“Yes, for by the papers we know what’s done all the world over.”
“The smith takes a paper in, and the miller too.”
“A paper fit for the smith, no doubt,” remarked Boryna, with a sneer.
“As it happens, the same paper that his Reverence takes in,” was Antek’s hot retort.
“You know, then? Have you read it?”
“Yes, I have … more than once.”
“You’ll get none the wiser for his counsels.”
“And whom do you hold wise? One with seventeen acres, or eight head of cattle, perhaps?”
“Hold your tongue before I lose my temper! Always picking quarrels with me!—You’re too full of bread—my bread!”
“Aye, so full that like a fishbone it sticks in my throat!”
“Then seek better bread. Hanka’s three acres will give you rolls!”
“Potatoes only; but these none will grudge me.”
“I grudge you nothing.”
“No? I work like an ox, nor ever get a kind word.”
“Elsewhere life is easier, and food given free!”
“Elsewhere it is better, surely.”
“Then go and try it!”
“What, empty-handed? Not I!”
“I’ll give you a staff, to keep the dogs away.”
“Father!” Antek shouted, starting to his feet, but falling back at once, for Hanka caught him round the waist. The old man glared at him fiercely: then, crossing himself as if dinner were over, he went out and into his room, saying in a hard voice:
“D’ye think I’ll let myself be pensioned off by you? Never!”
All rose at once and left the porch, except Antek, who stayed alone there, pondering. Kuba took the horses to the clover beyond the barn, and lay down to sleep beside a cornstack. But he could not; the full meal lay heavy on his chest. Moreover, it now occurred to him that if he had a gun he could kill birds enough—and, it might be, a leveret or two into the bargain—to offer every Sunday to his Reverence.
The smith could forge him a gun. He had made one for the keeper; and this, when let off in the woods, was plainly heard in the village!
“A first-rate workman!—But then he wants five roubles to make one!” He fell into a brown study.
“Where am I to get them from? Winter is at hand: I must buy me a sheepskin coat. My boots, too, will not last beyond Yuletide—Well, there are due me ten roubles, and two bits of clothing—trousers and a shirt. A sheepskin coat, short though it may be, will come to five roubles. Boots, three more. I must get a cap; and a rouble will have to go besides, for his Reverence to say a mass for my departed. So then nothing at all will be left!”—He was disappointed, fumbled in his pockets for a little tobacco that might be left, and so came upon the ready money he had previously forgotten.
“Ah! here I have some cash!”—He no longer cared to sleep. From the tavern there came a far-off sound of music, an echo of shouts, softened by the distance.
“There they are—dancing, and drinking vodka, and smoking too!” he sighed; and, lying down again on his stomach, he glanced over at the hobbled horses, that had gathered together and were nibbling at each other’s necks. Then he decided that in the evening he too would go to the tavern, purchase some tobacco, and just have a look at the dancers.
From time to time, he would glance at his money, then at the sun, which was that day going down with exceeding sluggishness, as if it also needed its Sunday rest. His longing for the tavern was now so great that he could hardly bear it; but he refrained from going just then, and only turned over on his side, and groaned within himself. Antek and Hanka had come out from behind the barn, and were walking along the dividing pathway between the fields.
Antek went foremost; Hanka, leading her little boy by the hand, came after. At times, as they walked on slowly, they spoke a few words. Then Antek would bend down, and stroke the blades that were sprouting forth.
“It is growing up.—As thick as the bristles of a brush,” he muttered, casting his eyes over those acres, sown by himself and for himself: the wages of work done for his father.
“Thick, yes: but Father’s corn is better still. It grows up like a forest,” Hanka said, casting a look on the neighbouring cornfields.
“The land might be better manured, had we but three cows.”
“And a horse of our own. …”
“Aye, then we might raise some fowls or things for market. As it is, what can we do? Father counts every husk of chaff, and thinks a lot of a potato-peeling.”
“And taunts us with every morsel he gives!”
They could speak no more. Their hearts were too full of gall and bitterness, and the angry gnawing pain of revolt.
After a time: “Eight acres or thereabouts would be our share, if …” he observed, absently.
“No more. There’s Yuzka, and the smith’s wife, and Gregory and ourselves,” she counted.
“If we paid money down to the smith, and kept the hut, and sixteen acres with it?”
“But have you the money to pay?” she cried, overwhelmed with a sense of helplessness; and the tears started to her eyes, as she gazed at her father-in-law’s fields—that land, precious as pure gold, whereon, aye, on every inch of it, wheat and rye and barley and beets might be grown.
“Don’t cry, you silly thing; at any rate, we shall have eight acres of our own one day.”
“Oh, if we had but half as many, with the hut and the cabbagepatch!” She pointed to the long stretch of ground, bluish-green with heads of cabbages; and they both bent their steps that way. At its edge they sat down under a bush; Hanka suckled the child, which had begun to cry for food, while Antek rolled a cigarette, lit it, puffed, and scowled.
He said not a word to his wife of the pain that was devouring him, and burned within his heart like coals of fire. For neither could he have told her, nor she have understood
