"He may indeed have been your son," slowly answered the old man, to whom strength had returned at this critical moment, "but now he is mine alone; he is my child. You see he does not know his mother, that when his father calls him he runs to me. I have reared him by the labour of my old age, by taking the bread from my own mouth. No one shall take him from me; Radionek will never leave me."
The mother, as she heard this, sobbed aloud. Jan Druzyna held her; but he himself blushed, trembled, and various expressions passed over his countenance.
"Listen, old man," he cried, "whether you will or no, you will be obliged to give up this child, whose caresses we have longed for so many years."
"If I should give him up to you, he would not go with you," answered Iermola; "he does not know you. He would not abandon the old man who has brought him up."
Radionek stood motionless, pale, and troubled. His mother held out her hands to him; her eyes sought his; her lips sought his lips. The mysterious power of maternal feeling roused itself to draw him to her; and the boy's eyes filled with tears.
"Anything for your son, anything you can ask!" cried Jan Druzyna.
"And what should I take from you?" replied the old man, indignantly. "What could you give me which would supply the place of my beloved, my only child? I ask nothing of you,--nothing but permission to die near him and to die in peace."
As he spoke, the old man burst into tears; his limbs shook, and he leaned against the wall to keep from falling. Radionek held him up, and helped him to sit down again on the door-sill; and Iermola, laying his hand on the child's fair head, kissed him passionately. The young mother wrung her hands in despair; her grief increased, and she became beside herself. At last she threw herself upon her child, ardent and strong as a lioness, and strained him in her maternal arms.
"You are mine!" she cried, choked by her tears; "you are mine!"
And already Radionek no longer sought to avoid her caresses; he had just received his mother's first kiss,--a kiss so sweet, so penetrating, so long awaited.