King Stakh's Wild Hunt

“Money is the emanation of human authority over a herd of others (regretfully so!). We should have learned to perform castration of the brains of all those who do not deserve the life of a conscious being. And the best should be given boundless happiness, for such a thing as justice is not foreseen by nature itself. This applies also to me. I need peace, which we have here more than anything else, and money in order to mature the idea for the sake of which I appeared in the world, the idea of splendid and exceptional injustice. And it seems to me that the first step might be the victory over that towards which my body is striving and which, however, it's necessary to overcome, the desire for the mistress of Marsh Firs. She is anyway condemned by blind fate to be done away with — the curse on her is being fulfilled by the appearance of the Wild Hunt at the walls of the castle. Though she is stronger than I had thought: she hasn't lost her mind yet. King Stach is weak, and I am ordained to correct his mistakes. I am, nevertheless, jealous of all young men and especially of this Biełarecki. I shot at him yesterday, but was forced to retreat. I shoot badly.”

The next sheet:

“It is possible that if I fulfilled the role of God's will, of his highest design (such as has been known to happen with ordinary mortals) the evil spirits will leave this place and I shall remain the master here. I convinvced Biełarecki that the chief danger lies in the Hunt. But what danger can there be in apparitions? Quite another matter the Little Man.”

“Gold, gold! Thousands of panegyrics could be sung to your power over people's souls. You are everything: the baby's diaper, the girl's body that is bought, friendship, love and power, the brain of the greatest geniuses, even the decent hole in the earth. And I will achieve all this.”

I crumpled the paper and squeezed my fingers until they ached.

“Abomination!”

And suddenly my hand came across a sheet of parchment folded in four among piles of paper. I unfolded the sheet on my knees and could only shake my head: it was the plan of Marsh Firs, a plan of the sixteenth century. And in this plan four listening channels were clearly indicated in the walls. Four! But they were so hidden in the plafonds that to find them was simply impossible. One of them, by the way, led from the dungeons in the castle to the room near the library (probably in orded to overhear prisoners' conversations), and the second one connected the library, the now abandoned servants' rooms on the first floor and — the room in which Janoŭskaja lived. The two others remained unknown to me: they opened into the corridor where were located the rooms belonging to Janoŭskaja and myself, but where they led to had been carefully rubbed out.

The villain had found the plan in the archive and had hidden it.

There turned out to be some more interesting things in the plan. In the outer wall of the castle a space appeared, a narrow passage and three small cells of some kind were indicated. And where I had once torn off a board in the boarded up room.

I swore as never before in my life. Many unpleasant things might have been avoided if I had thoroughly knocked at the walls covered with panels. But it wasn't too late even now. I grabbed the candle, glanced at the clock (half past ten) and ran as quickly as I could to my corridor.

I knocked half an hour probably, before I hit on a place which answered to my knocking with a resonant sound as if I were knocking on the bottom of a barrel. I looked for a place in the panel that I could catch onto and tear off at least a part of it, but in vain. Then I saw some light scratches on it made with some sharp thing. Therefore I got a folding-knife and began to prod it into the hardly noticeable cracks between the panels. With a blade of the knife I managed quite soon to find something that gave way. I pressed harder — the panel began to squeak and to turn round slowly, forming a narrow slit. I looked at the reverse side of the panel at the place in which I had stuck the knife. A hollow board was there and to open the manhole from the inside was impossible. I had gone down about 15 steps, but the door behind my back began to squeak pitifully, and I hurried upstairs, and managed just in time to hold it back with my foot so that it shouldn't shut. To remain in a rat-hole alone under the threat of sitting there till Doomsday with a candle-end was foolhardy.

Therefore I left the door half-open, put a handkerchief near the axle and myself sat down not far away on the floor, with my revolver on my knees. I had to blow out the candle, for its light might frighten the mysterious creature if it had thought of creeping out of its hiding-place. The candle burning round the corner in the corridor all night, even though dimly, still gave some light, and through the window an indefinite grey light also poured in.