The Knights of the Cross, or, Krzyzacy: Historical Romance
entire consent. Therefore, after my death, he will be the master and
owner of the castle, the soil, forests, waters, people and all the craft
in Spychow...."
Hearing this, Tolima was greatly surprised and began to turn his square
head to Jurand and to Zbyszko alternately, he said nothing, however,
because he scarcely ever did say anything, he only bowed to Zbyszko and
lightly embraced his knees. And Jurand continued:
"This is my will, written by Father Kaleb, and below is my seal in wax;
you must testify that you have heard this from me, and that I ordered
that the young knight should be obeyed here even as I am. Furthermore,
what is in the treasury in booty and money, you will show him, and you
will serve him faithfully in peace as well as in war till death. Did you
hear?"
Tolima raised his hands to his ears and nodded his head, then, at a sign
from Jurand, he bowed and went out; the knight again turned to Zbyszko
and said impressively:
"There is enough in the treasury to satisfy the greatest greed and to
ransom not one but a hundred captives. Remember!"
But Zbyszko inquired:
"And why are you giving me Spychow already?"
"I give you more than Spychow, in the child."
"And we know not the hour of death," said Father Kaleb.
"Yes, unknown," repeated Jurand, sadly, "a short time ago, the snow
covered me up, and, although God saved me, I have no more my old
strength...."
"Gracious God!" exclaimed Zbyszko, "something his changed within you
since yesterday, and you prefer to speak of death than of Danusia.
Gracious God!"
"Danusia will return, she will," replied Jurand; "she is under God's
protection. But if she returns ... listen ... take her to Bogdaniec and
leave Spychow with Tolima.... He is a faithful man, and this is a wild
neighborhood.... There they cannot capture her with a rope ... there she
is safer...."
"Hej!" cried Zbyszko, "and you talk already as if from the other world.
What is that?"
"Because I went half-way to the other world, and now I seem to be ill.
And I also care for my child ... because I have only her. And, you too,
although I know that you love her...."
Here he interrupted, and drawing a short weapon from its sheath, called
the _misericordia_, he held the handle toward Zbyszko.
"Swear to me now upon this little cross that you will never harm her and
that you will love her constantly...."
And tears suddenly started in Zbyszko's eyes; in a moment he fell upon
his knees and, putting a finger on the hilt, exclaimed:
"Upon the Holy Passion, I will never harm, and will love her constantly!"
"Amen," said Father Kaleb.
Jurand again put the "dagger of mercy" back into the sheath and extended
his arms:
"Then you are my child too!..."
They separated then, because it was late, and they had had no good rest
for several days. However, Zbyszko got up the following morning at
daybreak, because the previous day he had been frightened, lest Jurand
were really falling ill, and he wished to learn how the older knight had
spent the night. Before the door to Jurand's room he met Tolima, who had
just left it.
"How is the lord? well?" he inquired.
The other again bowed, and then, putting his hand to his ear, said:
"What orders, your grace?"
"I am asking how the lord is?" repeated Zbyszko, louder.
"The lord has departed."
"Where to?"
"I do not know.... In arms!"
CHAPTER VII.
The dawn was just beginning to whiten the trees, bushes and boulders
scattered in the fields, when the hired guide, walking beside Jurand's
horse, stopped and said:
"Permit me to rest, knight, for I am out of breath. It is thawing and
foggy, but it is not far now."
"You will conduct me to the road, and then return," replied Jurand.
"The road will be to the right behind the forest, and you will soon see
the castle from the hill."
Then the peasant commenced to strike his hands against his armpits,
because he was chilled with the morning dampness; he then sat on a stone,
because this exercise made him still more breathless.
"Do you know whether the count is in the castle?" inquired Jurand.
"Where else could he be, since he is ill?"
"What ails him?"
"People say that the Polish knights gave him a beating," replied the old
peasant. And there was a feeling of satisfaction in his voice. He was a
Teuton subject, but his Mazovian heart rejoiced over the superiority of
the Polish knights.
He presently added:
"Hej! our lords are strong, but they have a hard task with them."
But immediately after saying this, he looked sharply at the knight, as if
to convince himself that nothing bad would happen to him for the words
which he had heedlessly let slip and said:
"You, lord, speak our language; you are no German?"
"No," replied Jurand; "but lead on."
The peasant arose, and again began to walk beside the horse. On the way,
he now and then put his hand into a leathern pouch, pulled out a handful
of unground corn, and put it into his mouth, and when he had thus
satisfied his first hunger, he began to explain why he ate raw grains,
although Jurand was too much occupied with his own misfortune and his own
thoughts, to heed him.
"God be blessed for that," he said. "A hard life under our German lords!
They lay such taxes upon grist, that a poor man must eat the grain with
the chaff, like an ox. And when they find a hand-mill in a cottage, they
execute the peasant, take whatever he has, bah! they do not pardon even
women and children.... They fear neither God nor the priests. They even
put the priest in chains for blaming them for it. Oh, it is hard under
the Germans! If a man does grind some grains between two stones, then he
keeps that handful of flour for the holy Sunday, and must eat like birds
on Friday. But God be blessed for even that, because two or three months
before the harvest there will not be even that much. It is not permitted
to catch fish ... nor kill animals ... It is not as it is in Mazowsze."
The Teutonic peasant complained, speaking partly to himself, and partly
to Jurand, and meanwhile they passed through a waste country, covered
with limestone boulders, heaped with snow, and entered a forest, which
looked grey in the morning light, and from which came a sharp, damp
coolness. It became broad daylight; otherwise it would have been
difficult for Jurand to travel along the forest road, which ran somewhat
up hill, and was so narrow that his gigantic battle-horse could, in some
places, hardly pass between the trunks. But the forest soon ended, and in
a few "_Paters_," they reached the summit of a white hill, across the
middle of which ran a beaten road.
"This is the road, lord," said the peasant; "you will find the way alone,
now."
"I shall," replied Jurand. "Return home, man." And putting his hand into
a leather bag, fastened in front of the saddle, he took from it a silver
coin and handed it to the guide. The peasant, accustomed more to blows
than to gifts from the local Teutonic knights, could scarcely believe his
eyes, and catching the money, dropped his head to Jurand's stirrup and
embraced it.
"O Jesus, Mary!" he exclaimed: "God reward your honor!"
"God be with you!"
"God's grace be with you! Szczytno is before you."
Then he once more bent down to the stirrup and disappeared. Jurand
remained on the hill alone and looked in the direction indicated by the
peasant, at a grey, moist veil of fog, which concealed the world before
him. Behind this fog was hidden that ominous castle, to which he was
driven by superior force and misery. It is already near, then, and what
must happen, must happen.... As that thought came into Jurand's heart, in
addition to his fear and anxiety about Danusia, and his readiness to
redeem her from a foe's hands even with his own blood, he experienced a
new, exceedingly bitter, and hitherto unknown feeling of humiliation. And
now Jurand, at the mere mention of whose name the neighboring counts
trembled, was riding to their command with a bowed head. He who had
defeated and trampled under foot so many of them, now felt himself
defeated and trampled upon. It is true, they had not overcome him in the
field with courage and knightly strength, nevertheless he felt himself
subdued. And it was to him something so unusual, that it seemed as if the
entire order of the world were subverted. He was going to submit himself
to the Teutons, he, who would rather meet single-handed the entire Teuton
force, if it were not for Danusia's sake. Had it not happened already,
that a single knight, having to choose between disgrace and death had
attacked whole armies? But he felt that he might meet disgrace, and, at
that thought, his heart groaned with agony as a wolf howls when it feels
the dart within it.
But he was a man with not only a body, but also a soul, of iron. He knew
how to subdue others, he knew also how to subdue himself.
"I will not move," he said to himself, "until I have overcome this anger
with which I should rather lose than deliver my child."
And he wrestled with his hard heart, his inveterate hatred and his desire
to fight. Whoever had seen him on that hill, in armor, on a gigantic
horse, would have said that he was some giant, wrought out of iron, and
would not have recognized that that motionless knight at that moment was
waging the hottest of all the battles of his life. But he fought with
himself until he had entirely overcome and felt that his will would not
fail him. Meanwhile the mist thinned, although it did not disappear
entirely, but finally something darker loomed through it.
Jurand guessed that these were the walls of the castle of Szczytno. At
the sight of it he still did not move from the place, but began to pray
so fervidly and ardently as a man prays, when nothing is left for him in
the world but God's mercy. And when his horse did finally move, he felt
that some sort of confidence was beginning to enter his heart. He was now
prepared to suffer everything that could befall him. There came back to
his memory Saint George, a descendant of the greatest race in Cappadocia,
who suffered various shameful tortures, and nevertheless not only did not
lose any honor, but is placed on the right hand of God and appointed
patron of all knighthood. Jurand had sometimes heard tales of his
exploits from the abbots, who came from distant countries, and now he
strengthened his heart with these recollections.
Slowly even, hope began to awaken in him. The Teutons were indeed famous
for their desire of revenge, therefore he did not doubt that they would
take vengeance on him for all the defeats which he had inflicted upon
them, for the disgrace which had fallen upon them after each encounter,
and for the dread in which they had lived for so many years.
But that very consideration increased his courage. He thought that they
had captured Danusia only in order to get him; therefore of what use
would she be to them, after they had gotten him? Yes! They would
undoubtedly seize him, and, not daring to keep him near Mazowsze, they
would send him to some distant castle, where perhaps he would have to
groan until his life's end under ground, but they would liberate Danusia.
Even if it should prove that they had got him insidiously and by
oppression, neither the grand master nor the assembly would blame them
very much for that, because Jurand was actually very hard on the Teutons,
and shed more of their blood than did any other knight in the world. But
that same grand master would perhaps punish them for the imprisonment of
the innocent girl, who was moreover a foster-daughter of the prince,
whose favor he was seeking on account of the threatening war with the
Polish king.
And his hope constantly increased. At times it seemed to him almost