On Friday, at the first glimmer of dawn, Hanka had, together with Pete, finished whitewashing the cabin and outhouses, after which, and a hasty toilet, she had gone to church, where the other women were already assembled to be present at the carrying of the Lord’s Body to the Sepulchre.
In the cabin, a big fire was blazing up the chimney; and on it, in a vast cauldron that a couple of men could hardly lift, an entire ham was simmering, while sausages bobbed up and down in a smaller pot; from these the room was penetrated with so strong and delicious a scent that Vitek, busy whittling toys for the little ones, would again and again lift up his nose, and sniff and draw a deep breath of longing.
Before the fireplace, and in the brightest light of the flames, sat Yagna and Yuzka, amicably engaged in colouring the Easter eggs, though each vied with the other and kept her methods secret. Yagna washed hers first in tepid water, dried them, and then overlaid them with dots and patches of melted wax, and plunged them successively into the seething contents of three small pots. It was tedious work: the wax scaled off sometimes, or the eggs broke under her hands, or burst in the boiling; but she succeeded with about thirty. And then, oh, what things of beauty they were!
The idea of Yuzka as Yagna’s rival! Hers had been boiled with ears of rye and onion-skins that stained them a pretty reddish-brown, which she had embellished with variegated white and yellow patterns, uncommonly pleasing to the eye. … But, when she saw Yagna’s work, she remained open-mouthed with amazement, presently followed by vexation and annoyance.—Why, they dazzled the eyes with their red and yellow and violet tints, and colours like fields of blue flax-flowers! And upon those backgrounds there were painted such wonders that she could not believe her eyes: on one, cocks perched upon a fence and crowing open-beaked; on another, a lot of geese hissing at a sow that wallowed in the mud: here you saw a flock of doves flying over a crimson field, and there fantastic traceries of a bewildering type, and like the frost-patterns on the panes in winter.
Wondering, she gazed upon them again and again. Hanka, too, looked at them when she got back from church with Yagustynka, but said not one word. Only the old woman, after a glance at them all, gave vent to her surprise:
“How in the world have ye come by such fancies? Dear, dear!”
“How? Why, they just flowed from my head to my fingers.”
She was pleased with herself.
“Ye might take a few to his Reverence.”
“I shall offer him some; it may be that he will accept them.”
“His Reverence, indeed! Never saw such marvels! Will be thunderstruck with them!” Hanka muttered ironically, when Yagna had gone from the room.
That evening many villagers sat up late.
It was a black night, overcast, though still. The mill clattered on steadily, and the lamps gleamed in the hut-windows till close on midnight, throwing many streaks of light out into the lanes and over the trembling surface of the pond.
Saturday came, quite warm and a little hazy, but brighter than the previous day; so that the people, notwithstanding the hard work done already, rose blithely to encounter what was coming.
Outside the church, there was a great noise and tumult: for, according to immemorial custom, on that day (which brought Lent to its close) they had come together in the early morning to give a funeral to the zur31 and herrings on which they had been feeding all Lent through. There were no grown-up men in Lipka now; so the youngsters arranged the funeral, with Yasyek Topsy-turvy at their head. They had got, somewhere or other, a big pot of zur, to which they had added certain filthy matters besides.
Vitek let himself be enticed into carrying the pot, which dangled from his shoulder in a net, whilst another little fellow, at his side, dragged along the ground a herring cut out of wood and attached to a string. They went foremost, the others trooping behind with a deafening noise of rattles and shouts.
Yasyek directed the procession: though somewhat idiotic in life, he had quite enough brains for such tomfoolery. They went in procession round the pond and church, and turned off to the poplar road where the funeral was to take place … when suddenly Yasyek struck at the pot with a spade and shivered it to pieces! And the zur, with all its filth, poured over Vitek’s clothes!
This practical joke made everybody laugh very heartily, except Vitek, who flew at Yasyek and fought with him and with the other boys until, overpowered by numbers, he was forced to flee roaring home.
There he got a beating besides from Hanka, for having ruined his coat; and then she sent him to the woods to get sprays of pine-boughs for decorations.
Pete laughed at him into the bargain; nor did even Yuzka show him sympathy. She was busily engaged in strewing all the premises as far as the road with sand brought from the churchyard; its yellow was deepest there. She scattered it over the whole drive up to the porch, and all round the eaves, encircling the cabin with a saffron-coloured girdle.
And now, in Boryna’s cabin, they began to set forth the victuals that were to be blessed by the priest.
The great room had been well scoured and sanded, the windows cleaned, and all traces of cobwebs brushed away from the images on the walls. Yagna’s bed, too, had been covered with a beautiful shawl.
Hanka, Yagna and Dominikova, working together, though in all but absolute silence, had dragged a large table near the corner window, parallel to the bed where Boryna lay, and covered it with a white linen tablecloth, the edges of which Yagna had embellished with a border of red paper fantastically cut out.
