Billevich raised the letter again to his eyes.
“Not wishing to trouble you and expose your health to hazard in the present stormy times while getting this money, we have ordered ourselves to get it and count it.”
At this point Billevich’s voice failed, and the letter fell from his hands to the floor. For a while it seemed that speech was taken from the noble, for he only caught after his hair and pulled it with all his power.
“Strike, whoso believes in God!” cried he at last.
“One injustice the more, the punishment of God nearer; for the measure will soon be filled,” said Olenka.
CHAPTER XLV.
The despair of the sword-bearer was so great that Olenka had to comfort him, and give assurance that the money was not to be looked on as lost, for the letter itself would serve as a note; and Radzivill, the master of so many estates in Lithuania and Russia, had something from which to recover.
But since it was difficult to foresee what might still meet them, especially if Boguslav returned to Taurogi victorious, they began to think of flight the more eagerly.
Olenka advised to defer everything till Kettling’s recovery; for Braun was a gloomy and surly old soldier, carrying out commands blindly, and it was impossible to influence him.
As to Kettling, the lady knew well that he had wounded himself to remain in Taurogi; hence her deep faith that he would do everything to aid her. It is true that conscience disturbed her incessantly with the question whether for self-safety she had the right to sacrifice the career, and perhaps the life, of another; but the terrors hanging over her in Taurogi were so dreadful that they surpassed a hundredfold the dangers to which Kettling could be exposed.