Page:Sienkiewicz - The knights of the cross.djvu/161

Rh And approaching the wagon she kissed Matsko's hand.

"Is this you?"

"It is I. But in a wagon, for the Germans shot me."

"What Germans? The war surely was with Tartars! I know that, for I begged papa not a little to take me with him."

"There was war with the Tartars, but we were not at that war, for earlier we were fighting in Lithuania, I and Zbyshko."

"But where is Zbyshko?"

"Dost thou not know that this is Zbyshko?" asked Matsko, with a smile.

"Is that Zbyshko?" cried the girl, looking again at the young knight.

"Of course it is!"

"Give him thy lips for acquaintance!" cried Zyh, joyously.

Yagenka turned briskly toward Zbyshko, but drew back on a sudden, and covering her eyes with her hands said,—

"If I am ashamed?"

"But we are acquainted from childhood," said Zbyshko.

"Ah, we know each other well. I remember, I remember! About eight years ago you and Matsko came to us, and my dead mother brought us nuts and honey. But you, as soon as the older ones went from the room, put a fist to my nose, and ate the nuts yourself."

"He would not do that now," said Matsko. "He has been with Prince Vitold, and in Cracow at the castle, and knows courtly customs."

But something else came to Yagenka' s head, for turning to Zbyshko, she asked,—

"Then it was you who killed the bison?"

"I."

"Let us see where the arrow is."

"You will not see, for it is hidden entirely behind the fore leg."

"Never mind, do not examine," said Zyh. "We all saw how he shot him, and we saw something better yet, for he drew the crossbow in a second without a crank."

Yagenka looked a third time at Zbyshko, but now with astonishment.

"Did you draw the crossbow without a crank?" asked she.

Zbyshko felt, as it were, a certain incredulity in her voice,