For the Right Part 29

Three of them, however, he admitted, because he believed himself certain of their inmost souls. These were a couple of huntsmen who had acted as his guides on his former visits, and the "Royal Eagle," Julko Rosenko, youngest son of Hilarion the Just, who dwelt by the Black Water. His handsome presence, rare strength and activity, together with a courage so dauntless and daring that it was conspicuous even among that reckless tribe, had gained him the proud name he bore. And of the Huzuls who offered themselves to Taras he was the only one actuated not solely by a spirit of defiant adventurousness, but by a deep longing to take vengeance for violence he had suffered. When a mere youth, he had, by order of a military captain, been dragged from a fair to the barracks at Wiznitz, and declared fit for service, against all show of right. His fine figure had thus brought him to grief. In vain he remonstrated, a.s.suring his captors he was not even near the legal age for conscription; their answer was: "We have no wings, young eagle, to fetch you from your eyry when you may have reached the age. You had better submit; be reasonable, and you will enjoy the life." But the young man refused to be "reasonable;" no punishment, no bullying, could force him to take the military oath. For eight months he held out, when the visit of a higher officer brought sharp censure to the captain and liberation to the youth. He returned to the mountains thirsting for revenge; but Julko loved his father, Hilarion the Just, too dearly to grieve him by joining those who were looked upon as the refuse of the plains; he did not become a hajdamak, the repressed fury eating the deeper into his pa.s.sionate heart. Now, at last, the longed-for hour of retribution seemed to have come: to join the avenger was no shame, but a glory.

At first then Taras's band consisted of seven in all--the three Huzuls, his own two men, and the youths, Lazarko and Wa.s.silj, the latter of whom was almost always absent reconnoitring. Old Jemilian would shake his faithful head sadly, because the expected reinforcements were slow in appearing; and when Wa.s.silj, after his first day's scouting, made a glowing description of the enthusiasm he had met with, the old man laughed grimly, saying: "I doubt not but they will find us worthy of song, even when we have come to the gallows." Taras was unmoved; his heart having gone through the heaving waters, seemed to have gained the sh.o.r.e of a mysterious calm. He was silent, solemn, and though a rare smile might come to his lips, it never reached his eyes; but that expression of brooding thought, of agonised conflict, had left him.

When the news was brought that a.n.u.sia had gone out of her mind he shook his head. "I do not believe it," he said to Jemilian; "I know what one can bear and not go mad. I know it from my own experience, but now the worst is over. I have lost much, but I have recovered myself." And he would cheer his followers: "Never fear, we shall lack neither work, nor fit hands to do it." Whereupon he ordered the construction of a storehouse, a shelter for horses, and barracks to lodge thirty men.

Nor was his confidence mistaken; not a week pa.s.sed before helpers poured in, one of the very first being a man whom neither Taras nor any one else in that country would have expected to volunteer for such service.

It was early in the morning, the rocky heights and the firs above them stood forth against a background of brilliant light; but the lake below and the meadows on the gentle slopes had just caught the first rosy glimmer of day. Taras had relieved the "Royal Eagle," who had done sentry duty through the night, and was sitting with his gun between his knees on the solitary rock against which the barracks were to be erected. He sat motionless, his eye commanding the fair valley from the rocky entrance on the one side to the shrubby cleft on the other, through which the lake found its outlet. The dewy stillness of early morning hung on bush and brae. But suddenly he bent forward, listening.

There were steps approaching from the Red Hollow, distant yet, but falling heavily on the rocky soil, as of a traveller unused to such rough descent. The dark outline of a human figure grew visible presently amid the yellowish rocks, and Taras scanned the new comer.

"A Jew!" he exclaimed, with great surprise; "and he carries a firelock!

what on earth can he want?"

Well might Taras wonder, for a Jew bearing arms had never crossed his vision. Men of that persuasion in the East have a horror of weapons of any kind, and any humble Israelite who may be met with occasionally in the mountain-wilds is but a pedlar, trudging with his bundle of stuffs from homestead to homestead with no ground of safety but the goodness of the G.o.d of Abraham or the knowledge of his own abject poverty. But the son of Jacob now coming hither carried his head high, and his back was bowed by no other burden than the musket, the barrel of which caught sparkles from the rising sun. He was young, tall, and broad-shouldered; and if his ample caftan gave sorry proof of the difficult path he had come by, there was no weariness in his movements.

With undaunted step he approached the hetman.

"I greet you, Taras." he said. "I recognised you at first sight, although I daresay you have forgotten me; you used to be kind to me when I was a boy."

Taras gave a searching glance at the face before him, sharp-featured, gloomy, and furrowed as with terrible experience. "Nashko!" he cried, "is it you? Little Nashko, the son of the innkeeper at Ridowa?"

He held out both his hands, and the Jew caught them, his face trembling with delight. "I could hardly be sure of such a welcome," he said. "It is I indeed--your old friend Nashko, son of Berish!"

"But how is it?" cried Taras, making him sit beside him. "When I left my own village, twelve years ago, I cut you a reed-pipe to console you, and now----"

"Now," continued the Jew, with a dark smile, "it is a wonder I am not grey-haired, to judge from this face of mine. I am but four-and-twenty, Taras, but an old man through sorrow and despair."

"Things have gone ill with you? You have suffered wrong, and come to me to redress it?"

Nashko shook his head, yet added quickly, with a scrutinising look in Taras's face. "And if it were so, would you help me, though I am a Jew?"

"Can you doubt it?" exclaimed Taras, warmly. "Does the wrong-doer inquire into his victim's faith? How, then, should I? As they inflict wrong where they list, it is for me to right it wherever I find it. And I would help you, even if I hated the Jews. But I do not hate you, because, from a child upward, I have striven to be just. And whenever I heard people speak ill of them, I thought of you, Nashko, and of your father. Old Berish lived among us honestly and like one of ourselves.

He drew a modest livelihood from his tavern, and tilled his fields with diligence. The people of Ridowa respected him, therefore, as they would any other good man among them. And were not you as merry-hearted and plucky a boy as any in the village? The only difference was that you wore no cross, but the Jewish fringe.[6] And I always thought, it is not the difference of race; but the Jews behave to us just as we behave to them. Say on, then; what can I do for you?"

"Thank you, heartily," said the Jew, again seizing his hand. "But I have not come to beg for your help. It is too late for that, both as regards myself and my sister. And if there were a chance of revenge I would do the deed alone! I have come with another prayer, and the words you have just spoken give me courage to ask it. Let me join your band, Taras!"

"You!" cried the outlaw, starting from his seat in sheer amazement. "A Jew fighting for the right in the mountains. This has never been heard of since the beginning of days. To be sure, you have grown up like one of ourselves, as I have just been saying; still it is unheard-of. Poor fellow, what grievous wrong you must have suffered!"

"Grievous, indeed; but after all it is only what has happened to others before and will happen again," replied the Jew, his voice quivering with the deep trouble of his soul. "But while some can rise from their shame and forget it, others are undone for ever.... You will scarcely remember my sister Jutta?"

"O! yes," returned Taras, eagerly, "a dear little golden-haired thing--the prettiest child of the village."

"Well, she grew but the fairer as she grew in years. My father and I guarded her as the apple of our eye; my mother having died early, he and I brought her up, and she was the joy and pride of our life.

Several respectable men had asked her in marriage, although we were poor, but my father would not give her to any of them; none seemed good enough for our sweet girl. He regretted it sorely in his dying hour, and could only take comfort in the sacred promise I made him, henceforth to watch over her with double care and let my own happiness in life be subordinate to hers. I kept my promise. Our farm brought in little, and the tavern still less, because the lord of the manor increased the rent from year to year; nevertheless, I remained at Ridowa, because my going forth to look for a living elsewhere would have obliged Jutta to seek service with strangers. For her sake also I remained unmarried, that she might remain mistress of the house and my only care. For both these reasons the Jews of Barnow were dissatisfied with me, for, in the judgment of my people, it is well-nigh a wrong to remain unwedded, and nearly as bad to live apart from one's fellows in the faith without forcible reason. But I had other trouble to think of than the displeasure of the Jews of Barnow! A young nephew of our Count, a certain Baron Kaminski, was visiting at the manor. He saw my sister, and fell in love with her--after the fashion, Taras, in which a young Polish n.o.ble will play at love with a poor Jewish maiden! He often came riding by, annoying her with his addresses whenever he knew I was out of the way. She kept it from me as long as she could, knowing my pa.s.sionate temper, but the poor child at last could not help telling me. She had judged me aright--I was furious; and had I met the youngster in that hour, with these hands of mine I would have strangled him. But, growing calmer, I judged it best to appeal to our Count, begging him to interfere. He promised to speak to his nephew, and we seemed to be left at peace, the young baron never coming near the place, and even condescending to make some sort of apology on meeting me accidentally elsewhere."

"I know their tricks," said Taras, darkly; "it was his cunning to throw you off your guard."

"Yes," cried Nashko, drawing himself up and pacing to and fro wildly; "it was! I had business at the distillery one day, which kept me away over night. On returning, I found that the baron had been with his lackeys and creatures. I barely listened to the poor girl's piteous story, but s.n.a.t.c.hed up my gun and forced my way into the manor-house.

The wretch had left the place, thinking himself safer in Poland. My unhappy sister was seized with a burning fever, and, lest she should die without help, there being no doctor near us, I took her to Barnow.

The people there had nursed their anger against us, and perhaps not without some reason, as they viewed matters; but pity was strong, and they stood by us in that time of sorrow. My sister was kindly taken care of, and when she had recovered I made over to her all I possessed, and went my way to seek the baron. I knew what awaited me if I did the deed my heart demanded, but go I must. Again I missed him; he had left for Paris. Thither I could not follow. I returned to Barnow, but my sister was gone ..." He covered his face, his bosom heaving.

"Gone after him?" cried Taras, wondering.

"What do you mean!" retorted poor Nashko, with a proud look of disdain.

"Was she not an honest Jewish maiden? No; but the Sereth is a deep river and holds fast its prey. I never learned why she did it; whether for maidenly shame only, or because of any evil scorn, repressed while she was ill, but flung at her when she was about again--I cannot tell.

But what is now left for me I know; and therefore your call to every wronged one has found an echo in my heart I shook off the lethargy of grief and despair, and I have come to ask you, judge and avenger as you claim to be, will you let me join your band?"

Taras went up to him, laying his hand upon his shoulder. "Nashko," he said, solemnly, "if I still hesitate, it is not because of your being a Jew. A man who has gone through what I have gone through would not deserve a ray of sunlight on his path if he could make any difference between his brethren. And who is my brother but he who has suffered wrong? My doubts, therefore, do not concern your faith, but yourself.

Let me ask you, have you really lost all hope that your heart can ever grow still again and capable of being happy?"

"Certainly not," replied the Jew, firmly, and the fire of his eye spoke of terrible possibilities; "such hope, on the contrary, is ever present with me. My heart will grow calm again, and I shall be happy on the day when I shall cleave the head of him who ruined my sister.... Spare yourself any further trouble, Taras; the men of my race are wont to consider before they act. And I have considered. Will you accept me as one of yours?"

"Yes," said Taras, briefly, and called his men, who were not a little taken aback on beholding their new comrade, a scornful remark hovering on the lips of the "Royal Eagle," and shrinking back only at the captain's look of command.

Julko Rosenko, the first volunteer of the mountain wilds, and the Jew, the first one from the lowlands--or as, to this day, they are known in song, the "Royal Eagle" and "Black Nashko"--are the only two of Taras's band who strike the imagination either by their originality or by the motives inspiring their action. All the others, whom a lawless or revengeful disposition brought to his standard, may have been the victims of tyranny, indeed, but they were men of a lower type, and their history is but the outcome of the troublous confusion of oppressors and oppressed struggling for mastery.

Thus there was with him a peasant from the Bukowina, one Thodika Synkow, who to his fortieth year had lived quietly on his bit of land, till the harshness of a tax-gatherer selling the very pillow from under the head of his sick wife drove him to a deed of murder. There was an under-steward from near the frontier, Stas Barilko, who after years of faithful service had been cruelly flogged for having shot a hare without his master's leave. There was a certain Sophron Hlinkowski, the leader of a church choir, who in a dispute between the priest and the parish concerning t.i.thes had sided with the people, and, when the angry pastor, with the approval of his superiors, suspended the church services, had yielded to the entreaty of the peasants, reading prayers when there was a funeral. That was his crime; the priest denounced him, and the unfortunate precentor was sent to prison, finding himself a beggar when his two years had expired. His only child had died, and his wife had gone off with another man. So he joined Taras to "lift his voice now after another fashion, and make the ears tingle of those who used him so cruelly;" and Taras admitted him, as, indeed, he admitted any one whom honest resentment brought to his standard, and who, having nothing to lose, was possessed of the three requisites he looked for--obedience, courage, and frugality. For Taras held strictly by the words he had spoken beneath the linden: "Let none come to me who seeks for pleasure in life, and no happy man shall join me." Many offered themselves, setting aside this primary condition, but the hetman subjected every one to the most rigid examination; and any one hoping to find refuge with him from just punishment was rejected as mercilessly as were the mere ruffians looking for booty. Yet, in spite of such strict investigation, Taras's band on Easter morning consisted of thirty well-armed and resolute men.

But he had to give audience to a host of people besides, peaceful men coming to tell him of their troubles, or delegates pleading for a wronged community. Some of their complaints were worthless enough, but the greater number were well founded, strengthening him in his conviction that this "unhappy land in which justice is not to be found"

was sorely in need of an "avenger." The wisdom he had gained at the cost of his life's happiness made him sufficiently cautious not to believe blindly any reports that might reach him, and the only promise any of his suppliants got out of him was to the effect that he would make inquiry, and "woe to you if you have lied to me, but woe to your oppressors if you speak the truth!" And if they grew urgent, protesting their honesty, and entreating for speedy redress, he would answer: "You may look for me soon, but the hour shall not be fixed; for how can I be sure there are no tell-tales among you, enabling the Whitecoats to meet me? And, moreover, I have undertaken, first of all, to settle accounts with the mandatar of Zulawce. Not that I long for his punishment before that of any other evil-doer in the land, but a man must be true to his word."

But, to judge from the intelligence brought to him by Wa.s.silj, who on the Sat.u.r.day had returned from a reconnoitring expedition to Colomea, it promised to be a desperate venture to get hold of the mandatar, and Taras shrank from the risk of leading his faithful men to the well-garrisoned district town merely to carry out to the letter an a.s.surance given. If, however, his spirits failed him for a moment, his energy and confidence soon rose uppermost. Wa.s.silj was ordered back to Colomea to procure farther information, whilst Sefko and the Royal Eagle were despatched to inquire into the complaints made by two parishes on the plain, and Jemilian was sent off to announce to a.n.u.sia, and through her to the village, the impending arrival of the Whitecoats.

"Master," said the faithful old servant, hesitatingly, "have you forgotten that the mistress----"

"Is gone out of her mind?" interrupted Taras. "She never did, and by this time is as collected as you or I, Jemilian. She was stunned for a moment, but she knows what is laid upon her, and will never flinch."

"Have you had farther news?" inquired the man, wondering.

"No, but I know my wife. My own heart tells me."

And Taras continued making his preparations. "I have promised to be ready by Easter Day; that much, at least, I will keep." He a.s.signed to each man his place in the barracks, which, a light wooden structure, had been run up already; he gave orders concerning the daily rations and appointed the regulation of sentries. He also divided his band into two distinct companies, setting a sub-captain over each. The Royal Eagle should command the one, Black Nashko the other.

In naming the latter, Taras, with an imperious look, scanned the faces of his followers as they were drawn up before him. A flush of anger was plainly evident, and one of them, Stas Barilko, was about to speak. But that look of the hetman's silenced him, Taras repeating, "Our brother Nashko shall command these." Not a sound of dissent--and the sign for dispersing was given.

The Jew then came forward. "Taras," he exclaimed, "why did you not take me into your counsel? I fear this will be neither to your advantage, nor to mine. As for me it matters little, but you and your cause must not suffer. You should not have braved needlessly the prejudice in which they have grown up, and which is next to religion with them."

"Needlessly?" exclaimed Taras. "I have appointed you, because after due consideration I take you to be the most earnest and best qualified of my followers. These others--well they will soon see for themselves that you are worthy of my confidence; till then they will just obey."

"Yes, resentfully and under protest," urged the Jew, "and you should avoid that, unless the most sacred principle were at stake. Remember that your influence rests upon their free will alone."

"No!" cried Taras. "They could come to me or stay away of their own free will. But having come, they are what I am, instruments towards the gaining of a common and most holy end."

... The following morning--it was Easter Sunday--rose with all the wondrous fragrance of spring. Taras had caused a plain wooden cross to be erected, and the wild outlaws, bareheaded, gathered beneath the sacred sign. Nashko only held aloof.

And, taking his place beside the cross, Taras spoke to his men. "My brothers," he said, "we have neither priest nor altar to help us to keep this day. But G.o.d is to be found wherever the heart of man will turn to Him, and He will listen to the humble prayer we would offer up--a homeless flock, having left all that men count dear for the sake of His own holy justice."

He crossed himself and repeated the Lord's Prayer slowly and solemnly, the men saying it after him; and after that Sophron, of the church choir, stood up beside him, once more to do his duty in leading the ancient Easter Hymn; and all their voices joined in the fine old chorale:--

"Christ, the Lord, is risen to-day!"