With Fire and Sword by Henryk Sienkiewicz (big ebook reader .txt) 📕

Dontsovna approached the mill-stream and raised a gate holding back the water at the fall. All at once the swift current rushed with redoubled force, the wheel began to turn more swiftly, until at last it was covered with liquid dust; the foam, beaten fine, rolled under the wheel like boiling water.

The witch bent her eyes into the boiling mass and seizing the tresses near her ears, began to cry⁠—

“I call! I call! Appear! In the oaken wheel, in the white foam, in the clear mist, whether evil, whether good, appear!”

Bogun approached and sat at her side. His face denoted fear and feverish curiosity.

“I see!” screamed the witch.

“What do you see?”

“The death of my brother. Two bullocks are drawing him on a stake.”

“To the devil with your brother!” muttered Bogun, who wished to know something else.

For a time was heard only the thunder of the wheel whirling around in fury.

“Blue is my brother’s head, how blue! The ravens are tearing it,” said the witch.

“What else do you see?”

“Nothing. Oh, how blue! I call! I call! In the oaken wheel, in the white foam, in the clear mist, appear! I see⁠—”

“What?”

“A battle! The Poles are fleeing before the Cossacks.”

“And I am pursuing?”

“I see you too. You encounter a little knight. Hur! hur! hur! Be on your guard against the little knight.”

“And the princess?”

“She is not there. I see you again, and with you someone who is betraying you⁠—your false friend.”

Bogun was devouring with his eyes at one instant the foam, at another Horpyna; and at the same time he worked with his brain to aid the soothsaying.

“What friend?”

“I don’t see. I don’t know whether old or young.”

“Old, he must be old!”

“Maybe he is old!”

“I know who he is. He has betrayed me once already. An old noble with a blue beard and a white eye. Death to him! But he is not a friend of mine.”

“He is lying in wait for you, I see again⁠—Stop! the princess is here too; she is in a crown, a white dress, above her a hawk.”

“That is I.”

“Maybe it is. A hawk⁠—or a falcon? A hawk!”

“That is I.”

“Wait! All has vanished. In the oaken wheel, in the white foam⁠—Oh! oh! many soldiers, many Cossacks, oh, many, like trees in the forest or thistles in the steppes; and you are above all⁠—they are bearing three bunchuk standards before you.”

“And the princess is with me?”

“She is not; you are in the camp.”

The wheel roared till the whole mill trembled.

“Oh, how much blood, how much blood! how many corpses⁠—wolves above them, ravens above them, plague above them! Corpses and corpses⁠—far away nothing but corpses, nothing to be seen but blood!”

Suddenly a breath of wind whirled the mist from the wheel; and at the same time higher up above the mill appeared the deformed Cheremís with a bundle of wood on his shoulders.

“Cheremís, let down the sluice!” cried the girl.

When she had said this she went to wash her hands and face in the stream, and the dwarf stopped the water at once.

Bogun sat in thought. He was roused first by the coming of Horpyna.

“You saw nothing more?” he asked.

“What appeared, appeared; I shall see nothing more.”

“And you are not lying?”

“By my brother’s head, I spoke the truth. They were empaling him, drawing him on with oxen. I grieve for him. But death is written not for him alone. Oh, what bodies appeared! Never have I seen so many; there will be a great war in the world.”

“And you saw her with a hawk above her head?”

“Yes.”

“And was she in a wreath?”

“In a wreath and a white robe.”

“And how do you know that that hawk was I? I spoke to you of that young Polish noble⁠—maybe it was he?”

The girl wrinkled her brows and grew thoughtful. “No,” said she after a while, shaking her head; “if it had been the Pole, it would have been an eagle.”

“Glory to God, glory to God! I will go now to the Cossacks to prepare the horses for the road. We go tonight.”

“So you are going surely?”

“Hmelnitski has ordered, and Krívonos too. You know well that there will be a great war, for I read the same in Bar in a letter from Hmelnitski.”

Bogun in reality could not read, but he was ashamed of it; he did not wish to pass for illiterate.

“Then go!” said the witch. “You are lucky⁠—you will be hetman. I saw three bunchuks above you as I see these fingers.”

“And I shall be hetman and marry the princess⁠—I cannot take a peasant.”

“You would talk differently with a peasant girl, but you are afraid of her. You should be a Pole.”

“I am no worse.”

Bogun now went to the stable to the Cossacks, and Horpyna set about preparing dinner.

In the evening the horses were ready for the road, but the chief was in no hurry to depart. He sat on a roll of carpets in the chamber, with lute in hand, and looked on his princess, who had risen from the couch, but had thrust herself into the other corner of the room, and was repeating in silence the rosary without paying any heed to the chief, just as if he had not been in the room. He, on the contrary, followed with his eyes every movement of hers, caught with his ears every sigh, and knew not what to do with himself. From time to time he opened his mouth to begin conversation, but the words would not leave his throat. The face pale, silent, and with an expression of decisive sternness in the brows and mouth, deprived him of courage. Bogun had not seen this expression on the princess before, and involuntarily he remembered similar evenings at Rozlogi, which appeared before him as if real⁠—how they sat, he and the Kurtsevichi around an oaken table, the old princess husking sunflower seeds, the princes throwing dice from a cup, he looking on the beautiful princess just as he was looking