“For her?—Not I! She was sticking like a bone in my throat. No, ’tis something else that perplexes me.”
Antek felt surprised, but did not like to ask questions.
“To sorrow over each particular girl of mine the time would not suffice me. She came within my grasp; I took her: who would not have done so? But truly, mine was but the joy of a dog fallen down a well; she has wailed and lamented for ten women. I fled her; she came after me, just like my shadow. Let John now rejoice with her!—I no longer crave for love affairs, but something very different.”
“True, it were time for you to take a wife.”
“Nastka just now was saying so to me.”
“Our village girls are plentiful as poppies, and you have an ample choice.”
Matthew blurted out the thoughtless answer: “It was made long ago.”
“Then ask me to be your proposer, and have the wedding after harvest-home.”
Somehow the idea displeased him; he asked for more particulars about John, talked of Simon’s farm, and let out—inadvertently, it seemed—the information that, according to Andrew, Dominikova meant to bring an action against Antek for Yagna’s rights as old Boryna’s relict.
“But no one denies that Father made a settlement,” Antek said. “I’ll not give the land up, but will pay her its value to the full. The quarrelsome hag does this for sheer love of a lawsuit!”
“Did Yagna really give the title-deed back to Hanka?”
“Yes, but what of that? she took care not to annul it at the notary’s.”
This greatly relieved Matthew, who—now unable to conceal all he felt—dropped several words in Yagna’s praise.
The whole manoeuvre was soon plain to Antek, who only said with a mocking smile:
“Have you heard what they are saying about her now?”
“Oh, those old women are always her enemies!”
“It seems she is running after Yanek, the organist’s son. And most shamelessly,” he added for greater effect.
Matthew flared up, hot with anger.
“Did ye see that?”
“Nay, I am no spy on her: what is she to me? But those there are who daily see her go out to meet her Yanek … in the forest … or amongst the corn. …”
“A good beating for one or two of them would soon put an end to such tales!”
“Try, try; ye may perchance frighten them,” Antek responded deliberately, though horribly tortured with jealousy at the thought of Matthew possibly becoming her husband: it bit him with all the venom of a mad dog’s fangs.
To what the latter said, though his talk was not infrequently hostile and even offensive, he made no reply, lest he should reveal what he was suffering; but, when they parted, he could not help saying with a malicious smile:
“Whoso marries that woman will have plenty of … connections. …”
And they parted, not on very friendly terms.
When Matthew had gone a little way, his face grew brighter.
“She is keeping him off; that’s what makes him talk so!—Let her run after Yanek!—’Tis but a child; and she cares far more for the priest than for the man.”
His thoughts were so extremely lenient, because, having heard from Antek all about the title-deed and the settlement, he had made up his mind to marry Yagna. He slackened his pace to calculate how much he would want to pay off Andrew and Simon, and have the twenty acres all to himself.
“The old woman will be no treat, but she’ll not last forever.”
The recollection of Yagna’s pranks, indeed, disturbed him, but he said:
“What is over is over; and if she tries new tricks, I’ll soon make her give them up!”
Outside the hut, his mother was awaiting him.
“John is back!—He knows all.”
“Glad of it! I shall not have to lie.”
“Teresa has been in here more than once: talks of drowning herself.”
“Indeed, indeed … she might do so!”—The thought gave him so fearful a pang that he could not touch his supper, but sat listening for any sounds from John’s orchard, which was only separated from theirs by a pathway. His disquietude increasing, he pushed the dish away, and smoked cigarette after cigarette, striving in vain to overcome the fit of trembling that agitated him. He cursed himself and the whole race of women; he tried to jest at the silly business: all would not do. His terror grew more and more, tormenting him past all bearing. He had got up several times to go out and seek company—and yet there he was, remaining in the hut, and he knew not why!
Night had fallen, when he heard steps approaching, and then, coming in with a rush, Teresa had thrown her arms round his neck.
“O Matthew, save me, save me!—O God! how I have been waiting and looking out for you!”
He set her down by his side, but she clung to him like a little child; and with streaming tears she called upon him in the extremity of her despair.
“He has been told all! It never entered my mind that he would really return! … I was at work in the priest’s flax, when someone came and told me. … I had like to fall dead on the spot, and went home with death in my heart. … You were out. … I went to seek you, but could not find you in all Lipka. … I wandered about very long, but at last had to go in.—He was standing there, white as a sheet; he leaped at me with closed fists … and asked for the truth. The truth!”
Matthew, shaking in every limb, wiped the cold sweat from his face.
“So I told it him: of what use would a lie have been? … He seized hold of an ax, and I thought it was my last hour. … I cried out to him: ‘Kill me! You’ll make all right for both of us!’ And he did not even touch me—only flung me a look, sat down by the window, and wept. … And now, what am I to do, wretched one? whither shall I go? … Save me, you, else I leap into the well, or kill myself in some wise! … Save me!” she
