"Husband, I love you! I will save you!"
And with these words, pressing a spring in a corner of the room, she disclosed the secret passage by which the veteran Krizsanowski had come to her, and of which Constantine knew nothing.
"We must be quick! These stairs lead down to the garden gate."
The tapestried door was backed with iron; the assailants could not force it. Johanna threw a cloak about her, not mentioning her wound, and seizing her husband's hand led him hurriedly through the familiar passage until they had reached the gate of the subterranean way under the garden.
They were saved. But only for a brief period. From the adjacent city of Warsaw resounded the clang of alarm-bells: the insurrection had triumphed.
Outside the walls of Lazienka they met with a mounted lancer. Calling to him, the Viceroy bade him dismount and give him his horse, and, springing on to it, he lifted Johanna behind him and galloped away.
But the lancer making haste to inform the insurgents of the Viceroy's flight, he was quickly followed.
A division of lancers reached the fugitives in the forest of Bjelograd. The double burden was too much for the horse. The leader of the troops was Krizsanowski himself.
As they came up to her husband Johanna encircled him with her arms.
"Only through my body do you reach his!"