“If I had, I would not give it. The letter remained in Pilvishki.”
“Search him!” cried Kmita.
The soldiers seized the prince again by the arms. Soroka began to search his pockets. After a while he found the letter.
“Here is one document against you and your works,” said Pan Andrei, taking the letter. “The King of Poland will know from it what you have in view; the Swedish King will know too, that although now you are serving him, the prince voevoda reserves to himself freedom to withdraw if the Swedish foot stumbles. All your treasons will come out, all your machinations. But I have, besides, other letters,—to the King of Sweden, to Wittemberg, to Radzeyovski. You are great and powerful; still I am not sure that it will not be too narrow for you in this Commonwealth, when both kings will prepare a recompense worthy of your treasons.”
Prince Boguslav’s eyes gleamed with ill-omened light, but after a while he mastered his anger and said,—
“Well, Cavalier! For life or death between us! We have met! You may cause us trouble and much evil, but I say this: No man has dared hitherto to do in this country what you have done. Woe be to you and to yours!”
“I have a sabre to defend myself, and I have something to redeem my own with,” answered Kmita.
“You have me as a hostage,” said the prince.
And in spite of all his anger he breathed calmly; he understood one thing at this moment, that in no case was his life threatened,—that his person was too much needed by Kmita.
Then they went again at a trot, and after an hour’s ride they saw two horsemen, each of whom led a pair of packhorses. They were Kmita’s men sent in advance from Pilvishki.