They marched by the usual road through Mohiloff and Yampol. In Yampol they met the former garrison of Rashkoff, from which two hundred men joined Novoveski by order of the hetman; the rest, under command of Pan Byaloglovski, were to go to Mohiloff, where Pan Bogush was stationed. Pan Adam marched to Rashkoff.
The environs of Rashkoff were a thorough waste; the town itself had been turned into a pile of ashes, which the winds had blown to the four sides of the world; its scant number of inhabitants had fled before the expected storm. It was already the beginning of May, and the Dobrudja horde might show itself at any time; therefore it was unsafe to remain in those regions. In fact, the hordes were with the Turks, on the plain of Kuchunkaury; but men around Rashkoff had no knowledge of that, therefore every one of the former inhabitants, who had escaped the last slaughter, carried off his head in good season whithersoever seemed best to him.
Along the road Lusnia was framing plans and stratagems, which in his opinion Pan Adam should adopt if he wished to outwit the enemy in fact and successfully. He detailed these ideas to the soldiers with graciousness.
“You know nothing of this matter, horse-skulls,” said he; “but I am old, I know. We will go to Rashkoff; we will hide there and wait. The horde will come to the crossing; small parties will cross first, as is their custom, because the chambul stops and waits till they tell if ’tis safe; then we will slip out and drive them before us to Kamenyets.”
“But in this way we may not get that dog brother,” remarked one of the men in the ranks.
“Shut your mouth!” said Lusnia. “Who will go in the vanguard if not the Lithuanian Tartars?”
In fact, the previsions of the sergeant seemed to be coming true. When he reached Rashkoff Pan Adam gave the soldiers rest. All felt certain that they would go next to the caves, of which there were many in the neighborhood, and hide there till the first parties of the enemy appeared. But the second day of their stay the commandant brought the squadron to its feet, and led it beyond Rashkoff.
“Are we going to Yagorlik, or what?” asked the sergeant in his mind.
Meanwhile they approached the river just beyond Rashkoff, and a few “Our Fathers” later they halted at the so-called “Bloody Ford.” Pan Adam, without saying a word, urged his horse into the water and began to cross to the opposite bank. The soldiers looked at one another with astonishment.
“How is this,—are we going to the Turks?” asked one of another. But these were not “gracious gentlemen” of the general militia, ready to summon a meeting and protest, they were simple soldiers inured to the iron discipline of stanitsas; hence the men of the first rank urged their horses into the water after the commandant, and then those in the second and third did the same. There was not the least hesitation. They were astonished that, with three hundred horse, they were marching against the Turkish power, which the whole world could not conquer; but they went. Soon the water was plashing around the horses’ sides; the men ceased to wonder then, and were thinking simply of this, that the sacks of food for themselves and the horses should not get wet. Only on the other bank did they begin to look at one another again.