# The Knights of the Cross/Volume 2/Chapter 72

* CHAPTER LXXII.
* Old Matsko had divined the truth clearly, but only half of it. In fact one part of Zbyshko's life had ended completely. Whatever the young knight thought of Danusia, he grieved for her, but he said to himself that she must be happier in the court of heaven than she had been at the court of Prince Yanush. He had grown inured to the idea that she was no longer in the world; he had become familiar with it, and considered that the position could not be changed in any way. When in Cracow he had admired immensely the figures of sacred virgins outlined on glass and framed in lead on church windows. These figures were colored and gleaming in the sunlight, and now he imagined Danusia as being just like them. He saw her transparent, heavenly, turned toward him in profile, with palms placed together, and eyes uplifted, or he saw her playing on a lute among a host of celestial musicians, who in heaven play to the Holy Mother and the Divine Infant. There was nothing earthly in her now; to his mind she had become a spirit so pure and disembodied that when at times he remembered how Danusia had served the princess at the hunting-lodge, how she had laughed and conversed, how she had sat down at the table with others, he was filled as it were with wonder that such things could be. During his expedition with Vitold, when questions of warfare and battles had swallowed his attention, he ceased to yearn for his celestial one as a man yearns for a woman, and thought of her only as a devotee thinks of his patron saint. In this way his love, by losing gradually earthly elements, changed more and more into what was only a remembrance, sweet and pure as the sky itself, and became simply religious reverence.
* Had he been a man of frail body and deeper thought he would have become a monk, and in the calm life of a cloister would have preserved that heavenly reminiscence as something sacred till the moment in which his soul could fly from the shackles of its body into endless space, just as a bird rushes forth from its cage. But the third decade of his years had begun not long before; he was able to squeeze with his fist the sap out of green chips and could so press ​the horse under him with his legs as to take the beast's breath away. He was like all nobles of that period. If they did not die in childhood or become priests, they knew neither bound nor limit in physical vehemence and vigor; they let themselves out into robbery, loose life, drunkenness, or they married in youth and went to war in mature age when summoned, taking with them twenty-four or more sons, all of whom had the robustness of wild boars.
* But he knew not that he was a man of this kind, all the more since he had been sick. Gradually, however, his ribs, which had been set unskilfully, grew together, and showed merely a slight lump on one side which hindered him in no way, and which not only mail but ordinary clothing might conceal entirely.
* His weariness had passed. His rich yellow hair, cut in sign of mourning for Danusia, had grown again to a point below his shoulders. His former extraordinary beauty had returned. When some years before he had walked forth to meet death at the hands of the executioner he looked like a youth of great family, but now he had become still more beautiful, a genuine king's son. In shoulders, in breast, in arms and loins he was like a giant, but in features he resembled a maiden. Strength and vigor were boiling in him, as liquid in a caldron; invigorated by continence and long rest, life was coursing through his bones like blazing fire. He, not knowing what this meant, thought himself sick yet, and continued to lie in bed, glad that Matsko and Yagenka nursed him, cared for him, and divined his wishes. At moments it seemed to Zbyshko that he was as happy as if in heaven; at moments, especially when Yagenka was not there, existence appeared wretched, sad, unendurable; fits of yawning and stretching, with feverishness, seized him at such moments, and he declared to Matsko that on recovering he would go again to the ends of the earth against the Germans, Tartars, or some other like savagery, to rid himself of life, which was weighing him down terribly. Matsko, instead of opposing, nodded and agreed; meanwhile he sent for Yagenka, after whose coming thoughts of new expeditions vanished from Zbyshko as snows melt when warmed by the sun of springtime.
* Yagenka came promptly, both when summoned and of her own accord, for she loved Zbyshko with all the strength of her heart and soul. During her stay at the court of the ​bishop and that of the prince in Plotsk she saw knights as fine and as famous for strength and bravery as Zbyshko, knights who knelt before her more than once and vowed faith for a lifetime; but this was her chosen one, she had loved him from early years with her first love, and the misfortunes through which he had passed only increased that love to the degree that he was dearer to her, and a hundredfold more precious, not only than all knights, but than all princes on earth. Now, when returning health each day made him more splendid, her love turned almost into madness and hid all the rest of the world from her.
* But she did not confess this love to herself, even, and from Zbyshko she concealed it most carefully, fearing lest he might disregard her a second time. Even with Matsko she was now as secretive and silent as she had been aforetime outspoken. The care shown in nursing the young knight was all that could betray her, so she strove to give to it another pretext; hence on a certain day she said hurriedly to Zbyshko,—
* "If I look after thee a little it is from good will toward Matsko, but didst thou think otherwise?"
* And, as if to arrange the hair on her forehead, she shaded her face with her hand, and looked at him carefully through her fingers. Attacked thus on a sudden by the question, he blushed like a young girl, and only after a while did he answer,—
* "I did not think anything. Thou art now another person."
* A moment of silence followed.
* "Another person?" asked Yagenka at last, in a peculiar low and soft voice. "Well, it is sure that I am different. But that I should not endure thee, may God not permit that!"
* "God reward thee for even this word," replied Zbyshko.
* And thenceforth it was pleasant for them in each other's company, though in some way uneasy and awkward. At times it might seem that they were speaking of something aside, or that their thoughts were elsewhere. Silence was frequent between them. Zbyshko never rose from the bed, and, as Matsko had stated, followed Yagenka with his eyes whithersoever she went, for she seemed to him, especially at moments, so wonderful that he could not look at her sufficiently. It happened too that their glances met unexpectedly, and then their faces flamed, the maiden's breast ​moved with hurried breathing, and her heart beat as if she expected to hear something which would make the soul melt and flow apart in her. But Zbyshko was silent, for he had lost his former boldness completely; he feared to frighten her with some heedless word, and, in spite of what his eyes saw, he persuaded himself that she was showing him mere sisterly kindness out of friendship for Matsko.
* He mentioned this once to his uncle; he tried to speak calmly, with indifference; he did not even note that his words became more and more like a complaint, half sad and half filled with reproaches.
* Matsko listened patiently. At last he said the single word, "Simpleton!" and walked out of the room.
* But when he was in the stable he rubbed his hands, and struck his thighs with great gleefulness.
* "Ha!" said he, "when she came to thee for nothing thou wouldst not even look at her. Take thy fill of fright now, since thou art a simpleton. I will build the castle, and thou meanwhile, let thy mouth water. I will say nothing to thee; I will not take the cataract from thy eye, even wert thou to make more noise than all the horses in Bogdanets. When shavings are piled on a smouldering fire a blaze will burst up sooner or later in every case, but I will not blow, since there is no need, I think."
* And not only did he not blow, but he even opposed Zbyshko and teased him like an old fox glad to trifle with youthful inexperience. So one day when Zbyshko said again that he would go to some distant war to rid himself of a life which was unendurable, the old man said to him,—
* "While the lip under thy nose was bare I directed thee, but now—thou hast thy own will! If thou wish at all risks to trust in thy own wit and go—go."
* Zbyshko sprang up with astonishment and sat erect in bed.
* "How is this? Thou dost not oppose?"
* "Why should I oppose? I only grieve terribly for our family which might perish with thee, but I may find a way to avoid this."
* "How a way?" inquired Zbyshko, in alarm.
* "How? Well, my years are considerable, no use in denying that but there is no lack of strength in my bones. Seest thou, some younger man might chance to please Yagenka—but as I was a friend of her father—who knows but I—"
* "You were a friend of her father," answered Zbyshko, ​"but you never had any good feeling for me—never! never!"
* And he stopped, for his chin began to quiver, and Matsko said,—
* "Pshaw! since thou hast resolved to destroy thyself, what can I do?"
* "Well! do what you like—but I will leave here this very day!"
* "Simpleton!" repeated Matsko.
* And he left the room to look at the laborers, both men from Bogdanets and those whom Yagenka had lent him from Zgorzelitse and Mochydoly to help dig the moat which was to surround the castle.