“What does the man want here?”
“Oh, he is always wandering about the villages, talking with peasants—sometimes helping them—playing on his violin, teaching the girls to sing songs: he must be a little crazy.”
“Pray, Gregory, go on with what you had to say.”
“Ah, about the forest?—I was saying that we should not leave the matter in the hands of the old men: they would bungle it.”
“Well, but,” Antek said with decision, “there is only one thing to be done: if they set about felling our timber, we must all of us go and drive them away, until such time as the Squire shall come to terms.”
“That is just what they said at Klemba’s.”
“Said, yes: but what can they do? No one will go with them.”
“The husbandmen will.”
“Not all of them.”
“All, if Boryna leads them!”
“Which is doubtful.”
“Then,” Balcerek cried hotly, “let Antek be our leader!”
The proposal was enthusiastically assented to. But Gregory, having seen something of the world, and having a little book-learning, set to point out to them, like the scholar that he was, that violence would be no remedy; that all would end in court, and with sentences of imprisonment; and that the right thing was for the people to apply to a lawyer from the town.
But no one agreed with what he said; some even jeered at him. This put him in a great rage, and he said:
“Ye complain that your fathers are fools, whilst ye yourselves are as great fools as they, and talk nonsense, all of you, like children at their games.”
Someone here said: “See, Boryna has come, with Yagna and some girls.”
Antek, who had intended to answer Gregory, left him unanswered at the words.
They had come late, after supper. The old man had long resisted Yuzka’s whimperings and Nastka’s entreaties, for he wanted Yagna to join with them in begging him. Now, she had said at once, after dinner, that she would go to hear the band play, and he had told her sternly that she should not set her foot out of doors!
She did not ask him a second time, but cried in corners, and slammed doors, and rushed about by fits and starts, in a gusty way. And when they had supper, she would eat nothing, but set about getting ready to go, and taking her best skirt out of the chest to try it on.
What was the man to do? He swore a lot, talked, said again that he was not going anywhere—and finally he had very humbly to ask her forgiveness and, willy-nilly, go to the tavern.
He entered with a haughty imposing mien, saluting few of those present, for few of his equals were there, most of them being at the Voyt’s for the christening. He looked round carefully for his son, but missed him in the crowd.
Antek gazed on Yagna all the time, as she stood by the bar, while the lads crowded round her begging for a dance. She refused them all, but chatted gaily with them, now and then casting a quick glance here and there. Very lovely did she look that night, and they all eyed her with admiration, the fairest amongst all the women. Yet Nastka was there, arrayed in red, like a tall hollyhock; and Veronka Ploshka, like a peony in bloom, stately and self-possessed; and Soha’s daughter, a mere chit of a lass, but so slender and lithe and sweet to look upon! and many another strapping well-favoured girl, who pleased the lads—as did Mary Balcerek, divinely tall, shapely with firm white flesh, and the very best dancer in the village; but not one of them, not a single one, could vie with Yagna.
By her beauty, her attire, and her marvellous turquoise eyes, she surpassed them all, as the rose does the hollyhock, the peony or the poppy-flower, making them appear paltry and plain beside it: so was she above and beyond them, everyone. And that evening she had dressed herself as for a wedding: had donned a skirt of rich yellow, striped with white and green; and her bodice of deep-blue velvet, embroidered with gold thread, was cut low, disclosing half of her bosom; and on her chemise of fine linen, with dainty frills, frothing and foaming abundantly about her throat and hands, there hung many a necklace of coral and amber and pearl-like beads. And her head was adorned with a silken kerchief of turquoise-blue, with pink spots, the corners of which floated down on to her neck behind.
For this finery and sumptuousness of adornment, the women’s tongues wagged against her with bitter reviling. But she cared not a whit for all they said: she had beheld Antek. Colouring with delight, she turned to her husband, to whom the Jew had said something. He thereupon went over to the private room, and remained there.
This was precisely what Antek had been waiting for. He at once elbowed his way through the throng, and welcomed them with easy familiarity. But Yuzka sullenly turned her back upon him.
“Have ye come for the band, or for Margaret’s betrothal?”
“For the band,” Yagna replied, in a voice husky with emotion.
They stood for a while side by side, speechless but breathing fast, and casting side-glances at each other. As the dancers jostled them and drove them towards the wall, Simon took possession of Nastka, Yuzka drifted away somewhere or other, and the couple remained alone.
“How I have waited day by day … waited for you!” he whispered.
“How could I come? I am watched closely,” she answered, with a thrill, for their hands had somehow come together, and they stood at close quarters, hip touching hip. They both turned pale, their eyes gleamed, and within them other and ineffable music was striking up.
“Pray let me go, and stand away a little,” she begged; for they were surrounded with people.
He did not reply, but took her round the waist in a firm grasp, pushed the crowd aside, and, entering the
