X
The days between Corpus Christi and the next Sunday passed slowly for Matthew, Gregory, and their friends. Matthew had to suspend his work on Staho’s cabin, and the others too gave up their occupations, all their days and evenings being devoted to stirring up the people against the German settlers, and urging upon them the necessity of driving the latter out of Podlesie.
On his side, the tavern-keeper was lavish of persuasions and—with opponents—of free drinks, and even loans. Nevertheless, it was very uphill work. The elders would scratch their heads and heave a deep sigh, but go no farther without consulting their women, who unanimously condemned any such enterprise against the Germans.
“What folly is this?” they cried. “Have we not suffered enough on account of the forest? One affliction is not yet past, and they would bring down another upon us?” And the wife of the Soltys, usually a quiet woman, was near taking a besom to Gregory!
“If you’d egg us on to another rising, I’ll give you up to the gendarmes! The lazy rogues!—they won’t work, and only want to lounge about!” she bawled at him outside her hut.
Balcerkova, too, stormed at Matthew as fiercely:
“Ye pack of idlers! I’ll set the dogs at you! … Aye, and have boiling water ready besides!”
So they stood up stubbornly and unanimously against all persuasions, deaf both to arguments and to prayers, and would not hear reason. They clamoured against the men furiously, and often added tears to their clamours.
“I’ll not let my goodman go! I will hang to the skirts of his capote, and hold fast, aye, should they break my arms! We have had woes enough!”
Matthew cursed with rage. “May a brimstone thunderbolt blast you all!—Like magpies before rain: always shrieking, shrieking!—You’ll sooner teach human speech to a calf than words of wisdom to a woman,” he declared, bitterly disappointed.
“Let them alone, Gregory; you’ll never get at their understanding,” he complained. “Were the woman your wife, perchance she might listen then. Otherwise, the only argument for her is—a stick!”
“Nay, force is useless here,” Gregory said; “we must employ some other means with them. We must not contradict them at first, we even must approve … so as to bring them round little by little.”
He was unwilling to give all up for lost. Though he had at first opposed the plan, he had, when convinced it was the only thing to do, gone in for it afterwards with heart and soul. A bold stubborn fellow, determined to succeed in whatever he undertook, he allowed nothing to discourage him. They shut the door in his face; he talked to them through the window. They used threats; he, without loss of temper, flattered them freely, speaking to them of their children, praising their tidy ways, and little by little coming to the point; and if unsuccessful with one, he would go on to another. For two whole days, the village was full of him: in the cabins, in the gardens, even about the fields, talking of one thing, then of another, and at last coming to his subject. For such as found it hard to follow, he would draw a map in the dust of the domain of Podlesie and its divisions, so as to show forth the advantages of the plan of campaign to everyone. Yet in spite of these artifices his trouble would have been lost had it not been for Roch’s assistance. On Saturday afternoon, seeing they could not carry the village with them, they asked Roch to come behind Boryna’s granary; and there they opened their hearts to him, though much fearing lest he would oppose their scheme.
But after thinking a short time, he replied:
“A lawless proceeding it is; but we have no time to proceed otherwise.—I’ll help you willingly.”
At once he went to the parish priest, who was sitting in his garden, while his servant mowed the clover hard by. The servant told them later that his Reverence was at first angry with Roch, would not listen, and stopped his ears, but that they afterwards sat together talking for a long time. Roch had no doubt convinced him; for when the people came back at dusk from the fields, the priest went out as if to take the air, and, passing from cabin to cabin, he (talking first of indifferent matters) came at last to confer with the women chiefly, and dropped words to the following effect in the ears of each:
“The lads mean well. While there’s yet time, haste must be made. Take your determination: I shall go to the Squire and advise him to agree.” So, when he had overcome the women’s opposition, the husbandmen began to perceive that a plan approved by the priest was worth following.
They still spent the evening in debate, but early on Sunday morning they had decided to go after Vespers with Roch at their head, who would talk matters over with the German settlers.
This he had promised them to do; and when they had gone home, shouting loud cuckoo-calls of delight, he remained seated in Boryna’s porch, telling his beads and pondering deeply.
It was as yet early; they had but just cleared away after breakfast, Pete having lingered over his: a warm though yet not too hot day, with the swallows cutting the air swift as bullets. The sun had risen over the cabin, the grass glittered with dew in the shade; a fresh corn-scented breeze blew from the fields.
The hut, as usual on Sundays, was silent: the women busied with tidying the place, and the children out of doors, eating together at their porringer, and keeping Lapa off with spoons and cries. The sow grunted at the wall in the sunshine, the little ones nuzzling against her belly for milk; the stork was driving the hens off and running about after the colt that frisked in the courtyard. The orchard trees whispered, their branches waved; from the fields outside, the humming of bees on the wing resounded, and the lark’s song rang through the air.
This Sunday quiet was so deep that only the quacking of ducks about the pond was heard, or the laughter of the lads as they washed themselves there.
The roads lay deserted and bright in the sun, with very few wayfarers. Girls combed their locks on the doorstep; and the notes of a shepherd’s pipe bubbled forth.
Roch, as he said his rosary, heard all these sounds, but was mostly thinking of Yagna, whom he could hear bustling about within, sometimes coming close behind him, sometimes going out into the yard, and, as she returned, dropping her eyes before his, and flushing a deep red. He felt sorry for her.
“Yagna!” he whispered kindly, raising his eyes.
She stopped short with an intake of the breath, expecting he would say more. But he, as though doubtful of what he ought to say, only murmured a few inarticulate words and was silent.
She went her way again and sat down at the open window, where, leaning on the sill, she looked out mournfully upon the sunny scene and on the white clouds, wandering like wild geese through the bright fields of heaven. A heavy sigh burst from her bosom, and tears dropped more than once from her reddened eyelids, rolling slowly down her cheeks, now somewhat worn and thin. For ah! how much she had gone through in those last days! The women turned their backs upon her when she passed, and some spat after her. Her friends looked another way; the youngsters laughed contemptuously, and the youngest of the Gulbas family had once flung mud at her, calling out:
“The Voyt’s leman, you!”
The words had stabbed her like a knife; and she felt suffocated with the shame of it.
But, in God’s name, was she to blame in all this? He had made her drunk—so drunk that God’s world had vanished from her eyes!—And now they all accused her; the whole village fled from her as from one tainted, polluted: no one stood up in her defence.
And whither should she go now? They would slam the doors in her face—nay, set their dogs upon her. To flee to her mother’s availed nothing: she, in spite of entreaties and wailings, had all but driven her away. … And, had it not been for Hanka, she would have done herself a mischief. … Aye, it was she—the wife of Antek—who alone had held out a helping hand to her and protected her from her enemies! … No, no, no! she was not guilty, the Voyt was! guilty of tempting her, of forcing her to sin. … But the most guilty of all was … he! … that old monster! (She meant her husband!) “He has fettered my whole life. … Had I been a free woman, would any have dared to injure me so? Nay, none. … And what have I enjoyed with him? Neither life nor freedom!”
As she went on brooding, her grief turned to passion, and she set to pacing the room under its sway. “In truth, he is the fountainhead of all I suffer. … Without him, I should have lived in quiet still, as all the others do. … The devil set him in my way, tempting my mother with that land. … And now I must endure … endure!—Oh, may the worm devour you speedily!”
At this height of fury, she looked through the window, and perceived the litter with her husband in it under the trees. She ran out and, bending over him, hissed cruelly:
“Die, old dog! die! And the sooner, the better!”
He rolled his eyes at her and mumbled something; but she had gone. The outburst relieved her: she had someone on whom to revenge her grievances!
When she returned, the smith was standing in the porch, but feigned not to see her, and continued talking to Roch, raising his voice:
“Matthew is telling everyone in the village that ye are to go at their head and encounter the Germans.”
“As they have begged me, I intend to go with them and meet our new neighbours,” he replied, with a stress on the last word.
“The Lipka people are forging fresh fetters for themselves—that’s all. The affair with the Squire has turned their heads, and they fancy that a mob with sticks and shouts can deter the Germans from buying.”
He was so angry that he could scarce control himself.
“Perhaps they may prefer not to buy: who knows?”
“Oh, indeed! The lots are measured out; the families have arrived. They are digging wells and laying cornerstones!”
“This much I know: the deed is not yet signed before the notary.”
“It is as good as signed: so they have sworn to me.”
“I speak of my own certain knowledge; and, should the Squire find better purchasers. …”
“Not in Lipka, at any rate: no one smells very strong of money here.”
“Gregory has made a few calculations, and, as I take it. …”
“Oh, Gregory!” he interrupted rudely. “He is a meddler who misleads folk, and will only bring evil on them!”
“Well, we shall see how it turns out; we shall see!” Roch returned with a quiet smile, noting how the smith in his exasperation was tearing out his moustache.
“Here comes Paul of the police station!” he exclaimed, seeing the messenger enter the enclosure.
“An official paper for Anna Boryna,” Paul said, taking an envelope out of his pouch.
Hanka turned it about uneasily, uncertain what to do with it.
“I’ll read it for you,” Roch said.
But as the smith came behind, to read it over his shoulder, Roch folded the paper immediately, saying without interest:
“A permission for you to visit Antek twice a week in future.”
Roch waited till the smith had gone, and then followed Hanka into the cabin.
“The letter was not what I told you: I did not think the smith ought to know of it. Ye are advised that, either on your giving a sufficient guaranty or paying five hundred roubles into court, Antek will be set free directly.—What ails you?”
No reply. Her voice had failed her; she stood motionless, her face suffused with crimson first, then pale as death, her eyes blinded with tears. She stretched out her arms and, drawing a deep breath, fell on her face before the holy images.
Roch went out and, sitting down in the porch, read the document over again, smiling with joy. It was some time before he looked in again.
Hanka was on her knees, glowing with gratitude, her heart almost bursting with gladness. Short broken sighs and whispered ejaculations seemed to be filling the room with flashes and pillars of flame, fed with the fire of her lifeblood, and rising up to the feet of Our Lady of Chenstohova. The bliss of it was almost too much for her to bear: her tears flowed in torrents, washing away the memory of all her past sorrows and sufferings.
At length she rose, and, wiping her tears away, said to Roch:
“And now I am ready for anything in the future. The worst that may hap will be less evil than what has been.”
He looked with astonishment at the change that had taken place in her. Her eyes sparkled; her cheeks were no longer pale, but full of colour; she stooped no more, and looked ten years younger.
“Sell the things, quick,” he said; “get the sum together, and we shall go to fetch Antek tomorrow or on Tuesday.”
Dazed, she again and again repeated the words: “Antek is coming back—coming back!”
“Not a word about it! When he comes, why, folk will know of it anyway. Ah! and we must let it be supposed that he was set free unconditionally, or the smith would want to know where the money came from.”
All this he told her in a low voice, and she promised to obey, excepting Yuzka, however, whom she had to tell, and trust with the joyful secret; Hanka could hardly have borne alone such an awful weight of gladness. She went to and fro like one flushed with strong drink, kissed all the children twenty times over, talked to the colt, talked to the pig, and frisked with the stork; and as Lapa followed her about, looking wistfully into her eyes as if he understood something of the matter, she said in his ear:
“Tell no one, silly one! The goodman is coming home!”
Then she laughed and cried by turns, and spoke to Matthias, telling him all about it, till he rolled his eyes as if in fear, and made an indistinct murmur. And she so forgot the whole world that Yuzka had to remind her she must get ready for church.
She was so happy that she even wanted Yagna to come with them; but Yagna refused.
Her no one had told the news, but she easily guessed at it, from words dropped here and there, and from Hanka’s extraordinary gaiety. The news elated her likewise, and touched her with a sort of silent hope; and, heedless of meeting people, she ran over to her mother.
She dropped in just when a terrific quarrel was at its height.
Directly after breakfast, Simon had sat down by the window, smoking a cigarette, and spitting about the room, while he considered and reflected for a long time, casting many a look at his brother. At last he said:
“Now, Mother, give me some money, for I have to put up the banns. The priest told me to come after Vespers for the examination in Religion.”
“And whom would you wed?” she asked, with a bitter sneer.
“Nastka Golab.”
She said no more, but busied herself about the pots on the fireplace. Andrew put some more wood on, and though the fire drew very well, he blew upon it out of sheer trepidation. Simon paused for a reply, and, getting none, spoke once more: this time in a more decided tone.
“I shall need a five-rouble note, for there is to be the betrothal ceremony besides.”
“Oh!—And have ye sent her the proposers yet?”
“Klemba and Ploshka went to her.”
“And the answer was Aye, no doubt?” Her chin wagged with chuckling.
“Most surely.”
“She’s the ‘blind hen that happened on a grain,’ hey?—The idea of a Nay from her, the beggarly thing!”
Simon knitted his brows, but waited to hear her say more.
“You, fetch me water from the pond; and you, Andrew, let the pig out: it is squealing.”
They both obeyed mechanically. But when Simon returned to his place, and his younger brother was again pottering about the fireplace, the old dame commanded sternly:
“Simon, give the heifer to drink!”
“Do that yourself: I am not your maidservant!” he returned boldly, sprawling on the settle.
“Have you heard?—Drive me not to punish you on the Lord’s Day!”
“Have ye heard me asking for money?”
Then she exploded: “Neither money nor leave to marry will I give!”
“Leave I can do without!”
“Simon, keep your temper. Make me not angry!”
On a sudden he bent down before her, humbly clasping her feet.
“See, Mother, I beg, I implore you; I am crouching at your feet like a dog!”
His voice was choked with sobs.
Andrew too fell prostrate at her feet, and kissed her hands, beseeching her and moaning pitifully.
She repulsed them both with fury, shaking her fist.
“Dare but to oppose my will,” she cried out, “and I’ll sweep you to the four winds of heaven!”
But Simon’s hesitation was over now. Her words had roused him, and his blood boiled. The inborn stubbornness of the Pacheses had laid hold on him: he stood up erect, and, striding forward:
“Give me the money!” he roared. “I shall wait no longer, nor beg for it any more!”
“Never!” she cried stormily, and looked about her for some weapon of offence.
“Then will I seek it!”
With a wildcat’s leap, he bounded to the great chest, wrenched the lid open, and began to empty the clothing it contained on to the floor. She shrieked and darted at him, at first endeavouring to force him back; but she could not move him an inch. Then she caught hold of his thick fell of hair with one hand, battering his face with the other, while kicking his body and screaming all the time. He shook her off, and went on searching for the money; but, having received a terrible kick in the groin, pushed her away with such strength that she fell down flat upon the floor. She was up again, however, in an instant, and, seizing the poker, rushed at him. Unwilling to fight with his mother, he only tried to defend himself, attempting to wrest the poker from her hand. The din made the room ring again; and Andrew, in floods of tears, was hovering round them, weeping aloud and crying out:
“O Mother! for God’s sake! O Mother!”
Yagna, coming in then, ran forward to stop the struggle. In vain. Dominikova stuck to him like a leech, and battered him with insane fury, though he tried to give way and leap aside: she assailed him all the more fiercely, raining down blows on him, till, maddened by pain, he struck back again.
So they flew at each other like quarrelling dogs, staggering backward and forward about the room, and hitting the walls and furniture with extreme violence.
The neighbours were now coming in, and striving to force them apart, but to no purpose. The fight went on, the mother belabouring the son, the son seeking to keep the mother at bay. But, at last losing patience, he put forth all his strength, grappled her round the waist and flung her from him. She stumbled and fell like a log on to the blazing fireplace amongst the pots of boiling water; and the whole range came down on her with a crash!
They extricated her at once from among the fallen brickwork. She was fearfully scalded: yet, recking nothing of the pain nor of her burning petticoats, she wanted to fly at him still!
“Unnatural child! Accursed one! Away, away with you!” she bellowed with insane frenzy; and they had to use force to hold her back and quench the flames. They put wet compresses on to her scalds, and she yet was ready to rush at him again.
“Quit my sight! let me behold you nevermore!”
As for Simon, breathless, beaten all over, unable to utter a word, and streaming with blood, he stood staring at his mother in the utmost bewilderment and dismay.
The uproar had scarce begun to subside, when she tore herself free from the women round her, darted to the pole behind the fireplace on which Simon’s things were hanging, pulled them all down and threw them out of the window.
“Go! may mine eyes not see you any more! Naught is yours here, all is mine! … You shall not have one strip of land, not one spoonful of food, were you dying of hunger!” she vociferated with the rest of her failing strength; and, overcome at last by the intensity of her pains, she then fell to groaning and screaming most horribly.
So she was carried to her bed.
So many people had pressed in that the cabin was chock-full, and the passage as well; even the open windows were blocked up with heads.
Yagna, at a loss what to do, was completely disconcerted. The old woman was now howling in frightful agony. No wonder: all her face and neck were scalded fearfully, her arms were burnt, her hair was singed off, and her eyes were all but sightless.
Simon had gone out and was sitting in their little orchard close to the cabin-wall, his chin resting on his fists, stiff as a corpse, bruised all over, with clots of blood upon his face: he was listening to his mother’s groans.
After a while, Matthew came up to him, saying, as he took him by the hand:
“Come over to our hut. You have naught to do here now.”
“Go I will not! … The land is mine, the land of my forefathers, my own: here will I remain!” he growled with sombre obstinacy.
Neither arguments nor entreaties could prevail against him; he sat still, and spoke no more.
Uncertain what to do, Matthew seated himself near him; but Andrew made a bundle of the clothing just thrown out and, placing it before his brother, said timidly:
“With you, Simon! I’ll go away with you!”
“O mothers of dogs!” cried the other, beating on the wall so hard that Andrew winced to hear him; “once for all I have said that I will not budge; and budge I will not!”
Now they were again silent; dreadful shrieks were heard within. Ambrose had come to bandage the old woman. He put fresh unsalted butter on the scalds and burns, covering them with the leaves of certain herbs, over which again he put a layer of curdled milk, and bound up the whole with moist bandages. Having directed Yagna to pour some cold water on the clouts every now and then, he hurried away to Church, hearing that the Mass-bell was already beginning to tinkle.
It was Mass-time indeed; the roads were swarming with people, carts were rattling by, and so many acquaintances sought to call on the patient that Yagna was at length compelled to close her door on her prying neighbours, and only Sikora’s wife remained with her.
And now there was again quiet in the hut. Dominikova was mute. The still murmurous drone of the organ was just audible; and the voices of the singers, with their plaintive, soothing, quavering melody, were wafted along through the orchards.
Both the young men were still sitting outside the hut. Matthew was talking on in a low voice; Simon nodding in reply; while Andrew, lying on the grass, gazed on the smoke of his brother’s cigarette, rising in tangled threads above the thatch, like bluish gossamer.
Matthew rose at last, promising to come again in the afternoon. He intended to go to church, but at the sight of Yagna sitting at the water’s brink, he drew near her.
Her pail stood full by her side; she was bathing her feet in the millpond.
“Yagna!” he whispered very low, approaching beneath the alders.
Instantly she let her skirt down over her knees, and bent a look on him—a look so tearful, so full of pain and sorrow, that he felt cut to the heart.
“What is it, Yagna? are you ailing?”
The trees waved very silently, pouring down their rain of lights and shadows upon her bright head, like a shower of green and gold.
“No, but things go not well with me. Not well.” And she looked away from him.
“If I could but aid … or advise you …” he went on kindly.
“What? did you not lately turn away from me in my garden … and never come near me since?”
“For you had spurned me! … How could I dare? O Yagna!” His tone was gentle and full of sympathy.
“Aye, but I called after you, and you—you would not hearken!”
“Did you call me back, Yagna? Truly?”
“Truly.—I might have died and no one have come near me. I am a poor forlorn creature, that everyone is free to humble and ill-use!”
Her face was burning; she turned it away in confusion, splashing the water with her feet.—Matthew was reflecting.
All through the silence which ensued, the symphony of the organ went on trickling in a soothing gentle stream—a streak of mellow sound. The millpond shimmered, rolling sinuous ripples from Yagna’s feet, like iridescent serpents: while between her and him there passed warm glances, wreathed and twined together.
Matthew was growing more and more fascinated; he longed to take her in his arms and fondle her like a little child, pressing her to his breast and comforting her with the tenderest caresses.
“And I thought you unfriendly!” she whispered.
“Never was I that; and you know it.”
“Never last year, peradventure,” she said, but added unthinkingly: “All the same, ye have gone with the others now!”
All at once he remembered, with anger and jealousy gnawing at his heart.
“Because … because ye have … ye are. …”
He could not utter the hateful words that choked him, and, checking himself, said harshly:
“Fare ye well!”
And he turned to leave her, lest he should reproach her with the Voyt.
“So once again you go!—But why? what harm have I done you?”
She felt startled and pained.
“None—none. … But—” and he spoke hurriedly, looking into her deep-blue eyes, and feeling sorrow, anger and tenderness rise up within him by turns—“but—Yagna! do put away from you that abominable creature! Put him away!” he repeated most earnestly.
“Ha! did I ever speak him fair? am I now doing aught to keep him?” she cried out angrily.
Matthew stood perplexed and hesitating.
A tempest of weeping shook her, and the tears poured down her glowing cheeks.
“Oh, the cruel wrong he did me!—To take my senses away! … And yet no one came forward on my behalf to accuse him! … No one has any mercy; ye all cry: Down, down with her!” she lamented bitterly.
“The villain! I will pay him out for it!” Matthew exclaimed, clenching his fist.
“Aye, pay him, Matthew! pay him! And ye shall have … !” Her eager appeal died away on her lips.
Without another word he hastened to the church.—She sat for a long time by the pond, wondering whether he would indeed take her part, and suffer no more wrong to be done to her.
“Antek, perchance!” the thought flashed through her brain.
She returned home, her mind agitated by secret but not unpleasant anticipations.
The bells were pealing as the people came out of church, and the air rang with their laughter; but those who passed by Dominikova’s cabin went silently, with gloomy looks and meaning glances at one another.
None of the merry sounds that echoed through all the rest of the village during the noonday meal was heard in her hut. Nor was anyone eager to visit her, as she lay there moaning and feverish. Yagna, to whom a long stay by her side was unbearable, went out at times to the porch, now and then walking as far as the gate; or she would sit by the window, looking out with weary desire for change. Simon sat motionless outside. Andrew alone remembered that the dinner had to be cooked, and set about cooking it.
Some time after dinner, Hanka came to look in. She was in an odd state of excitement, asking questions without number, deeply interested in the sufferer, but at times casting a stealthy troubled glance in the direction of Yagna, and sighing deeply.
After a time, Matthew dropped in to see Simon.
“Will you go forth with us to the Germans?”
“This place will I not quit: ’tis my father’s land and mine; from it I will not budge,” he answered, full of on thought only.
“A great ass you are!—Sit ye here till tomorrow, if you will.” Matthew was annoyed at this foolery; and as Yagna was then seeing Hanka to the gate on her departure, he went out with her, without bestowing so much as a look on the other.
They went along by the millpond road.
“Has Roch left the church yet?” he asked.
“Aye, and a good many peasants are waiting for him.”
He glanced back, and saw Yagna gazing after them. Quickly turning his head round, and with eyes cast down, he inquired of Hanka:
“Is it true that the priest has denounced anyone from the pulpit?”
“Why ask?—Ye have heard.”
“I came too late for the sermon.—They told me something, but I thought they were lying.”
“He denounced … more than one.—Oh, how he clenched his fists!—To be stern with sinners, to throw stones at them—anyone can do that.—But there is no one can prevent the evil thing!” She felt deeply mortified at the slur on her own family, and her mood was very angry.—“But,” she added, dropping her voice, “he made no allusion whatever to the Voyt.”
Matthew cursed savagely. He would have put one other question, but hesitated; and they moved on in silence, Hanka much vexed at the whole business. Yes, Yagna had sinned, she said to herself. Yes, she deserved punishment. … But to be rebuked from the pulpit, and almost by her name—it was too much! … She was the wife of Boryna, and not a common drab!—He had said naught against Magda or the girls in the mill: yet all knew of their doings!—And the lady of the Manor of Gluhov: did not all know of her fondness for peasant lovers? Had he said one word of her? Her dignity as a Borynova was hurt.
“Did he … did he mention Teresa?” The question was put at last, so low that she scarcely heard it.
“Aye. He mentioned both. And everyone guessed of whom he was speaking. Someone must have set him against her.”
He was near exploding with rage.
“They say it is either Dominikova’s work or Balcerkova’s. The former is avenging herself on you for Simon and Nastka; the other would fain have you for her own girl Mary.”
“Aha! Sits the wind in that quarter? I should not have dreamed it.”
“Men only see what is under their noses.”
“Well, Balcerkova has lost her trouble; and she may well be trounced for it yet by Teresa. Besides, to spite Dominikova, Simon shall marry Nastka: I’ll see to that myself.—Those miserable hags!”
“They work out their schemes, and honest folk have to suffer for them,” she said with sorrow.
“Each one tries to hurt everyone else: ’tis hard to bear life here.”
“So long as Matthias was with us, they had someone to keep them in bounds, someone to listen to.”
“Very true. Our Voyt is a fool who knows naught, and who plays such pranks that the folk can abide him no longer. Oh, if Antek were but to come back!”
“He will—he will! And shortly! But”—and her eyes sparkled—“would he be obeyed?”
“Yes. ’Tis settled between me and Gregory and the others. And when he returns, we shall set the village in order, with him at our head. Ye shall see.”
“It is high time. Things here are getting loose, as a wheel when the linchpin has dropped off.”
They were now at the hut, where several people had already gathered in the porch—somewhat under a score of farmers ready to start, along with the best of the farmhands. Yet (as previously, and for the forest expedition) all the villagers had declared that they would go … to a man!
“Our Voyt ought to come with us,” someone observed, stripping the bark off a stick.
“The Head Official,” another answered, “has summoned him to the District Office; and the scrivener says he will be ordered to call a meeting and get a school voted by Lipka and Modlitsa.”
“He may call a meeting, but we’ll vote no school!” laughed Klemba.
“We should have at once so much more per acre to pay in taxes. Just as in Vola.”
“Surely,” the Soltys admitted; “but when the Head Official gives an order, we have to obey.”
“What orders have we to take from him? Let him order his gendarmes not to join with the thieves to rob us!”
“Gregory, you are growing saucy,” said the Soltys severely. “Men’s tongues have ere now taken them farther away than they wished to go!”
“Ye shall not put me down. I know our rights, and fear no Head Official. Only you poor ignorant sheep shake from head to foot before every Jack in office.”
He spoke so loud that they were shocked at his rashness, and more than one felt his flesh creep. Klemba went on to say:
“But truly, such a school is of no use to us! For two years my boy Adam went to the school in Vola. The teacher got three bushels of potatoes a year from me, and eggs and butter from my wife besides at Yuletide and Easter. And what has come of it all? He can neither read a Polish prayerbook nor say his A.B.C. in Russian! Whereas my younger ones, whom Roch taught last winter, can both make out writing, and read the books our gentry read.”
“Then,” said Gregory, “let us engage Roch to teach our children.”
Here the Soltys stepped a little aside from the group, and said, lowering his voice:
“Roch would be the best, I know, and he has taught my boys; but it cannot be. The police have found out something, and they are on his trail. The Superintendent saw me in the office, and inquired diligently about him—said he was sure that Roch taught the children, and distributed Polish books and newspapers to the folk.—We must tell him to take good heed.”
“That’s a bad business,” said old Ploshka. “He’s a good religious man; but the whole village may come to great harm through him. … Yes, measures must be taken—and quickly.”
“What, man!” said Gregory in an indignant whisper; “are ye such a coward as to think of betraying him?”
“Should he stir up the people against the Government to the destruction of us all, we ought all to do so. You are young; but I recollect well what took place in the war of the gentry, and how we peasants were cudgelled formerly for the least thing we did. With them we have naught in common.”
“Ah, ye would fain become Voyt! And ye are no more good than a boot with a hole in it!”
They said no more, for Roch then came out of the cabin, looked round at the people, crossed himself, and cried:
“It is time!—On, in the name of the Lord!”
He stepped forward, and behind him surged the mass of peasants in the middle of the road, with a few women and children after them.
The heat of the day was over, the bells were just pealing for Vespers, and the sun was rolling forestward. It was fine bright weather, and the skyline showed so clear that the remotest villages were made out distinctly.
To keep up their spirits, some of the men were striking the ground with their oaken cudgels; some spat in their palms, and put on an indomitable mien as they marched along.
The women went no farther than the mill, while the men went on slowly up the slope, their feet raising puffs of dust.
They trudged on in silence, with proud hard faces and eyes glittering defiantly.
Their ranks moved as solemnly as in a procession, and if anyone began talking, the stern looks of the others silenced him soon. It was no time for conversation then: each man withdrew within himself to find courage and strength there for what was coming.
At the cross and the village landmarks they stopped awhile to rest. But they were still silent, gazing out upon the landscape: on the huts of Lipka, scarce visible amongst their orchards; on the gilt cupola of the village church; on the vast expanse of green, green fields. And, as they listened to the shepherds’ pipes playing far away and drank in the sweet peace and joy of springtime all around, many of them felt a dull sinking of heart, and looked out towards Podlesie with painful misgivings.
“Come!” Roch cried to stir them up; “we are not here to trifle the time away!” For he saw in his men clear signs of weakening resolve.
They turned and made straight for the farm-buildings. Their way led them through lands overgrown with weeds, miserable rye-fields, blue with cornflowers, patches of late-sown oats, all yellow with flowers of gold, land where the thin wheat crop was quite scarlet with wild poppies, and plots where the potatoes were hardly above ground yet. Gross carelessness and neglect were seen at every step.
“A Jew could not have tilled the land worse! It is an eyesore!” growled one of the men.
“The worst farmhand would have done better work.”
“This one, though a great owner, has had no respect for the sacred land which is his!”
“No, he treats it as one that only milks and never feeds his cow: small wonder if it gives him naught!”
They had now reached the fallows. At a slight distance rose the dingy ruins of the burnt buildings; the orchard was black with charred trunks. Around stood the messuages, some of the roofs fallen in, and the chimney-stacks standing up stark and black. Near the houses a group of persons was to be seen: they were the Germans. A cask of beer stood upon the paving-stones; a man on a doorstep played the flute; the others, either lolling on benches or upon the grass, were taking their ease, in shirtsleeves, with pipes in their mouths, and drinking beer out of earthenware jugs. Some children frisked outside the house, and lusty cows and horses grazed hard by.
They saw the men coming; for they started up, looking in the direction of the newcomers, shading their eyes, and bawling out in their own speech. But one of them, an old man, said a few words, and they sat down quietly to drink again. The flute-player played his sweetest strain; high above their heads the larks sang; while from the corn, the rapid and incessant shrilling of the crickets dinned yet louder in the ear, and the piping of the quails was heard from time to time.
The ground, baked by the sun, sounded hard beneath the peasants’ feet, and the stones rang under their hobnailed boots as they drew near: the Germans remained motionless, as though they had not heard anything, but sat enjoying their beer and the fragrance of the evening air.
The men, coming in with slow ponderous tread, were close to them now, grasping their sticks tight and striving to breathe easily; but their hearts were throbbing, a hot thrill ran down their backs, and their throats went very dry. Nevertheless, they drew themselves up, and glared boldly at the Germans.
“Praised be … ,” said Roch in German, coming to a halt, while the whole company drew up in a crescent behind him.
The Germans replied in chorus, but without moving from their places. The grey-bearded old man alone rose and gazed around him, turning somewhat paler.
“We,” Roch began to say, “have come to see you on a certain matter.”
“Then sit ye down. I see that ye are husbandmen of Lipka: let us talk together in neighbourly wise—Johann! Fritz! bring settles for our neighbours.”
“Many thanks, but our business will be soon over: we may as well stand.”
“Soon over?” he cried in Polish. “Can that be, when the whole village has come?”
“That is but because the matter interests all equally.”
“Also,” Gregory added meaningly, “we have left thrice as many at home.”
“Well, we are glad to see you.—And, since ye have been the first to pay a visit, perchance ye will taste some beer with us.”
“How generous!” cried several voices. “ ’Twas not for beer we came!”
Roch hushed them with a glance. The old German said dryly:
“We are listening.”
A stillness ensued, in which quick short breathing was heard. The men of Lipka drew closer together, trembling with excitement; the Germans rose like one man and faced them in serried array, exchanging fierce looks with the peasants, and muttering low, and twirling the strands of their beards.
The women looked on, terrified; the children ran to hide in the passages; close at the wall, a few tan-coloured dogs began to snarl: while, for the space of one “Hail Mary” at least, the men stood facing one another in profound silence, like a troop of rams, with fiery eyes rolling, backs tense, heads lowered, and ready at any moment to charge one at the other. Then Roch broke the silence, thus speaking in Polish, in clear ringing tones:
“We come in the name of the whole village to request you—and in friendly wise—not to complete the purchase of Podlesie.”
“Right! Quite right! We come for that!” they all agreed, striking on the ground with their sticks.
For the Germans, this was a thunderclap.
“What says he? What would he have? We understand naught,” they stammered, thinking they had not heard aright.
Roch therefore repeated his request, this time in German; and when he had done, Matthew burst out with the words: “And to take yourselves away—you and your long trousers—to all the devils!”
At this, they jumped as though doused with boiling water. The quarrel then began and waxed furious, all the more embroiled by their fierce-sounding unintelligible jargon, as they stamped their feet and waved their arms; some of them, with lifted fists, making as if to rush at the peasants, who stood firm and immovable as a wall, eyeing them with bold looks and clenched teeth, while their hands twitched nervously upon their cudgels.
“What, are ye all mad?” exclaimed the old man, with uplifted hands. “Would ye forbid us to purchase land? Wherefore? and by what right?”
Roch calmly explained the whole situation in all its details; but the German, reddening with anger, cried out:
“The land belongs to him that pays for it!”
“We,” Roch replied gravely, “think otherwise: we think the land should belong to him that hath need of it.”
“Belong? And how? Without payment, by robbery peradventure?” he cried with a sneer.
“Our hands can give exceeding good payment,” Roch answered in the same tone.
“Why shall we waste time bandying jests? We have bought Podlesie; it is ours, and ours it shall remain. And whoso likes not this, let him go his way, and not come near us!—Well, wherefore do ye wait?”
“Wherefore?” Gregory exploded. “To tell you: ‘Hands off the land that’s ours!’ ”
“Take yourselves off it, you!”
Here someone called out: “Mark this: ours has been a neighbourly request … so far!”
“Ye threaten us? Then we’ll go to law! Oh, there are means to master you. Your term of jail for the forest brawl is not yet done: you will get some more, and do both terms together!” The old man attempted to laugh, but was too much upset, and his companions were exasperated.
“Ye lousy devils!”
“Thievish, stinking hounds!” they shouted in German, writhing about like snakes disturbed in their nest.
“Dogs’ blood! be silent when men speak to you!” Matthew thundered at them; but they cared nothing for him, and began to come on in a body.
Roch, fearing there would be violence, got his men together and urged them to be calm; but they were out of hand, each vociferating louder than the other.
“A slap in the face to the first who comes near us!”
“They want to have a little blood let!”
“What, boys! shall we let them flout all our people thus?”
“No, no! we must not—we must not!” cried the rest, pressing threateningly forward, till Matthew, setting Roch aside, pushed on to the Germans, showing his teeth like an angry wolf.
“Hear me, ye Germans!” he roared, clenching his fists. “We have spoken to you words of kindness, with honest intent; and you not only menace us with prison, but insult us as well! Good; but we play another game with you henceforth. Ye refuse to agree: therefore here we swear to you, before God and man, that you shall never settle down in Podlesie. We came to offer peace: you chose war. Very well: war let it be! Ye have the courts for you, the officials for you, the power of money for you; and we—nothing but our bare hands. And who will get the better—we shall see!—Let me say, besides, that ye may remember it after: Fire can burn, not straw only, but even brick-built houses, even unripe corn; and cattle may come to fall down in the pasture-lands; and men may be unable to escape deadly misadventure. Remember this that I have told you: war by day, war by night, war in every place.”
“War! War!—So help us God!” they all cried together.
The Germans sprang to their long staffs, standing by the wall; some ran for their guns or took up stones, while the women shrieked aloud.
“Let but one man shoot at us: all the villages will be here anon!”
“Kill one man, Long-Trousers! and ye’ll be beaten to death, as men beat a mad dog!”
“O Swabians! tackle not us peasants, or ye’ll be tackled yourselves.”
“And so well that the hungriest dog would not touch your carcasses!”
“Dare but to touch us, Long-Trousers!” they cried in loud defiance.
And now both parties were about to close, each glaring at the other, stamping, beating on the ground with their sticks, flinging menaces and insults broadcast, and boiling over with eagerness to clapperclaw the enemy. But Roch at last succeeded in drawing his party somewhat to the rear; and his men, wheeling round, carefully protected their flanks as they withdrew, followed by the derisive shouts of the Germans.
“Away from our country, abominable swine!”
“Or stay till the Red Cock wake you up at night!”
“We shall look in again to dance with your maidens!”
Their language at last grew so strong that Roch was obliged to silence them.
And now twilight had come; a cool wind swept the corn, the dew lay silver-grey on the damp grass, and evening, quiet and fragrant, reigned over the land.
The men were coming home, their white capotes flapping behind them. They talked and sang till the woods rang again, stopping from time to time, whistling and gloating over the Podlesie fields.
“They are easy to portion out, these lands,” said old Klemba.
“Aye, we can divide them into complete farms—each with its own meadow and bit of pasture.”
“Provided the Germans give in!” said the Soltys, with a sigh.
“No fear: we know they will,” Matthew said reassuringly.
“I should like the piece near the road, just at the end,” said Adam Prychek.
“And I,” said another, “the one in the middle, near the cross.”
“And I,” said a third, “want the patch close to Vola.”
“Oh,” sighed a fourth, “could I but get the garden-plot in the farm itself!”
“No fool you! You would snap up the best lot of all!”
“Come, come; there’s enough for us all,” Gregory said to pacify them, for they were near quarrelling over it!
“If the Squire agrees and gives up Podlesie to you,” observed Roch, “you will all have a great deal of work to do.”
“We shall manage to get through with it, though!” they cried in great glee.
“Work on one’s own land is never hard toil!”
“On such terms, who would not willingly take all the lands of the Squire?”
“Let him but give it you—you would see!”
“Why, we should take root in the soil, like trees; let him pluck us thence who can!”
And so they talked on, as they neared home; faster now, for they saw the women running out to meet them.