Zbyszko did not answer, but began to breathe heavily; the Czech was silent for a while, then he said:
"If you wish me to hasten to Bogdaniec, I will go. Perhaps you will be glad to see the old lord, because God only knows whether you will recover."
"What does the ksiondz Wyszoniek say?" asked Zbyszko.
"The ksiondz Wyszoniek says that he will know when the new moon comes.
There are four days before the new moon."
"Hej! then you need not go to Bogdaniec, because I will either die, or I will be well before my uncle could come."
"Could you not send a letter to Bogdaniec? Sanderus will write one. Then they will know about you, and will engage a mass for you."
"Let me rest now, because I am very ill. If I die, you will return to
Zgorzelice and tell how everything happened; then they can engage a mass.
I suppose they will bury me here or in Ciechanow."
"I think they will bury you in Ciechanow or in Przasnysz, because only the Kurpie are buried in the forest, and the wolves howl over their graves. I heard that the prince intends to return with the court to Ciechanow in two days' time, and then to Warszawa."
"They would not leave me here alone," answered Zbyszko.
He guessed correctly, because that same day the princess asked the prince's permission to remain in the house in the wilderness, with Danusia and the ladies-in-waiting, and also with the ksiondz Wyszoniek, who was opposed to carrying Zbyszko to Przasnysz. Sir de Lorche at the end of two days felt better, and he was able to leave his bed; but having learned that the ladies intended to remain, he stayed also, in order to accompany them on their journey and defend them in case the "Saracens" attacked them. Whence the "Saracens" could come, the Lotaringer did not know. It is true that the people in the East used thus to call the Litwins; but from them no danger could threaten Kiejstut's daughter, Witold's sister and the first cousin of the mighty "Krakowski king," Jagiello. But Sir de Lorche had been among the Knights of the Cross for so long a time, that notwithstanding all he had heard in Mazowsze about the baptism of the Litwa, and about the union of the two crowns on the head of one ruler, he could not believe that any one could expect any good from the Litwins. Thus the Knights of the Cross had made him believe, and he had not yet entirely lost all faith in their words.