“What do you mean?” Dominikova asked.
“That his Reverence has just carried the Holy Viaticum to Bartek over the water.”
“Why, he was quite well when I saw him but now at the fair!”
“He has been so savagely cudgelled by his son-in-law that his liver was ruptured.”
“When? and on what account?”
“On account of the land, of course. They have been at odds these six months, and today at noon they settled the matter.”
“Why,” Yagna cried, “is there no judgment of the Lord upon such murderers?”
“It will come,” her mother replied sternly, raising her eyes to the holy images.
“Yes, but it will not bring the dead to life,” Ambrose muttered.
“Sit down, and share our board.”
“I have naught against that. I still can get through a dish—if only large enough.”
“You think of nothing but jesting and drollery.”
“I have nought else in the wide world: why should I care!”
They seated themselves round the bench on which the two dishes—potatoes and sour milk—had been put, and set to eating with the usual deliberation and taciturnity, while Andrew saw to the pots’ being abundantly supplied. Only Ambrose now and again said something funny, at which he himself was the first to laugh.
“Is his Reverence at home?” Dominikova asked towards the end of the meal.
“Where else, in such weather? Yes, at home, poring over books like a Jew.”
“A learned, a most learned man!”
“And so good! The best man in the world,” Yagna chimed in.
“Ah, yes. No harm in him. … Takes care of himself, and hurts nobody.”
“That’s not the way to speak, Ambrose!”
They had done. Yagna had gone with her mother to where the distaffs were fixed in front of the fireplace, while her brothers, as was their custom, cleared away and washed and set things in order. Dominikova had always ruled her sons with iron sway, and brought them up to do the duties of girls, that Yagna’s beautiful hands might not grow coarse.
Ambrose lit his pipe, puffed up the chimney, and poked the embers, while adding some faggots, with furtive glances at the womanfolk. He was pondering over something and settling how to begin.
“I fancy you must have had a proposal or two.”
“More.”
“Naturally. Yagna is as pretty as a picture. His Reverence says there is none so pretty in the whole village.”
Yagna blushed scarlet with delight.
“Did he say so?” quoth the old dame. “May the Lord grant him health! I have long, long been getting money together for a votive mass: I will have one sung directly.”
“There’s somebody that would like to send you a proposal; but he is somewhat shy.”
“A farmhand?” Dominikova inquired, turning the spindle swiftly, till it fluttered about the floor.
“A man with a household under him. Comes of a good stock, but is a widower.”
“What, nurse another’s children? Not I.”
“Fear nothing, Yagna; they are all well out of leading-strings.”
“Young as she is, why should she accept an old man? Let her wait for a young one, if any such should come.”
“Oh, there are plenty. No lack of young men, no! Lads as straight as arrows, smoking cigarettes, dancing in the tavern, swallowing drams of vodka, and with a keen eye for any girl that has a few acres and a bit of money. Wretched husbandmen, though, who rise at noonday, and in the afternoon carry dung in a wheelbarrow, and till the land with a hoe!”
“I will not let my Yagna stoop to any such!”
“They say you are the wisest of us all; and they say true.”
“On the other hand—small delight can an old man give a young girl.”
“She may find young ones to delight her—not a few.”
She eyed him severely. “So reverend in years, yet so careless in talk!”
A pause ensued.
“He’s an honourable elder, and not greedy of other folk’s money.”
“No, no! naught but sin can come of it!”
“Well, but he might make a marriage settlement,” he continued, now quite serious, and knocking the ashes out of his pipe.
The reply, when it came, was given with hesitation.
“Yagna has enough of her own.”
“He would give more than what he received; certainly more.”
“What’s that you say?”
“What I know. Neither the wind nor my fancy has taught it me: I come here in another’s name.”
Silence again. The old housewife took a long time to straighten the tangled flax on the distaff; then, wetting her left thumb and finger, she drew out the long fibres, while her right set the spindle whirling, flapping and whirring along the floor like a top.
“Well then, shall he send her his friends with vodka?”
“He? Who?”
“Know you not? He that dwells over there!” And Ambrose pointed to the lights in Boryna’s hut, twinkling across the pond.
“His family are grown up: they will oppose it. Besides, they have a right to their portions.”
“But he can always make a settlement with what is his own! He is a good man, and no indifferent farmer; religious into the bargain. And hale! Lord, I have seen the man heave more than two bushels of rye in a sack on to his shoulders. Let your Yagna wish for anything in the world except pigeon’s milk, and she will get it. And then, the lad Andrew is next year to be a conscript. Now, Boryna knows all about official matters, and whom to apply to, and may be of great use.”
“But how do you, Yagna, look upon this?”
“Indifferently.—If you say: ‘Marry him’ I will. It is for you, not for me, to decide.” She spoke very low, her forehead touching her distaff, while, looking vacantly into the fire, she listened as the faggots crackled merrily.
“Well?” Ambrose queried, rising from his seat.
“Let his friends come”; the words dropped one by one from the old dame’s lips. “A betrothal is not a wedding yet.”
Ambrose crossed himself and went out, making straight for Boryna’s cabin.
Yagna was sitting dumb and motionless.
“Yagna dearest, what do you say to this?”
“Naught whatever; it is all the same to me. If you like, I marry Boryna; if not, I stay with you. … By your side, I am very well off.”
Her mother spoke in
