For a whole day death hovered over Basia. Like a spider, which secreted in some gloomy corner of the ceiling crawls out at times to the light, and lets itself down on an unseen web, death seemed at times to come down right there over Basia’s head; and more than once it seemed to those present that his shadow was falling on her forehead, that that bright soul was just opening its wings to fly away out of Hreptyoff, somewhere into endless space, to the other side of life. Then again death, like a spider, hid away under the ceiling, and hope filled their hearts.
But that was merely a partial and temporary hope, for no one dared to think that Basia would survive the attack. Pan Michael himself had no hope of her recovery; and this pain of his became so great that Zagloba, though suffering sev
