But he arose, crossed his hands and said: "So may God help me, that I shall go to Malborg and even across oceans. So may Christ bless me, that I shall look for her until the last breath of my nostrils, and that I shall not cease until I perish. It is easier for me to fight the Germans, and meet them in arms, than for this orphan to moan under ground. Oh, easier! easier!"
And he said that, as always when he mentioned Danusia, with such rapture, with such pain, that his words broke off as if some one had clutched him by the throat.
The princess recognized that it would be useless to turn him aside, and that if anybody wanted to detain him it must be by chaining him and casting him under ground.
But Zbyszko could not leave at once. Knights of that day were not allowed to heed any obstacles, but he was not permitted to break the knightly custom that required the winner in a duel to spend a whole day on the field of combat, until the following midnight, and this in order to show that he remained master of the field of battle and to show his readiness for another fight, should any of the relatives or friends of the defeated wish to challenge him to such.
This custom was even observed by whole armies, which thus sometimes lost advantages which might accrue from haste after the victory. Zbyszko did not even attempt to evade that inexorable law, and refreshing himself, and afterward putting on his armor, he lingered until midnight in the castle yard, under the clouded wintry sky, awaiting the foe that could not come from anywhere.
At midnight, when the heralds finally announced his victory by sound of trumpet, Mikolaj of Dlugolas invited him to supper and at the same time to a council with the prince.
CHAPTER V.
The prince was the first to take the floor at the consultation and spoke as follows:
"It is bad that we have no writing nor testimony against the counts. Although our suspicions may be justified, and I myself think that they and nobody else captured Jurand's daughter, still what of it? They will deny it. And if the grand master asks for proofs, what shall I show him? Bah! even Jurand's letter speaks in their favor."
Here he turned to Zbyszko: