The Deluge. Vol. 2

But in all places trusty guides were found, to whom it was enough to say that they were conducting bishops and lords who desired to preserve themselves from Swedish hands. They were led, therefore, among snows, cliffs, and whirlwinds, and over places so inaccessible that you would have said: "A bird cannot fly through them."

More than once the king and the dignitaries had clouds below them, and when there were not clouds their glances passed over a shoreless expanse, covered with white snows, an expanse seemingly as wide as the whole country was wide; more than once they entered mountain throats, almost dark, covered with snow, in which perhaps only a wild beast might have its lair. But they avoided places accessible to the enemy, shortening the road; and it happened that a settlement, at which they expected to arrive in half a day, appeared suddenly under their feet, and in it they awaited rest and hospitality, though in a smoky hut and a sooty room.

The king was in continual good humor; he gave courage to others to endure the excessive toil, and he guaranteed that by such roads they would surely reach Lyubovlya as safely as unexpectedly.

"The marshal does not expect that we shall fall on his shoulders!" repeated the king, frequently.

"What was the return of Xenophon to our journey among the clouds?" asked the nuncio.

"The higher we rise, the lower will Swedish fortune fall," answered the king.

They arrived at Novy Targ. It seemed that all danger was passed; still the mountaineers declared that Swedish troops were moving about near Chorshtyn and in the neighborhood. The king supposed that they might be the marshal's German cavalry, of which he had two regiments, or they might be his own dragoons sent in advance and mistaken for the enemy's scouts. Since in Chorshtyn the bishop of Cracow had a garrison, opinions were divided in the royal party. Some wished to go by the road to Chorshtyn, and then pass along the boundary to Spij; others advised to turn straight to Hungary, which came up in wedge-form to Novy Targ, and go over heights and through passes, taking guides everywhere who knew the most dangerous places.

This last opinion prevailed, for in that way meeting with the Swedes became almost impossible; and besides this "eagle" road over the precipices and through the clouds gave pleasure to the king.

They passed then from Novy Targ somewhat to the south and west, on the right hand of the Byaly Dunayets. The road at first lay through a region rather open and spacious, but as they advanced the mountains began to run together and the valleys to contract. They went along roads over which horses could barely advance. At times the riders had to dismount and lead; and more than once the beasts resisted, pointing their ears and stretching their distended and steaming nostrils forward toward precipices, from the depths of which death seemed to gaze upward.

The mountaineers, accustomed to precipices, frequently considered roads good on which the heads of unaccustomed men turned and their ears rang. At last they entered a kind of rocky chasm long, straight, and so narrow that three men could barely ride abreast in it. Two cliffs bounded it on the right side and the left. At places however the edges inclined, forming slopes less steep, covered with piles of snow bordered on the edges with dark pine-trees. Winds blew away the snow immediately from the bottom of the pass, and the hoofs of horses gritted everywhere on a stony road. But at that moment the wind was not blowing, and such silence reigned that there was a ringing in the ears. Above where between the woody edges a blue belt of sky was visible, black flocks of birds flew past from time to time, shaking their wings and screaming.

The king's party halted for rest. Clouds of steam rose from the horses, and the men too were tired.

"Is this Poland or Hungary?" inquired, after a time, the king of a guide.

"This is Poland."

"But why do we not turn directly to Hungary?"

"Because it is impossible. At some distance this pass turns, beyond the turn is a cliff, beyond that we come out on the high-road, turn, then go through one more pass, and there the Hungarian country begins."

"Then I see it would have been better to go by the highway at first," said the king.

"Quiet!" cried the mountaineer, quickly. And springing to the cliff he put his ear to it.

All fixed their eyes on him; his face changed in a moment, and he said: "Beyond the turn troops are coming from the water-fall! For God's sake! Are they not Swedes?"

"Where? How? What?" men began to ask on every side. "We hear nothing."

"No, for snow is lying on the sides. By God's wounds, they are near! they will be here straightway!"

"Maybe they are the marshal's troops," said the king.

In one moment Kmita urged his horse forward. "I will go and see!" said he.

The Kyemliches moved that instant after him, like hunting-dogs in a chase; but barely had they stirred from their places when the turn of the pass, about a hundred yards distant, was made black by men and horses. Kmita looked at them, and the soul quivered within him from terror.

Swedes were advancing.

They were so near that it was impossible to retreat, especially since the king's party had wearied horses. It only remained to break through, to perish, or to go into captivity. The unterrified king understood this in a flash; therefore he seized the hilt of his sword.

"Cover the king and retreat!" cried Kmita.

Tyzenhauz with twenty men pushed forward in the twinkle of an eye; but Kmita instead of joining them moved on at a sharp trot against the Swedes.

He wore the Swedish dress, the same in which he disguised himself when going out from the cloister. Seeing a horseman coming toward them in such a dress, the Swedes thought perhaps this was some party of their own belonging to the King of Sweden; they did not hasten their pace, but the captain commanding pushed out beyond the first three.

"What people are you?" asked he in Swedish, looking at the threatening and pale face of the young man approaching.

Kmita rode up to him so closely that their knees almost touched, and without speaking a word fired from a pistol directly into his ear.

A shout of terror was rent from the breasts of the Swedish cavalry; but still louder thundered the voice of Pan Andrei, "Strike!"

And like a rock torn from a cliff rolling down, crushing everything in its course, so did he fall on the first rank, bearing death and destruction. The two young Kyemliches, like two bears, sprang after him into the whirl. The clatter of sabres on mail and helmets was heard, like the sound of hammers, and was followed straightway by outcries and groans.

It seemed at the first moment to the astonished Swedes that three giants had fallen upon them in that wild mountain pass. The first three pushed back confused in the presence of the terrible man, and when the succeeding ones had extricated themselves from behind the bend of the pass, those in the rear were thrown back and confused. The horses fell to biting and kicking. The soldiers in the remoter ranks were not able to shoot, nor come to the assistance of those in front, who perished without aid under the blows of the three giants. In vain did they fall, in vain did they present their weapon points; here sabres were breaking, there men and horses fell. Kmita urged his horse till his hoofs were hanging above the heads of the steeds of his opponents, he was raging himself, cutting and thrusting. The blood rushed to his face, and from his eyes fire flashed. All thoughts were quenched in him save one, – he might perish, but he must detain the Swedes. That thought turned in him to a species of wild ecstasy; therefore his powers were trebled, his movements became like those of a leopard, mad, and swift as lightning. With blows of his sabre, which were blows beyond human, he crushed men as a thunderbolt crushes young trees; the twin Kyemliches followed, and the old man, standing a trifle in the rear, thrust his rapier out every moment between his sons, as a serpent thrusts out its bloody tongue.

Meanwhile around the king there rose confusion. The nuncio, as at Jivyets, seized the reins of his horse, and on the other side the bishop of Cracow pulled back the steed with all his force; but the king spurred him till he stood on his hind legs.

"Let me go!" cried the king. "As God lives! We shall pass through the enemy!"

"My Lord, think of the country!" cried the bishop of Cracow.

The king was unable to tear himself from their hands, especially since young Tyzenhauz with all his men closed the road. Tyzenhauz did not go to help Kmita; he sacrificed him, he wanted only to save the king.

"By the passion of our Lord!" cried he, in despair, "those men will perish immediately! Gracious Lord, save yourself while there is time! I will hold them here yet awhile!"

But the stubbornness of the king when once roused reckoned with nothing and no man. Yan Kazimir spurred his horse still more violently, and instead of retreating pushed forward.

But time passed, and each moment might bring with it final destruction.

"I will die on my own soil! Let me go!" cried the king.

Fortunately, against Kmita and the Kyemliches, by reason of the narrowness of the pass, only a small number of men could act at once, consequently they were able to hold out long. But gradually even their powers began to be exhausted. A number of times the rapiers of the Swedes had struck Kmita's body, and his blood began to flow. His eyes were veiled as it were by a mist. The breath halted in his breast. He felt the approach of death; therefore he wanted only to sell his life dearly. "Even one more!" repeated he to himself, and he sent down his steel blade on the head or the shoulder of the nearest horseman, and again he turned to another; but evidently the Swedes felt ashamed, after the first moment of confusion and fear, that four men were able to detain them so long, and they crowded forward with fury; soon the very weight of men and horses drove back the four men, and each moment more swiftly and strongly.

With that Kmita's horse fell, and the torrent covered the rider.

The Kyemliches struggled still for a time, like swimmers who seeing that they are drowning make efforts to keep their heads above the whirl of the sea, but soon they also fell. Then the Swedes moved on like a whirlwind toward the party of the king.

Tyzenhauz with his men sprang against them, and struck them in such fashion that the sound was heard through the mountains.

But what could that handful of men, led by Tyzenhauz, do against a detachment of nearly three hundred strong?

There was no doubt that for the king and his party the fatal hour of death or captivity must come.

Yan Kazimir, preferring evidently the first to the second, freed finally the reins from the hands of the bishops, and pushed forward quickly toward Tyzenhauz. In an instant he halted as if fixed to the earth.

Something uncommon had happened. To spectators it seemed as though the mountains themselves were coming to the aid of the rightful king.

Behold on a sudden the edges of the pass quivered as if the earth were moving from its foundations, as if the pines on the mountain desired to take part in the battle; and logs of wood, blocks of snow and ice, stones, fragments of cliff's, began to roll down with a terrible crash and roar on the ranks of the Swedes crowded in the pass. At the same time an unearthly howl was heard on each side of the narrow place.