Antek left the assembly about as willingly as a cat driven away from a
bowl of milk. He was even deliberating whether he had not better return,
when, perceiving the gendarmes following him, he was struck with an
idea. On his way, he broke off a large bough, and set about whittling it
into a stick, leaning against a fence, and eyeing the “Brown-Coats,” who
walked as slowly as they could, but could not help coming up with him
very soon.
“Wither away, my ancient?” he asked the elder of them in a tone of
mockery.
“On duty, Master Farmer.—Are we bound for the same place?”
“It would please me, but I fancy not.”
Looking around, he saw that they were quite alone with him, but still
too near the District Office: so he went with them, walking close to the
hedge, and well on the look-out for a sudden attack.
The “ancient,” cautiously disposed, continued the talk in a friendly
tone, complaining bitterly that he had not eaten since early morning.
“The scrivener,” Antek replied, “has treated the head official most
grandly, so no doubt he had left good things for you, my ancient!—Alas!
in the country there are no such dainties to be had—only _kluski_ or
cabbage!—and what are those things for grand folk like you?” He was
jeering on purpose to irritate them. The younger of the two, a stalwart
young fellow with flashing eyes, growled under his breath, but the
“ancient” made no answer.
Antek, still playing with the men, now stirred his legs so vigorously
that they had much ado to keep up with him, and awkwardly splashed along
after him through pools and stumbled into hollows.
The country-side was quite empty and deserted; a blazing sun burned.
Here and there a peasant stared after them, or a few children peeped out
from shady places: the village dogs alone followed them persistently and
with great clamour of barking.
The “ancient” lit a cigarette, and held it between his teeth as he went
on talking, lamenting over his lot: no rest either day or night with
that everlasting service!
“Indeed? That means it is no easy thing nowadays to squeeze money out of
the peasants!”
The “ancient” flung out a curse at him, with a foul reflection on his
mother. Antek, who had no mind to bandy insults with them, grasped his
stick with a firm clutch, and rejoined, now openly attacking him:
“What I say is the simple truth: your service in the villages only gets
you barked at; at most, some poor fellow’s last _zloty_ may now and then
find its way to your pockets!”
The “ancient,” though he turned green with spite, and clenched his hand
on his sword-hilt, still bore this in silence. It was only when they
were just passing the last cabin in the village that he unexpectedly
sprang at Antek, crying out to his comrade:
“Seize him!”
The surprise failed, however. Before they could touch him, Antek had
sent them both reeling back with a couple of blows. Leaping to one side,
he stood, with his back against the cabin, brandishing his stick,
showing teeth that gleamed like a wolf’s, and uttering bits of
sentences, hoarse and incoherent:
“Go your ways.... Ye’ll never get hold of me!... Even four of you would
be too few!... Dogs! I’ll break all your teeth!... What would ye?... I
have done no one any harm.... Will ye have a fight?—Very well; but first
order a cart to carry your bodies away.... Come on, then.—Touch me.—Let
me see you try!” he growled; and his stick sang loud in the air. He was
in a slaying mood.
Seeing him thus, they both stood transfixed: the man was of such great
stature, expanded to the utmost by the towering passion he was in; and
his stick hissed and hummed and whirled in his hand with so ominous a
sound!—The “ancient” felt that an attack upon him was out of the
question, and attempted to turn the whole affair off as a joke.
“Ha! ha! excellent!... Trapped! Trapped! A splendid joke we have played
off on you!” He burst out laughing, holding both his sides, while they
withdrew several steps (overcome, as it were, with the fun of the
thing); but, continuing to retire, and now out of danger, he suddenly
changed his tone and, shaking his fist, snarled furiously:
“Ye have not seen the last of us, my master: we shall talk with each
other once more!”
He snarled back in reply: “May the plague carry you both off first! Why,
you are afraid lest _I_ should attack _you_; therefore did ye try to
turn it into a jest!—And I too shall talk with you ... but man to man,
and alone!” he growled, as he watched them out of sight.
“Those fellows—to set upon me!” he thought. “The fools! They were the
hounds, I was the hare!”—He mused.—“Because of what I said at the
assembly! Though indeed it could not have been much to his taste.”
He was now near the Manor garden, that lay at some distance beyond the
village, and sat down there to rest awhile and compose himself. The
Manor was seen through the wooden fence, white upon the background of a
larch grove, its open windows staring darkly, like so many grottoes. On
the pillared veranda, there were several people sitting: probably taking
refreshment, for servants hovered about them, and there was a clinking
of crockery. At times the sound of merry laughter was heard.
“They are well off, those folk! Eating, drinking, and caring for nothing
at all!” he thought, making a meal of the bread and cheese that Hanka
had put in his pocket.
As he ate, his eyes roved over the huge lime-trees which bordered the
road, and were now full of blossoms and humming bees, and the soft
steamy fragrance from them filled him with delight. A duck quacked in a
neighbouring pond; there, too, frogs croaked drowsily; the thickets
around him thrilled to the many voices of living things, and from the
fields came the grasshoppers’ concert, alternately loud and faint: till,
after a time, all these sounds were hushed and silenced, as it were, in
the sunshine’s hot downpour. Silence reigned; all animated life hid away
from the desolating heat—all except the swallows, that were darting and
dashing and flashing about evermore.
His eyes ached with the intensity of the heat, and even in the shadow he
felt parboiled. The last pools were drying up, and the blast, which blew
from the all but ripe cornfields and the parched fallow lands, was like
that from an open oven.
Antek, after resting well, walked swiftly towards the neighbouring
woods; but, passing out of the shadow and into the light, he felt a
quiver pass through him, as if he were entering a furnace of white fire.
His capote was off, but his shirt, that clung close to his moist reeking
sides, seemed like hot sheet-iron. He took off his boots as well, and
went on with naked feet crunching the burning sand.
The stunted little birch-trees that grew here and there gave hardly any
shadow yet; the drooping ears of rye bent down over the roadway, and the
flowers also hung their heads in the burning glare.
Sultry silence prevailed: no man was visible; no bird, no living
creature anywhere in sight. Not a leaf, not a blade of grass trembled.
It was as if the Demon of Noontide had swooped down upon the country
and, with husky lips, were sucking all the strength out of the swooning
earth.
Antek walked on, still more slowly, thinking of the assembly: now
furious with anger, now laughing with scorn, now heavy with
discouragement.
“What’s to be done with such men?—The first gendarme who comes by appals
them!... If they were commanded to obey a gendarme’s boot, they
would!—Sheep, silly sheep, all of them!” he thought, with mixed feelings
of bitterness and compassion.
“True, we are all badly off—each one of us wriggling like a tortured
eel! And everyone is so wretched, he can hardly breathe: why should he
trouble about things that concern him less! Ah, poor people, so
benighted, so miserable! They do not so much as know what they need!”
And his heart went out to them, afflicted at the thought of their
misery.
“Swine find it hard to raise their snouts to the sky—and so do men!” So
he thought, sorely troubled, but yet got no profit of his pain, further
than the feeling that he himself was in as bad a case as anyone
else—perhaps worse.
“Only those can live their lives contentedly who never think!”
He waved his hand with a gesture of despair, and then walked on, plunged
in so deep a reverie that he nearly stumbled over a Jew—a
ragpicker—sitting at the edge of a cornfield.
“Resting, are ye? Indeed, the heat is terrible,” he said, stopping for
an instant.
“Heat? We are in a furnace: ’tis a judgment of God!” the Jew ejaculated.
Getting up, he passed a strap over his round old shoulders, and, thus
harnessed to his wheelbarrow, set about pushing it along with infinite
toil. It was chock-full of rags and wooden boxes; above these towered
baskets of eggs and a coop full of chickens; and, the road being deep
with sand, and the weather unbearably hot, he had to struggle along
desperately, and sit down to rest every now and then.
“Nuchim, you’ll be late, Sabbath is at hand,” he soliloquized, chiding
himself with tears. “Push, Nuchim, push on! you’re strong as a horse!
Now, Nuchim!—One—two—three!...” And with a cry of desperation, he would
wheel the barrow on for a score of paces, and then stop again.
Antek was for passing him by with a nod, but the Jew called to him
earnestly:
“Master Farmer, I pray you! Help me, and I will pay you well. I can no
more, in truth I can no more!” And he fell forward against the
handbarrow, breathless and as white as a sheet.
Without a word, Antek turned round, threw his capote and boots on to the
barrow, seized it by the handle and pushed it forward so lustily that
the wheel hummed and the dust flew. The Jew trotted beside him, catching
his breath as he went, and chattering by the way to interest his helper.
“Only as far as the wood: the road is good there. ’Tis not far. And I’ll
give you five whole kopeks!”
“Confound your kopeks! Fool, do I care for your money? But ye Jews think
money is everything in the world.”
“Be not angry, Master, I’ll give you pretty toys for your
children.—No?—Then needles, thread, ribbons peradventure?—No?—Then may I
offer rolls or scones or caramels ... or aught else? For I have
everything—Or would ye, Master Farmer, buy of me a packet of tobacco? Or
may I give you a glass of quite superior vodka? such as I have only for
my very good friends—on my conscience, only for my very good friends.”
And here a fit of coughing made his eyes almost start from their
sockets.... Antek went a little more slowly, and the Jew, catching at
the barrow, managed to drag himself along.
“We shall have a good harvest,” he continued, starting another subject;
“the price of rye is falling.”
“Aye, and when the crop is scanty, it must bring us in less: either way,
it is ill for farmers!”
“But the Lord God has granted us fine weather, and the corn in the ear
is dry.” He rubbed some in his hands and tasted it.
“Well and good; but the Lord Jesus is hard upon us for the barley crop:
it is quite lost.”
From topic to topic, they came to talk about the morning’s assembly. It
appeared that the Jew had special information on this point. Looking
cautiously about him, he said:
“Do ye know? The District Official made a contract as far ago as last
winter with a builder about that Lipka school! My son-in-law acted as
his agent.”
“What, in winter, and before it was voted? What is this ye tell me?”
“Was he to ask anyone for leave? Is he not throughout his District like
a Squire on his estate?”
Antek put him a few more questions, which Nuchim answered, giving many
curious particulars, and finally saying, with tolerant amenity:
“Things have to be so. The husbandman lives on the land he tills, the
tradesman on what he sells, the Squire on his estate, the priest on his
parish ... and the official, on everybody. It must be so, and ’tis well
so. All men should get their livelihood, should they not?”
“To my mind, that one man should fleece the others is not well; but that
all men should live justly, and as the Lord hath commanded.”
“What’s to be done? Folk must live as they can.”
“Oh, I know the saying: ‘Every man peels his own turnip’; but therefore
do things go so badly.”
The Jew nodded, but kept his own counsel.
They at last got to the wood, where the road was less deep in sand.
Antek gave up the barrow, bought a _zloty’s_ worth of sweets for his
children, and, when the Jew wanted to thank him, cried out:
“You are foolish! To help you was but a whim of mine.”
And then he started off at a good pace for Lipka. He was now in the cool
grateful shadow of the trees, with only a tiny strip of sky overhead,
and a thin bright stream of sunshine beneath. The wood—of oak, pine and
birch—was old and tall, and the trees were pressed close, with a thick
undergrowth at their feet of hazels, aspens, juniper-bushes, and
hornbeams, with here and there a few groves of firs, pushing greedily
skywards to get at the sun.
There still were plenty of pools glittering on the road after
yesterday’s rain; plenty of broken boughs, too, and tree-tops scattered
on the ground. In some places, a slender tree had been uprooted, and lay
across the way, which was quiet and cool and darksome, and smelling of
mould and of mushrooms.
The trees stood motionless, lost, as it were, in the contemplation of
heaven; only at rare intervals did they let a few beams slip through,
like golden gossamer threads, on to the banks of moss, and the wild
strawberries, sprinkled about, and red as clotted blood, amongst the
pallid grasses.
Antek was so charmed with the cool and profound tranquillity of the wood
that he sat down under a tree, and fell unawares into a doze, from which
he only awoke at the sound of a galloping snorting horse. It was the
Squire, out for a ride, and he went forward to accost him.
They greeted one another as usual, and in neighbourly fashion.
“Fearfully hot, eh?” said the horseman, soothing his restless mare.
“So it is.—In a week’s time, we shall have to go reaping.”
“In Modlitsa they are already cutting down the rye.”
“The soil is sandy there; but this year they will everywhere be reaping
earlier.”
The Squire asked him about the meeting at the District Office, and
stared to hear what had taken place.
“Did ye actually demand a Polish school?—and so openly, and so firmly?”
“I have said: my tongue tells no false tales.”
“But what daring! To demand such a thing in the head official’s very
presence!—Well, well!”
“It is so written down in the laws, as clear can be; I had the right to
demand it.”
“But how did the idea come into your head to ask for a Polish school?”
“How? Because I am a Pole—not a German, nor of any other nation.”
“But who gave you the idea?” he asked, lowering his voice, and
approaching.
“Untaught, children may learn to think aright,” he answered evasively.
“Ah,” he went on in the same tone, “I see that Roch’s work amongst you
has borne fruit....”
“Who, together with your Honour’s _kinsman_, teaches our folk as he
can.”
Antek had interrupted the Squire, and, laying stress on the word
“kinsman,” looked keenly on him. The Squire, ill at ease, tried to turn
the conversation; but Antek returned to the subject of set purpose,
speaking of the peasants’ many grievances, and their benighted and
friendless condition.
“That’s because they will hearken to no one. I know well how the clergy
work for their good, and how they urge industry upon them ... and how it
is all lost labour.”
“Sermons are no more good for that purpose than a thurible of incense
for a dead man!”
“Then what _is_ good, pray?—You have, I see, learned not a few things in
prison,” he retorted. The taunt made Antek’s eyes blaze and his face
flush; but he answered with calm:
“So I have. And, especially, that the nobility is to blame for the evils
we suffer!”
“Foolish prating! What harm did they ever do to you?”
“Harm?—When Poland was free, they cared no whit for the people, only to
drive them to work with a whip, and oppress them, while they themselves
made merry, and danced the country to ruin: so that we now must build it
all over, from the very foundations.”
The Squire was a hot-headed man, so he lost his temper:
“You insolent peasant! Let alone the nobles and their doings—care rather
to pitchfork your dung—you had better! And keep your tongue between your
teeth, and well inside, or there be those that will cut it out for you!”
And, slashing his mare, he went off down the road at a swift gallop.
Antek was not less offended and indignant.
“That race of hounds!” he muttered angrily. “Great gentlemen, forsooth!
Blood of a dog! So long as he stood in need of the peasants, he was
hail-fellow-well-met with them all! The vermin—himself not worth a roast
louse!” Infuriated, he strode along, crushing the toadstools on his path
in his rage.
On leaving the wood for the poplar road, he heard a couple of voices
that seemed familiar to him, and, peering forward, perceived a britzka
covered with dust in the shade of some birches at the edge of the wood,
and Yanek, the organist’s son, standing with Yagna a few paces off.
He rubbed his eyes, quite sure they must be in fault. They were not. The
couple, not twenty paces from him, stood gazing one at the other, with
faces wonderfully radiant.
Much surprised, he strained his ears to catch what they were saying; but
he could only just hear that they spoke aloud.
She had come out of the forest, and met him driving to the village: a
chance meeting, he thought at first. But at that moment he was swept by
a wave of suspicion, and a rankling sense of bitterness got hold of him.
“No! It cannot be but they have met by agreement.”
Yet once more, scanning the innocent features of the young man, and
seeing the saintly serenity that lighted up his face, Antek grew calmer,
though he was still unable to explain why Yagna had dressed so carefully
to go to the forest, why her azure eyes flashed so brightly, why her
crimson lips trembled so, or why she was so visibly flooded with joy. He
took note of her, his eyes gleaming like a hungry wolf’s, as she, with
swelling bosom, bent forward to offer Yanek a small basket of bark, out
of which he took strawberries, eating some, and putting some in her
mouth.
“... He is almost a priest, and he wants to play like a baby!”
He whispered the words in a tone of pity, and slipped away quickly home,
for the sun told him the afternoon meal was due.
“That ulcer of mine” (he was alluding to Yagna) “hurts me, but only when
I happen to touch it!... Oh, how greedily her eyes were fixed on the
lad! As if she would have devoured him!—Well, let her! Let her!”
But, do what he would, his “ulcer” gave him excruciating pain.
“She flees me as the plague!... This fellow’s new sieve for her
peg.—Fortunately, she will lose her trouble with Yanek.—Ah!” he said,
now more and more wrought up; “some women are of such nature that they
will run after any man who only whistles to them.”
But, fast as he went, his burning memories went with him. He saw no one,
though several men passed by; and he only calmed down at the village, on
perceiving Yanek’s mother, sitting by a ditch, her youngest son rolling
in the sand beside her, and a flock of geese grazing between the
poplar-trees.
“You have come pretty far with your geese, Madam,” he said, stopping to
wipe his face.
“I went out to meet Yanek; he must be here at any minute.”
“I just saw him at the skirt of the forest.”
“Ah, is he, then, so near?” she ejaculated, starting up and chiding her
geese for getting into the rye near the roadside, where they were doing
considerable damage.
“His britzka was standing near the crucifix; he was in talk with some
woman or other.”
“Yes, he must have met an acquaintance and had a chat. Good kind-hearted
boy! he cannot even pass by a strange dog without patting it.—And who
was she?”
“I could not be quite sure, but fancy she was Yagna.” He saw the old
dame purse her lips at the name, and added, smiling significantly: “I
could not tell, for they were slipping away into the thickets. On
account of the heat, no doubt.”
“Saints of the Lord! what has come to your mind? Yanek!—to mix with such
a one!”
“She’s as good as others!” he retorted, suddenly angry. “Better, it may
be.”
The organist’s wife bent over her knitting, and her fingers wagged more
quickly.
“What! Yanek, on the very verge of the priesthood, to have anything to
do with such a woman!” And then she recalled certain tales she had heard
about priests, and dug a knitting-needle into her hair in perplexity,
and resolved to see into this and inquire.... But Antek had gone; and
now there came a great cloud of dust upon the road; and two minutes
later Yanek was embracing her with the tenderest affection, and crying
out from his heart:
“O my dear, my darling mother!”
“Saints of the Lord!—Let go, you young giant, let go: you’re choking
me!” But when he had let go, she fell herself to hugging and kissing,
and gloating over him with eager eyes.
“Poor little mite! How thin they have made you! How pale, poor son of
mine! and how wretched-looking!”
“One does not grow fat on broth of holy water!” he answered, laughing,
and tossing his little brother up in the air, till he crowed with
delight.
“Fear nothing; we’ll stuff you and puff you out in no time,” she said,
stroking his cheeks with affection.
“Well, let us drive on, Mother dear, and we shall be sooner home.”
“Ah, those geese! Lord, Lord! In the rye again!”
He ran to drive them off, for they were plucking at the rye-stalks and
devouring the grain at will. Then he placed his brother in the cart, and
walked on himself along the middle of the road.
“Look there!” his mother cried; “how that brat has smeared his face!”
She pointed to the boy on the britzka.
“Yes he has made free with my strawberries. Eat away, eat away!—I met
Yagna coming out of the wood with them, and she gave me some.” He
coloured bashfully.
“Boryna was just telling me he had met you both....”
“I did not see him; he must have passed at some distance.”
“Child, folk in a village can see things through walls—even things that
have not taken place!” She laid stress on the words, looking down on her
twinkling knitting-needles.
Yanek had apparently not caught her meaning. Seeing a flight of doves
sweeping low above the rye, he aimed a stone at one of them, saying
merrily:
“They are the priest’s: anyone can tell that, so fat they are!”
“Be still, Yanek! Someone else might hear you!” she gently rebuked him,
though her thoughts already saw him a parish priest, and herself
spending her old age by his side, and living the rest of her years in
peace and happiness.
“And when is Felix coming for the vacation?”
“Why, Mother, know ye not? He is in jail.”
“Saints of the Lord! In jail! What was the misdeed?—And I always said
and foretold he would come to a bad end!—Such a scapegrace!—Had he
become a scrivener of low degree—that would have sufficed him—quite; but
the miller wanted him to be a doctor, forsooth!... And they were so
stuck up, so proud of their darling! Now he is in jail—and a pretty
comfort to them!” she said, trembling all over with malevolent
satisfaction.
“But, Mother, it is not that at all: he is in the Warsaw Citadel.”
“In the Citadel? Then” (she lowered her voice) “it is some political
misdeed!”
Yanek either could not or would not tell her any more, and she went on,
in a faltering voice:
“My dear child, remember never to have aught to do with any such
affairs.”
“No! In our seminary, anyone who so much as speaks of them is expelled.”
“You see? They would expel you, and you would never be a priest, and I—I
should die of shame and sorrow! O God! have mercy upon us!”
“My dear mother, have no fear for me.”
“And you are aware how hard we work and strive for the bettering of your
lot; what trouble we have—so many of us, and our gains always growing
less; and how, were it not for the bit of land we have, our priest would
drive us to die of starvation. Aye, he now settles matters directly with
the peasants, both for weddings and for funerals: who ever heard of such
a thing! He says Father takes too much from the peasants—and he becomes
their benefactor at other folk’s expense!”
“But,” Yanek faltered here, “Father really did take too much!”
“What! will ye rise up in judgment on your own father?—Even were this
true, for whom is he greedy? For himself? No: for you all; for you and
your schooling!” She felt deeply hurt.
Yanek was going to ask her forgiveness, but he just then heard a bell
tinkle on the other side of the pond, and cried:
“Hark, Mother! it must be the priest taking the Holy Viaticum to some
sick man!”
“He is more likely to be ringing to prevent the bees from flying away;
they are probably swarming in his garden now. He is more interested in
his bees and his bull than in the church.”
They were just passing the churchyard, when suddenly they heard a
roaring hum, and Yanek had but just time to call out to the driver:
“Bees are coming!—Hold the horses still, or they’ll bolt.”
A huge swarm was flying with a loud drone about the church square,
rising up like a sonorously purring cloud, and wheeling about in search
of a good place to settle upon; at times sweeping low and floating
amongst the trees. Behind it ran the priest, clad only in shirt and
breeches, bareheaded, out of breath, and continually sprinkling the bees
with water from an aspergill. Near him came Ambrose, creeping along in
the shadow of the bushes, ringing and shouting with all his might. They
went twice round the square without slackening their speed; for the
bees, flying ever lower, seemed to want to alight on one of the
cottages, from which the frightened children were already making their
escape; but then, rising a little higher, they made straight for Yanek’s
britzka. His mother, with a shriek, and pulling her petticoat over her
head, ran to crouch down in the nearest ditch; the geese waddled away;
the horses would have bolted, had not the driver covered their eyes with
cloths. But Yanek stood quietly, with uplifted head, while the swarm
swirled on above him, and passed him towards the belfry.
“Water, quick, before they are off again!” bellowed the priest, rushing
after, and, coming up with them, sprinkled them with so copious a shower
that their damp wings allowed them to go no farther, and they began to
settle on the belfry window.
“Ambrose! the ladder and the sieve now!—Hurry, else they are away
again!—Stir your leg and hurry up!—How do you do, Yanek? Get me some
live coals in a thurible: we shall have to quiet them with incense!” he
cried in great excitement, incessantly sprinkling the swarm as it was
settling. Before he could have said a “Hail Mary,” the ladder was there,
and Ambrose tinkling, and Yanek sending up clouds of aromatic smoke as
from a chimney; and meanwhile the priest climbed up and, bending over
the swarm, groped amongst the bees to find their queen.
“Ha! here she is! God be praised; they will not flee any farther
now!—But they are dispersing: Yanek! smoke them from beneath!” he cried,
taking the bees up in his bare hands and pouring them into the big
sieve, the swarm being an exceedingly large one, talking to them all the
while, and not in the least afraid, although they came setting on his
head and crawling over his face.
“Take heed! they are getting excited, and may sting,” he said, warning
the others, as he came down, surrounded by a vast cloud that was eddying
on all sides of him, and buzzing and humming. On reaching the ground, he
raised up the sieve as carefully and as solemnly as though it had been a
Monstrance. Yanek, swinging the thurible, accompanied him; Ambrose
followed, now ringing, now sprinkling the bees. And thus they went in
procession to the priest’s apiary, behind his house, where stood in a
separate enclosure some scores of hives, all humming as loud as if each
of them were about to swarm.
While the priest was getting his bees into their new hive, Yanek, now
very tired and hungry, slipped away quietly home.
They all rejoiced exceedingly to see him, and the noise and fuss made
over him cannot be described. When the first outburst was over, they
made him sit down to table, bringing him all sorts of good things,
enticing and pressing and teasing him to eat, till the whole house
echoed to the din and bustle, all wanting to be by the lad’s side or
doing something for him. In the midst of this hubbub, in dropped
Gregory, the Voyt’s brother, to ask them anxiously if they had seen Roch
anywhere. But they had not.
“Nowhere can I find him,” he said in distress, and, without staying to
talk, went on to another cabin to seek for him. Scarcely had he left
them, when the priest sent for Yanek. He lingered and delayed going as
long as he could, but of course had to go at last.
His Reverence, who was sitting on the porch, embraced him like a father,
and, making him sit down by his side, said with great affability:
“I am glad you have come: we shall say our breviary together.—But do ye
know how many swarms of bees I have this year? Fifteen! And as vigorous
as any of the old ones; some have already filled a quarter of the hive
with honey. And I had more swarms; but I had told Ambrose to watch for
the swarming, and he fell asleep, the blockhead! and where are the bees
now?—In the woods and the forests!—And then the miller stole one from
me; he did, I say! They flew on to a pear-tree of his, and he claimed
them for his own, and would not hear of returning them. Sore about the
bull, he is, and that’s his revenge.... The robber!—What, have you heard
about Felix?... Ah! these wretches, they sting like wasps!” he broke off
all at once, brushing away with his handkerchief the flies that came
settling on his bald crown.
“All I know is, he’s in the citadel.”
“If that were all!... And I warned him so!... The donkey would not
hearken to me; and now he’s in a pretty fix.... The old father is a
loud-mouthed boor; but I’m sorry for Felix; a clever young rogue, and
with his Latin at his fingers’ ends, as well as any bishop!... What is
that saying? ah, ‘Touch not what’s not allowed, and keep yourself from
things forbidden’ ... and: ‘A docile calf thrives as though it sucked
two mothers.’ Aye ... aye ...” he continued his voice growing feebler,
as he went on brushing the flies away. “Recollect that, Jasio, recollect
it.” His head fell back, and he sank deep into his vast arm-chair. But
as Yanek got up to leave, he opened his eyes and murmured: “Those bees
have tired me out!—Come and say the breviary with me of an evening....
And take heed not to be too familiar with the peasants. Note this: ‘He
that mixes with chaff will be eaten by swine!’ Eaten, I tell you—and
there’s an end.”—With these words he threw a handkerchief over his face,
and was asleep in the twinkling of an eye.
What the priest had said, Yanek’s father thought, no doubt; for, when
the farm-servant came home with the horses from the pastures, and Yanek
vaulted upon one of them, the old man cried:
“Get down this instant! It is unseemly for a clergyman to ride
barebacked, or to keep company with herdsmen!”
Dearly as he would have loved a ride, he nevertheless alighted meekly
and, twilight having fallen now, went into the garden to say his evening
prayers. But he could not keep his mind on them. There was a girl,
somewhere about, trilling a song; some women were gossiping in a
neighbouring orchard, and every word came wafted over the dewy grass to
him; children shouted as they bathed in the pond; in another direction,
the sound of laughter struck his ears; and then came the lowing of the
cows, and the metallic cackle of the priest’s guinea-fowls pierced the
air, and the whole place was full of sounds of every kind, and like a
hive of humming bees. All this put him out; and when he had at last
collected himself, and, kneeling down at the edge of a rye-field, raised
his eyes to the starry heaven, and his soul to the Infinite beyond it,
he heard such a sudden din of piercing shrieks and howls and curses that
he ran back to the house, not a little alarmed and shaken, to ask his
mother (who had just come to call him in for supper) what the matter
was, and whether the people there were fighting in earnest.
“Oh, ’tis only Joseph Vahnik, back from the police office a little in
his cups, and he’s fighting his wife. The woman had long stood in great
need of a good drubbing. Do not trouble, she will take no harm.”
“But she screeches as if she were being skinned alive!”
“That’s her way: if he had taken a stick to her, she’d have been quiet
enough. And she’ll get even with him to-morrow, she will!—Come, dearest,
or supper will be cold.”
He went to bed, utterly worn out, and having scarcely touched any food.
But as soon as the sun rose next morning, he was on his legs: going
about the fields, bringing clover to the horses, teasing the priest’s
turkeys till they gobbled at him indignantly, making friends with the
dogs, that tried to fawn on him till they well-nigh broke their chains;
scattering grain to the pigeons, helping his youngest brother to drive
the cattle, and Michael to chop wood; looking whether the pears in the
orchard were ripe yet; frolicking with the colt, going everywhere and
greeting everything he saw with eyes of love, as friends and
brothers—even the flower-dight hollyhocks, the little pigs basking in
the sun, the very weeds and nettles themselves! And his mother,
following his gambols with loving looks, murmured, smiling fondly at the
lad:
“He’s out of his wits—clean out of his wits!”
And so he wandered about, radiant as that July day: smiling, sunny, full
of warmth, and embracing the whole world with intense affection ...
until, the Mass-bell beginning to tinkle, he quitted all to hasten away
to church.
It was a Votive Mass, and Yanek walked out of the sacristy in front of
the priest, in a new surplice, freshly adorned with red ribbons. The
organ pealed forth, and from the choir there came a big bass voice which
made the flames of the altar-lights tremble. Quite a number of
worshippers were kneeling round the altar, when the service began.
Yanek, though serving Mass and praying fervently between his responses
and the acts of his ministry, could not help noticing Yagna and her
gleaming dark-blue eyes, fixed upon him, and the lurking smile on her
parted crimson lips.
After church, the priest took him to his house directly and set him
amanuensis work to do for him till noon, when he was free to visit his
acquaintances in the village.
He went first to see the Klembas, his nearest neighbours, but found none
of them at home. Only, looking through the passage open at either end,
he saw that something moved in a corner, and heard a husky voice:
“Here I am ... I, Agata!” She raised herself up, and lifted her hands in
astonishment. “Lord! ’tis Master Yanek!”
“Pray you, do not rise!... What, are ye unwell?” he asked her kindly,
and, seating himself on a stump that he brought in, looked into her
face, which he could scarcely recognize, so worn and wasted it was.
“I am waiting upon the Lord and expecting His mercy.” Her voice had a
strangely solemn sound.
“What is it that ails you?”
“Naught. But Death is growing ripe within me for the harvest. The
Klembas have only taken me in here that I might die amongst them: so
here I am—praying and awaiting the end ... waiting for Dame Crossbones
to knock and say: ‘Come away with me, you weary soul!’”
“But wherefore are you not lying within—in the cabin?”
“Ah, I would not be in the way till my time comes. As it is, they had to
take their calf hence to make room for me.... But they have promised to
lay me in their dwelling-room for my last hours—on a bed, beneath the
Holy Images, and with the Taper of the Dying lit in my hand!... And to
bring the priest, and dress me in my best clothes, and give me a real
goodwife’s funeral! Yea, and I have paid for everything, and they are
honest folk: perhaps they will not play false with a poor lone old
woman.—I shall not trouble them long; and they promised me this in the
presence of witnesses—of witnesses!”
“But are you not weary of lying here alone?”—His voice sounded tearful
and unsteady.
“Master Yanek, I am very well off indeed here. Through these doorways, I
can see many a thing: folk that go along the road, folk talking one to
another; some look in, some even have a few kind words for me: I might
just as well be going about the village. And when they have all gone to
their work, I can see the fowls scratching in the rubbish-heaps; and
then the sparrows hop into the passage, or the sun looks in for a little
ere he sets, or some naughty boy flings a clod my way; and so the day is
gone by before I know it.... And ... in the night ... they come to
me—oh, many a one!...”
“They? Who, ah! who is’t that comes?” He bent close, and peered into her
seemingly sightless eyes.
“My own folk, who died long ago: kinsfolk and acquaintances.—I tell you
true, young master: they do come!—Once, too,” she whispered with a smile
of ineffable rapture, “once the Virgin Mother herself came and said to
me tenderly: ‘Lie there, Agata, the Lord Jesus will reward you.’ It was
she of Chenstohova: I knew her at once by her crown and her mantle, all
covered with gold and coral beads. And she stroked my hair and said: ‘Be
not afraid, O lone one; you shall be a foremost dame in the court of
Heaven, a lady of high degree.’”
Thus spoke the old woman, chirping feebly, like a bird that is dropping
off to sleep; while Yanek, bending over her, looked and listened; as one
who, gazing into abysmal depths, hears something hidden that bubbles and
gurgles, and sees the glimmer of a mystery that is going on, beyond the
ken of the human mind! He felt terror-stricken, yet could not tear
himself away from that rag of humanity, that withered ear of corn, that
life which, trembling like a ray that goes out in the darkness, was yet
dreaming of its forthcoming renewal and splendour! Never yet had he
beheld so near as this the inexorable destiny of man, and he was
naturally appalled on realizing it. His heart was filled with mourning,
and tears welled up from his eyes; he was bowed down to the earth with
deep commiseration, and a fervent supplication burst convulsively from
his lips.
Old Agata roused herself, lifted up her head, and cried ecstatically:
“O Yanek! O, most holy youth! Dear priest, beloved of my heart!”
He remained for a long time afterwards, standing propped against a wall,
taking in the warmth of the sun, and feasting his eyes on the bright
day, and the life he saw seething round him.
Did it matter, after all, if hard by him a human soul were struggling in
the grip of death?
The sun shone all the same, the cornfields rustled; far, far above, the
white clouds sailed past; children played on the roads; on the boughs,
ripe apples glowed crimson; hammers beat upon the smithy anvil; they
were getting ready a wagon, and tempering a sickle for the coming
harvest; the air was redolent of fresh-baked bread; women were chatting
together, kerchiefs moved along the hedges and fields and enclosures:
humanity went on its way, as usual, as everlastingly, swarming,
bustling, full of cares and little schemes, no one so much as wondering
who would be first to fall into the abyss!
And so Yanek soon shook off his sadness, and went on to the village.
He stayed a little with Matthew, who was now raising the walls of
Staho’s hut to a good height; had a talk with Ploshkova, busy bleaching
her linen; paid a visit to Yuzka, who was still in bed; lent an ear to
the complaints of the Voyt’s wife; looked how the smith at his forge was
hardening scythes and putting a jagged edge to reaping-hooks; and he
looked also into the gardens where women and lasses were at work:
everyone was glad to see him, hailed him as a friend, and looked on him
with no little pride—a child of Lipka—one of them!
Dominikova’s was the last hut he visited. She was sitting outside,
spinning, and he wondered how she could spin with a bandage over her
eyes.
“My fingers tell me if the thread is fine or thick,” she said; and,
greatly pleased that he had come, called Yagna, who was doing something
about the yard.
She came at once, scantily attired in only smock and petticoat; but on
seeing Yanek, she hastily put up her hands and ran into the cabin, as
red as a cherry.
“Yagna, bring us milk: Master Yanek will surely take some refreshment.”
She brought in a full milking-pail, and a mug to drink from. She had
covered herself with a shawl, but was still extremely confused. As she
poured the milk out with downcast eyes, her hands shook, and she turned
pale and red by turns.
All the time he was there, she said not one single word; but,
accompanying him to the gate when he went away, she gazed after him till
he was out of sight.
There was in him something that attracted her irresistibly, and stirred
her up with such power that, in order not to follow him, she flew to the
orchard, caught hold of a tree, and embraced it with all her might,
hugging it in both arms. There she stood, breathless, almost beside
herself, cloaked and hidden, as it were, by the apple-covered branches
that bowed down over her, with eyelids half closed, and a faint smile of
happiness on her lips, though she also felt a vague dread, and a fearful
yet pleasant sense of agitation: something like what she had experienced
when looking at him through the window, that night in spring.
She too attracted him, though he was not aware of any attraction. He
would now and then look in at her cabin for a short time, feeling an
unaccountable gladness at the visit; and, seeing her daily in church,
always on her knees during the whole of Mass, and seeming to be in a
state of fervent, even ecstatic prayer, he could not witness this
without a pleasing emotion. One day he spoke to his mother of that
ardent piety of hers.
“Oh, if anyone stands in need of prayer and pardon, she does!” was the
reply.
Now Yanek’s soul was as pure a white as the whitest flower in the world,
and so he failed to catch the real meaning of those words. As, moreover,
she used to frequent their house, where everybody liked her, and he saw
her piety besides to be so great, he really had no suspicion of what she
was. Only he thought it a curious thing that she had not come once since
his return.
His mother answered: “I have just sent for her; there is much ironing to
be done.”
And presently she came, but so finely dressed that he wondered.
“What? are ye off to a wedding?”
One of the girls here cried out: “Rather she has received an offer of
marriage.”
“Let them but dare! I should soon send them flying!” she replied with a
laugh, blushing like a rose, for every eye was upon her.
Yanek’s mother set her to iron at once; his sisters joined her, and
Yanek went with them. In a short time they were all very merry, roaring
with laughter over the merest trifles, and finally the old dame had to
rebuke them.
“Be quiet, ye magpies!—Yanek, better go into the garden. ’Tis not
fitting you should sit grinning here.”
So he had to go out, according to his wont, into the fields away beyond
the village, or even as far as the boundaries of Lipka, where he would
sit reading or meditating.
Yagna knew well those haunts of his, and where to find him, if only with
the mind’s eye; she was for ever flying round him, like a moth round a
candle, and could not help herself; for she was driven towards him, and
now followed her impulse without resistance, giving way with all her
heart and soul to that gentle force, which like the rush of a foaming
current impelled her onward; she never even wondered on what shores it
would land her, nor how it all would end.
Whether she laid herself down to rest late in the night, or rose up at
early dawn, she was continually repeating with every heart-beat:
“I shall see him—see him—see him once again!”
She was often kneeling before the altar, when the priest came out to say
Mass; the organ burst forth with soul-stirring strains, the
incense-smoke poured out of the thuribles, and whispered prayers went up
to the throne of God; but she, with eyes full of worship, gazed only on
Yanek, clad in white, slender, fair to behold, moving with joined hands
amidst the fragrant vapours and the rainbow hues that streamed down from
the stained-glass windows. He seemed to her like a real angel, stepping
out of a picture-frame, and gliding towards her with a sweet smile. And
then all Heaven would enter her soul; she would fall prone in the dust,
kissing the place where his feet had passed, and, carried away by the
force of her passionate emotions, would join with the others to sing the
hymn: “Holy, Holy, Holy!” in a delirium of purely human bliss.
Sometimes Mass was over, and the people had gone home, and Ambrose came
jingling his keys to close the church, while she was yet there, on her
knees, gazing at the spot, now empty, where Yanek had been—plunged in a
hallowed calm, an intoxicating joy, intensified even to pain—shedding
big tears that flowed down clear as crystal.
Now was every day for her like a day of solemn festival, a great day of
indulgence, with the never-ceasing joy of adoration ever thrilling her
soul; and when she looked out upon the country-side, the ripe ears of
corn, the sun-baked soil, the orchards bending under their burden of
fruit, the far-away forests, the passing clouds, and that grand sun,
like the Sacred Host, rising up over the world—all these, with one
accord, sang together in her soul one and the same hymn, which reached
to Heaven: “Holy, Holy, Holy!”
“At a time like this,” she thought, “how strong one feels! One could
wrestle with God—master death—even struggle against one’s fate! To one
in such a pass, life is for ever a joy; even the merest worm is beloved
by him!... Every morning he kneels to thank the Lord, every night he
blesses the day gone by: he willingly would give away all he has, for he
would yet remain rich; and with each of those marvellous days, his power
of loving increases!
“And how his soul rises up—up—far above all the worlds! And how he looks
on the stars as on things close by! how boldly he stretches out his hand
to Heaven and the day of bliss everlasting, seeing clearly that there is
naught to bound his power of loving, and that naught can turn it aside!”
Meanwhile the days glided by as usual, those days of tedious preparation
for the harvest. And she was bustling about and working hard, but as
full of song as any lark; unweariedly joyful, blossoming all over with
gladness, like a rose-bush or an exuberant hollyhock; or rather like
some flower from the garden of Paradise—so winsome to see, so radiantly
alluring with those wonderful eyes of hers, so perpetually wreathed with
beaming smiles! Even the glances of aged men followed her with delight,
and young swains again came flocking about her cabin, sighing with love.
But she rejected every one of them.
“Take root here, if you will; you’ll profit nothing,” she said mockingly
to each.
“We are all scorned by her! She is as haughty as any Manor lady,” they
complained to Matthew. And he only sighed bitterly: he himself, had he
any greater privilege than to talk at dusk with her mother, and eye
Yagna as she hurried about the cabin, and listen to the songs she sang?
He looked and listened, and each time went home in a surlier mood, now
more and more often repairing to the tavern, and on his return thence
discharging his bitterness on everyone around him. Especially on Teresa,
whom he pained so much that life was a burden to her; so much that,
meeting Yagna one day, she could not forbear from a manifestation of
spite—turning her back on her and spitting!
But Yagna, walking by with far-away looks, passed on without even seeing
her.
Teresa, in a fury, said to the girls that were by, washing at the
mill-pond:
“See ye how she stalks past—never looking at anyone, either by day or by
night?”
“And,” cried another, “arrayed as if it were the local feast to-day!”
“Daily she sits combing her hair till noon!”
“She’s always buying ribbons and headgear!” they chimed in, full of
hate. Since some time, whenever she appeared in the village, she was
followed everywhere by the women’s piercing looks—sharp as cats’ claws,
stinging as a viper’s fangs. And on every occasion they would find
something to say against her. The goodwives whispered in Ploshka’s
enclosure, as she passed:
“It is unbearable, the way she sets herself above us all.”
“And dresses like a Manor Lady: whence can the money come?”
“Has she not great favour with the Voyt?”
“Antek also, they say, is very open-handed with her.”
But here Yagustynka interfered. “Oh, no, Antek cares no more for her
than a dog for a fifth leg! ’Tis someone else she has taken up with
now!” And she smiled with such a knowing air that they all pestered her
to know who this was. She would not, and told them:
“I am no scandalmonger! Ye have eyes: find out for yourselves!”
And from that time, a hundred pair of eyes spied all Yagna’s doings
still more closely than ever. So many hounds in pursuit of one hare!
Yagna, thus constantly watched by prying eyes, went her way quite
unconscious; nor would she have cared in any case, having the bliss of
seeing her Yanek daily, and losing her whole being in his eyes.
Almost every day, she would look in at the organist’s, always when Yanek
was at home. Sometimes he happened to sit by her side, and she knew that
his eyes were upon her; and then her face glowed, all on fire, her feet
trembled and her heart would beat like a hammer. At other times, when he
was giving his sisters lessons in the next room, she would listen,
holding her breath, and so extremely attentive to the sweet sounds of
his voice that the old dame once asked her why she gave ear so eagerly.
“Because Master Yanek teaches in such learned wise that I cannot
understand anything at all!”
“And are ye so fain to do so?” she replied with a smile of pity. “My son
has learned in no mean school!” she added with pride, and continued
expatiating on her Yanek for some time. She was fond of Yagna, and liked
her to come; the girl was handy at every sort of work, and besides very
often brought something—pears, wild strawberries, whortleberries,
sometimes even a pat of fresh butter.
Yagna listened with eager attention to all she said; but when Yanek left
the house, she would presently hurry away—to her mother’s, she said. She
loved to gaze on him from a distance; and at times, too, hidden in the
rye or behind a tree, she would gloat over him for a long time, and with
such tender emotion that the tears would fall in spite of her.
But her joy was greatest in the short warm clear summer nights. As soon
as her mother was asleep, she carried her bedding out into the orchard,
where, lying on her back, she looked up at the stars scintillating
through the tree-tops, and dreamed sweetly of the “world without end.”
The sultry night-winds swept over her face and the stars looked down
into her wide-open eyes; the voices out of the fragrant darkness, the
breathless whispers of the leaves, the broken rustling of the creatures
slumbering around—feeble sighs and dull stifled calls and timid
chuckling sounds—melted within her into a weird music, penetrating her
with a hot thrill that made her catch her breath, and quiver, and fall
down, rolling on the cool dewy sward on which she lay like a fruit
fallen from the tree. There she would remain, prone and powerless, in
the clutch of the almighty force of Nature, as did the ripening fields,
the fruit-burdened branches, the broad yellow wheat-lands, ready for the
sickle, the birds, the blasts, or for any fate that awaited them,
indifferently expecting all!
Thus did Yagna spend the short warm clear nights and the burning days of
July: they passed by her like a delightful dream, repeated again and
again, and always more desirable.
And she moved about, too, as in a dream, scarce knowing whether it was
day or night.
Dominikova noted that something unusual was taking place in Yagna, but
she knew not what: only she was rejoiced at her unexpected and most
fervent piety, and would often say:
“Yagna, I tell you: whoso seeks God, to him doth God come!”
And Yagna would then smile a quiet humble smile of expectant happiness,
but said nothing.
And one day, quite unawares, she came upon Yanek, sitting by the mound
that was the village landmark, book in hand. She could not take to
flight, so stood there stock-still, confused and blushing deeply.
“Why, what are you doing here?” he said.
She stammered something, fearing lest he had guessed how matters stood
with her.
“Sit down; I can see you are hot and tired.”
As she hesitated whether to comply, he took her by the hand and seated
her by his side; she, with a quick motion, hiding her bare feet under
her skirt.
Nor was Yanek at his ease; he seemed embarrassed and troubled, and
looked about him in perplexity.
No one was near. The roofs and orchards of Lipka rose like far-away
islands out of a sea of corn, which rolled its waves in the breeze;
there was a warm scent of wild thyme mingled with that of the rye. A
bird was sailing high above their heads.
To break the awkward silence, he said: “It is terribly hot.”
“And it was pretty hot too yesterday,” she replied, in a voice so husky
with joy and fear that she could hardly get the words out.
“Reaping will begin soon.”
“Aye, it will,” she assented, her eyes glued to his face.
He smiled and, attempting a free and easy tone, said to her:
“Why, Yagna, you are growing prettier every day!”
“I pretty? No, indeed!” she faltered, turning very red, while her
dark-blue eyes shot flames, and a smile of secret delight trembled on
her lips.
“But tell me true, Yagna, do ye not mean to marry again?”
“Never! Am I not happy, single as I am?”
“And is there no one for whom ye care at all?” he asked, growing bolder.
“No one, no one!” She shook her head, fixing full upon him her dreamy
eyes that told of blissful thoughts. He bent forward, and looked into
their azure depths. In her glance there could be read a prayer, full of
sweet and most profound trust—like the fervent outcry of an adoring
heart at the most sacred instant of the Mass. And her soul stirred
within her, as a sunbeam passing over the fields, as a bird winging its
way, singing far above the earth.
On a sudden he shrank back, strangely perturbed, rubbed his eyes, and
rose to his feet.
“I must be going home.” He nodded farewell to her, and set off towards
the village through the fields, opening his book to read as he went. His
eyes happening to wander off it, he looked round, and stopped short.
Yagna was following, only a few paces behind him!
“This,” she said, timidly excusing herself, “is the shortest way home
for me too.”
“Then let us walk abreast,” he answered, gruffly, not much pleased at
having her company; and on he went, reading the book to himself half
aloud.
“What does it tell of?” she inquired, with a glance at the open pages.
“I’ll read you some, if you wish.”
There was a spreading tree not far off; so he sat down in its shade to
read, while Yagna, squatting down and facing him, her hand propping her
chin, listened very eagerly, drinking in all his being with greedy eyes.
“How do you like this?” he asked after a while, raising his head. She
blushed, looked away, and blurted out bashfully:
“Can I tell?—It is not a story about kings, is it?”
He looked annoyed and read on, but slowly and distinctly this time,
laying stress upon every word. He read about fields and cornlands ...
about a manor that stood in a grove of birches ... about the son of a
Squire who came home ... and a damsel who sat in a garden with the
children! And all that was set down in verse, exactly as in the books of
pious canticles, and they sounded like a hymn given out by a priest from
the pulpit. And she felt a wish to sigh and cross herself and shed
tears, the words impressed her so.
But the place where they were sitting was fearfully hot. All around them
stood the rye, spoiled by tangles of cornflowers and vetches and
morning-glory flowers, forming a dense wall, through which no breath of
air could pass to cool them. The silence was broken only by the rustling
sound of the dangling ears of rye, by the chirping of sparrows in the
boughs, and the drone of some passing bee. Yanek’s voice sounded very
sweet and melodious; but Yagna, though her eyes were fastened upon him,
as upon a most beautiful picture, and her ears did not miss one word he
said, yet could not help nodding from time to time, for she felt so
drowsy she had much ado to keep awake.
Fortunately he left off reading then, looking her straight in the eyes.
“Say, is it not truly beautiful?”
“Aye, very beautiful; very like a sermon!”
His eyes flashed and his cheeks flamed, as he held forth to her about
the poem, and quoted many a passage, describing the fields and forests.
But she broke in:
“Why, every infant knows that trees grow in the woods, that water flows
in the rivers, and that men sow the fields; wherefore, then, put such
things in print?”
Yanek started, astonished and displeased.
“I,” she went on to say, “care only for tales of kings, of dragons, of
spectres—tales which make one’s flesh creep to hear them, and the heart
within one burn like a live coal.... Such tales Roch tells us sometimes:
I could listen to him all day, all night!—Have ye any books on such
matters?”
“Who would read them? Mere trash, mere fables!” he ejaculated,
scornfully, and very much put out.
“Fables? Why, Roch has read them to us: they are in print!”
“Then he read you falsehoods and senseless things!”
“What, are all those marvellous tales only falsehoods and made-up
stories?”
“Nothing more!”
“And those about the noonday phantoms too? And those about the dragons?”
she asked, more and more disappointed.
He was losing patience. “I tell you, all that is mere falsehood!” he
said.
“But is all false too?—About the Lord Jesus, journeying with Saint
Peter?”
He had no time to answer her; for suddenly, as if risen out of the
ground, Kozlova appeared, standing in front of them and looking on the
pair with a wicked smile.
“Master Yanek,” she said in soft tones, “they are seeking you throughout
Lipka.”
“What can the matter be?”
“Three carts, full of gendarmes, have come to the village.”
He started up, greatly upset, and made off as fast as was seemly.
Yagna too returned to the village in deep trouble, Kozlova walking by
her side.
“I fear I have interrupted you two ... in your prayers!” she hissed.
“By no means. He was reading to me from a book with certain tales done
into verse.”
“Oh. I fancied something very different indeed. His mother had begged me
to seek him.... Coming this way, I look around: there is no one.... Then
I think of giving a look under this pear-tree ... and behold, there are
my turtle-doves, cooing one to another.—’Tis a very convenient spot ...
quite out of sight!—Aye, aye!”
Yagna broke away from her in a rage, screaming: “May your filthy tongue
be struck dumb for ever!”
And Kozlova cried after her: “And ye’ll always have someone to shrive
you!”