Here he balled his gigantic fist, and began to approach them. Then Mirski said threateningly, “Shout not, and remember that you are speaking to superiors.”
Kovalski quivered, and straightened himself involuntarily; for really his dignity in presence of such a Mirski was nothing, and all his prisoners were a head above him in rank and significance.
Stankyevich added: “If you have been commanded to take us, take us; but raise no voice, for to-morrow you may be under the command of any one of us.”
Kovalski stared and was silent.
“There is no doubt you have fooled away your head, Pan Roh,” said Oskyerko. “To say, as you do, that we helped him is nonsense; for, to begin with, we were sleeping, just as you were, and secondly, each one would have helped himself rather than another. But you have fooled away your head. There is no one to blame here but you. I would be the first to order you shot, since being an officer you fell asleep like a badger, and allowed a prisoner to escape in your own helmet and cloak, nay, on your own horse,—an unheard of thing, such as has not happened since the beginning of the world.”
“An old fox has fooled the young man!” said Mirski. “Jesus, Mary! I have not even the sabre!” cried Kovalski.
“Will not the sabre be of use to him?” asked Stankyevich, laughing. “Pan Oskyerko has said well,—you have fooled away your head. You must have had pistols in the holsters too?”
“I had!” said Kovalski, as if out of his mind.
Suddenly he seized his head with both hands: “And the letter of the prince to the commandant of Birji! What shall I, unfortunate man, do now? I am lost for the ages! God give me a bullet in the head!”
“That will not miss you,” said Mirski, seriously. “How will you take us to Birji now? What will happen if you say that you have brought us as prisoners, and we, superior in rank, say that you are to be thrown into the dungeon? Whom will they believe? Do you think that the Swedish commandant will detain us for the reason simply that Pan Kovalski will beg him to do so? He will rather believe us, and confine you under ground.”