"True," said the lieutenant; "but why has he fled with her across the Dnieper, instead of going to Lubni or Chernigoff?"
"Well, quiet your mind, my dear fellow! I know that Zagloba. He drank with me and borrowed money of me. He does not care for money,--either his own or another man's. If he has his own he will spend it, and he won't repay another's if he borrows; but that he would undertake such a deed I do not believe."
"He is a frivolous man," said Pan Yan.
"Frivolous he may be, but he is a trickster who will outwit any man, and slip out of every danger himself. And as the priest with prophetic spirit said that God would give her back to you, so will it be; for it is just that every sincere affection should be rewarded. Console yourself with this hope, as I console myself."
Here Pan Longin began to sigh deeply, and after a while added: "Let us inquire once more at the castle. Maybe they passed by here."
They inquired everywhere, but to no purpose. There was not a trace even of the passage of the fugitives. The castle was full of nobles with their wives and children, who had shut themselves in against the Cossacks. The prince endeavored to persuade them to go with him, and warned them that the Cossacks were following in his tracks. They did not dare to attack the army, but it was likely they would attack the castle and the town after his departure. The nobles in the castle, however, were strangely blinded.
"We are safe behind the forests," said they to the prince. "No one will come to us here."
"But I have passed through these forests," said he.
"You have passed, but the rabble will not. These are not the forests for them."
The nobles refused to go, continuing in their blindness, for which they paid dearly later on. After the passage of the prince the Cossacks came quickly. The castle was defended manfully for three weeks, then was captured and all in it were cut to pieces. The Cossacks committed terrible cruelties, and no one took vengeance on them.