“Indeed!” answered Kmita; and urging forward his horse, he pushed Zavratynski away, and seizing the reins of the prince’s horse, he looked Boguslav straight in the face. “And how is my horse? Have I added even one virtue?”
“A good horse!” answered the prince. “If you wish, I will buy him.”
“This horse deserves a better fate than to carry a traitor till his death.”
“You are a fool, Pan Kmita.”
“Yes, for I believed the Radzivills.”
Again came a moment of silence, which was broken by the prince.
“Tell me, Pan Kmita, are you sure that you are in your right mind, that your reason has not left you? Have you asked yourself what you have done, madman? Has it not come to your head that as things are now it would have been better for you if your mother had not given you birth, and that no one, not only in Poland, but in all Europe, would have ventured on such a dare-devil deed?”
“Then it is clear that there is no great courage in that Europe, for I have carried off your highness, hold you, and will not let you go.”
“It can only be an affair with a madman,” said the prince, as if to himself.
“My gracious prince,” answered Pan Andrei, “you are in my hands; be reconciled to that, and waste not words in vain. Pursuit will not come up, for your men think to this moment that you have come off with me voluntarily. When my men took you by the arms no one saw it, for the dust covered us; and even if there were no dust, neither the equerries nor the guards could have seen, it was so far. They will wait for you two hours; the third hour they will be impatient, the fourth and fifth uneasy, and the sixth will send out men in search; but we meanwhile shall be beyond Maryapole.”