Zbrojek, into whose head this idea must have come, said, as if in answer to these thoughts of Miller: “It is certain that everything is in a storm now in our Commonwealth. Let only such a Kmita shout, hundreds and thousands will surround him, especially after what he has done.”
“But what can he effect?” asked Miller.
“Remember, your worthiness, that that man brought Hovanski to desperation, and Hovanski had, counting the Cossacks, six times as many men as we. Not a transport will come to us without his permission, the country houses are destroyed, and we are beginning to feel hunger. Besides, this Kmita may join with Jegotski and Kulesha; then he will have several thousand sabres at his call. He is a grievous man, and may become most harmful.”
“Are you sure of your soldiers?”
“Surer than of myself,” answered Zbrojek, with brutal frankness.
“How surer?”
“For, to tell the truth, we have all of us enough of this siege.”
“I trust that it will soon come to an end.”
“Only the question is: How? But for that matter to capture this fortress is at present as great a calamity as to retire from it.”
Meanwhile they had reached the little barn. Miller dismounted, after him the officers, and all entered. The soldiers had removed Kuklinovski from the beam, and covering him with a rug laid him on his back on remnants of straw. The bodies of three soldiers lay at one side, placed evenly one by the other.