Hanka, terrified, cried out; and both the others rushed in, ministering to the sick man, and gave him some water to drink. But he did not come to himself, and lay, as he had lain, stiff and motionless, with staring eyes that seemed to note nothing around him.
They sat long with him, both women silent, but in tears. Dusk fell, the room grew dark, and they went out. Only so much remained of day as empurpled the millpond from the last glow in the West.
Turning round upon Hanka, the smith asked her: “What has he told you?”
“What ye both have heard.”
“But what said he when alone with you?”
“Nothing else.”
“Do not enrage me, Hanka, or you’ll rue it!”
“What do I care for threats of yours?”
“The old man put something in your hand,” the smith added, throwing out a feeler.
“Ye may go seek it in the dunghill, then.”
He rushed at her and might have done her some injury, but that Yagustynka, who came up just then, said after her sour fashion:
“Oho! you both get on so lovingly that the whole village is talking about you two!”
With an imprecation, he went his way.
The night had come—starless, with a wind that rustled soft and sad through the trees, presaging a change of weather.
There was light and noise in Hanka’s room, supper preparing at the crackling fire, elderly women holding forth with Yagustynka upon various matters, and Yuzka sitting outside with Nastka and with Yasyek Topsy-turvy; while Pete was drawing out of his violin such wailing notes as made their hearts feel sorrowful. Hanka alone was unable to stay seated, and, continually pondering over Boryna’s words, looked again and again round into the room where he lay.
“Pete, have done!” she cried. “Why, it will presently be Holy Monday, and still you fiddle and fiddle!—’Tis a sin!”
She scolded the man, simply because she was so upset, and fell nigh weeping. He gave over, and they all went into the big room.
Several times that evening she heard the dogs barking loud within the enclosure, and set them on:
“At him, Lapa!—At him, Burek!—At him!”
But each time the dogs ceased suddenly, and came back, wagging their tails with satisfaction.
This took place so often that a fearful suspicion arose in her mind.
“Pete, take heed to lock and bolt everything well. Someone is prowling nigh, and no stranger either; for the dogs know him!”
At last all went to bed and to sleep—all but Hanka. She made sure that all the doors were locked; then she stood lending an attentive ear for a long time.
“Among the corn!—In one of the barrels, I dare say. … Ah, what if someone has forestalled me?”
The very thought made her heart throb, and brought a cold sweat to her brow. That night she hardly slept at all.
III
“Yuzka, kindle the fire; fill all our pots with water, and put them on to boil. I am off to Yankel’s to get the seasonings.”
“Then hurry; Ambrose will be here straightway.”
“No fear; he cannot come so early. He has his duties to perform in church.”
“Only to ring the bell for Mass. Roch is going to take his place for all the rest.”
“Well, I shall be in time. Meanwhile, you hurry the lads, make them scour the trough quickly, and bring it outside the cabin.—Yagustynka will be here presently: let her wash the tubs.—Also the empty barrels must be taken out of the larder and rolled into the pond, to get the staves properly soaked and swollen out.—Do not wake the little ones; so long as they sleep, they’ll be less in the way.”—And, having given her orders and tied her apron over her head, she hastened out into the air of an early and very muggy and rainy morning.
The day was dismal, wet, and most unpleasantly cold; grey mists dripped and drizzled, the slippery roads were sodden and dank, the drab-coloured huts loomed faintly through the rain that fell; the trees, drooping gloomily over the pond, were seen like tremulous shrinking swaying shadows, as dim as if they had been made of mist; in this foul weather, there was scarce any landscape visible, and no one was out as yet. It was only when the Mass-bell began to tinkle that a few red petticoats were seen picking their way through the mire to church.
Hanka tripped on swiftly, thinking she might perhaps meet Ambrose at the turning of the road; but he was nowhere in sight. Only the priest’s old blind horse, as usual at that hour of the day, was going down to the pond with a large barrel, drawn on sledge-runners, stopping and stumbling at every rut, yet finding its way to the place by scent: the farm-lad waiting for it having sheltered himself from the rain in the bushes, and begun smoking a cigarette.
Just in front of the priest’s house, a britzka drawn by a couple of well-fed chestnut horses, had pulled up and the ruddy-faced incumbent of Laznov stepped out of it.
“Come to hear confessions, along with his Reverence of Slupia,” she thought, as she looked in vain for Ambrose. She went on round the church by the poplar road, where the mire was yet more abundant, and the trees, plunged in the vapoury mizzle, looked like shadows seen through a steam-clouded pane. Passing the tavern, she struck off in the squashy pathway that led to her sister’s.
She would, she reckoned, have time enough for a call on her father, and a talk with her sister, with whom, now that she had removed to Boryna’s, she was on very friendly terms.
“Yuzka told me yesterday that Father was not well!” she exclaimed on entering.
“Ah, what’s to be done? He is lying in bed under his sheepskin, and moaning, and talking about being ill,” Veronka moodily replied.
“How cold it is here! I feel it creeping up the calves of my legs!”
“And have I any fuel at all? Who will
