18. Do Not Play With Daggers

At the moment when he spoke these wicked words, the heavens burst into lightning, with such a clap of thunder, that all those who were on the terrace, and Méphodiévna herself, were astonished to find themselves unhurt.

The frightened Ataman ran into the house, his trembling wife following him. Méphodiévna, hesitating, abandoned the terrace, though with evident regret.

But why did Maroussia, standing by the side of her good friend, seem changed into stone? Why this sudden pallor on the cheek of Tchetchevik himself?

“Méphodiévna!” he exclaimed, extending his hand to the Ataman’s sister-in-law.

There was something of supreme renunciation in the gesture, and of command in the voice, suddenly grown young, of the old singer.

The young woman returned resolutely to the terrace.

“Behold!” said Tchetchevik to her, “behold! One second of time was sufficient for the justice of God to strike down him who just now was looking so scornfully on our Ukraine.”

The young woman glanced at the spot pointed out by Tchetchevik’s extended arm. Shocked in her turn by what she saw so unexpectedly, Méphodiévna drew back a step.

But with a sudden turn: “God has freed Ukraine from her most detestable enemy,” she said in a trembling voice. “May His will be done on earth as it is in heaven.”

The noble Russian lord was lying dead on the ground, struck by lightning.

Tchetchevik stooped down and withdrew his dagger from the burnt hand of the Russian. The blade, so imprudently exposed by him in the midst of the lightning, had no doubt acted as a conductor for the electricity.

Then lifting up the would-be buyer of the dagger, Tchetchevik, followed by Méphodiévna and Maroussia, carried him with a rapid step into the palace of the Ataman.

Let us be silent when God strikes!