“No one is the worse for good advice.—See well to this: Boryna must never be set at naught, but always treated with tender respect. An old man cares much more for that sort of thing than a young one does. … And who knows whether he may not settle all his land on you? or perhaps give you a big sum—from hand to hand?”
“For that I care nothing,” she interrupted impatiently.
“Because you are young and inexperienced. Look round you: what is it men quarrel for, work for, and make every attempt to get? Why, what but property, property alone!—The Lord never, never made you for toil and suffering.—Whom have I laboured for all my life, if not for my Yagna?—And now I shall be alone—quite alone!”
“But the lads will not quit your side; they will always be with you.”
“Of them I have as much joy as of the day that is no more!” She wept, and added, wiping her eyes: “You must also live in harmony with your husband’s children.”
“Yuzka is a kindly girl. Gregory will not be back from the army for some time yet. And—and. …”
“Beware of the smith!”
“Why, he is on the best of terms with Matthias.”
“If so, it is for some reason of his own: be sure of that.—The Anteks are worst of all; they will not be reconciled. … His Reverence wanted to make peace yesterday, but they would none of it.”
“Oh, but Matthias is a wicked old man to drive them from his house!” Yagna burst out passionately.
“What’s that—what do you say, Yagna? Do you know that Antek would have taken back the land from us—that he cursed you, and said of you things unfit to repeat?”
“Antek against me? Antek? They lie who told you so. … May their foul tongues drop out of their heads!”
“Oh! And what is it sets you so strongly on his side? Say!” she asked with a threatening look.
“Their being all against him! I am not a begging dog that fawns on all who toss him bread. He is ill-used, and I know it!”
“You would like to return the deed of settlement to him, would you not?”
Yagna could speak no further; a stream of tears fell from her eyes; she rushed into the inner room, bolted the door, and cried there for a long while.
Dominikova did not try to interfere. The scene had awakened new feelings of anxiety in her mind, but she had no time to brood over them. Eva came; the lads slouched into the passage; the last preparations and arrangements were now to be made.
The sun was up, and the morning-tide rolling on.
The frost of the previous night had been hard enough for the roadside pools and the borders of the pond to be coated with ice, and the quagmires to bear the weight of the lesser flocks.
Now it was growing warmer, though in the shadow and under the hedges the frost still reigned. The thatches dripped with crystal drops, and wreaths of smoke-like vapour were curling up from the marshes.
Not the least little cloud floated in the dark azure of the sky.
Nevertheless, crows hovering about the cabins, and cocks frequently crowing, foretold bad weather to come.
It was Sunday; and though the bells had not yet begun to ring, the whole village was like a hive of swarming bees. Half the inhabitants were smartening themselves up for the wedding of Boryna with Yagna.
In every cabin, turmoil and racket prevailed; everyone was getting ready, trying things on, and dressing carefully; and out of many an open window and door came the sounds of merry voices.
On Dominikova’s premises, of course, everything was in seething tumult, as usual on such a day.
The cottage, freshly whitewashed, was noticeable from afar, having been decorated with green boughs in Whitsuntide fashion. Already the day before, the boys had come to fix pine-branches on the thatched roof and where possible along every chink in the wall. From the fence to the porch, fir-tree boughs had been likewise set up, so that the fragrance was like that of the woods in the springtime.
Within, the arrangements made were very fine indeed.
On the farther side of the house, generally used as a storeroom, a great fire had been made, and Eva from the miller’s was cooking there with some neighbours and Yagustynka to help her.
All the furniture had been removed from the other side, the room whitewashed afresh within, the chimneypiece veiled with a great piece of blue drapery. Nothing remained but the holy images on the walls; but the lads had carried in stout benches and long tables, which they set up along the sides. The ceiling, with its age-darkened rafters, had been adorned with paper figures that Yagna had herself cut out. Matthias had fetched her coloured paper from town, out of which she had snipped many a fringed and variously coloured circle, and imitating flowers, and curiosities of different descriptions—as, for instance, a dog running after sheep, its master following it, staff in hand; or a church procession, with priest, banners flying, and images borne aloft—and so many other marvels of the same kind, it was impossible to remember them all! And all were well-shaped and artistic in appearance, and had been greatly admired the evening before, when they were unplaiting Yagna’s tresses. She knew how to make many another thing besides—anything that caught her eye or fancy; and in all Lipka there was not a cabin without some cutting made by her hands.
Having partly dressed herself in the other room, she came out to paste the rest of her cuttings upon the walls beneath the holy images, there being no room anywhere else.
“Yagna! will you have done with those fancy things of yours? The people are assembling, the band is marching through the village: and that girl is amusing herself with drolleries!”
“Plenty of time, plenty of time,” she returned briefly; but she now stuck no more cuttings, and busied herself strewing the floor with pine-needles, laying the
