Pan Michael Part 45

"I am the son of Tugai Bey."

"My Azya," said Pan Bogush, after a while, "I do not deny that they may be in love with your blood and the glory of Tugai Bey, though they are our Tartars, and Tugai Bey was our enemy. I understand such things, for even with us there are n.o.bles who say with a certain pride that Hmelnitski was a n.o.ble, and descended, not from the Cossacks, but from our people,--from the Mazovians. Well, though such a rascal that in h.e.l.l a worse is not to be found, they are glad to recognize him, because he was a renowned warrior. Such is the nature of man! But that your blood of Tugai Bey should give you the right to command all Tartars, for this I see no sufficient reason."

Azya was silent for a time; then he rested his palms on his thighs, and said, "Then I will tell you; Krychinski and other Tartars obey me. For besides this, that they are simple Tartars and I a prince, there are resources and power in me. But neither you know them, nor does the hetman himself know them."

"What resources, what power?"

"I do not know how to tell you," answered Azya, in Russian. "But why am I ready to do things that another would not dare? Why have I thought of that of which another would not have thought?"

"What do you say? Of what have you thought?"

"I have thought of this,--that if the hetman would give me the will and the right, I would bring back, not merely the captains, but would put half the horde in the service of the hetman. Is there little vacant land in the Ukraine and the Wilderness? Let the hetman only announce that if a Tartar comes to the Commonwealth he will be a n.o.ble, will not be oppressed in his faith, and will serve in a squadron of his own people, that all will have their own hetman, as the Cossacks have, and my head for it, the whole Ukraine will be swarming soon. The Lithuanian Tartars will come; they will come from the South; they will come from Dobrudja and Belgrod; they will come from the Crimea; they will drive their flocks, and bring their wives and children in wagons. Do not shake your head, your grace; they will come!--as those came long ago who served the Commonwealth faithfully for generations. In the Crimea and everywhere the Khan and the murzas oppress the people; but in the Ukraine they will have their sabres, and take the field under their own hetman. I swear to you that they will come, for they suffer from hunger there from time to time. Now, if it is announced among the villages that I, by the authority of the hetman, call them,--that Tugai Bey's son calls,--thousands will come here."

Pan Bogush seized his own head: "By the wounds of G.o.d, Azya, whence did such thoughts come to you? What would there be?"

"There would be in the Ukraine a Tartar nation, as there is a Cossack.

You have granted privileges to the Cossacks, and a hetman. Why should you not grant them to us? You ask what there would be. There would not be what there is now,--a second Hmelnitski,--for we should have put foot at once on the throat of the Cossack; there would not be an uprising of peasants, slaughter and ruin; there would be no Doroshenko, for let him but rise, and I should be the first to bring him on a halter to the feet of the hetman. And should the Turkish power think to move against us, we would beat the Sultan; were the Khan to threaten raids, we would beat the Khan. Is it so long since the Lithuanian Tartars, and those of Podolia, did the like, though remaining in the Mohammedan faith? Why should we do otherwise? We are of the Commonwealth, we are n.o.ble. Now, calculate. The Ukraine in peace, the Cossacks in check, protection against Turkey, a number of tens of thousands of additional troops,--this is what I have been thinking; this is what came to my head; this is why Krychinski, Adurovich, Moravski, Tarasovski, obey me; this is why one half the Crimea will roll to those steppes when I raise the call."

Pan Bogush was as much astonished and weighed down by the words of Azya as if the walls of that room in which they were sitting had opened on a sudden, and new, unknown regions had appeared to his eyes. For a long time he could not utter a word, and merely gazed on the young Tartar; but Azya began to walk with great strides up and down in the room. At last he said,--

"Without me this cannot be done, for I am the son of Tugai Bey; and from the Dnieper to the Danube there is no greater name among the Tartars." After a while he added: "What are Krychinski, Tarasovski, and others to me? It is not a question of them alone, or of some thousands of Lithuanian or Podolian Tartars, but of the whole Commonwealth. They say that in spring a great war will rise with the power of the Sultan; but only give me permission, and I will cause such a seething among the Tartars that the Sultan himself will scald his hands."

"In G.o.d's name, who are you, Azya?" cried Pan Bogush.

The young man raised his head: "The coming hetman of the Tartars!"

A gleam of the fire fell at that moment on Azya, lighting his face, which was at once cruel and beautiful. And it seemed to Pan Bogush that some new man was standing before him, such was the greatness and pride beating from the person of the young Tartar. Pan Bogush felt also that Azya was speaking the truth. If such a proclamation of the hetman were published, all the Lithuanian and Podolian Tartars would return without fail, and very many of the wild Tartars would follow them. The old n.o.ble knew pa.s.sing well the Crimea, in which he had been twice as a captive, and, ransomed by the hetman, had been afterward an envoy; he knew the court of Bagchesarai; he knew the hordes living from the Don to the Dobrudja; he knew that in winter many villages were depopulated by hunger; he knew that the despotism and rapacity of the Khan's baskaks were disgusting to the murzas; that in the Crimea itself it came often to rebellion; he understood at once, then, that rich lands and privileges would entice without fail all those for whom it was evil, narrow, or dangerous in their old homesteads. They would be enticed most surely if the son of Tugai Bey raised the call. He alone could do this,--no other. He, through the renown of his father, might rouse villages, involve one half of the Crimea against the other half, bring in the wild horde of Belgrod, and shake the whole power of the Khan,--nay, even that of the Sultan. Should the hetman desire to take advantage of the occasion, he might consider Tugai Bey's son as a man sent by Providence itself.

Pan Bogush began then to look with another eye on Azya, and to wonder more and more how such thoughts could be hatched in his head. And the sweat was in drops like pearl on the forehead of the knight, so immense did those thoughts seem to him. Still, doubt remained yet in his soul; therefore he said, after a while,--

"And do you know that there would have to be war with Turkey over such a question?"

"There will be war as it is. Why did they command the horde to march to Adrianople? There will be war unless dissensions rise in the Sultan's dominions; and if it comes to taking the field, half the horde will be on our side."

"For every point the rogue has an argument," thought Pan Bogush. "It turns one's head," said he, after a while, "You see, Azya, in every case it is not an easy thing. What would the king say, what the chancellor, the estates, and all the n.o.bles, for the greater part hostile to the hetman?"

"I need only the permission of the hetman on paper; and when we are once here, let them drive us out! Who will drive us out, and with what?

You would be glad to squeeze the Zaporojians out of the Saitch, but you cannot in any way."

"The hetman will dread the responsibility."

"Behind the hetman will be fifty thousand sabres of the horde, besides the troops which he has in hand."

"But the Cossacks? Do you forget the Cossacks? They will begin opposition at once."

"We are needed here specially to keep a sword hanging over the Cossack neck. Through whom has Doroshenko support? Through the Tartars! Let me take the Tartars in hand, Doroshenko must beat with his forehead to the hetman."

Here Azya stretched out his palm and opened his fingers like the talons of an eagle; then he grasped after the hilt of his sabre. "This is the way we will show the Cossacks law! They will become serfs, and we will hold the Ukraine. Do you hear, Pan Bogush? You think that I am a small man; but I am not so small as it seems to Novoveski, the commandant of this place, and you, Pan Bogush. Behold, I have been thinking over this day and night, till I have grown thin, till my face is sunken. Look at it, your grace; it has grown black. But what I have thought out, I have thought out well; and therefore I tell you that in me there are resources and power. You see yourself that these are great things. Go to the hetman, but go quickly. Lay the question before him; let him give me a letter touching this matter, and I shall not care about the estates. The hetman has a great soul; the hetman will know that this is power and resource. Tell the hetman that I am Tugai Bey's son; that I alone can do this. Lay it before him, let him consent to it; but in G.o.d's name, let it be done in time, while there is snow on the steppe, before spring, for in spring there will be war! Go at once and return at once, so that I may know quickly what I am to do."

Pan Bogush did not observe even that Azya spoke in a tone of command, as if he were a hetman giving instructions to his officer. "To-morrow I will rest," said he; "and after to-morrow I will set out. G.o.d grant me to find the hetman in Yavorov! Decision is quick with him, and soon you will have an answer."

"What does your grace think,--will the hetman consent?"

"Perhaps he will command you to come to him; do not go to Rashkoff, then, at present,--you can go more quickly to Yavorov from this place.

Whether he will agree, I know not; but he will take the matter under prompt consideration, for you present powerful reasons. By the living G.o.d, I did not expect this of you; but I see now that you are an uncommon man, and that the Lord G.o.d predestined you to greatness. Well, Azya, Azya! Lieutenant in a Tartar squadron, nothing more, and such things are in his head that fear seizes a man! Now I shall not wonder even if I see a heron-feather in your cap, and a bunchuk above you. I believe now what you tell me,--that these thoughts have been burning you in the nighttime. I will go at once, the day after to-morrow; but I will rest a little. Now I will leave you, for it is late, and my head is as noisy as a saw-mill. Be with G.o.d, Azya! My temples are aching as if I had been drunk. Be with G.o.d, Azya, son of Tugai Bey!"

Here Pan Bogush pressed the thin hand of the Tartar, and turned toward the door; but on the threshold he stopped again, and said, "How is this? New troops for the Commonwealth; a sword ready above the neck of the Cossack; Doroshenko conquered; dissension in the Crimea; the Turkish power weakened; an end to the raids against Russia,--for G.o.d's sake!"

When he had said this. Pan Bogush went out. Azya looked after him a while, and whispered, "But for me a bunchuk, a baton, and, with consent or without, she. Otherwise woe to you!"

Then he finished the gorailka, and threw himself on to the bed, covered with skins. The fire had gone down in the chimney; but through the window came in the clear rays of the moon, which had risen high in the cold wintry sky. Azya lay for some time quietly, but evidently was unable to sleep. At last he rose, approached the window, and looked at the moon, sailing like a s.h.i.+p through the infinite solitudes of heaven.

The young Tartar looked at it long; at last he placed his fists on his breast, pointed both thumbs upward, and from the mouth of him who barely an hour before had confessed Christ, came, in a half-chant, a half-drawl, in a melancholy key,--

"La Allah illa Allah! Mahomet Rossul Allah!"

CHAPTER x.x.x.

Meanwhile Basia was holding counsel from early morning with her husband and Pan Zagloba how to unite two loving and straitened hearts. The two men laughed at her enthusiasm, and did not cease to banter her; still, yielding to her usually in everything, as to a spoiled child, they promised at last to a.s.sist her.

"The best thing," said Zagloba, "is to persuade old Novoveski not to take the girl with him to Rashkoff; tell him that the frosts have come, and that the road is not perfectly safe. Here the young people will see each other often, and fall in love with all their might."

"That is a splendid idea," cried Basia.

"Splendid or not," said Zagloba, "do not let them out of your sight.

You are a woman, and I think this way,--you will solder them at last, for a woman carries her point always; but see to it that the Devil does not carry his point in the mean while. That would be a shame for you, since the affair is on your responsibility."

Basia began first of all to spit at Pan Zagloba, like a cat; then she said, "You boast that you were a Turk in your youth, and you think that every one is a Turk. Azya is not that kind."

"Not a Turk, only a Tartar. Pretty image! She would vouch for Tartar love."

"They are both thinking more of weeping, and that from harsh sorrow.

Eva, besides, is a most honest maiden."

"Still, she has a face as if some one had written on her forehead, 'Here are lips for you!' Ho! she is a daw. Yesterday I fixed it in my mind that when she sits opposite a nice fellow, her sighs are such that they drive her plate forward time after time, and she must push it back again. A real daw, I tell you."

"Do you wish me to go to my own room?" asked Basia.

"You will not go when it is a question of match-making. I know you,--you'll not go! But still 'tis too early for you to make matches; for that is the business of women with gray hair. Pani Boski told me yesterday that when she saw you returning from the battle in trousers, she thought that she was looking at Pani Volodyovski's son, who had gone to the woods on an expedition. You do not love dignity; but dignity, too, does not love you, which appears at once from your slender form. You are a regular student, as G.o.d is dear to me! There is another style of women in the world now. In my time, when a woman sat down, the chair squeaked in such fas.h.i.+on that you might think some one had sat on the tail of a dog; but as to you, you might ride bareback on a tom-cat without great harm to the beast. They say, too, that women who begin to make matches will have no posterity."

"Do they really say that?" asked the little knight, alarmed.

But Zagloba began to laugh; and Basia, putting her rosy face to the face of her husband, said, in an undertone, "Ah, Michael, at a convenient time we will make a pilgrimage to Chenstohova; then maybe the Most Holy Lady will change matters."

"That is the best way indeed," said Zagloba.