Page:Henryk Sienkiewicz - Potop - The Deluge (1898 translation by Jeremiah Curtin) - Vol 1.djvu/410

380 When he had said this, Kmita bent his head and went out In the other room the servants rose at sight of him, but he passed like a drunken man, seeing no one. At the threshold of the room he caught his head with both hands, and began to repeat, almost with a groan, —

"Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews! Jesus, Mary, Joseph!"

With tottering steps he passed through the guard, composed of six men with halberds. Outside the gate were his own men, the sergeant Soroka at the head of them.

"After me!" called Kmita. And he moved through the town toward the inn. Soroka, an old soldier of Kmita's, knowing him perfectly, noticed at once that something uncommon had happened to the colonel.

"Let your soul be on guard," said he quietly to the men; "woe to him on whom his anger falls now!"

The soldiers hastened their steps in silence, but Kmita did not go at a walk; he almost ran, waving his hand and repeating words well-nigh incoherent.

To the ears of Soroka came only broken phrases, —

"Poisoners, faith-breakers, traitors ! Crime and treason, — the two are the same — "

Then he began to mention his old comrades. The names Kokosinski, Kulvyets, Ranitski, Rekuts, and others fell from his lips one after another ; a number of times he mentioned Volodyovski. Soroka heard this with wonder, and grew more and more alarmed; but in his mind he thought, —

"Some one's blood will flow; it cannot be otherwise."

Meanwhile they had come to the inn. Kmita shut himself in his room at once, and for about an hour he gave no sign of life. The soldiers meanwhile had tied on the packs and saddled the horses without order.

"That is no harm," said Soroka; "it is necessary to be ready for everything."

"We too are ready!" answered the old fighters, moving their mustaches.

In fact, it came out soon that Soroka knew his colonel well; for Kmita appeared suddenly in the front room, without a cap, in his trousers and shirt only.

"Saddle the horses!" cried he.

"They are saddled."

"Fasten on the packs!"

"They are fastened."