IX
The green Whitsuntide boughs, decorating the cabin-doors, had not yet quite withered, when one morning Roch dropped most unexpectedly into the village.
It was only after hearing Mass, however, and having a long talk with the priest, that he went round to the village. There were but few people about, most of them being occupied tumping their potato-plants; but when, with its usual speed, the news had gone about, a good many hastened to bid him welcome after his long absence.
He came, according to his wont, slowly, leaning on his staff, but with head erect, and wearing the same grey capote and the same rosary about his neck. The wind blew his grey hair loose, but his thin features were gleaming with kindness and geniality.
He gazed around him, smiling gladly upon all he saw, with a special greeting for everybody; patting the little ones’ heads, and accosting the women with great pleasure to find everything in its former state.
When they inquired curiously of him where he had been so long, “In Chenstohova, to gain the indulgences,” he replied.
Glad to see him back, they at once set to telling him all the village news: asking advice, complaining of their neighbours, and all wishful to explain their troubles to him in private.
He was extremely tired, he told them; they must wait: he would be staying in Lipka a day or two.
At that they all begged him to stay with them. But he said he was engaged for the beginning by his promise to Hanka; after, if anyone would take him, he might stay longer. And so he made for Boryna’s.
Hanka of course was overjoyed to receive him. No sooner had he laid down his staff and wallet than he went over to the old man.
“Ye will find him lying in the orchard: it is too hot in the room.—Meanwhile we are boiling some milk for you … and eggs too, if you care.”
Roch was at once in the orchard, bending under the drooping branches, as he made his way to the patient, who lay in a basketwork contrivance, covered over with a sheepskin coat. Lapa, curled up at his feet, watched over him; and Vitek’s stork was strutting bravely about amongst the trees, as if on guard.
In this old leafy orchard, the well-grown trees kept the sun out so completely that only a few spots of light, like golden spinners, moved about on the grass beneath.
Matthias lay upon his back. The boughs waved their dark mantle over his head, murmuring softly, and only now and then, when tossed by the winds, letting a patch of blue sky peep through, and a sunbeam fall on his face.
Roch sat down by his side. The patient at once turned to him.
“Ah! Matthias, don’t you know me? don’t you know me?”
A slight smile passed over Boryna’s face, his eyelids fluttered, and his ashen lips moved; but no sound came from them.
“If it be our Lord’s will, ye may yet recover.”
This he must have understood, for he shook his head, and—unconsciously, it seemed—turned his face away, to look at the tossing boughs, and the bright rays that from time to time shone into his eyes.
Roch sighed, made the sign of the cross over him, and went back.
“Well,” Hanka inquired, “is not Father better now?”
He pondered some time; then replied, in low grave tones:
“A lamp always flickers more brightly just before going out. Belike Matthias is passing away. For my part, I wonder he has held out so long.”
“He eats naught: often will he not even take milk.”
“Ye should be ready for the end any day.”
“We should indeed.—Ambrose told me so only the other day, and advised me not to delay having a coffin made.”
“Ye may,” he answered mournfully; “ ’twill not be empty very long.—The soul that is panting to leave this world nothing can keep back, not even our tears. Else some should remain with us for centuries.” And, supping the milk she had prepared for him, he asked her about things in the village.
What she told him he had learned on his way to her; but she afterwards dilated at length and eagerly on her own troubles.
“Where is Yuzka?”
“In the fields, tumping our potatoes along with the komorniki and Yagustynka. Pete is off to the forest, fetching Staho timber for a new hut.”
“What, is he building one?”
“Aye. Mr. Yacek has given him ten trunks of pinewood.”
“Given him? I heard something of that sort, but could not believe it.”
“For it is incredible! No one would credit the thing at first. The man had promised; but that anyone can do. ‘Promises are toys made to give fools joys,’ as the saying is.—Well, Mr. Yacek gave Staho a letter he was to carry to the Squire. Even Veronka said no to that: why should he wear his boots out for nothing, and be laughed at into the bargain for believing a Squire? But he would have his own way. And when he had given in the letter (he told us) the Squire called him into his room, offered him vodka, and said: ‘Bring ye wagons, and the forester shall mark out ten logs for you.’ Klemba and the Soltys gave him wagons, and I gave him Pete besides. The Squire was actually in the clearing, waiting for him, and himself chose ten of the straightest and longest of all, that had been hewn down in winter for the Jews! And now Staho is setting up a beautiful cabin.—No need to say how or with what excuses he thanked Mr. Yacek; whom indeed we all held for a pauper and a lackbrain, forasmuch as no one can tell what his means are, and he plays the fiddle under the holy figures or in the corn, and sometimes talks in rambling wise, and as one not in his right wits.—Yet is he such a big man that the very Squire does his bidding. Who could have believed such a thing?”
“Look not upon the man, but on his deeds.”
“But to give such a quantity of timber, worth (Matthew says) a thousand zloty at least, and all just for a Thank-you-kindly! Why, it is unheard of!”
“They say he intends to take over the old cabin, to live in for the rest of his life.”
“Absurd! it has the worth of a split wooden clog: no more.—Folk were so suspicious of something underhanded that Veronka went to ask his Reverence about the whole business; who scolded her, and called her a silly woman.”
“So she was.—Take what is given you, thanking God for His goodness.”
“Aye, but to get aught for naught is so monstrous a thing: and out of a Squire besides! So unheard of! Did anyone ever give a peasant anything at all for love? When we want the simplest advice, they look to see what our hands offer. Just accost an official empty-handed: how surely he’ll tell you: ‘Tomorrow,’ or ‘Come next Sunday’! Oh, Antek’s business has taught me how things are done, and I have spent not a little that way already.”
“ ’Tis well ye put me in mind of Antek.—I have been in town.”
“And seen him?”
“No time for that.”
“I too went not long ago, but did not see him. God knows when I shall.”
He smiled. “Sooner perchance than ye think.”
“Good Lord! what is it ye say?”
“The truth. I have been told at headquarters that Antek may be released before the trial. But someone must stand bail for him to the amount of five hundred roubles.”
“The very sum the smith spoke of!” And she told him Michael’s advice, word for word.
“There is something in it; but, coming from him, ’tis unsafe! He surely has only his own gain in view.—Be not hasty to sell: ‘A man rides away from his lands on a stallion, but on foot he comes back—a tatterdemallion.’—Would anybody stand bail? We must seek someone.—If the money were but at hand!”
“Perhaps it is,” she said timidly. “I—I have a little cash in hand, but cannot count it aright.”
“Show it me; we shall do the sum together.”
She disappeared, and soon returned, shot the bolt, and laid a parcel on his knees.
It contained notes, some silver and some gold pieces, besides six strings of corals.
“These belonged to his dead wife. He gave them to Yagna, and (I suppose) took them back again later,” she whispered, squatted down by the settle on which Roch was counting.
“Four hundred and thirty-two roubles, five zloty.—From Matthias, hey?”
“Yes—yes!” she faltered, turning red. “He gave them to me after Eastertide.”
“It will not suffice entirely, but you might dispose of some of the animals.”
“It might be done. Our sow could go … and the barren cow likewise. The Jew asked to buy her; she might still be worth some bushels of corn to us.”
“Then we shall bail Antek without aid.—Is it known to anyone that ye have this money?”
“Father gave it to me to set Antek free, forbidding me to say one word of it to any creature. You are the first to know.—If Michael … !”
“Be easy; your secret is safe. When I hear the time has come, we shall go together and free Antek. The clouds will roll by and the weather clear up, my dear child!” he said, and kissed the top of her head, as she fell at his feet to thank him.
She wept tears of joy. “My own father could not have been fonder,” she sobbed.
“Your man will return to you, thank God!—Where is Yagna?”
“She started for town this morning in company with her mother and the Voyt. They say Dominikova is going to the notary, intending to make all her land over to Yagna.”
“All to Yagna?—And her sons?”
“They want her to divide the land, and she would spite them. Hell is in their cabin now, and the Voyt is on Dominikova’s side: at the father’s death, he was named the orphans’ guardian.”
“Is it so? About the Voyt I had heard another tale.”
“Ye have heard true. He does indeed care for Yagna, but in such wise as I shame to speak of. He is past his prime, but still vigorous; and she, a wanton. I do not repeat hearsay; myself I saw them in the orchard.”
“I would lay me down somewhere: may I?”
She wanted him to sleep on Yuzka’s bed, but he preferred going to the stable.
“Keep your money safe!” he said on leaving her.
He was not seen until dinnertime. After the meal, he was making for the village, when Hanka hesitatingly proffered a request.
“Roch, would you help us to adorn our altar?”
“Ah! yes: tomorrow is Corpus Christi Day.—Where are you to erect it?”
“Where we do every year: outside our porch. I am sending Peter instantly to the forest for young fir-trees and pine-bough decorations, whilst Yagustynka is to hurry off with Yuzka and get flowers for garlands.”
“And have ye the tapers and candlesticks yet?”
“Only this morning, Ambrose promised to bring me some from the church.”
“And on whose premises are altars to be set up besides?”
“At the Voyt’s, on this side of the pond; on the other, at the miller’s and at Ploshka’s.”
“I shall help: but first I must see Mr. Yacek. Ere dusk, I am here again.”
“Then pray tell Veronka to come over by daybreak tomorrow, and make herself useful.”
He nodded, and walked away towards the ruins of Staho’s hovel.
Mr. Yacek was, as usual, on the threshold, smoking, stroking his beard, and looking far away to where the birds fluttered above the undulating corn.
In front of the hut, close to the cherry-trees, lay several enormous trunks; ancient Bylitsa went pottering among them, now dealing a blow at them with an ax, now smoothing away some protruding knag with a hatchet, and talking to them all the time aloud:
“Aha! So you have come into our yard. Many thanks! Matthew will soon cut you asunder into shapely beams that shall do you no little honour. Aye, you shall dwell here secure from moisture: fear not.”
“He talks to it as though it were a living thing!” Roch observed in some surprise.
“Sit ye down: he is mad with joy today.—Hark to him!”
“And you too, poor sufferer, lived in the forest; now will you rest, and none shall come to trouble you any more!” continued the old man, patting the resin-stained bark with loving hands.
Then, stepping over to the largest trunk, that had been flung down by the roadside, and crouching close to the flat sawn resin-sweltering surface with yellow rings that he gloated fondly upon, he muttered:
“So great a one? yet overcome all the same, hey? The Jews would fain have carried you to town, but through our Lord’s grace you remain here with your own, your husbandmen: they will hang sacred images upon you, and the priest will bless you with holy water. Aye, Aye!”
At this, Mr. Yacek smiled faintly, and, having spoken a few words with Roch, took up his violin, and made for the forest by the field-paths.
Roch stayed listening to Veronka as she talked, and evening slowly came on.
The morrow being a festival, the day’s work was sooner ended than usual. Women began to weave festoons outside the cabins, children came in, bringing armfuls of green flags and rushes. In front of Ploshka’s and the miller’s houses, birch and fir-boughs were piled in heaps, to be planted wherever an altar was raised; and the girls decked the walls behind them with greenery. They also filled up many hollow places in the roads with gravel and sand.
Roch, who had left Veronka, was just emerging on the poplar road, when someone on horseback appeared, galloping at breakneck speed in a cloud of dust. The carts that carried Staho’s timber impeded him and he tried to pass round them by the field.
“If ye haste so, you will founder your horse,” they cried in vain. He went by them, and galloped on, till the horse was panting and blown.
“Adam!” Roch exclaimed; “wait a minute!”
Young Klemba just stopped long enough to roar:
“Know that two people lie murdered in the forest. O Lord! how frightened I am! I had been just by, tending the horses, and was coming home with the lad Gulbas, when—just at Boryna’s cross—my horse shied. I looked and saw two people lying in the juniper-bushes. I called out to them; but they made no more answer than if dead.”
“O fool, what fable are you telling us now?” his hearers cried.
“Then go look yourselves: there they lie! Gulbas saw them as well, but he ran away to the komorniki.”
“Good God!—Then make haste to the Voyt and tell him.”
“He is not yet back from town,” someone said.
“Then to the Soltys! He is near the blacksmith’s, mending the road with other workmen,” they called after him as he clattered away.
The news of the murder had flashed round the village, and people were crossing themselves with fear. Someone informed his Reverence, who came out to ask about it; and all most impatiently awaited the return of the Soltys, who at once had gone in a cart, with Klemba and some labourers.
They waited for ever so long. It was growing dusk when he came back, and—to everybody’s amazement—along with the Voyt’s horse and britzka; in a very ferocious humour too, cursing, slashing at his poor jade, and doing his best to pass through the crowd. But someone seized the bridle; and, forced to stop, he cried:
“Those mischievous boys! they have been trying a practical joke. There was no one slain: only some people asleep in the bushes. Oh, let me but catch that young Klemba, he shall pay for the fright given—and that soundly!—So I met the Voyt and brought him home with me … and that’s all!—Vee—o! Little One!”
“But,” one man remarked, looking into the open cart, “what ails the Voyt? He is sprawling there like a sick man!”
“He’s asleep, that’s all!” And the Soltys whipped the horses into a trot.
“What mischievous rascals! To make up such a story!”
“It’s all young Gulbas’ doing: he is always the first in such games!”
“Rub them both down with an oaken towel! Teach them to scare folk for nothing!”
Very indignant over the whole affair, they were going home, when on their way they met the komorniki, with heavy faggots on their backs, and Kozlova marching at their head, though nearly bent double with her load. Seeing them, she leant back, and remained propped up by her burden.
“He has duped you finely, has the Soltys!” she sneered, almost speechless with fatigue. “Ha! No dead men indeed were in the forest, but worse perchance.”
A large group was soon attracted by her words; and then she burst forth with her tale.
“I was going back to the cross by the forest-path, when Gulbas, scared to death, came running to me, telling of dead folk that lay in the juniper-bushes hard by. I thought it were well to look at them, at any rate. We went, and I saw from afar two people lying as dead. Filipka pulled my sleeve to drag me away, and Gregory’s wife was pattering her prayers, and I too felt creepy all over. … But I crossed myself, went up to them, and looked—and what do I see? My lord the Voyt, lying, with his coat off, and beside him Yagna Borynova: both sleeping very deep. … And how they reeked of vodka! … And she, unclad in such guise that I shame to say. … It was as bad as Sodom! I am old, but such a scandal I never yet heard of.—So the Soltys came up, and Yagna ran off; but his Lordship the Voyt was hard to get into the cart.—Drunk as a pig!”
A voice was heard: “Merciful Lord! this is a new thing in Lipka!”
“If it had been only a farmhand with a wench!—But a husbandman, a father, and our Voyt!”
“Boryna lies close to death, with no one to give him to drink; and she! …”
“I would escort her with tapers out of the place, the harlot! Nay, I’d beat her with rods before the church!” Kozlova shouted once more.
“And where is Dominikova?”
“They left her in town; she was in their way.”
“Oh, the sin, the scandal of it! And the shame extends to us all.”
“That Yagna—so careless of honour—ready to do the same again tomorrow!”
In their huts, they went on complaining, full of horror and indignation, some of the kinder-hearted women also weeping, in fear of God’s judgment upon all of them; and all the village was full of talk and lamentation.
Some young fellows took Gulbas aside to question him about particulars.
“A famous fellow with women, that Voyt of ours,” said Adam Vahnik.
“He’ll have to pay for this: his wife will tear his hair out!”
“And hold aloof from him for six months.”
“Oh, he will not care so much for that now!”
“Yes, one might do any folly for such a lass as Yagna!”
“Surely. Among the Manor damsels, none more fair than she, and when she but looks at any man, she sends a thrill through him!”
“So honey-sweet!—No wonder if Antek Boryna …”
“Hold your tongues, men! Gulbas is a liar; so is Kozlova: all this they say out of spite, and we do not know the truth as yet,” Matthew interfered, in tones of great concern; but he was interrupted by Gregory the Voyt’s brother’s arrival.
“Well? Is Peter still asleep?” they asked him. He answered:
“That man was my own brother; but after what he has done, he’s no more to me than a dog!—But,” he added with a burst of fury, “that carrion is the cause of all!”
“ ’Tis a lie!” vociferated Pete, the farm-servant at Boryna’s, pushing forward towards Gregory; “and he that utters it is a yelping cur!”
They all were amazed at this unexpected explosion; and he went on, with clenched trembling fists:
“No one is guilty but the Voyt. Was it she gave him corals? or enticed him to the tavern? or lurked for him in the orchard all night long? How he tempted her, how he forced her on! Oh, I know too well! He may even have drugged her: do I know?”
“You plague-spotted protector of hers, be still, or your girdle may come off!”
“But she’ll know how you’ve stood up for her … and reward you well!”
“Peradventure with a pair of breeches Matthias wears no more!”
They jeered and laughed till they nearly burst their sides.
“Since her goodman cannot speak for her, I who can will. Aye, I will, blood of a dog! … Let me but hear another word against her! O you loud-mouthed curs, how silent you’d have been had she been your sister or your wife!”
“Now then, hold your peace, you stable-boy!” Staho Ploshka thundered. “What right have you to meddle here? Meddle with your horses’ tails!”
“And beware,” Vahnik added, “lest you get more than this rebuke!”
“And leave farmers alone, you filthy matted-pate!” was the shout they sent up as they withdrew.
“O you scurvy bumpkins!—A stable-boy I am, yes; but never at least did I take a measure of corn in secret to the Jew! Ye know me not!” he called after the retiring group; and they, feeling somehow small and mean, answered nothing, but went home.
The weather was strange that evening: windy, but very bright. Long after sundown there yawned huge gulfs of bloodred fire far up in the depths of the sky. There prevailed a feeling of unrest; the gale howled aloud, but so high above that it only tore at the lofty treetops. Geese, no one knew why, would fall a-clamouring in the enclosures all together; dogs ran about nervously, even beyond their homes. No one remained in the house or sat on the doorsteps; all gathered at some distance from the dwelling, and talked with their neighbours in low voices.
Hanka had with her a few friends, who had come to condole, and learn something more about Yagna. But when they came to the subject, she answered them scornfully:
“ ’Tis a shame and a sin, but an affliction too!”
“Certainly; and the whole parish will know all tomorrow!”
“And will say we are the worst village of all.”
“And the shame will fall upon all the Lipka women.”
“Because they all are so good that, driven like Yagna, they all would do the same!” Yagustynka said, mocking.
“Be silent! ’tis not the time for jeering now!” snapped Hanka, with such stern rebuke that she uttered not another word.
Hanka was still half choked with shame; but the anger which at first surged up within her had now passed away. And when her friends had gone home, she looked in at the other side, ostensibly to see to Matthias. Perceiving Yagna lying asleep in her clothes, she bolted the door and undressed her carefully in the dark.
“May God have pity on such a fate as hers!” was the thought which came to her a little after, flooding her with immense compassion.
Yagustynka must have noted this change of attitude; for she said, though reluctantly:
“Yagna is not guiltless, but the Voyt is still more to blame.”
“True; and it is he—he!—that ought to be punished for everything,” Hanka returned, in such energetic agreement that Pete cast a look of gratitude towards her.
They had gauged the common feeling. Till late in the night Ploshka and the Koziols were going about the village, stirring people up against the Voyt. The former would enter the huts and say, as in jest:
“Well, well, we have got a splendid Voyt: the most strapping fellow in all the district!”
And, finding them slow to follow his drift, he would take them with him to the tavern, where some of the smaller farmers were gathered already; plied them assiduously with vodka, and returned to the attack when he saw them flushed.
“Our Voyt is great for doing things, hey?”
“And not for the first time either,” Kobus replied, cautiously.
“I know about him. … I know. … I know … what I’ll not tell,” growled Sikora, who was tipsy, and leaned heavily against the bar.
“And about you too, I know. … I know … what I’ll not tell,” he went on growling.
“The only thing,” said Ploshka, ordering glasses round again, “is to depose him. Whom we have made Voyt, we can unmake. What he has just done shames all the village; but he has done worse. He has always held with the Squire, to the hurt of our community. He would have had a school opened in Lipka; and ’twas he no doubt who recommended the Voyt to sell Podlesie to the Germans. He revels and drinks continually; he has built a barn and purchased a horse; weekly he eats flesh-meat; and he drinks tea!—At whose expense, pray? Not at his own, belike!”
“I know,” Sikora growled, interrupting, “that the Voyt is a swine, but also that in this trough you would fain put your snout too!”
“The man’s drunk and talking nonsense!”
“And likewise do I know that you shall never be Voyt!”
Thereupon they went apart from him, and took counsel far into the night.
On the morrow the Voyt’s adventure was talked about yet more loudly, for the priest had forbidden the altar which had been in former years erected before his cabin. Early in the morning, he had sent for Dominikova, who had not come home till midnight the day before; and he was so angry that he even chid the organist, and gave Ambrose a beating with his long pipe-stem!
Corpus Christi, like the former days, rose serene and splendid, but remarkably sultry and still. Ever since dawn, the sun had been blazing pitilessly; the air was so parched that all the leaves drooped; the corn bowed earthward, faint and limp; the sand burned the bare feet like hot embers, and great drops of resin came trickling out of the walls.
This heat was really a visitation, but the people troubled little about it, plunged as they were in their preparations for the service. The girls appointed to bear the feretories and shrines and pictures in the procession ran like mad from cabin to cabin to try on their robes and comb their hair, while their elders were adorning the altars as fast as they could—at the miller’s, outside the priest’s (instead of at the Voyt’s), and before Boryna’s cabin, where Hanka with her household had been working hard ever since the peep of day.
They were also the first to have done the work, and so artistically that everyone admired it even more than the miller’s altar.
It was indeed finer. In front of the porch there stood a sort of little chapel, made of interwoven birch-boughs, covered with pieces of woollen cloth, striped in many a hue; whilst inside, on a platform, rose an altar with white napery and fine linen, embellished with tapers and flowers in pots, to which Yuzka had stuck various patterns in gilt paper to adorn them.
There hung above the altar a large-sized painting of our Lady, and several smaller ones on either side. To enhance the effect of the whole, they had suspended over the altar a cage containing a blackbird that Nastka had brought.
From the very gate a lane had been made of fir-branches, alternating with birch-boughs, planted and neatly tumped with yellow sand; and the sanded path had been sprinkled over with sedges.
Yuzka had brought whole armfuls of cornflowers, larkspurs and field vetches, with which she wreathed images, candlesticks, and whatever else could be wreathed, even strewing flowers all over the ground before the altar. The cabin too came in for its share: walls and windows were drowned in verdure, and waving sedges stuck all along the top of the roof.
Everybody was hard at work, except Yagna alone, who early in the morning had slipped out of the hut, and was not seen any more that day.
So they were the first to be ready, but not before the sun shone well over the village, and the clatter of the carts coming in from the other hamlets began to increase.
Very hurriedly they made ready for church.
Vitek alone was to remain in the enclosure; for swarms of children came pressing in to admire the altar and whistle to the blackbird. He tried to keep them at a distance with a bough, but it would not do. So he loosed his stork, that came on stealthily, prodding and thrusting at their bare legs with its sharp beak, and made them disperse with screams.
They started all together, just as the Mass-bell began to tinkle. Yuzka went in front, dressed all in white, book in hand, and with bows of bright red to her shoes.
“What do you think of this, Vitek?” she had asked, spinning on her heel before him.
“You’re as fair to see as the whitest goose!” he answered in admiration.
“Your boot knows as much about it as you do! But Hanka says no one in all the village is clad so well,” she said, stamping and pulling down her short skirt.
“Your red knees can be seen through the skirt, as the flesh of a goose through the feathers!”
“Silly lad!—But,” she added, in a warning whisper, “hide your stork away! The priest will come with the procession, and might see and know it again.”
“Oh, but how fine the mistress looks! For all the world like a turkey-cock!” he murmured in ecstasy, gazing after them down the road; and then, mindful of Yuzka’s warning, he shut the stork up in the potato-pit, and let out Lapa to watch before the altar: after which he betook himself to Matthias, lying as usual in the orchard.
The village was deserted. In the church, the service had commenced. The priest came out for Mass, the organ pealed; and, the sermon ended, all the bells were set ringing till they frightened the doves off the roofs. Then the people poured out, streaming through the great door, with banners dipping forward, tapers flaming, holy pictures borne by white-clad maidens, and, at last, the red canopy over the priest, who bore the golden Monstrance.
They formed in procession, with a long lane, edged with flickering lights, cut through the dense throng; and his Reverence intoned:
“Lo, at Thy gate I stand, O Lord!”
to which all the multitude answered, thundering in unison—one great Heaven-reaching voice!—
“My soul hath waited on Thy word.”
Singing, they moved forward, with a great crush about the narrow lich-gate; for the concourse was immense, consisting of the whole parish. All the folk of all the Manors were present: several Squires supported the priest on either side, or walked close by, taper in hand. The canopy was borne aloft by husbandmen of the parish: only (perhaps on account of the recent disgrace) none of them men of Lipka.
From the churchyard shadows to the open space beyond, white, dazzling, broiling hot, where the burning sun made the eyes to blink with its living fires, on they walked to the sound of the whole tolling belfry. The chants rose up, the incense-smoke soared forth along with clouds of dust; lights scintillated, and bright showers of flowery petals fell continually, scattered at the feet of his Reverence.
The crowd surged along, heavy-footed, chanting mightily, like to a noisy many-coloured stream; and in its midst—a boat in the rapid current, as it were—floated the crimson canopy. And the holy banners waved and tossed beside the pictures and statues of saints, veiled in gauze and gay with flowers.
Onwards they moved, dense, serried, squeezed, heads close to heads, and each one singing for all he was worth—each as if the whole world sang with him the glory of the Lord—as if those tall lime-trees, those dark alders, those waters sparkling in light, those tapering birches, those lowly orchards and green fields and vague distances beyond human ken—all and everything—were adding to the hymn their hearty and joyful accompaniment; and the notes rolled and flew through the heat-laden air, up to the radiant sky, up to the sun!
That choral song stirred the very leaves upon the trees, and brought the last blossom-petals floating down!
The priest read the first Gospel at Boryna’s altar, and, after a short rest, went forward to the miller’s.
It was now still hotter than before, and fast growing unbearably hot. Every throat was dry as dust; a whitish haze had come over the sun; athwart the bright sky long filmy streaks were floating; the overheated air made the outlines of things quiver and wave as though seen through boiling water.—A storm was at hand.
The procession had lasted a full hour; the priest was drenched with perspiration and as red as a beetroot: yet he continued to officiate with grave dignity, going from altar to altar, listening to the various Gospels sung and intoning the various hymns.
There were moments when the people ceased from chanting; and then the larks took up the song, and the continual cry, Cuckoo, Cuckoo! rang out. Meanwhile, and never-endingly, the great bells boomed.
And though the chants recommenced, and the peasants roared with stentorian throats, and the women’s thin shrill voices joined in with the pipings of the children, and the rippling music of the tiny jingling bells carried in the procession, and the loud footsteps upon the trampled earth: still the voice of that grand tolling was loud all the time—pure, high—with deep golden notes that reached to Heaven, full of joy and gladness and sonorous beauty: as if hammers, beating on the sounding disk of the sun, were striking out of it those mighty notes, making the whole countryside toss and ring again!
Then came the return to the church, and a long service within doors: organ pealing loud, voices lifted up!
At last the congregation dispersed: when on a sudden the sky grew dark, the rolling of thunder resounded afar, a dry blasting wind came in whirling gusts, the trees lashed each other, and volumes of dust filled the air.
The people from the neighbouring villages drove away at once and at the top of their speed. A drizzling rain fell, making the air still more close and sultry, while the sun went on pouring down its pitiless heat. The frogs’ croaking grew fainter and more drowsy to the ear. The gloom came nearer, and the far-off landscape was now already shrouded; the thunder growled again, and from the livid East brief pallid lightnings flashed forth.
It was from the East that the storm came, extending crescent-wise its ponderous masses of slate-blue clouds, pregnant with rain—possibly with hail. It whistled in the treetops, it tore along the corn, while the birds flew with noisy cries to the shelter of the eaves, and even the dogs sought the cabins. The cattle, too, were coming back from the fields; whirls and pillars of dust were dancing along the roads, and closer and closer still came the sound of the thunder.
Presently the sun was submerged in a mass of rusty-hued vapour, through which it shone as through a pane of semitransparent glass. The thunder growled close to the village, and such gusts came now and then as might have torn the trees up by the roots. The first thunderbolts struck somewhere far away in the woods; the whole sky quickly became of a dark livid tint; the sun vanished. Gusts flew raging by; bolts fell in quick succession; the earth shook with thunder, and the black sky shone brilliantly with flashes whose sudden glint plucked the eyes out.
The very dwellings quivered to the sounds, and all creation quailed and shrank with fear.
Luckily, however, the storm passed over on one side. The lightning struck somewhere far away, the wind went down, having done no harm, the sky brightened up again, after a plentiful rain had fallen a little before Vespers, bringing with it such a flood of water that all the corn was laid instantly, the mill-stream ran in spate, and every ditch, field-path and furrow was flowing with foaming water.
It was only at evening that all was as before, the rain having given over, and the sun shining forth behind the western clouds—a huge bright-red ball.
Then did Lipka breathe once more, its inhabitants looked out upon the world again, gratefully inhaling the cool air and the scents of the land after the rain, especially those of the young birches and the mint-plants in the gardens. The pools all along the roads burned in the sunset, the leaves and grasses sparkled, and the frothy waters seemed liquid fire, as they bubbled with joy, streaming down to the millpond.
A slight breeze rustled the laid corn; a bracing cool now breathed from the woods and fields. The children, shouting merrily, went out to paddle in the brooks and ditches; birds chirruped in the boughs, dogs scampered about; the metallic notes of the priest’s guinea-hens sounded from the hedge: in all the roads and all about the huts there was a din of talk and merry calls. Soon, too, not far from the mill, rose the sounds of the love-ditty:
“Long, long waiting, I am drenched with dew:
Loved one, loved one, take me in to you!”
And from the fields, together with the bellowing of the cattle driven homewards, there floated a song bawled by some herdsman:
“Sweetheart, your rye once reaped, you said
That me without delay you’d wed:
Rye, wheat and oats are reaped; and yet
My marriage lines I cannot get!
Oy dana, da dana!”
Now the carts of those who had stayed out the storm began to drive off; but a good many farmers from the neighbouring places remained as the guests of the Lipka folk—those, that is, who had so kindly come to help the women not long since. They were received in the homes of the wealthier farmers with plenty to eat and drink; but the poorer took their kind friends to treat them at the tavern, so as to enjoy the pleasure of company: the more, the merrier.
Some musicians came too; and, immediately after Vespers, there was heard inside the tavern the thin melody of the violin, the rumbling of the bass-viol, and the deep-toned boom of the drum.
People crowded all the more eagerly to enjoy themselves, because since Easter there had been no occasion for merrymaking.
So many had gathered together that there was not room for all, and quite a crowd had to be satisfied with the logs that lay outside the tavern; but as the weather was now fine, with a grand display of gold in the sky, they sat down there in numbers, and called for drink.
The tavern itself was brimful of young people, and they at once set to dancing the oberek, making walls and floors groan with their impact and tread as they whirled along. And who led the dance with Nastka?—who but Simon, son of Dominikova? In vain did his brother Andrew dissuade him, plucking him by the sleeve; he was in a gay unruly mood, and drank vodka, and pressed it on Nastka and his boon companions, and flung five-kopek pieces to the band, that they might play with more spirit. And he took Nastka round the waist, vociferating with might and main: “Come, boys, be lively! Stamp and tramp as Poles do!”
And he galloped about the room like a runaway colt, shouting and striking the floor with great violence.
“He has no straw in his boots, that young blade!” Ambrose muttered, his throat twitching greedily, as he looked on at the drinkers. “As a flail, so wields he his limbs! … I hope they may not come off!” he added louder, and coming near.
“Take care lest one of yours come off!” Matthew retorted grimly, alluding to the other’s wooden leg.
“Oh, I wish so much to drink friendship with you!” he answered, with a propitiatory smile.
“Here, drunkard! and have a care to leave the glass unswallowed!” Matthew replied, pouring out a full glass, and turning his back. Gregory, the Voyt’s brother, was holding forth to his group in low tones; they listened, crowded up against the bar, and with such attention that they neither noted the dancers around nor the vodka that stood before them. They were six, all of the best families in the place, and very keen on the matter under discussion; but as the noise and the crowd increased, they presently passed into the Jew’s private parlours, which he occupied along with his guests.
It was a small place indeed, so crammed with the beds of the Jewish brats that it was hard to find room at the table. A single tallow candle, stuck in a brass chandelier that hung from the rafters, burned with a smoky flame.
Gregory passed the bottle twice, and they drank, but no one referred to the talk they had broken off, till Matthew cried tartly:
“Now, Gregory, let’s hear you: we all sit here like crows expecting rain!”
But before the latter could begin, the blacksmith entered, greeted them, and looked around for a seat.
“Pah! Here comes Sooty-Face, always springing up where he has not been sown!” Matthew blurted out; but, stifling his annoyance, he at once added: “Michael, here’s to you!”
The smith tossed the liquor off and, trying to put a good face on the matter, remarked as if in jest: “I care not to learn the secrets of other folk, and perhaps I am not wanted here?”
“As you say!” Ploshka returned. “Being so friendly with the Germans—eating bacon on Friday and drinking coffee with them—would you not rather be still with them on a holiday like this?”
“You speak as one of the drunkards speaks!”
“I say but what all men know: you are ever in converse with them.”
“I work for them that give me work: I do not pick and choose.”
“Work!” hinted Vahnik; “there’s more than work between them and you!”
“Of such work,” Prychek added significantly, “as you did with the Squire and our forest.”
“Oho! It seems I have met my judges here!—Much ye all know of the affair!”
“Let him be,” said Gregory, staring sternly into the smith’s shifty eyes. “He is free to do his business by himself … as we too to do ours by ourselves.”
“Should a gendarme look through the window here,” said the smith with a poor attempt at mockery, while his lips were twitching with rage, “he would take you for conspirators.”
“And perchance we are, but not against you, Michael: you’re not worth it.”
At that he pulled his cap on, and made his exit, slamming the door.
“He scented something in the wind, and came here to find out all about it.”
“He might even play the eavesdropper outside.”
“Let him: he will hear something about himself that he will not like!”
“Now hark to me, boys!” Gregory said, gravely. “As I told you, the Germans have not purchased Podlesie yet, but the deed of sale may be signed any day. They talk of next Thursday.”
“That we know: the question is, what’s to be done!” Matthew cried impatiently.
“Advise us, Gregory, you who can, who are book-learned and read the papers.”
“You see, if the Germans buy it and settle next to us, it will be like Gorka over again: we shall not have room to breathe in Lipka.”
“Our fathers sigh, and scratch their heads, and cannot make out what to do.”
“Yet they will not give up their farms to us!” several voices exclaimed at once.
“The Germans, what are they?” cried another. “Some settled in Lishka, and our peasants bought them out to the last acre.—True, in Gorka it was the other way round, but by our own fault: we drank, we went to law continually, and we all went a-begging in the end.”
“Why, then, we too may buy Podlesie later!” said Yendrek Boryna, Antek’s cousin.
“ ’Tis easy to talk. At present, we cannot manage to pay so much as sixty roubles an acre: how shall we ever pay a hundred and fifty?”
“If our fathers would but give each man his proper portion, we should mend matters more easily.”
“That’s sure. I should know what to do directly.”
Here Gregory interfered. “O ye fools, ye fools! With all their land entire, our elders can scarce make both ends meet; and ye think to lay by from a part thereof?”
They were struck dumb—stunned by the evidence of the truth he uttered.
“No,” he went on to say; “the evil is not that our fathers will not give up their holdings, but that Lipka has too little land and too many people. A plot that gave food for three in our grandfathers’ time must now be shared by ten.”
“How true you speak!—Aye, it is the truth,” they all agreed, much abashed.
“Then,” someone proposed, “let’s buy Podlesie, and share it amongst ourselves.”
“Ye may buy a whole village; but whence shall the money come?” Matthew grunted.
“Wait a little: peradventure we may find a means.”
“Wait; do as ye please; I have enough of waiting, and am disgusted.—I’ll leave the country and go to the town!”
“Please yourself. But we—the others—must stay and take some step or other.”
“The devil take it all! We are so close that I wonder the walls do not fall apart, so many we are in each hut, with misery clamorous therein: while hard by, there are broad lands, asking but to be taken up. No, were we starving, there’s not the wherewithal to purchase it; nor can we borrow aught from anyone. To the devil with it!”
Then Gregory told them how things went on in other countries, and they listened mournfully, until Matthew interrupted him:
“Others are well off: what is that to us? Show a hungry man a dish and put it by: shall he fill his belly with the sight thereof? Elsewhere folk are protected; not so here, where every man grows like a wild tree upon waste land, and whether he succeeds or fails—provided only that he pay the taxes, serve in the army, and obey the officials—who cares?”
Gregory heard him out in silence, and started afresh.
“There is but one way to get Podlesie into our hands.”
Here they pressed closer to him, for a sudden hubbub had filled the great room: the panes were shaking with it, and the music had ceased. Someone went out and returned to tell them with a laugh what had taken place. Dominikova had come in with a stick for her sons, and caused a dreadful disturbance. She would have beaten and driven them home; but they had stood up to her, and made her leave the tavern; and now Simon was drinking to his heart’s content, and Andrew, completely muddled, was howling up the chimney.
They cared to hear no more, for now Gregory set to expound his plan. It was for the village to be reconciled with the Squire and then barter each acre of the forest for four acres of the Podlesie land!
The possibility of such a solution equally surprised and delighted them; and Gregory went on to tell them how a similar agreement had been made with a village near Plotsk, of which he had read in the papers.
“Good for us peasants!—Jew, more vodka!” Ploshka called out through the door.
“Aye, for every three acres of forest, exactly twelve of cornland!”
“And for ten, a big holding!”
“But he ought to let us have some faggots besides for firing!”
“And an acre of meadow-land each by the wood-skirts into the bargain!”
“And some timber for building also!”
Everyone had a fresh condition to add.
“And a horse apiece too,” Matthew sneered, “with a cart and a cow!”
“Be quiet!” cried Gregory.—“And now the farmers must meet, then see the Squire, and say what they wish to have. It may be that he will come to terms.”
Here Matthew cut in.
“That he will not, unless the knife be at his throat. He needs money now: the Germans will give it him any day. Whereas, ere our people have scratched their heads and agreed on one single point, and ere their wives too have given their advice, a month will pass by, and the Squire will by then have sold the land and turned his back on us, having money to await the result of the lawsuit. Gregory’s plan is good; but, to my mind, it needs setting upside-down to work well.”
“Say on then, Matthew, and advise us.”
“Not to talk—not to take counsel—but to act! … as we did for the forest!”
“To act is possible sometimes, and sometimes not,” Gregory muttered.
“I tell you it is possible … not by the same means, but to the same end.—Let us go tell the Germans not to venture on purchasing Podlesie!”
“Are they such fools—to fear us and obey?”
“If they refuse, we tell them they shall not either sow or build … nor move one step beyond their fields. Will they have no fear, think ye? Why, they would be like a fox that we smoke out of its earth.”
But here Gregory burst out: “As there’s a God in heaven, such threats will get us put in prison once more!”
“We should not lie in jail forever; and when we got out, ’twould be all the worse for them! … They are no fools, and will first take good thought whether they have aught to gain by fighting us.—And when we have driven his buyers away, the Squire will take another tone.—Or if not. …”
Gregory could keep silence no longer. Starting up, he did all he possibly could to dissuade them from such a reckless plan of campaign. He pointed out what actions at law must come of it, what fresh calamities to all of them, and the possibility of their being clapped in prison as rebels, and for several years! He showed, too, how everything might be arranged peaceably with the Squire alone. He went on talking to them till he was crimson, kissed them all, begged and implored them to give up that idea. All would not do, his words were in vain, and at last Matthew said:
“Ye are preaching! Ye talk like a book; but ’tis not what we want!”
At this they all set to banging their fists on the table, speaking at the same time, and shouting enthusiastically:
“Hurrah! Hurrah!—Down with the Germans! Away with the Long-Trousers! Matthew is right, we’ll do as he says, and whoso fears, let him hide his face!”
They were so excited, there was no reasoning with them.
At this juncture the Jew came in, bringing a bottle: he listened, as he wiped the vodka spilt upon the table; then he said diffidently:
“ ’Tis good advice that Matthew is giving you.”
“What! is Yankel against the Germans now? Can this thing be?” they cried in amazement.
“Because I prefer to hold with those of my own land. We live here—wretchedly, but by God’s help we live. … But when the Germans have come, then not only a poor Jew, but even a dog, will have no food to eat. … Oh, may they all drop down dead! May the pestilence sweep them away!”
“What, a Jew to side with our folk! Who ever heard of such a thing!” They were astounded, stupefied.
“Yea, I am a Jew, but not a wild man of the woods: born here as you were, as my father and grandfather were too! … Am I not, then, one of you? … What is better for you will be better for me: the bigger farmers you will be, the more business I shall do with you.—And this wise plan of yours against the Germans I am ready to back thus, offering a whole bottle of rum! … To your healths, O farmers of Podlesie!” he exclaimed, drinking to Gregory.
They then drank very copiously, and became so joyful that they scarcely refrained from kissing the Jew’s long beard: they set him in their midst, and went over the whole matter again, consulting him on every point. Even Gregory began after a time to feel less gloomy.
But now the meeting came to an end, for Matthew sprang to his feet. “To the big room, boys! let’s stretch our legs!” he cried. “We’ve done enough for today.” And they went in together.
Matthew immediately took Teresa out of another man’s arms into his own. Following his example, the others brought the girls out of the corners, called to the musicians and began to dance.
These suddenly set to playing up with great liveliness, being well aware how quick Matthew was both with kopeks and with blows.
In the tavern they were now at last dancing in earnest, with hot and steaming brows; and the din, and the stamping and music and boisterous cries, poured out of doors, as out of a boiling pot, by every aperture; and those outside, too, were enjoying themselves well, clinking glasses, drinking one another’s health, and chatting ever louder and more excitedly.
It was night; the stars’ rays shone keen and vivid, the trees rustled and murmured; from the marshes came the frogs’ hoarse glee, and now and then a beetle passed by with a buzz. Nightingales sang in the orchards, and all was warm and fragrant. The people, too, longed to enjoy the cool night air, and now and again a couple, arms round waists, would leave the tavern to vanish into the shadows; while outside the conversation became so loud, everyone besides speaking quick and all together, that they were nearly unintelligible.
“… And hardly had I let the hog go, ere it had even time to put its snout among her potatoes, behold! she was upon me, bellowing!”
“… Drive her out of the village! Away with her!”
“… I remember that they did the same to one such in my young days. She was scourged even to blood in front of the church, and then driven outside our boundary marks; and we had peace.”
“… Jew, a whole measure, and quickly!”
“… We must elect a new one: so say all.”
“… Weed the evil out, ere its roots strike too deep!”
“… Now drink you to me, and I’ll tell you what!”
“… Take the bull by the horns, nor loose it till ’tis down!”
“… Two acres and one are three: three and one are four!”
“… Drink, brother, dear as if you were my own!”
Thus scraps of sentences spurted out of the darkness, it being doubtful who spoke and who was spoken to: except when Ambrose, much the worse for liquor, was heard to pass from group to group, with his everlasting and whining request for a dram, though he staggered so heavily that he could hardly walk.
“You, Voytek, I baptized; I rang your wedding-bell until my arms were stiff: O brother, but one glass!—Or will you stand me a full dram? I’ll ring her ‘Everlasting Rest’ and bring a second wife to you—a young one, firm of flesh as any turnip is!—Brother, a full dram, pray!”
And the young people danced on unweariedly; and the whole room was full of the rustling of waving skirts and capotes. Songs too were sung to the tunes of the music; the revels grew so wildly uproarious that even old women joined in leaping and capering with shrill screams; while Yagustynka, pushing forward to the middle, set her arms akimbo, and stamped on the floor to the lilt of the doggerel stave:
“I’d never fear wolves, were they more
Than a score;
Nor foes, were I fighting with men
Ten times ten!”