CHAPTER IV.
The company which Kabilovitsch and the children had joined was halted at the edge of the great camp. Other peasants and non-combatants crowded in from their desolated homes; but neither Milosch's face, nor Helena's, nor yet little Michael's, were among those they anxiously scanned. The command of King Vladislaus secured for the three favored refugees every comfort which the rude soldiers could furnish. The boy and girl were soon asleep by a fire, while the old man lay close beside them, that no one could approach without arousing him. He, however, could not sleep. On the one side was the noisy revelry of the victors; on the other, the darkness of the plain. Here and there were groups of soldiers, and beyond them an occasional gleam of the spear-head of some sentinel, who, saluting his comrade, turned at the end of his beat.
The dusky form of a huge man attracted Kabilovitsch's eye. As the stranger drew near, his long bear-skin cape terminating above in a rough and ungraceful hood, and his long pointed shoes with blocks of wood for their soles, indicated that he was some peasant. He seemed to be wandering about with no other aim than to keep himself warm. Yet Kabilovitsch noted that he lingered as he passed by the various groups, as if to scan the faces of his fellow-sufferers.
"Heaven grant that all his kids be safe to-night!" muttered the old man.
As the walking figure passed across the line of a fagot fire, he revealed a splendid form; too straight for one accustomed to bend at his daily toil.
"A mountaineer? a hunter?" thought Kabilovitsch, "for the field-tillers are all round of shoulder, and bow-backed. But no! His tread is too firm and heavy for that sort of life. One's limbs are springy, agile, who climbs the crags. A hunter will use the toes more in stepping."
Kabilovitsch's curiosity could not keep his eyes from growing heavy with the cold and the flicker of the fire light, when they were forced wide open again by the approach of the stranger. The old man felt, rather than saw, that he was being closely studied from behind the folds of the hood which the wanderer drew close over his face, to keep out the cutting wind which swept in gusts down from the mountains. He passed very near, and was talking to himself, as is apt to be the custom of men who lead lonely lives.
"It is bitter cold," he said, with chattering teeth, "bitter cold, by the beard of Moses!"
The last words startled Kabilovitsch so that he gave a sudden motion. The stranger noticed it and paused. Gazing intently upon the old man, who had now assumed a sitting posture, he addressed him—
"By the beard of Moses! it's an awful night, neighbor."