Page:Taras Bulba. A Tale of the Cossacks. 1916.djvu/170

164 Taras looked at the Jew, and wondered how he had already succeeded in entering the city.—"What enemy took you there?"

"I'll tell you at once," said Yankel. "As soon as I heard the uproar at daybreak, and the kazáks began to fire, I seized my kaftan, and without stopping to put it on, ran at the top of my speed, thrusting my arms in on the way, because I wanted to know, as soon as possible, the cause of the noise, and why the kazáks were firing at dawn. I took and ran to the very gate of the city, at the moment when the last of the troops were passing through. I look—and at the head of the file is Cornet Galyandovich. He is a man well known to me: he has owed me a hundred ducats for more than two years past. I ran after him, as though to claim the debt of him, and so entered the city with them."

"So you entered the city, and wanted him to settle the debt!" said Taras; "and he didn't order you to be hung on the spot, like a dog?"

"God is my witness that he did want to hang me," replied the Jew: "his servants had already seized me, and thrown a rope about my neck. But I besought the nobleman, and said that I would wait for my money as long as he liked, and promised to send him more if only he would help me to collect my debts from the other knights; for I will