“Scoundrels! have some respect for a man of honour.”

This seemed to petrify them.  I put my right hand under the pistoli’s armpit, while the general helped him on the other side, and thus we took him to the inn, which happened to be near at hand.

Branicki stooped as he walked, and gazed at me curiously, apparently wondering where all the blood on my clothes came from.

When we got to the inn, Branicki laid himself down in an arm-chair.  We unbuttoned his clothes and lifted up his shirt, and he could see himself that he was dangerously wounded.  My ball had entered his body by the seventh rib on the right hand, and had gone out by the second false rib on the left.  The two wounds were ten inches apart, and the case was of an alarming nature, as the intestines must have been pierced.  Branicki spoke to me in a weak voice,—­

“You have killed me, so make haste away, as you are in danger of the gibbet.  The duel was fought in the ban, and I am a high court officer, and a Knight of the White Eagle.  So lose no time, and if you have not enough money take my purse.”

I picked up the purse which had fallen out, and put it back in his pocket, thanking him, and saying it would be useless to me, for if I were guilty I was content to lose my head.  “I hope,” I added, “that your wound will not be mortal, and I am deeply grieved at your obliging me to fight.”

With these words I kissed him on his brow and left the inn, seeing neither horses nor carriage, nor servant.  They had all gone off for doctor, surgeon, priest, and the friends and relatives of the wounded man.

I was alone and without any weapon, in the midst of a snow-covered country, my hand was wounded, and I had not the slightest idea which was the way to Warsaw.

I took the road which seemed most likely, and after I had gone some distance I met a peasant with an empty sleigh.

“Warszawa?” I cried, shewing him a ducat.

He understood me, and lifted a coarse mat, with which he covered me when I got into the sleigh, and then set off at a gallop.

All at once Biniski, Branicki’s bosom-friend, came galloping furiously along the road with his bare sword in his hand.  He was evidently running after me.  Happily he did not glance at the wretched sleigh in which I was, or else he would undoubtedly have murdered me.  I got at last to Warsaw, and went to the house of Prince Adam Czartoryski to beg him to shelter me, but there was nobody there.  Without delay I determined to seek refuge in the Convent of the Recollets, which was handy.