Chapter 21
Jurko woke with his hand somewhere very nice and soft, with Helena's hand holding it there. He heard his father's chuckle.
"That bad Cossack hand of yours is looting Helena, my boy," said Jeremi.
Jurko opened his eyes, and smiled hazily at his father, unaware of how absurdly young he looked.
"Helena looted me a long time ago," he said. "Well, it feels like it." He tried to withdraw his hand from Helena's breast, but she made a grumpy noise and hung on to it. "I fear my Cossack hand is a prisoner of war."
"She's a clever little girl, and will probably ransom it in kisses," said Jeremi, relieved that Jurko looked much better for a night's sleep.
"I'll pay her ransom willingly," said Jurko. "Father, I was thinking. I thought I would ask Helena to sew us a banner with an iron fist on the end of a Cossack whip. I'm going to have a heap of iron cast into the shapes of clenched fists. I think it would be neat if our arapniki deliver an iron fist."
"It's not popular amongst the other Cossacks," said Jeremi. "They don't call me that to flatter me."
"But it can be made popular when they see you use it to flatten those who offend against their rights too," said Jurko. "You can tell them the truth, that you were raised by your uncle to be Polonised, and learned to despise your roots, but that since finding you have a Cossack son, you have learned more about them, and want to return to your roots by supporting them."
Jeremi still despised most Cossacks, but he was not about to say so. His son was too sincere, too joyous in his praise of him.
But he could certainly act proud of his roots.
"We're descended from Rurik of the Kievan Rus, according to some tales," he said. "Your ideas have merit. How are you?"
"Much better, thank you, father," said Jurko. "How is Wasyl?"
"Also much improved," said Jeremi. "I will be petitioning to ratify a land grant for him, as well as to ratify what I wish to give to you."
"Oh, father! I will be happy as Helena's husband to lick Rozłogi into shape," said Jurko. "And to be your captain of ships."
"Oh, the king will love you, I fancy a piece of him died inside when his navy was destroyed by the Danes, such as it was."
"Well, what do you expect from converted merchantmen? We need dedicated war ships, and built by the Dutch, to their shallow draft designs, we can make our canals shallow, so our ships can sail them, and the Swedish ships, which are now being built with deeper draft, cannot," said Jurko, enthusiastically. "The Swedes are keen to prevail against Denmark, and are copying the English manner of building ships, which is suited to the German Ocean, where the Dutch ships are built to take advantage of their many canals."
"You are remarkably knowledgeable," said Jeremi, surprised.
"I've sailed with a few displaced people from a selection of odd places," said Jurko. "And some of them slaves we've freed, for having the knowledge to improve our sail handling. One of my Cossacks is a Scotsman, a sailor."
"Well, it will come in useful, presenting your ideas to the king," said Jeremi. "Helena, my dear, do wake up; you have looted Jurij's hand and it might set tongues wagging."
Helena awoke with a start, blushed violently, and moved her hand. Jurko captured it and kissed it warmly.
"My hand enjoyed being prisoner of war to so lovely a jailor who found it out cossacking," he murmured. Helena blushed more.
"You daft pair," said Jeremi.
There was more than a touch of envy in his voice.
Wiśniowiecki palace was a fine stone building around sixty years old.1 It was a relatively modest palace, but then, Jeremi did not spend much of his time in Warszawa. It was three storeys high around a courtyard, with a protruding entrance reached by steps.
"There's a barracks block around the back for your lads, but we'll keep Wasyl in with us," said Jeremi. "And Kurylo, unless you think they'd misbehave without him?"
Jurko crossed himself dramatically.
"Not so much misbehave, but... high spirits might be almost as bad," he said.
Kurylo would rather be with the men, anyway.
The entrance hall was vaulted, with the red and gold Korybut arms painted on each vault section. It was a curious device. On the red ground, above a six-pointed star was a horizontal crescent from which grew a cross, its top and arms finished with crosses pattée.
The entrance hall opened out onto steps leading left and right down to the courtyard, and up to to the next floor. There was also an open corridor all the way round the inside of the courtyard. Steps led up to the next storey as well, with matching corridor. Gracious arches supported these corridors, and balustrades of stone ran round them.
"Your chambers are above this level," said Jeremi. "Also the long gallery on the river side. The ballroom is below the long gallery, and so is the banqueting hall. And we shall have a family portrait for posterity, to hang in the long gallery, Jurij, you and Michał as my sons, Gryzelda, and Helena as your intended. And Róża of course," he added.
"If you say so, father," said Jurij. "Well, it will give them something to paint a funerary plaque from if I drown at sea or am cut up too small to recognise."
"Nonsense, my boy, more likely that they will chose the likeness of vivacious son approaching his prime than paint from life a wrinkled old man who has served the Commonwealth all his life and is still bossing the king about," laughed Jeremi.
"Well, I'm not about to tempt fate," said Jurko. "But a Cossack hopes to live a full life, die in the saddle, and leave plenty of loot."
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Jeremi managed to arrange an appointment to see the king that afternoon, and took Jurko with him. Not, however, before he had rummaged through his own kontusze and żupany and selected those he thought suitable.
"Your taste is excellent, my son, but you've avoided red, and you should make the comment that you are entitled to it," said Jeremi. "A white and gold żupan to show that you are of the status to wear white without worrying about it being laundered, and a red kontusz. And one of the family kontusz sashes as well to demonstrate your affiliation."
"Father..."
"Take them as gifts; I've put on a little weight since I wore them last, and it seems foolish not to use them. Clothes are statements of intent, and though you'll make your own statements with the bolts of cloth you have, this is Warszawa, a visit to the palace, and formal. Be flamboyant at social functions; be plain and sumptuous for political ones."
"I see, father. Clothes are diplomacy, which is a form of warfare where the sabre is sheathed and the weapons are display."
"Nicely put, my son."
Jeremi was clad in a gold żupan with white flowers on it, and plenty of real gold threads, and a rich red kontusz with his arms woven into it. He wore red boots. Jurko thought his father looked very fine indeed.
When they reached the palace, Jeremi murmured to the flunky, who announced, "Prince Jeremi Korybut Wiśniowiecki, and his son, Jurij Korybut Bohun Wisniowieki."
Jurko was dumbfounded.
"Father, your in-laws..."
"Have never given me half as much trust and loyalty you have," said Jeremi. "Sire!" he bowed deeply to the king, a dark-visaged man dressed after the western fashion, with a heavy wig of dark curls and neatly trimmed beard and moustache.
Jurko went on one knee, and rose in a single fluid movement before bowing down to the ground in the Sarmatian fashion.
"Jurij is a Cossack name," said the king.
"My son's a Cossack and I am thinking of connecting more deeply with my Cossack roots to try to settle the Cossack question," said Jeremi. "Jurij is also a deep thinker, and has a way to enable you to have a navy."
"The Sejm would never vote more money for another navy," said Władysław IV.
"I would finance it, majesty," said Jeremi.
"And what would you want in exchange?"
"Something of mutual benefit; but please hear my son out first. As you can see by his sling, he was wounded in keeping the ladies of my household from harm, and I wanted too to ratify a land grant to him, and to the man who was shot at point blank range saving my young son's life. Michał was threatened with being shot or dismembered."
The king sat forward.
"What is this?" he said. "Come through into my privy chamber where we shall all sit, for your son has an unhealthy pallor beneath his tan."
"I am much obliged, sire," said Jurko. "I wanted to get the women and children to safety and without worrying them so I ignored a wound."
"I understand," said the king.
Sat down, and with wine, the king turned to Jeremi.
"You were attacked? In my realm? By whom and where? It cannot have been far from here, I think?"
"I was not there," said Jeremi. "I had taken the hussars who were part of my outriders and had ridden ahead to Puławy to speak to Jerzy Lubomirski. We came by river, overnight."
"Then speak, lad," said the king, looking at Jurko.
"We were waylaid by armed men, and I called them to move off the road, as we had carts with women and children. The leader asked if we carried men and arms, which would have been none of his business if my father had been carrying such, and when I warned him it was only women, he said that he would kill us and rape the women. One of them tried to seize Michał, and made the threats my father has related, and Wasyl rode into the way of a bullet. I had given the order to use non-lethal force already, and my men used bolas arapniki to stun. I used our banner name and called on them to surrender. Some did. Some fought on."
"And what manner of brigands were these?" asked the king.
"Winged hussars," said Jurij. "And if I had not had my father's high name, I wager that it would be assumed that we Cossacks had done the attacking."
"Your tone is bitter, young Wiśniowiecki," said the king.
"I go by 'Bohun,' sire, for it is my brother who is the Wiśniowiecki heir."
"And you do not resent that?"
"Not in the least; it is a joy and a privilege to have a father who is proud of me, and gives me love." He turned a look of devotion on Jeremi. The king was surprised to see an unwonted softness in return on the harsh features of one of his less empathic princes.
"But you speak of winged hussars... this is iniquitous! Whose banner do they follow?"
"The leader said his lord was Mikołaj Potocki," said Jurko. "One reason I wanted them alive, to testify to a third party that it was we who told the truth. May I have some water, please? The wine is going to my head, and though a Cossack hates to admit to that, I will be no use to your majesty fuddled."
"Jeremi, there's a carafe on the cupboard with ice," the king directed Jeremi to fetch over the water. "I dilute my wine during long conferences."
"A wise precaution, majesty," said Jeremi. Jurko drank, gratefully.
"You don't get on with Potocki; was this an attack on you?" asked the king.
"I don't think so, sire; it was an attack on Cossacks, regardless of whom they were guarding, I think," said Jeremi. "Of those who surrendered, some begged to enter my service in atonement for the actions of their fellows. I read shock and truth in their eyes and accepted."
"And those who did not?"
"I... I was furious, sire. I had the leader and the brute who would threaten a six-year-old child in such a fashion hanged. The rest, flogged."
"I doubt anything would have been done if you had petitioned Potocki," said the king, dryly. "I hope you do not want to ask for odpowiedź, blood feud, on the family?"
"Oh, no, sire," said Jeremi, hastily. "But I will confront him, and if he does not apologise on behalf of his men, I will fight him."
"I would prefer that you do not."
"I will not look a coward in his eyes."
"I will issue an order to both of you if either of you challenges the other; he is an able man and I cannot afford to lose him."
"If it comes to preventing a Cossack uprising or losing Potocki, sire, which would you choose? Because it may come to that with my proposition."
"I... will hear your proposition and consider it," said the king. "But about this navy you are prepared to finance?"
"Jurij, it is all your plan; put it to the king," said Jeremi.
"Sire, I have been studying maps, and made some studies on the ground. It is my belief that we could put a series of canals to make Warszawa no more than a few days distant from Kijów and all points between," said Jurij. "If there was a channel from the Prypeć to the Dniepr below the rapids, and a canal between the Prypeć and the Bug, and a canal from the Bug to the Wisla, this could be accomplished. If the canals are shallow, and we get in ship-builders from Holland, and canal-builders too, who will come willingly, I believe, we can have shallow-draft ships, able to go into the Baltic at need, or the Black Sea, and across country. We already sell Polish oak to Dutch ship-builders, we can use it for our own ships, and use their design of windmill-driven saw mills to speed up production. Not to mention supply barges, troop barges, and so on. And in winter when shallow canals freeze, then heavy sledges can carry supplies and they would form highways for mounted men, using Cossack horse shoes, and straw overshoes for the surefootedness of the horses."
"And what is special about Cossack horse shoes?"
"They have spikes on them to hold firm on a slippery surface, like coming downhill. Equally the straw overshoes spread weight in snow or mud and protect hoofs."
"That piece of intelligence alone convinces me of your sincerity," said the king. "Have you any idea how much a war ship costs?"
"About two and a half thousand golden złoty," said Jurij. "Possibly less to commission with military carpenters building."
"I hope you have not been going against my dictates to raid the Turks?" said the king.
"We have rescued slaves, which is not going to war, but taking back what is ours," said Jurij. "One of my men now has his wife back, I have a number of my men back, from when raiding was legal, and my daughter, who is eight years old, rescued from a deviant. Many women glad to return to their homes, and I do not regret it for an instant. And if you call me traitor for caring for my own people, you are not the little father of all of Poland I believe you to be."
"He's a proud boy, isn't he?" said Władysław Waza.
"He's my son," said Jeremi. "I endorse his actions. But in rescuing one of his men, he took an Ottoman war vessel, which has proved very useful policing our coasts. Ships not relying on rowers would be even better. And I would finance some for the Dniepr regardless of whether you sanction the canals."
"And what do you want in return, you old fox?" asked the king.
"Ah! Now that falls into preventing a Cossack uprising," said Jeremi.
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1 I have no data regarding early palaces before Warszawa was knocked down several times by Swedes, let along later by the Nazis. So I am making it up as it seems reasonable to assume he would have had a palace.