Page:Sienkiewicz - The knights of the cross.djvu/126

102 and Father Stanislav of Skarbimir, who bore a crucifix, walked Zbyshko.

All eyes were turned to him; from every window and balcony female forms bent forward. Zbyshko advanced dressed in the white jacket which he had won; it was embroidered with gold griffins and adorned at the bottom with a beautiful gold fringe. In this brilliant attire he seemed to the eyes of the audience a prince, or a youth of some lofty house. From his stature, his shoulders, evident under the closely fitting dress, from his strong limbs and broad breast, he seemed a man quite mature, but above that stature of a man rose a head almost childlike, and a youthful face, with the first down on its lips, which was at the same time the face of a royal page, with golden hair cut evenly above his brows and let down long on his shoulders.

Zbyshko advanced with even and springy tread, but with a pallid face. At moments he looked at the throng, as if at something in a dream; at moments he raised his eyes to the towers of the churches, to the flocks of doves, and to the swinging bells, which were sounding out his last hour to him; at moments also there was reflected on his face, as it were, wonderment that those sounds and the sobs of women, and all that solemnity were intended for him. Finally he saw on the square from afar the scaffold, and on it the red outline of the executioner. He quivered and made the sign of the cross on himself; at that moment the priest gave him the crucifix to kiss. A few steps farther on a bunch of star thistles thrown by a young maiden, fell at his feet. Zbyshko bent down, raised it, and smiled at the maiden, who burst into loud weeping. But he thought evidently that in presence of those crowds, and in presence of women waving handkerchiefs from the windows, he ought to die bravely, and leave behind the memory of a "valiant youth" at the least. So he exerted all his courage and will; with a sudden movement he threw back his hair, raised his head higher, and advanced haughtily, almost like a victor in knightly tournaments which he had finished, a victor whom men were conducting to receive his reward.

The advance was slow, for in front the throng became denser and denser, and gave way unwillingly. In vain did the Lithuanian crossbowmen, who moved in the first rank, cry continually: "Eyk shalin! Eyk shalin!" (Out of the road!). People had no wish to know what those words meant—and crowded the more. Though the citizens of