“I’ll go and find the prisoner. He can’t have ridden far in this storm; and I know his road.”
“But your arm is broken.”
“We can tie it up while he gets the horses.”
“Tell me why you set him free, Karasch,” I said, as Gartski and Andreas went out. “And while you talk I’ll see to your arm.” I examined it, and found the fracture in the upper arm; and having set it as best I could I dressed it and bound it up while he spoke.
“On account of the woman,” he said. “I know the man, and he told me about her. She’s a witch and a thief and worse, and comes from Belgrade. She murdered a child, and was being sent to Maglai, in the hills, to be imprisoned; and this morning cast a spell over the men who were taking her and escaped. They were to have a big sum of money if they got her safe to Maglai, and the man promised me a share of it if I’d let him go back and bring his friends here to retake her. I have no mercy for a witch. God curse them all;” and he crossed himself earnestly and spat on the ground.
“She is no witch, Karasch, but just a girl in a plight.”
“A witch can look just as she pleases. You don’t know them, Burgwan”—this was how they pronounced my name. “She was an old woman when she left Belgrade. My friend told me that; and she’s been growing younger every hour. She’s known to be a hundred years old at least. She’s cast her spell over you.”
This was true enough; although not in the sense he meant. He was so obviously in earnest that I saw it was useless to attempt to argue him out of his superstition.
“Well, witch or no witch, spell or no spell, I am going to see her into safety,” I answered firmly.
“You’ll live to rue it, Burgwan. If I help you, it’s because I serve you; not to serve her, God’s curse on her;” and he crossed himself again and spat again, as he always did when he spoke of her. “If you want to be safe from her spells and the devil, her master, you’d better twist her neck at midnight and lop off her hands. It’s the only way to break the spell when once cast.”