In the distance the waters of the Dnieper were gleaming in a pale, fugitive light. Around them reigned absolute stillness. It was the stillness that roused him. The cannon of Kudák had ceased to roar.
"What is that?" thought Krechovski. "The first attack is repulsed, or maybe Kudák is taken?"
But that was unlikely. No; the beaten Cossacks were lying somewhere at a distance from the fortress, licking their wounds, and the one-eyed Grodzitski was looking at them through the port-hole, aiming his guns anew. To-morrow they would repeat the storm, and again break their teeth. The day had now come. Krechovski roused the men in his own boat, and sent a boat for Flick. Flick came at once.
"Colonel," said Krechovski, "if the castellan does not come before evening, and if the storm is repeated during the night, we will move to the relief of the fortress."
"My men are ready," answered Flick.
"Issue powder and balls to them."
"I have done so."
"We land during the night and go by the steppe in the greatest quiet. We will come upon them with a surprise."
"Gut! sehr gut! But mightn't we go on a little in the boats? It is twenty miles to the fortress,--rather far for infantry."
"The infantry will mount Cossack horses."
"Gut! sehr gut!"
"Let the men lie quietly in the reeds, not go on shore; make no noise, kindle no fires, for smoke would betray us. We must not be revealed."
"There is such a fog that the smoke will not be seen."
Indeed the river, the inlet overgrown with reeds, in which the boats were hidden, and the steppe were covered as far as the eye could see with a white, impenetrable fog. But it was only the beginning of day; so the fog might rise and uncover the expanse of the steppe.
Flick departed. The men in the boats woke gradually. Krechovski's commands to keep quiet and take the morning meal without tumult were made known. No person going along the shore or sailing in the middle of the river would have even imagined that in the adjoining thicket several thousand men were hidden. The horses were fed from the hand, so that they should not neigh. The boats, covered with fog, lay tied up in the reeds. Here and there only passed a small two-oared boat carrying biscuits and commands; with this exception, the silence of the grave reigned everywhere.
Suddenly in the reeds, rushes, and shore-grass all around the inlet were heard strange and very numerous voices, calling,--
"Pugú! pugú!"
Then quiet. "Pugú! pugú!"
And again silence, as if those voices, calling on the banks, waited for an answer.
But there was no answer. The calling sounded a third time, but more quickly and impatiently.
"Pugú! pugú!"
This time from the side of the boats was heard in the middle of the fog the voice of Krechovski,--
"But who is there?"
"A Cossack from the meadows."
The hearts of the Cossacks hidden in the boats beat unquietly. That mysterious call was well known to them. In that manner the Zaporojiana made themselves known to one another in their winter quarters; in that way in time of war they asked to conference their brothers, the registered and town Cossacks, among whom were many belonging in secret to the Brotherhood.
The voice of Krechovski was heard again; "What do you want?"
"Bogdan Hmelnitski, the Zaporojian hetman, announces that his cannon are turned on the Poles."
"Inform the Zaporojian hetman that ours are tamed to the shore."
"Pugú! Pugú!"
"What more do you want?"
"Bogdan Hmelnitski, the Zaporojian hetman, invites his friend Colonel Krechovski to a conference."
"Let him give hostages."
"Ten kuren atamans."
"Agreed."
That moment the shores of the inlet bloomed with Zaporojians as if with flowers; they stood up from the grass in which they had been hidden. From the steppe approached their cavalry and artillery, tens and hundreds of their banners, flags, and bunchuks. They marched with singing and beating of kettledrums. All this was rather like a joyful greeting than a collision of hostile forces.
The Cossacks on the river answered with shouts. Meanwhile boats came up bringing the kuren atamans. Krechovski entered one of the boats and went to the shore. There a horse was given him, and he was conducted immediately to Hmelnitski.
Seeing him, Hmelnitski removed his cap, and then greeted him cordially.
"Colonel," said he, "my old friend and comrade! When the hetman of the crown commanded you to seize me and bring me to the camp, you did not do it, but you warned me so that I might save myself by flight; for that act I am bound to you in thankfulness and brotherly love."
While saying this he stretched out his hand kindly; but the swarthy face of Krechovski remained cold as ice. "Now, therefore, after you have saved yourself, worthy hetman, you excite rebellion!"
"I go to ask reparation for the wrongs inflicted on myself, on you, on the whole Ukraine, with the charter of Cossack rights granted by the king in my hand, and with the hope that our merciful sovereign will not count it evil in me."
Krechovski looked quickly into the eyes of Hmelnitski, and asked with emphasis: "Have you invested Kudák?"
"I? Do you think I have lost my mind? I passed Kudák without a shot, though the old blind man celebrated it with guns. I was hurrying not to Kudák, but to the Ukraine, and to you, my old friend and benefactor."
"What do you wish, then, of me?"
"Come a little way in the steppe, and we will talk."
They spurred their horses, and rode on. They remained about an hour. On returning, the face of Krechovski was pale and terrible. He took quick farewell of Hmelnitski, who said,--
"There will be two of us in the Ukraine, and above us the king, and no man else."
Krechovski turned to the boats. Old Barabash, Flick, and the elders waited for him with impatience. "What's going on? What's going on?" he was asked on every side.
"Come out on the shore!" answered Krechovski, with a commanding voice.
Barabash raised his sleepy lids; a certain wonderful fire was gleaming in his eyes. "How is that?" asked he.
"Come to the shore; we yield!"
A wave of blood rushed to the pale and faded face of Barabash. He rose from the kettle on which he had been sitting, straightened himself up, and suddenly that bent and decrepit old man was changed into a giant full of life and power.
"Treason!" roared he.
"Treason!" repeated
