"Do you think I would let them take me? Have we not people in Zgorzelice, and do I not know how to manage a crossbow or a boar-spear? Let them try! I would chase them back home and even attack them in Rogow or Brzozowa. Father knew very well that he could go to the war and leave me home alone."
Speaking thus, she frowned, and shook the crossbow threateningly, so that
Zbyszko began to laugh, and said:
"You ought to have been a knight and not a girl."
She becoming calmer, answered:
"Cztan guarded me from Wilk and Wilk from Cztan. Then I was also under the abbot's tutelage, and it is well for everyone to let the abbot alone."
"Owa!" answered Zbyszko. "They are all afraid of the abbot! But I, may Saint George help me to speak the truth to you, I would neither be afraid of the abbot, nor of your peasants, nor of yourself; I would take you!"
At this Jagienka stopped on the spot, and fixing her eyes on Zbyszko, asked in a strange, soft, low voice:
"You would take me?"
Then her lips parted and blushing like the dawn, she waited for his answer.
But he evidently was only thinking what he would do, were he in Cztan or Wilk's position; because after a while, he shook his golden hair and said further: