“Ye have greatly changed.”
“Suffering shapes the soul as the smith shapes iron—and sooner.”
Her reply amazed him so, he could find nothing to say to it, and turned round to Ambrose to talk about the lawsuit with the manor. In spite of the Voyt’s promise, he had lost, and had to pay costs into the bargain.
“I shall,” he said confidently, “appeal and succeed.”
“That will be hard. The manor-folk have long arms, and manage to succeed everywhere.”
“Against them too there’s a way—as there always is, if one waits patiently for the right moment.”
“You are right, Matthias; but oh, how cold it is! Let’s go to the tavern and warm ourselves.”
“Very well.—Having spent so much, I can spend a little more.—But ye should know that only a blacksmith should ‘strike while the iron’s hot.’ The man who would overcome must take happenings coolly, and possess his soul in patience.”
By the time they had come to the village, the twilight had deepened into thick darkness, and in the dusky air the houses they passed by were indistinguishable; but the storm was slowly subsiding.
Boryna stopped the horses at the path to Hanka’s cabin, and got down to help her to get the bundle on her back; when she had alighted, he said in her ear:
“Come round and see me—tomorrow, if you like. I know you are badly off; that scoundrel drinks away all his earnings, leaving you and the children to starve.”
“But ye drove us out; how can I dare return?”
“You speak foolishly.—I tell you, come!”
Choking with emotion, she kissed his hand, unable to utter a word.
“Will you come?” he asked, in a strangely kind and tender voice.
“I will, and thankfully; since ye order me, I will come.”
He whipped the horses up, and at once turned off to the tavern: while Hanka, not waiting for her father, who was just alighting from Bartek’s sledge, hastened back to her hut.
It was dark as pitch there, and seemed even colder than out of doors. The children slept curled up in the featherbed. She set busily about to make the fire and prepare supper, but was all the while full of her extraordinary meeting with Boryna.
“No! Were he on his deathbed, I must not go: Antek would make me pay too dear!” she cried out angrily. But other thoughts succeeded presently, some of revolt against her husband.
Had anyone in the world made her suffer so much as he?
True, Boryna had made over land to that swinish woman, and had driven them away. But Antek had fought with him first, and had been continually snarling at him, so that the old man lost patience. So long as he lived, he had the right to do with his own land as he pleased.—And how tenderly he had asked her to come just now! … and inquired about the children, and everything!—Yes, and never, had not Antek gone after that woman, would there have been half this misery and humiliation. … That at least was not in any wise the old man’s fault.
And as she went on musing, her resentment against Boryna began to abate.
In then came Bylitsa, half frozen and terribly exhausted. He had to warm himself by the fire for an hour at least, before he could say how he had been unable to go any farther, and possibly might have been frozen to death under that tree but for Boryna.
“He saw me, and would have put me on his sledge; but when I said you were on the road ahead, he left me to Bartek, and drove on to catch up with you.”
“Was it so? He never told me that.”
“He is not a hard man really, but would have folk think he is.”
After supper, when the children had eaten as much as they could, and were tucked up in bed again and asleep, Hanka sat down by the fireside to spin what remained of the organist’s wool; and her father still continued warming himself, looking timidly at her, clearing his throat, and gathering courage to speak; which he did at last, though with great hesitation.
“Prithee make it up with him. Think, not of Antek, but of yourself and the children.”
“That is easy to say.”
“Boryna himself made the first advances. … And see: his home is now become a hell. … He will surely thrust Yagna away from him; if not at once, he will very shortly. … Yuzka can never manage so large an establishment.—If, when that comes to pass, you have found favour in his eyes, it were well. … You can render him many a service, and in good season … we know not what may happen … he may ask you to return. …”
As he spoke, she let the spindle go and, with her head propped on the top of her distaff, began to think this over and reflect upon her father’s advice.
He was now preparing to go to bed, but asked her, in a confidential tone:
“Did he talk to you by the way?”
She told him all.
“Pray go to him, my daughter; go tomorrow morning; go, run to him, since he calls for you. Think but of yourself and of the children. … Be on the old man’s side, and kind to him. Be like the docile calf, which, folk say, ‘thrives, sucks much milk, and waxes stout.’—Remember that ‘spite never yet brought success to any man.’—As to Antek, he will return to you. He is now possessed of a devil, and driven
