Life was fast becoming impossible at Dominikova’s. Yagna was always
straying about like someone distraught, heedless of everything in the
world. Andrew did his work in a slovenly way, and his absences at
Simon’s grew more frequent. The farm had fallen into complete neglect.
Sometimes the cows were driven unmilked to the pastures, and the pigs
were squealing for food all day long, and the horses gnawed at their
empty racks. The old dame could not do all by herself, having to grope
about with her stick, half blind and her eyes bandaged. No wonder if she
almost went mad with trouble and mortification.
She hired a _komornitsa_ for the work, and did all she could, both by
herself and by her influence over her children. But Yagna seemed deaf to
all entreaties and remonstrances; and Andrew, when threatened, would
answer back insolently:
“Ye have driven Simon away: work ye by yourself. He wants you not, is in
no trouble, has a hut, has money, has a wife, has a cow—and is an
out-and-out good farmer!”—But, saying these words, he took good care to
keep out of her reach.
“Aye, aye,” she answered, with a dreary sigh; “truly, that unnatural
wretch has contrived to succeed in all things.”
“Yes, and he manages so well that even Nastka is astonished!”
“I must” (she spoke her thoughts aloud) “hire someone to work regularly,
or take a farm-servant.”
Andrew scratched his head, and said with some hesitation:
“But why take a stranger, when Simon is there, if ye’ll but say the
word?”
“Do not meddle when you’re not asked!” she snarled; but all the same,
she felt—and it was a bitter pill to swallow—that she would sooner or
later have to give way and come to terms with Simon.
But what made her most anxious was Yagna’s state. From her she could get
no clue; and she went on piling surmises on surmises, unpleasant fancies
on fancies not less unpleasant, till at last, one Saturday afternoon,
she could bear it no longer, and—bearing a large duck with her as an
offering—groped her way to the priest’s house.
She came back only at evening, in great agitation, crying and wailing
like an autumn wind at night; but, until she was alone with Yagna after
supper, she spoke no word.
Then, “Do you know,” she said, “what tales are afloat concerning you and
Yanek?”
“I am no lover of gossip!” her daughter answered unwillingly, raising
her eyes, that shone with a feverish glow.
“But you have to know this ... and to learn, too, that there’s no hiding
things from neighbours’ eyes.—‘What’s done in silence is spoken of
aloud.’—They say most fearful things of you.”
Then she told her every particular that she had gleaned from the
organist’s wife and from his Reverence.
“... That very night they held judgment upon him; his father gave him a
beating; the priest added some blows from his long pipe-stem; and he has
been sent to Chenstohova, to protect him from you!—Do you hear that? Oh,
think what you have done!” she cried indignantly.
“Jesu Maria!—Yanek beaten!—Beaten!—O God, O God!” And she started up
with a mad idea of doing something ... but sat down again and hissed
between her teeth:
“May their arms wither, may their hands rot off! And when the plague
comes, may they not be spared!” She then wept bitterly, with the tears
streaming from her swollen eyes, like blood from a freshly opened wound.
Careless of her agony, Dominikova still continued to lash her with her
tongue; and each word was a blow. She reminded her of all her many sins
and transgressions, omitting not a single one, and pouring out before
her all the bitterness that she had endured in silence for ever so long.
“Can you not see that all this must come to an end? that you cannot live
on any more in this wise?” she cried, more and more pitilessly, though
she herself was weeping, and the tears fell under her bandage down her
cheeks. “Shall you be held the lowest of the low? Shall all men point
their fingers at you now?—Oh, what a shame for my old age, good Lord!
Oh, what a shame!” she murmured despairingly.
“Ye too, I hear, were no whit better in your youth!”
This silenced Dominikova effectually.—Yagna set to ironing some frills
for the next day. It was a windy evening, with whistling sounds in the
trees. The moon was sailing athwart a sky flecked all over with
cloudlets. Away in the village the lasses were singing, while someone
scraped a jerky accompaniment on a fiddle.
They heard the Voyt’s wife talking as she passed by.
“He went to the Police Bureau yesterday; since then, no news of him.”
“Yesterday evening,” Matthew’s voice returned, “he went to the District
Office; and the Soltys says the head official had sent both for him and
for the scrivener.”
After they had passed on, the old woman spoke again, but less harshly
this time.
“Wherefore did you drive Matthew away from us?”
“He was displeasing to me; why, therefore, should he sit here? I seek no
man, nor do I need any!”
“But ’tis time—aye, high time—to provide yourself with a goodman! Folk
would then no longer attack you so. Even Matthew—he’s not to be
disdained; a clever fellow, and an honest.”
For some time, and very earnestly, she held forth on this theme, but
Yagna, busy with her own work and full of her own sorrows, made no
reply. So at last her mother gave over, and took up her rosary. It was
late in the night. All was quiet, save for the tossing trees and
clattering mill; the moon was now quite hid behind dense clouds, though
their edges were silvery, and a few sheaves of light shot out between
them.
“Yagna, you must go and confess to-morrow. You’ll feel more at ease,
when rid of your sins.”
“To what purpose?—No, I’ll not go!”
“Not go to confession!” Her mother’s voice was stridulous with horror.
“No. Quick to punish, slow to help: that’s what the priest is.”
“Hush, lest the Lord God punish you for those wicked words!—And I say to
you: Go to confession, do penance, beg God’s forgiveness; do so, and all
may yet be well!”
“Penance indeed! Is mine slight? And for what wrong that I have done,
pray? No doubt, because I love, and because I suffer, I am rewarded
thus. For me, the worst that can be has already come to pass!” And she
went on bewailing herself in her sullen mood of exasperation.
Alas, poor thing! she had no foreboding—no, not the slightest—of the
chastisement which was about to overtake her: a chastisement far less
foreseen, and far harsher still!
For on the next day, which was Sunday, a rumour spread round the village
before High Mass—the incredible rumour that the Voyt had been arrested
for a deficit in the village accounts!
At first no one would believe it, and though fresh and more dreadful
particulars came in hourly, they were hardly taken in earnest by anyone.
The graver members of the community only said: “The idle love inventing
stories and spreading them for a pastime.”
They believed, however, when the blacksmith, home from town, bore out
every word, and Yankel told the whole village:
“’Tis all true! Five thousand roubles of the community’s money are
wanting. His farm will be seized for the sum, and should it not suffice,
Lipka will have to make up the rest!”
Thereupon a furious storm of protest arose. What! when they all were in
such straits, and misery cried aloud everywhere; when there was nothing
more to eat, and many had to borrow, that they might pull through till
the harvest was over: was it now that they must pay money for a thief?
That was beyond human patience; the whole place went mad with rage, and
curses and threats and foul names flew about like hail.
“I was no partner of his: therefore will I not pay in his stead!”
“Neither will I! He had revelled and caroused and had his pleasure: must
I suffer now, paying for the pranks he has played?” So said many a one,
in sore trouble, and hardly able to keep back his tears.
“Long have I had mine eyes upon the man, and foretold all that has now
come to pass. Ye would not hearken then; and now, here you are!” old
Ploshka said, not without ulterior intentions; and his wife, like a
worthy helpmeet, echoed his words about the place, repeating them to any
that would listen.
The tidings were so overwhelming that but few went that day to church,
but talked the matter over at home. As the grievance was common to all,
so they all complained together in huts and orchards, but especially
along the mill-pond banks. What puzzled them most was, where the man
could have wasted so much money.
“He must have hidden it somewhere; he never can have spent such a sum!”
“Nay, he has trusted in the scrivener’s uprightness, and we know well
how far that goes.”
“Poor man! he has wronged us all, but himself more than anyone,” some of
the graver villagers remarked: when Ploshka’s wife thrust her portly
figure amongst them, and came forward wiping dry eyes, and with assumed
sympathy:
“And I say, poor wife!—she that was such a grand and haughty dame—what
will she do now? Both land and house will be taken from her, and the
poor wretch will have to go into lodgings and work for others! ’Tis not
as if she had got some pleasure out of all that money spent!”
“Oh, but she has enjoyed herself very well as it is!” Kozlova bawled,
attacking her like Ploshkova, but in a different fashion. “They have
both lived like lords, the merry villains!—meat every day, and half a
potful of sugar in her coffee! And they both of them drank their rum
neat and in tumblers! I myself have seen them bring all sorts of good
things from town—half a cartful! What else made them so big-bellied? Not
fasting, at any rate!”
She was listened to in grave silence, in spite of the arrant nonsense of
her closing words. But it was the organist’s wife who decided the
attitude of the people. She happened (it seemed a hazard at least) to be
passing among them; and, listening to their talk, she observed, with
apparent indifference:
“Why, do ye not know on what the Voyt has spent so much?”
They closed round her, and insisted on her telling them.
“’Tis clear enough: on Yagna!”
This was a surprise, and they looked at one another in bewilderment.
“Since last springtime, all the parish has been talking of naught
else.—I shall not say a word; but go ye, ask anyone, even down in
Modlitsa ... and ye shall hear the truth!”
Seemingly unwilling to say more, she made as to leave them; but they
followed her and literally drove her into a corner. Then she told them,
as a secret that was to go no farther, how the Voyt had bought Yagna
rings of the purest gold, kerchiefs of the finest silk, and given her
lots of coral necklaces and quantities of ready money into the bargain!
All these were of course glaring fabrications, but they believed her
implicitly. All but Yagustynka, who cried out in a passion:
“Great saints, Snuffle and Cant, pray for us!—Have you seen all this,
madam?”
“Yes, I have! And I can swear, even in church, that it was for her he
has stolen: aye, and very likely at her instigation too! Ah, but she is
capable of any crime; naught on earth is sacred to her, that shameless,
that conscienceless one! The lewd beast, for ever prowling about Lipka,
bringing shame and disgrace wherever she goes!... Why, she even
attempted to seduce my own Yanek, that innocent lad, as pure as a child!
But he escaped from her and, coming, told me all! Only think of it: the
wanton will not even leave a priest alone!” She stopped, out of breath,
for her bitter spite had made her speak at a great rate.
These words had the effect of a spark on gunpowder. All the former
grudges against Yagna now sprang into life again—all the feelings of
envy and rivalry and hatred; all present gave utterance to what they had
to accuse her of, and the tumult became indescribable. Everyone tried to
shout down everyone else, and with louder and louder shrieks.
“How can our Christian land support such a monster?”
“And who caused Boryna’s death? Have ye forgotten?”
“So she has even attempted to entice a priest! O merciful Jesus!”
“Ah, how much drunkenness and quarrelling and iniquity are all owing to
her!”
“She is an ulcer that infects the whole village, and because of her,
Lipka is despised by all!”
“So long as she’s amongst us, there will ever be sin and wickedness and
lechery! To-day the Voyt robs us for her sake; another may do the same
to-morrow!”
“Drive her out! Out—like a leper—to the woods and the forests!”
“Drive her out!—There’s no help for it! Drive her out!” they yelled,
infuriated, and now wrought up to any extremity. On the proposal of the
organist’s wife, they all went in a body to the Voyt’s. They found his
wife bathed in tears, and so wretched, so miserably dejected, that they
embraced her and wept over her, and condoled with her with the utmost
tenderness.
After a while, Yanek’s mother mentioned Yagna.
“Ah, ’tis God’s truth,” the other lamented in despair. “She is the cause
of all.... Oh, may she, for the wrong she has done, die like a dog in a
ditch, eaten of worms for this my shame, for this my misery!” And she
fell back on a settle, torn with fierce agony, and wrestling with a fit
of sobs.
They sorrowed and wept over her for a long time; but as the sun was
going westward, they at last went home. Only the organist’s wife
remained; and the two, shut up together, took counsel and talked over a
certain measure to be taken. They then both went from cottage to
cottage, canvassing the village, and preparing the secret enterprise on
which they had entered.
They were joined by the Ploshka women and several others, who embraced
their cause, and with whom they visited the priest. He, however,
stretching out his open hands before him, said:
“With these doings I will have naught in common. I cannot prevent them;
but I want to know nothing about the whole business, and shall be going
to Zarnov to-morrow for the whole day.”
The evening was noisy with quarrels and contradictions and secret
plottings: when night fell, all those in the plot repaired to the
tavern, where the organist stood treat to them all. There they once more
set about debating and deliberating: the foremost farmers and nearly all
the married women in Lipka were there. They had been conferring together
for some time, when Ploshka’s wife shouted:
“Antek Boryna, where is he? All are assembled here, and he is the
foremost amongst us; no decision we took without him would be valid.”
“Yes, we will send for him; he must come!” they shouted; “we can do
nothing till he is here.”
“What if he take her part?” said a voice.
“Would he dare to oppose us—us, the community? For we are
determined—all, all, all!”
Antek was in bed, but the Soltys woke him up.
“Ye must go and speak your mind. If you will not, then they’ll say you
are for her, and fly in the face of our assembly! And your trespasses in
the past will never be forgiven by the women!—Come now; we must put an
end to all this!”
He went indeed, for he could not choose but go; but with a heavy heart.
The tavern was full to bursting, and resonant with a loud droning sound.
The organist then got up on a bench, and made a speech like a sermon.
“... Nothing else is to be done! The village is like unto a house, from
which, if a thief shall take away one of the foundation beams, another
will greedily seize upon the rafters, and a third a log from the walls;
and presently the house itself must fall, and crush all the dwellers
therein! See then: if amongst us everyone shall be free to rob and slay
and do all manner of wrong, behaving lewdly, what will become of the
village? I say to you that it will be a village no longer, but a shame
and a disgrace to every honest man! that all men will shun it from afar,
and cross themselves when it is named! Aye, and I say that sooner or
later a judgment of God must fall on such a village, even as on Sodom
and Gomorrah! Yea, it will fall, and on all of us; for we shall be
guilty, both those that do evil themselves, and they that permit the
evil to increase! For what says Holy Scripture? ‘If thy hand offend
thee, cut it off; if thine eye hath trespassed, pluck it out and throw
it to the dogs.’—Moreover, I say to you, Yagna is worse than the plague,
worse than any pestilence; for she sows seeds of scandal, sins against
all God’s commandments, and draws down upon us the wrath and terrible
vengeance of our Lord. Drive her out, then, while it is not yet too
late! The measure of her iniquities is full; the day of reckoning has
come at last!” he concluded, bellowing like a bull, with purple face and
eyes starting out of their sockets.
“Yes, yes! It is time!—We, the people, have power both to punish and to
reward!—Drive her from the village!” they all shouted, their excitement
now waxing greater and greater.
Gregory and others spoke too, but were hardly listened to: the
organist’s wife was telling of the affair with Yanek, the Voytova
pouring her grievances into everyone’s ears; and, others joining in to
swell the hubbub, the whole place was roaring with the noise.
Antek alone said not a word. He stood close to the bar, gloomy, his
teeth set hard, pale with the torments he endured, and at times assailed
with a wild craving to snatch up a bench, beat the whole shrieking mob
to a jelly and trample them under his feet: so odious they were to him!
But he kept himself in hand, though drinking glass after glass of
liquor; only he spat on the ground, and swore under his breath.
Ploshka addressed him after a time, and said aloud, for all to hear: “We
are at one to drive Yagna from the village: come, Antek, speak your mind
on the matter.”
A great silence fell upon the multitude; every eye was fixed upon him:
they felt sure he would be against them. He, however, drew a deep
breath, threw back his shoulders, and answered in a ringing voice:
“I, living with the community, am of one mind with the community. Will
ye expel her? Do. Will ye exalt her? Do.—To me ’tis all one.”
He pushed the crowd apart and left the place, without even a glance at
anyone.
They continued the debate a long time, even till the morning light; but
in the end it was quite decided that she should be expelled.
But few took her part; those who did were shouted down. Matthew alone
fearlessly dealt curses around upon them all and, reviling the whole
village in the utmost paroxysm of fury, left the place at last, and went
to beg Antek to save Yagna.
“Do ye know what has been decided?” he asked him at dawn, pale as death
and trembling from head to foot.
“I know. Law and custom are on their side,” he replied curtly, whilst
washing his face at the well.
“To hell with such laws! It’s all the work of the organist and his
wife.... Shall we put up with such injustice?—In what has she been to
blame? All their accusations are mere lies!... Lord! are they to hunt
her from our midst, like a mad dog?”
“Would you, then, resist the assembly of the people?”
“Ye talk as if ye were on their side!” Matthew cried, in a tone of sharp
reproach.
“I am on no one’s side. She is no more to me than a stone.”
“O Antek, rescue her!—Do something, for God’s sake! I shall go mad—mad!
Think of it: what can she do? where can she go?... Ah, those villains,
those sons of dogs, those wolves!... I will swing my ax, and smite, and
spare no one!”
“I will not help you in any wise. They have decided: what is one man
against them all?—Nothing!”
“Aha!—You have a grudge against her!” Matthew suddenly flashed out.
“Grudge or no grudge, that concerns none but myself!” Antek replied
sternly, and leaned back against the well-cover, looking into vacancy.
His passion for Yagna, suppressed but not less active, was now raging
within him, together with bitter jealousy: both tossing him to and fro,
like a tree that groans in the blast.
He looked around him. Matthew was gone. The village seemed a strange
place to him—loathsome and blatant exceedingly.
And in the very weather of that memorable day, too, there was something
odd and abnormal. The huge swollen disk of the sun shone pallid in the
sky; the heat was of a sultriness beyond all that had yet been; the sky
was clouded with low-hanging hideous-looking vapours; the wind every now
and then sprang up in fitful gusts, and the dust rose in thick whorls
and spirals. A storm was at hand; far away, there were flashes along the
wooded horizon.
Now had the fermentation amongst the people risen to the highest pitch.
They ran about wildly; brawling was heard in almost every hut; women
fought together on the mill-pond banks; the dogs were howling all the
time. Scarcely anyone went to work in the fields. The cattle, left at
home, lowed plaintively in the byres. Nor was there any Mass on that
day, the priest having left the place at daybreak. And every minute the
feeling of unrest increased in every mind.
Antek, seeing that the people were gathering on the organist’s premises,
shouldered a scythe and went off to one of his fields that was close to
the forest. The wind hampered his work, waving the corn to and fro, and
blowing into his eyes; but he stood his ground firmly and reaped away,
listening—now more calmly—to the distant sounds he heard.
“Perchance they are about it at this instant!” was the thought that
flashed through his brain, making his heart beat like a hammer. A wave
of rage swept over him: he drew himself up and was on the point of
tossing his scythe away and running to the rescue of Yagna; he only
mastered himself just in time.
“Whoso has done evil must suffer the penalty!—So be it! So be it!”
The rye bent in ripples round his knees, like the waves of a stormy
lake; the gale blew his hair about, drying the sweat of agony on his
face. He could barely see anything, for he was in spirit at Yagna’s
side—all of him but his arms, with hard trained sinews working
instinctively, wielding the scythe and laying the rye low, swath by
swath!
Once, however, there came upon the wings of the wind a shriek, loud and
long-drawn-out, that came from the village!
He flung the scythe on the ground and sat down in the corn that rose
like a wall around him. He grovelled close to the earth, and clung to it
with a mighty effort, and held himself down with an iron grasp. And he
kept himself fast, and did not weaken, though his eyes wandered away to
Lipka; though his heart cried out aloud in terror; though an awful fit
of trembling shook him from head to foot.
“All things must take their course: they _must_! We plough to sow, we
sow to reap; and if anything hinder, we pluck it out like an evil weed!”
Thus spoke within his soul an inexorable immemorial Voice.—Whose?... Was
it not that of the earth and its inhabitants?
He still felt himself rebelling, but now listened to it with more
willing obedience.
“Even so. Everyone has the right to defend himself against a wolf....
Everyone!”
A few last regrets, a few idle thoughts, came still like stinging gusts
of wind, wrapping him in darkness, and urging him to rise and act.
But he started to his feet, whetted his scythe, crossed himself, spat on
his hands—and set to work with a will, laying low swath after swath with
such furious energy that his scythe-blade hissed through the air, and
the walls of ripe grain around him resounded to his strokes.
In the village, meantime, the fearful hour of judgment and chastisement
had arrived. What took place there can scarcely be related. All Lipka
was as in the delirium of a high fever; the people seemed to have gone
stark staring mad. Those of more sensible natures kept within doors, or
fled to the fields. The others were gathered on the banks of the pond,
and so drunk (if we may say so) with rancour that, before wreaking
revenge on Yagna, they had begun to wreak their fury on one another,
with spiteful words of hate....
But in a minute the whole multitude had set out to Dominikova’s, like a
foaming torrent in spate. The Voytova and Yanek’s mother led them on,
and a howling infuriated rabble followed.
They burst into the cabin like a tempest. Dominikova blocked the way—she
was trampled down in an instant. Andrew sprang forward to her aid, and
was knocked down at once. Lastly, Matthew, standing in front of the
inner door, strove to keep them back; but in spite of the club he
wielded with all his strength, not half a minute elapsed before he was
lying close to the wall, unconscious and with a broken head.
Yagna had locked and bolted herself up in the alcove. When they burst
the door open, she appeared, standing with her back to the wall; but she
neither made any defence nor uttered any cry. White as a corpse, with
wide-staring eyes, she shook all over in expectation of death.
A hundred hands shot out to seize her in their greedy clutches, ravenous
with hatred; she was whirled away like a bush torn up by the roots, and
dragged out into the enclosure.
“Bind her, else she may give us the slip and escape!” the Voytova
commanded.
By the roadside stood a cart prepared for her, filled to the very top
with hogs’-dung, to which cart a couple of black cows had been yoked.
Into the dung they tossed her, bound fast and unresisting; and then, in
the midst of a deafening uproar—laughter, foul invectives,
imprecations—each a stab of murderous intent—the procession set out.
It halted at the church, and Kozlova bawled:
“Let her be stripped here, and whipped in the porch!”
“Aye,” screamed another; “creatures of her kidney were always flogged
outside the church.”
“Let her be whipped until the blood spurts out!”
But Ambrose had bolted the lich-gate, and stood close to the wicket, the
priest’s gun in hand; and when they stopped, he bellowed at them:
“The first that breaks in here—as I hope for mercy, I’ll shoot him!...
I’ll kill him like a dog!” And he looked so grim, so formidable, with
his gun ready to fire, that they forbore, and turned aside to the poplar
road.
They hurried on, for the storm might burst at any moment. The sky had
grown still more gloomy; the tall poplars tossed to and fro in the gale;
clouds of blinding dust flew up beneath their feet, and far-off thunder
rumbled.
They cried: “Faster, Pete, faster!” They looked skywards ill at ease,
less noisy now, and walking by the roadside, for the middle was deep
sand; and only now and then did one or another of her bitterest enemies
draw near the cart and shriek:
“You swine! You wanton! To the soldiers!—Go, you plague-spotted harlot!”
Pete, Boryna’s servant, was driving the cart, for no one else would do
so. He walked beside and flogged the cows, and spoke a few words of pity
to her, when he could speak them unnoticed.
“’Tis not far ... your wrong shall be avenged: suffer now in patience!”
Thus did Yagna, bound, on a bed of dung, the blood oozing from her
beaten limbs, disgraced for all her life, unutterably degraded, and
supreme in wretchedness, lie neither hearing nor feeling anything around
her; but the tears streamed down her bruised cheeks. At times, too, her
bosom rose as if to utter a cry—but the cry never came. It stopped
within her, petrified.
“Faster, Pete, faster!” they exclaimed, hurrying him along, and
impatience partly calming their madness, they now came on at a quick
trot, nearing the mounds which were the landmarks of Lipka.
Here they pulled out one side of the cart, made of loose boards, and
shot her out, along with the dung, like loathsome offal. A loud thud was
heard; she fell on her back, and remained motionless.
The Voytova came forward, and spurned at her with her foot, hissing:
“Return to us again, and we’ll hunt you away with dogs!” and, lifting up
a clod as hard as a stone, and striking her cruelly, she added: “This
for the wrong you have done my children!”
Another struck her a second blow: “This for the shame you have brought
on Lipka!”
“May you perish for ever and evermore!”
“May you never lie in hallowed earth!”
“But die of hunger and of thirst!”
With these invectives, there rained upon her clods and stones and
handfuls of earth; while she lay motionless, looking up into the trees
that waved over her.
Then it grew dark, and a dense rain began to fall.
Pete delayed over “something to arrange about the cart,” so the people
did not wait for him, but returned in bands, much depressed and subdued.
About half-way back, they met Dominikova, covered with blood and with
torn clothes, sobbing and groping her way with a stick. On finding out
whom she was passing, she shrieked in a fearful voice:
“Murrain and plague and fire and flood—let them not pass you over!”
At the words, they hung their heads, and fled panic-stricken.
* * * * *
It was a great storm. The sky had grown liver-coloured, the dust flew in
bellying clouds; the poplars, with sobbing soughing sounds, were bowed
and shaken to their roots; the winds howled, wrestling with the corn,
and rushed roaring away to the quivering and murmuring forests. Twisted
masses of hail-cloud, slate and copper-hued, hung low in bulging piles
and airy hummocks here and there, cloven by streaming thunderbolts of
wonderful brightness; though indeed the hail fell only in scanty
showers, beating down a few leaves and boughs.
This, with few intervals, lasted all day long and till evening set in,
followed by a black, cool, refreshing night.
And the next day it was splendid weather again; a sky without a stain,
and the land sparkling all over with dew.
Everything in Lipka was now on its former footing. As soon as the sun
was well above the sky-line, they all, as by common consent, sallied
forth together to reap; the field pathways and roads were alive with
rolling carts.
And as the Mass-bell tinkled from the church, each man stood up in the
fields to listen to the sounds: those nearest could even catch the faint
notes of the organ. Some knelt down to say their morning prayer, even
aloud; some uttered a pious ejaculation, in which he found spirit and
strength to work; everyone at least crossed himself ... and then fell to
work with the utmost energy.
Thus did it go on all day: a Divine Service of hard and ceaseless and
most fruitful work. Scarcely anyone remained at home. All the doors of
all the huts stood wide open; even the children went afield, the aged
and the invalids; and even the dogs, breaking loose from the ropes that
bound them, darted off to the harvest-making.
No one was indolent, no one stood eyeing his neighbours’ crops; they
all, bowed over the furrows, and with untiring diligence, worked hard in
the sweat of their brows.
Dominikova’s fields alone remained unreaped—forgotten, as it were. The
corn dropped grain by grain to the ground, the ears withered up with
drought: no one went there, and the passers-by averted their heads not
to see the desolation. More than one felt compassion, and cast wistful
glances at his neighbours; but he would then fall to work again more
diligently than before: it was no time for them to stand contemplating
ruin and devastation.
For harvest was now in full swing: day succeeded day, full of the
hardest toil, most joyfully supported.
And at last, the weather continuing magnificent, they bound the cut corn
into sheaves, setting them up on the fields by clusters of eight, to be
brought home to Lipka at their convenience. Now did the ponderous wagons
roll along, on every field, through every lane, to every barn in the
village. The gathered billows of golden corn flowed out along the ways
and in the yards and on to the threshing-floors; a few stalks even
floated in the pond, or dangled aloft from the roadside trees, with
their yellow bearded stalks; and all the country-side was redolent of
the reaped straw and the fresh ripe grain.
On not a few threshing-floors the flails were beating already, for the
people were in a hurry to get their corn made into bread. Without, on
the vast expanse of stubble, multitudes of geese were gleaning the
remaining ears, and flocks of sheep and herds of oxen grazed there too.
There, too, some fires had been kindled; and all day long the lasses
sang and made a joyful noise, that mingled with calls and rumbling of
carts, and made the merry sunburnt faces of the villagers shine still
brighter.
The rye was not yet all cut down, before the oats on the uplands were
more than ready for the sickle, and you could almost see how quick the
barley ripened, and the wheat daily grew of an ever rustier gold. There
was no time to rest, not even to eat at one’s leisure; they were all so
tired, so worn out, that many would fall asleep over their meals; and
yet, when they came home in the evening, Lipka thrilled to the merry din
of talk and laughter, of music and songs.
Yes, the hard times that came before the harvest were over and gone; the
barns were full, there was corn in abundance, and everyone, poor as he
might be, held up his head proudly, and looked forward in confidence to
the future and the happy times he had so long desired.
On one of these golden days of harvest, when they were bringing in the
barley, the blind old _Dziad_, led by his dog, passed through the
village. The heat was intense, yet he would not rest anywhere, being in
haste to get to Podlesie. This was hard work for him to do, dragging a
heavy stomach upon twisted limbs; and he could but move slowly along,
stretching out his neck, and listening attentively to each sound he
heard. Stopping sometimes near the reapers, he would “praise God,” offer
them snuff, and—if a coin dropped into his palm—mumble a few prayers,
and ask, as it were indifferently, for news about Yagna and the affairs
of the village.
He got little information on the first point, however; they answered him
unwillingly, and told him no matter what came to their heads.
But at Podlesie, on getting to the crucifix, he happened to meet
Matthew, who was not far off, putting the timber for the smith’s
windmill into shape.
“Please take me to Simon’s hut,” the _Dziad_ asked him, swinging forward
on his crutches.
“Ye’ll have but little comfort there, where is naught but weeping and
sorrow!” Matthew replied.
“Is Yagna still ailing? They told me something in her brain had gone
wrong.”
“Not at all.—But she is always in bed, and has well-nigh forgotten all
things in the world. Her state would move a heart of stone.... Oh, what
creatures men are!”
“Aye, to ruin thus the mind of a Christian!... But I hear her mother
intends bringing an action against all Lipka.”
“She cannot win. The decision was taken by the whole assembly: they were
within their rights.”
“Oh, the wrath of the multitude is a fearful thing!” The _Dziad_
shuddered as he spoke.
Matthew flared up hotly. “Fearful, yes; but senseless and spiteful and
unjust exceedingly!”
He brought him close to the hut, and went in himself. Only for a minute,
however, to come out again wiping a tear away.
Nastka was spinning under the eaves. The _Dziad_ sat down by her, and
produced a blue flask.
“See, ye must sprinkle Yagna with this thrice a day, and also rub the
crown of her head therewith; in a week, all trace of hurt will be gone.
The nuns in Przyrov gave it me.”
“May God be your reward! Already a fortnight has gone by, and she
continually lies there unconscious. Only, from time to time, she makes
as though she would flee somewhither ... and laments ... and calls upon
Yanek.”
“And Dominikova, how is it with her?”
“She too is like one dead, save that she is always sitting at her side.
Ah, she’ll not last long!”
“So many ruined lives, O Lord!—And where’s Simon?”
“At present, always in Lipka. He has a great burden on his shoulders
now, having to take care of two farms.”
She put a five-kopek piece in his hand, but he would not take it.
“’Twas for my own pleasure I brought her the flask ... and will add a
prayer for her besides at the altar of the Transfiguration!—She was ever
most kind-hearted, and cared for the poor as but few care!”
“Truly and indeed, her heart was very kind ... else she might
peradventure have had less to suffer.”
The sound of the Angelus rose up from Lipka, with the clatter of carts,
the ringing of scythes on the whetstone, and some far-off snatches of
song: while the dust, golden in the western air, now began to blur the
outlines of cabins and fields and woods.
The _Dziad_ got on his crutches, drove the dogs away, set his wallet
straight, and started off, saying:
“Dear folk, may God be with you evermore.”
THE END
A NOTE ON THE TYPE IN
WHICH THIS BOOK IS SET
_This book is set_ (_on the Linotype_) _in Elzevir
No. 3, a French Old Style. For the modern revival
of this excellent face we are indebted to Gustave
Mayeur of Paris, who reproduced it in 1878, basing
his designs, he says, on types used in a book which
was printed by the Elzevirs at Leyden in 1634.
The Elzevir family held a distinguished position as
printers and publishers for more than a century,
their best work appearing between about 1590 and
1680. Although the Elzevirs were not themselves
type founders, they utilized the services of the best
type designers of their time, notably Van Dijk,
Garamond, and Sanlecque. They developed a type
face which is open and readable but relatively narrow
in body, permitting a large amount of copy to
be set in limited space without impairing legibility._
SET UP, ELECTROTYPED AND PRINTED
BY THE VAIL-BALLOU PRESS, INC.,
BINGHAMTON, N. Y. · ESPARTO
PAPER MANUFACTURED IN
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BY THE H. WOLFF ESTATE,
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[Illustration: Publisher’s Logo]
Transcriber’s Notes
1. Italic text in the original is delimited by underscores.
2. Bold text in the original is delimited by equals signs.
3. Footnotes originally appearing at the bottom of a given page have
been moved to directly below the paragraph in which they appear.
4. Hyphenated words were silently joined across lines and pages when
the intended word was clear.
5. The following table notes the other material changes made to the
printed text, in order to correct apparent printing errors
(punctuation, spelling, quotation marks, repeated words), and to
standardize spelling and hyphenation for identical words to the
more common usage across all four volumes. Changes are denoted in
[brackets].
=Page= =Text= =Operation=
18 red as a beet[-]root, and Removed
28 shall remember me well![’]” Added
35 bluebells and corn[-]flowers were seen Removed
56 those bare[-]backed ones, who Removed
60 into the lamp[-]lit circle Removed
63 choir, Agata[,] was pattering Removed
66 Yesterday Ko[s/z]lova sold her Replaced
71 red as a beet[-]root. Yet, Removed
92 go to Father[”;/,”] and Replaced
94 but green;[,] also a thrill Removed
96 even a des[s]ert—half Added
105 to his [h/b]arn, as Replaced
109 to following what he says...![”] Added
115 The small[-]pox, I think; Removed
118 said, with strong signifi[c]ance. Added
121 cart timber for the saw[-]mill. Removed
140 round him at the country[-]side, and Added
158 for in broad day[-]time and Added
165 plaintively over the pasture[-]lands Added
167 with arms a[-]kimbo Removed
184 red as a beet[-]root, perspiring, Removed
199 over a Jew—a rag[-]picker—sitting Removed
208 breeches, bare[-]headed, out of Removed
211 clergyman to ride bare[-]backed, or Removed
220 ribbons and head[-]gear Removed
228 mountains of mole[-]hills! You Removed
231 couple of weeks: small[-]pox. Removed
241 “Teres[k]a’s goodman! Removed
243 than once heaving a [h/s]igh. Replaced
256 stands at ‘Variable,[”/’] and we Replaced
257 home as red as a beet[-]root, Removed
286 though she would flee somew[h]ither Added