbierhovski?"

She made no answer; she simply laughed in her fist, with a laugh as resonant as a silver bell.

Meanwhile, when the priest had galloped to the company, the men, who loved Yatsek, fell to inquiring, -

"Well, how is it there? How is our wounded man?"

"He is no longer in this world!" replied Father Voynovski.

"As God lives! What has happened? How is he not in the world?"

"He is not, for he says that he is in paradise-a woman!!!"

The Bukoyemskis, as men who understand without metaphor all that is said to them, did not cease to look at the priest with astonishment and, removing their caps, were just ready to say, "eternal rest," when a general outbreak of laughter interrupted their pious thoughts and intention. But in that laughter of the company there was sincere good-will and sympathy for Yatsek. Some of the men had learned from Pan Stanislav how sensitive that cavalier was, and all divined how he must have suffered, hence the words of the priest delighted them greatly. Voices were heard at once, therefore: "God knows! we have seen how he fought with his feelings, how he answered questions at random, how he left buckles unfastened, how he forgot himself when eating or drinking, how he turned his eyes to the moon during night hours."

"Those are infallible signs of unfortunate love," added some. "It is true," put in others, "that he is now as if in paradise, for if no wounds give more pain than those caused by Love, there is no sweeter thing than mutuality."

These and similar remarks were made by Yatsek's comrades. Some of them, having learned of the hardships which the lady had passed through, and how shamefully Krepetski had treated her, fell to shaking their sabres, and crying; "Give him hither!" Some became sensitive over the maiden, some, having learned how Martsian had been handled by the Bukoyemskis, raised to the skies the native valor and wit of those brothers. But after a while universal attention was centred again on the lovers: "Well," cried out all, "let us shout to their health and good fortune et felices rerum successus!" and immediately a noisy throng moved toward the wagon on horseback. In one moment almost the whole regiment had surrounded Pan Yatsek and Panna Anulka. Loud voices thundered: "Vivant! floreant!" others cried before the time: "Crescite et multiplicamini!" Whether Panna Anulka was really frightened by those cries, or rather as an "insidious woman," she only feigned terror father Voynovski himself could not have decided. It is enough that, sheltering her bright head at the unwounded shoulder of Yatsek, she asked with shamefaced confusion, -

"What is this, Yatsek? what are they doing?"

He surrounded her with his sound arm, and said, -

"People are giving thee, dearest flower, and I am taking thee."

"After the war?"

"Before the war."

"In God's name, why so hurried?"

But it was evident that Yatsek had not heard this query for instead of replying, he said to her, -

"Let us bow to the dear comrades for this good-will, and thank them."

Hence they bowed toward both sides, which roused still greater enthusiasm. Seeing the blushing face of the maiden, which was as beautiful as the morning dawn, the warriors struck their thighs with their palms from admiration.

"By the dear God!" cried they. "One might be dazzled!"

"An angel would be enamoured; what can a sinful man do?"

"It is no wonder that he was withering with sorrow."

And again hundreds of voices thundered more powerfully, -

"Vivant! crescant! floreant!"

Amid those shouts, and in clouds of golden dust they entered Shydlovets. At the first moment the inhabitants were frightened, and, leaving in front of their houses the workshops in which they were cutting out whetstones from sandrock, they ran to their chambers. But, learning soon that those were the shouts of a betrothal, and not of anger, they rushed in a crowd to the street and followed the soldiers. A throng of horses and men was formed straightway. The kettledrums of the horsemen were beaten, the trumpets and crooked horns sounded. Gladness became universal. Even the Jews, who through fear had stayed longer in the houses, shouted: "Vivait!"7 though they knew not well what the question was.

But Tachevski said to Panna Anulka, -

"Before the war, before the war, even though death were to come one hour later."

CHAPTER XXVI

"How is that?" inquired Father Voynovski, at the dinner which his comrades gave Yatsek. "We are going in five or six days; thou mightst die in the war; is it worth while to marry before a campaign, instead of waiting for the happy end of it, and then marrying at your leisure?"

His comrades, when they heard these prudent words, burst into laughter; some of them held their sides, others cried in a chorus, – "Oh! it is worth while, benefactor! and just for this reason that he may die is it worth while all the more."

The priest was a little angry, but when the three hundred best men, not excepting Pan Stanislav insisted, and Yatsek would not hear of delay, it had to be as he wanted. Renewed relations with the court, and the favor of the king and queen facilitated the affair very greatly. The queen declared that the coming Pani Tachevski would be under her protection till the war ended, and the king himself promised to be at the marriage, and to think of a fitting dowry when his mind was less occupied. He remembered that many lands of the Sieninskis had passed to the Sobieskis, and how his ancestors had grown strong from them, hence he felt under obligations to the orphan, who, besides, had attracted him by her beauty, and also roused his compassion by her harsh fate, and the evils which she had suffered.

Pan Matchynski, a friend from of old, to Father Voynovski, and also a friend of the king, promised to remind him of the young lady, but after the war; for at that time when on the shoulders of Yan III the fate of all Europe was resting, and of all Christianity, it was not permitted to trouble him with private interests. Father Voynovski was comforted with this promise as much as if Yatsek had then received a good "crown estate," for all knew that word from Pan Matchynski was as sure of fulfilment as had been the words of Zavisha. To speak strictly, he was the author of all the good which had met Panna Sieninski in Cracow; he mentioned Father Voynovski to the king and queen; finally he won for the young lady the queen, who, though capricious in her likings, and fickle, began from the first moment to show her special favor and friendship, which seemed even almost too sudden.

A dispensation from banns was received easily through protection of the court, and the favor of the bishop of Cracow. Even earlier, Pan Serafin had obtained for the young couple handsome lodgings from a Cracow merchant, whose ancestors and those of Pan Serafin had done business in their day, when the latter were living in Lvoff, and importing brocades from the Orient. That was a beautiful lodging, and, because of the multitude of civil and military dignitaries in the city, so good a one could not be obtained by many a voevoda. Stanislav had determined that Yatsek should pass those few days before the campaign as it were in a genuine heaven, and he ornamented those lodgings unusually with fresh flowers and tapestry; other comrades helped him with zeal, each lending, the best of what he had, rugs, tapestry, carpets, and such like costly articles, which in wealthy hussar regiments were taken in campaigns even.

In one word, all showed the young couple the greatest good-will, and helped them as each one was able and with what he commanded, except the four Bukoyemskis. They, in the first days after coming to Cracow, went sometimes twice in a day to Stanislav and to Yatsek, and to merchants at the inns with whom officers from the regiment of Prince Alexander drank not infrequently, but afterward the four brothers vanished as if they had fallen into water. Father Voynovski thought that they were drinking in the suburbs, where servants had seen them one evening, and where mead and wine were cheaper than in the city, but immediately after that all report of them vanished. This angered the priest as well as the Tsyprianovitches, for the brothers were bound to Pan Serafin in gratitude; this they should not have forgotten. "They may be good soldiers," said the priest, "but they are giddy heads in whose sedateness we cannot put confidence. Of course they have found some wild company in which they pass time more pleasantly than with any of us."

This judgment proved inaccurate, however, for on the eve of Yatsek's marriage, when his quarters were filled with acquaintances who had come with good wishes and presents, the four brothers appeared in their very best garments. Their faces were calm, serious, and full of mysteriousness.

"What has happened to you?" asked Pan Serafin.

"We have been tracking a wild beast!" replied Lukash.

"Quiet!" said Mateush, giving him a punch in the side, "Do not tell till the time comes."

Then he looked at the priest, at Pan Serafin and his son, and turning finally to Yatsek, began to clear his throat, like a man who intends to speak in some detail.

"Well, begin right away!" urged his brothers.

But he looked at them with staring eyes, and inquired, -

"How was it?"

"How? Hast thou forgotten?"

"It has broken in me."

"Wait-I know," cried Yan. "It began: 'Our most worthy-' Go on!"

"Our most worthy Pilate," began Mateush.

"Why 'Pilate'?" interrupted the priest. "Perhaps it is Pylades?"

"Benefactor thou hast hit the nail on the head," cried Yan. "As I live, it is Pylades."

"Our worthy Pylades!" began Mateush, now reassured, "though not the iron Boristhenes, but the gold-bearing Tagus itself were to flow in our native region, we, being exiled through attacks of barbarians, should have nothing but our hearts glowing with friendship to offer thee, neither could we honor this day as it merits by any thank-offering-"

"Thou speakest as if cracking nuts," cried out Lukash excitedly.

But Mateush kept on repeating: "As it merits, – as it merits-" He stopped, looked at his brothers, calling with his eyes for rescue, but they had forgotten entirely that which was to come later.

The Bukoyemskis began now to frown, and the audience to titter. Seeing this Pan Serafin resolved to assist them.

"Who composed this speech for you?" asked he.

"Pan Gromyka, of Pan Shumlanski's regiment," said Mateush.

"There it is. A strange horse is more likely to balk and rear than your own beast; so now embrace Yatsek and tell him what ye have to say."

"Surely that is the best way."

And they embraced Yatsek one after another. Then Mateush continued, – "Yatsus! we know that thou art no Pilate, and thou knowest that after losing Kieff regions we are poor fellows, in short we are naked. Here is all that we can give, and accept with thankful heart even this."

Then they handed him some object wound up in a piece of red satin, and at that moment the three younger brothers repeated, with feeling, -

"Accept it, Yatsus, accept! Accept!"

"I accept, and God repay you," answered Yatsek.

Thus speaking, he put the object on the table, and began to unroll the satin. All at once he started back, and cried, -

"As God lives, it is the ear of a man!"

"But dost thou know whose ear? Martsian Krepetski's!" thundered the brothers.

"Ah!"

All present were so tremendously astonished that silence followed immediately.

"Tfu!" cried Father Voynovski, at last.

And measuring the brothers, one after the other, with a stern glance, he began at the eldest, -

"Are ye Turks to bring in the ears of beaten enemies? Ye are a shame to this Christian army and all nobles. If Krepetski deserved death a hundred times, if he were even a heretic, or out and out a pagan, it would still be an inexpressible shame to commit such an action. Oh, ye have delighted Yatsek, so that he spits from his mouth that which comes into it. But I tell you that for such a deed ye are to expect not gratitude but contempt, and shame also; for there is no regiment in all the cavalry, or even a regiment in the infantry, which would accept such barbarians as comrades."

At this Mateush stepped out in front of his brothers, and, flaming with rage, said, -

"Here is gratitude for you, here is reward, here is the justice of people, and a judgment. If any layman were to utter this judgment I should cut one ear from him, and also the other to go with it, but since a clerical person speaks thus, let the Lord Jesus judge him, and take the side of the innocent! Your Grace asks: 'Are ye Turks?' but I ask: Do you think that we cut off the ear of a dead man? My born brothers, ye innocent orphans, to what have ye come, that they make Turks of you, enemies of the faith! To what?"

Here his voice quivered, for his grief had exceeded his auger. The three brothers, roused by the unjust judgment, began to cry out with equal sorrow, -

"They make Turks of us!"

"Enemies of the faith!"

"Vile pagans!"

"Then tell, in the name of misfortune, how it was," said the priest.

"Lukash cut off Martsian's ear in a duel."

"Whence did Krepetski come hither?"

"He rode into Cracow. He was here five days. He rode in behind us."

"Let one speak. Speak thou, but to the point."

Here the priest turned to Yan, the youngest.

"An acquaintance of ours from the regiment of the Bishop of Sandomir," began Yan, "told us by chance, three days ago, that he had seen in a wineshop on Kazamir street a certain wonder. 'A noble,' says he, 'as thick as a tree stump, with a great head so thrust into his body that his shoulders come up to his ears, on short crooked legs,' says he, 'and he drinks like a dragon. A viler monkey I have not seen in my life,' says he. And we, since the Lord Jesus has given us this gift from birth, take everything in at a twinkle, we look at one another that instant: Well, is not that Krepetski? Then we said to the man, 'Take us to that wineshop.' 'I will take you.' And he took us. It was dark, but we looked till we saw something black in one corner behind a table. Lukash walked up to it, and made sparks fly before the very eyes of him who was hiding there. 'Krepetski,' cries he, and grabs him by the shoulder. We to our sabres. Krepetski sprang away, but saw that there was no escape, for we were between him and the doorway. Did he not jump then? He jumped up time after time as a cock does. 'What,' says he, 'do ye think that I am afraid? Only come at me one by one, not in a crowd, unless ye are murderers, not nobles.'"

"The scoundrel!" interrupted the priest.

"What did he try to do with us? That is what Lukash asked him. 'Oh!' said Lukash, 'thou son of such a mother, thou didst hire a whole regiment of cut-throats against us. It would be well,' said he, 'to give thee to the headsman, but this is the shorter way!' Then he presses on, and they fall to cutting. After the third or fourth blow, his head leans to one side. I look-and there is an ear on the floor. Mateush raises it immediately, and cries, – 'Leave the other to us, do not cut it. This,' said he 'will be for Yatsek, and the other for Panna Anulka.' But Martsian dropped his sabre, for his blood had begun to flow terribly, and he fainted. We poured water on his head, and wine into his mouth, thinking that he would revive and meet the next one of us; but that could not be. He recovered consciousness, it is true, and said: 'Since ye have sought justice yourselves, ye are not free to seek any other,' and he fainted again. We went away then, sorry not to have the other ear. Lukash said that he could have killed the man, but he spared him for us, and especially for Yatsek. And I do not know if any one could act more politely, for it is no sin to crush such vermin as Martsian, but it is clear that politeness does not pay now-a-days, since we have to suffer for showing it."

"True! He speaks justly!" said the other brothers.

"Well," said the priest, "if the matter stands thus it is different, but still the gift is unsavory."

The brothers looked with amazement one at another.

"Why say unsavory?" asked Marek. "You do not think we brought it for Yatsek to eat, do you?"

"I thank you from my soul for your good wishes," said Tachevski. "I think that ye did not bring it to me to be stored away."

"It has grown a little green-it might be smoke-dried."

"Let a man bury it at once," said the priest with severity; "it is the ear of a Christian in every case."

"In Kieff we have seen better treatment," growled out Mateush.

"Krepetski came hither undoubtedly," remarked Yatsek, "to make a new attack on Anulka."

"He will not take her away from the king's palace," said the prudent Pan Serafin, "but he did not come for that, if I think correctly. His attack failed, so I suppose he only wanted to learn whether we know that he arranged it, and if we have complained of him. Perhaps old Krepetski did not know of his son's undertaking; but perhaps he did know; if he did, then both must be greatly alarmed, and I am not at all surprised that Martsian came here to investigate."

"Well," said Stanislav, laughing, "he has no luck with the Bukoyemskis, indeed he has not."

"Let him go," said Tachevski. "To-day I am ready to forgive him."

The Bukoyemskis and Stanislav, who knew the stubbornness of the young cavalier, looked at him with astonishment, and he, as if answering them, added, -

"For Anulka will be mine immediately, and to-morrow I shall be a Christian knight and defender of the faith, a man whose heart should be free of all hate and personalities."

"God bless thee for that!" cried the priest.

CHAPTER XXVII

At last the long-wished-for day of his happiness came to Tachevski. In Cracow a report had gone out among the citizens, and was repeated with wonder, that in the army was a knight who would marry on one day and mount his horse the day following. When the report went out also that the king and queen would be at the marriage, crowds began from early morning to assemble in the church and outside it. At length the crowd was so great that the king's men had to bring order to the square so that the marriage guests might have a free passage. Tachevski's comrades assembled to a man; this they did out of good-will and friendship, and also because it was dear to each one of them to be seen in a company where the king himself would be present, and to belong, as it were, to his private society. Many dignitaries appeared also, even men who had never heard of Tachevski, for it was known that the queen favored the marriage, and at the court much depended on her inclination and favor.

To some of the lords it was not less wonderful than to the citizens that the king should find time to be at the marriage of a simple officer, while on that king's shoulders the fate of the whole world was then resting, and day after day couriers from foreign lands were flying in on foaming horses; hence some considered this as coming from the kindness of the monarch and his wish to win the army, while others made suppositions that there existed some near bond of kinship, difficult to be acknowledged; others ridiculed these suppositions, stating justly that in such a case the queen, who had so little condescension for the failings of cavaliers that the king more than once had been forced to make explanations, would not have been so anxious for the union of the lovers.

People remembered little of the Sieninskis, so to avoid every calumny and gossip the king declared that the Sobieskis owed much to that family. Then people of society were concerned with Panna Anulka, and, as is usual at courts, at one time they pitied, at another time they were moved by her sufferings, and next they lauded her virtue and comeliness. Reports of her beauty spread widely even among citizens, but when at last they saw her no one was disappointed.

She came to the church with the queen, hence all glances went first to that lofty lady whose charms were still brilliant, like the bright sun before evening; but when they were turned to the bride, all men among dignitaries, the military, the nobles, and citizens whispered, and even loud voices were heard.

"Wonderful, wonderful! That man owes much to his eyes, who has beheld once in life such a woman."

And this was true. Not always in those times was a maiden dressed in white for her marriage, but the young ladies and the assistants arrayed Anulka in white, for such was her wish, and that was the color of her finest robe also. So in white, with a green wreath on her golden hair, and with a face confused a trifle, and pale, with downcast eyes, she, silent, and slender, looked like a snowy swan, or simply like a white lily. Even Yatsek himself, to whom she seemed in some sort a new person, was astonished at sight of her. "In God's name!" said he to himself, "how can I approach her? She is a genuine queen, or entirely an angel with whom it is sinful to speak unless kneeling." And he was almost awestruck. But when at last he and she knelt side by side before the altar, and heard the voice of Father Voynovski full of emotion, as he began with the words: "I knew you both as little children," and joined their hands with his stole, when he heard his own low voice: "I take thee as wife," and the hymn, Veni Creator burst forth a moment later, it seemed to Yatsek that happiness would burst his bosom, and that all the easier since he was not wearing his armor. He had loved this woman from childhood, and he knew that he loved her, but now, for the first time, he understood how he loved her without measure or limit. And again he began to say to himself: I must die, for if a man during life were to have so much happiness, what more could there be for him in heaven? But he thought that before he died he must thank God; and all at once there flew before the eyes of his soul Turkish warriors in legions, beards, turbans, sashes, crooked sabres, horsetail standards. So from his heart was rent the shout to God: "I will thank to the full, to the full!" And he felt, that for those enemies of the cross and the faith, he would become a destroying lion. That vision lasted only one twinkle, then his breast was filled with a boundless wave of love and rapture.