“Enough, friend,” replied the captain in a kindly voice, “the Lord be with you. Put away this seditious project, disperse to your houses and no one will hurt you. You may return to live happily in your villages. You will pay a double tax; and that’s all.”
“Ah captain, tell that to children in arms; we folks know what we have to expect. Fine talk, and there it ends.”
“I swear, upon my honour, to let every one of you go free without hurt,” exclaimed Pirsky. He spoke the truth; he really had decided to let them off, contrary to the decree, on his own responsibility, if they would only surrender.
“But why should we waste our strength in shouting, our voices might give way.” “I am getting hoarse,” he added with a smile. “The window is so high I can scarcely hear. Look here! Drop a leather line and I will fasten myself to it and you can pull me up through the window, but a wider one than this. I could not get through this one. I am alone, you are many; there is nothing for you to fear. We will talk, and with God’s help we may come to an understanding.”
“To what purpose should we talk? How can we, destitute beggars, vie with such as you,” answered Cornelius, sarcastically revelling in his power and superiority, “between us and you there is a great gulf fixed; none of our people, if he wished, could go to you, none of yours could join us. I would advise you, Captain, to go back. We shall light up directly.”
The window was flung to. Again silence ensued, only the wind rustled in the tree tops, and the crickets chirped from the swamps.
The captain returned to his soldiers and treated each man to a glass of vodka. “We will not fight with them,” he said, “there are but few men among them, mostly women and children. We will break open the door and catch them without any weapons.”
The soldiers prepared ropes, hatchets, ladders, pails and barrels full of water, and long poles each ending with an iron hook, to haul the human beings out of the flames. At last when it was quite dark the men approached the chapel along the border of the wood, then across the glade on all-fours, hiding in the tall grass and behind bushes like sportsmen beating their game.
Arrived at the chapel, which was still as the grave, they began to put up their ladders.