"Soon! soon!" groaned the mandatar, falling back on a chair. It chanced to be the fauteuil near the palms and things. The comedy was being changed into tragedy.
Bogdan recovered himself first. "I do not believe," he said, "that Taras is in the neighbourhood and likely to attack you in your chambers or on your way back to the town; but we will hold ourselves prepared for the worst. Stay here for the night. I'll have the gates closed, my men can be armed, and I will send for assistance to the main guardhouse."
And so he did, but the protection he was able to hold out to his worthy son-in-law proved of the poorest nevertheless. The officer on duty sent back orders not to trouble him with idle tales; and, concerning his own servants, Bogdan knew that they would throw down their arms at the first sight of danger.
"If Taras indeed were to come, I cannot protect you," he confessed to the mandatar. "We are not without neighbours, but none of them would stir to help us."
And with this agreeable assurance they kept watching through the night.
CHAPTER XIII.
[THE BANNER UNFURLED.]
The excitement of the people of Zulawce rose steadily as the Easter sun was sinking to its rest. The cottages stood forsaken; the community had gathered beneath the linden. The men were fully armed and many a fierce threat was uttered against the "villain in the iron closet"; but the peasants seemed fully resolved to take no part whatever in the coming work of revenge. None of the inmates or dependents of the manor-house were present. The under-steward, Boleslaw, had ordered the gates to be closed, addressing his men in the courtyard. "Let us not act foolishly," he said. "There is no doubt but that Taras will come, since the report of the iron closet is so fully believed in; but he will not harm us, if we open the doors to him to let him see that there is no such thing as an iron closet in the place, and that the mandatar is not with us. Our only fear is that the peasantry may grow revengeful, and attack us when he is gone. Let us be ready to resist them, but we will not fight Taras."
Nor had any of Anusia's people joined the public gathering; her orders had been sufficient. She herself was sitting in the large family-room, holding little Tereska on her lap, while her boys pressed close to her with an indefinable fear. The children dared not speak, for the mother seemed sunk in that strange stupor which had kept her to the bed of sickness but lately.
Father Leo and the little popadja found her thus. A greeting was exchanged, but conversation would not flow. It was impossible to talk of indifferent matters, and they shrank from touching upon that which filled their hearts. So they sat silent, a red light streaming in through the windows; for the sun, like a glowing ball of fire, was sinking behind the fir-covered uplands.