XII
On a sudden he made a start to rush after her.
“Whither?” his mother asked grimly, blocking the way.
“Why—why have ye turned her out? Because she was so kind to me? It is unjust—unjust—and I will not have it.—What wrong thing has she done, say?” he cried, struggling violently in his mother’s powerful grasp.
“Sit down quietly, or I’ll call Father. … What has she done, hey?—I’ll tell you at once. You are to be a priest: I will not see you taking a mistress under my very roof, nor load yourself with such shame and disgrace that folk will point their fingers at you as you go by! That’s why I expelled her. And now you know!”
“Lord Almighty!—What is this you say?” he cried indignantly.
“What I know well.—I was aware that you had meetings with her; but, as God is my witness, I never suspected you of any wickedness! For I thought that if my son wore a priest’s habit, he would not drag it in the mud—not make me curse him forever—not force me to tear him out of my heart, and break my heart in the tearing!” As she spoke, her eyes flamed with such holy indignation that Yanek was petrified with amazement. “Kozlova,” she went on to say, “was the first to open mine eyes; and now I myself have seen how this drab was trying to inveigle you!”
He burst into a flood of tears, and brokenly—between fits of sobbing and complaints of her monstrous suspicions—told her so frankly all about their meetings that her trust in him was completely restored. She pressed him to her heart, and wiped his tears, and soothed him.
“Now do not marvel if I feared for you. Why, she is the worst trull in the whole village!”
“Yagna … the worst … !” He could not believe his ears.
“It shames me to speak of such things; but for your good I must.” She thereupon poured forth all the scandalous tales in circulation against Yagna, sparing him none of them.
Yanek shook with horror, and started up at last, crying:
“This cannot be; I will never believe her so vile.”
“Take heed; ’tis your mother who speaks; these are no lying inventions of hers.”
“But they must be lies! Were they true, it would be too horrible.” And he wrung his hands in despair.
“What makes you defend her so stoutly? Answer me that!”
“I must defend anyone—anyone that’s innocent.”
“You’re an arrant fool!” She was losing her temper; his disbelief pained her deeply.
“If ye think me so—well.—But supposing Yagna so wicked, how could ye let her come to our house?” he asked, flushing as red as an angry young turkey-cock.
“I have not to justify my doings to you, a simpleton who could not understand me. But this I say to you: keep away from her! For if I meet you with her, I will—aye, even before the whole village, I will—give her a drubbing she will not get over for a month!—And you too may get a taste of the same!”
With these words she went out, slamming the door.
Yanek, not suspecting at all why Yagna’s good name was so very dear to him, remained thinking over his mother’s words, and chewing the cud of his bitter reflections till his soul was sickened with the nauseous taste.
“She that kind of woman? She, Yagna?” he groaned, with such stern abhorrence that, had she then appeared before him, he would have turned from her with angry loathing. Why, the very thought of such things had never come to his mind! And now he was forced to ponder them, with ever-increasing anguish! Many a time he was on the point of running out to throw all those many sins and wicked deeds in her teeth. “Let her know what folk say, and clear herself, if she can. Let her declare that they are all falsehoods!” He went on musing feverishly, now more and more inclined to think that she was perhaps not in fault. … Sorrow for her took hold of him; and then there was a secret longing for her in his mind … and the memories of their past meetings came back, not without a certain sense of sweetness. … Then his eyes grew dim with a bright haze of vague delight; and, with a mysterious pang at his heart, he sprang up, crying out, as to the whole world:
“ ’Tis untrue—untrue—untrue!”
At supper, he did not raise his eyes from his plate, shunned his mother’s glances, and sat speechless, though they were talking of Agata’s death. Gloomy, fastidious in his eating, tiresome to his sisters, querulous about the heat in the house, he got up as soon as the meal was done, and went over to the priest’s. His Reverence, sitting pipe in mouth in the porch, was busy talking of various affairs with Ambrose. He kept away from them and walked about under the trees, in company with his painful thoughts.
“And yet, it may be true! Mother could never have invented that!”
From the windows of the house, long streaks of light played upon the lawn and flowerbeds, where the dogs frolicked and snarled in fun. Gruff voices came to him from the porch:
“Have you seen the barley at ‘Swine’s Hollow?’ ”
“The stalks are still somewhat green; the grains are dry as pepper.”
“You must air the vestments, they are getting quite ruined with mould.—And take my surplus and the albs to Dominikova’s for Yagna to wash.—Who was it brought his cow here this afternoon?”
“Someone from Modlitsa. The miller met him on the bridge and vaunted his bull, and even offered the use of the beast gratis; but the man preferred ours.”
“He was right. One rouble will give him a lifelong profit … and a first-rate breed of cows.—Know ye if the Klembas are to pay Agata’s funeral fees?”
“No, she herself has left ten zloty for her burial.”
“She shall be buried, as grandly as any village dame!—Ah! by the way, tell the Confraternity Brethren that I will sell them my unbleached wax; the bleached wax they may want they must buy elsewhere. Tomorrow Michael will see to the church; you must go round and tell the reapers to hurry. The weatherglass stands at ‘Variable,’ and we may have a storm.—When are they starting for Chenstohova?”
“They have asked for a votive Mass on Thursday.”
This talk getting on Yanek’s nerves, he walked farther away to a low latticework fence that separated the orchard from the apiary, where he paced to and fro along a narrow path overhung by trees, the apple-laden boughs coming in frequent contact with his head.
It was a stifling evening, redolent of honey close by, and of the rye cut down a little farther; the sultry air was saturated with heat. The whitewashed trunks glimmered in the shadows, like shirts hung out to dry. From the Klembas’, the dismal moaning of the dirges was heard.
Weary of thinking over his trouble, Yanek was going home, when his ear caught the muffled sound of persons whispering eagerly together in the apiary.
He could see no one, but stopped and listened, holding his breath.
… “Get along. … Let me alone, or I shall scream.”
“… foolish … why struggle? … I am doing nothing wrong … nothing wrong.”
… “Someone may hear. … Loose me, for God’s sake. … You’re breaking my ribs!”
Yanek knew the voices: Pete from Boryna’s and Maryna the priest’s maidservant were there! He walked away, somewhat amused at their courtship, but, after a few paces, returned and listened with absorbing interest. It was impossible to see anything for the thick bushes and the dark night, but he was soon able to make out their broken words, that were now more distinct, more ardent, like spurts of flame; at times, too, there was the sound of a tussle and of deep-drawn breaths.
“… as nice as any of Yagna’s … you shall see, Maryna … only. …”
“Trust you indeed? … Am I such a one? … For God’s sake, let me breathe!”
There was a heavy fall upon the ground; the bushes cracked and snapped; then they seemed to pick themselves up, and whispers and chuckles and kisses went on as before.
“Sleep has quite fled from me now … all for thinking of you, Maryna … of you, O dearest!”
“To every girl you say that! … I waited till midnight … courting someone else. …”
Yanek trembled like an aspen leaf.—The wind sprung up, making the trees to rustle faintly, as if talking in their sleep; the heavy scent of honey from the apiary oppressed him so, he could scarcely breathe; his eyes watered, a hot thrill went through him, an obscurely pleasurable sensation pervaded his whole being.
“… as far from me as any star!—’Tis to Yanek she has an eye at present! …”
Mastering his emotion, Yanek bent over the fence and gave ear, in spite of his growing excitement.
“True, she goes out to him every night. … Kozlova surprised them in the wood together. …”
Here everything began to turn round, his eyes saw nothing and he almost fell swooning. Meanwhile, the sound of kisses and low laughter and whispering continued.
“If you. … I’ll scald your head with boiling water! … Pete! … Pete!”
He had heard enough. He rushed away, swift as the wind, tearing his soutane on the way, and reached home as red as a beetroot, perspiring profusely, and in a fever of excitement. Luckily, no one paid attention to him. His mother, sitting by the fireplace, was singing under her breath the evening hymn,
“All our actions of this day,
At Thy feet, O Lord, we lay,”
and spinning the while; his sisters and Michael, who was polishing the church candlesticks, joined in. His father was in bed.
He went to his room and began to say his hours. But, strive as he would to attend to the Latin words, his mind was always harking back to the whispers and kisses he had overheard. At last, dropping his head on the book, he unconsciously gave way to the thoughts which came over him like a burning blast.
“So? … Are things so?” he mused, with growing horror, and a thrill that was nevertheless not unpleasant. “Are things so!” he suddenly repeated aloud; and to get rid of the abominable fancies that beset him, he put his breviary under his arm, and went to his mother, telling her, in a low subdued voice, that he was going to pray by Agata’s body.
“Yes, go, dearest; I will come for you later!” she returned, with a glance very full of love.
Klemba’s cabin was almost empty. Only Ambrose was there, mumbling out of a book, beside the deceased who lay covered with a sheet. At the head of the bed, the death-taper burned, stuck in a small jug. Fruit-laden apple-boughs peered in at the open window; and now and then a belated passerby peered in too. In the passage, the dogs growled low.
Yanek knelt down close to the light, and fell to his prayers with such intense fervour that he never knew when Ambrose got up and hobbled home. The Klembas had lain down to rest in the orchard.—The first cock had crowed before his mother, remembering, came to fetch him home.
But no slumber came to his eyelids there. Each time he fell into a doze, Yagna’s form appeared to him with such lifelike reality that he started up in bed, rubbed his eyes, and looked around in horror—only to see that all the place was quiet, and to hear his father snoring sonorously.
“Ah! … Perhaps … perhaps that was what she desired?” he thought, as the memory of her scorching kisses and flaming eyes and husky voice came back to him. “And I—I thought it but. …” He shook himself, overwhelmed with anger and shame. He leaped out of bed, opened the window wide, and, seated on the sill, pondered till daybreak with profound sorrow over his involuntary offences and temptations.
At Mass the next morning, he did not venture to raise his eyes; but he prayed all the more earnestly for Yagna, in whose great guilt he now believed entirely, although hatred and disgust for her were beyond his power.
“What’s the matter?” the priest said to him in the sacristy after Mass. “You were sighing so hard, you almost put out the candles!”
“My soutane makes me so hot!” he answered evasively, averting his face.
“When you are accustomed to it, ’twill be as easy to wear as your own skin!”
Yanek kissed his hand and went off to breakfast, picking out the shadows along the millpond, for the heat was broiling. On the way, he met Maryna pulling the priest’s blind old mare along by the mane, and singing a noisy song.
His recollections of her stung him to the quick, and he went up to her in an angry mood.
“What makes you rejoice so, Maryna?” And he gazed at her with shamefaced curiosity.
“The heyday in my blood!” she replied, showing her white teeth in a broad grin; and she went on pulling at the mare’s mane and singing still more noisily.
“Merry! … and after what she has done!” He turned away hastily from the girl—whose skirt was tucked up almost to her snowy knees—and went on to the Klembas’. There Agata lay in high state and in the centre of the dwelling-room, arrayed in her best holiday attire, wearing her cap, deeply frilled over the brows, many strings of beads round her neck, and a new striped skirt, and shoes laced with bright red laces. Her face seemed moulded in bleached wax, and full of a marvellous joy. Her cold stiffened fingers held the holy image, somewhat awry; two tapers burned at the bed’s head. Yagustynka was brushing the flies away with a bough. The smoke of juniper-berries was wafted through the room from the fireplace. Every now and then somebody came in to pray for her soul, and several children were playing about outside.
Yanek, not without some qualms, looked into the dark room.
“The Klembas have gone to town,” Yagustynka whispered. “As she has left them no small amount, they have to deck themselves out for her funeral. For is she not their kinswoman? Surely! But the body will be taken out only this evening; Matthew has not finished the coffin yet.”
The room was close; and, besides, that waxen face with its changeless smile looked so ghastly that he must needs cross himself and go out speedily. On the doorstep, he met Yagna and her mother entering. She stopped on seeing him, but he passed her by without a word, not even the usual “Praised be Jesus Christ!” It was only on nearing the fence that he inadvertently turned round. She was still standing where he had passed her, gazing mournfully after him.
Going home, he would take no breakfast, pretexting a headache.
“Go out for a walk; it may pass away,” his mother advised.
“Mother! where am I to go? Ye will directly fancy … who knows what?”
“Yanek, how can you speak so?”
“Why, Mother, have you not locked me up in our house? Can I go out, if I must not speak to people?”
His nerves were overstrung, and he made his mother suffer in consequence. … It all ended, however, in her bandaging his head with a compress dipped in vinegar, and making him lie down in a darkened room. She drove the children out of the yard, and watched over her boy like a hen over her chicken till he had slept well and eaten a good meal.
“And now go for a walk; and go by the poplar road, where ’tis cooler because of the shade.”
He did not reply, but, seeing that she carefully noted the way he took, chose the opposite direction on purpose. He strayed about the village, looked in at the forge and the hammers as they smote with deafening din on the anvil; he peeped into the mill, entered garden after garden, and went past the flax-fields and wherever the crimson gleam of a woman’s dress was to be seen. Then he sat and talked with Mr. Yacek, tending Veronka’s cows by a field-path, went on to Simon’s cottage in Podlesie, where they refreshed him with some milk, and came back late in the afternoon, without having seen Yagna anywhere.
It was only the next day, at Agata’s funeral, that he met her; her eyes were fixed upon him during all the service. The letters of his book danced before his eyes, and he mistook his Responses. As the body was on its way to the churchyard, she walked almost at his side, utterly indifferent to the fierce glances and loud murmurs of his mother; she felt herself melting in his presence like snow in the spring sunshine!
When the coffin was lowered into the grave and the customary lamentations broke forth, his ear caught the sound of her wailing; but he knew well that those sobs were not for Agata, and that they flowed from the fullness of a sorely pained and wounded heart.
“I must—I must have speech with her!”
His mind was made up on this point on returning from the funeral, but he could not get free at once. Many people from the other hamlets, and even some from neighbouring parishes, had come to Lipka about noon, in order to join in the pilgrimage.
This was to start the next morning at once after the votive Mass had been sung; and all were now slowly assembling, so that the road by the millpond was crowded with carts. A great many, too, had gone to the priest’s bureau, and Yanek had to stay and help his Reverence in settling many various matters. It was only quite at evening that he found a convenient time to take his book and slip out behind the barn and to that pear-tree under which he had once sat together with Yagna.
He never opened the book at all, but threw it somewhere away into the grass. Then, looking round the fields, he entered the rye; and stealthily, almost creeping on all fours, he made his way to Dominikova’s garden.
And Yagna was there just then, digging up new potatoes. She had no notion that anyone was gazing at her. Now and then she would draw herself up wearily, look about her with very mournful eyes, and utter a long and heavy sigh.
“Yagna!” he exclaimed timidly.
She turned suddenly pale as a sheet of canvas, scarcely believing her own eyes, and well-nigh regarding him as a miraculous vision.
Yanek’s eyes were filled with light, and his heart with the sweetness of honey. But, mastering himself, he only sat down in silence, gazing upon her with an irresistible sense of delight.
“I feared I should never see you again, Master Yanek!”
As a scented breeze, blowing up from the meadows upon him, so was the sound of her voice to his soul, thrilled with inexpressible rapture!
“Yesterday evening, outside the Klembas’ house, ye would not even look at me!”
She stood before him, flushed like a rosebush in flower; like a spray of apple-blossoms, all drooping with desire; full of comeliness and altogether lovely.
“And I thought my heart would break!” she added, tears standing like diamonds on her long eyelashes, and veiling the dark azure of the heavens behind.
“Yagna!” he cried; it was a cry from the core of his inmost heart.
She knelt down in a furrow close by and, pressing close to his knees, fixed upon him the fiery depths of her eyes—those eyes as clear, yet as unfathomable, as the sky—those eyes whose looks went to the head like kisses, or the caresses of a beloved hand—those eyes instinct at once with subtle temptation and with absolute simplicity.
With a violent effort to shake himself free from the spell she was casting over him, he spoke to her sternly and recounted all the sins and evil deeds of which his mother had told him. She drank in all his words eagerly, her eyes fastened upon him, but scarcely at all understanding what he said, absorbed as she was in the one feeling and knowledge and consciousness of his being by her side—he, the chosen of her soul amongst all!—of his saying something, of his eyes gleaming bright; and of her kneeling before him as before the image of a saint, and praying to him with the deep, deep faith of love!
“Say now,” he concluded with energetic entreaty, “say, Yagna, say of all this: ’Tis untrue!”
“ ’Tis untrue!—untrue!” she repeated, and with such transparent sincerity that he could not but believe her. Then she, leaning forward, rested her breast against his knees … and in low trembling utterances confessed her love. … She opened wide her soul to him, as if to a father confessor, threw herself down before him as a stray worn-out bird might fall; and with an ardent entreaty, that sounded like a prayer, she gave herself up without reserve to his love … to do with her whatsoever he would.
Yanek trembled like a leaf tossed in a furious tempest, tried to push her from him and escape; but his mind was dazed, and he could only whisper faintly:
“Hush, Yagna, hush! say not such things, they are sinful!”
Then she ceased from speaking, being quite exhausted. And they both were silent; neither did they dare to look into each other’s eyes, but yet they pressed together so closely that they could feel each other’s hearts beat, and the hot stifled panting of their bosoms. Both felt infinite rapture and gladness; tears streamed down their pale cheeks, but a smile played on the lips of both, and both their souls were plunged in deep serene beatitude.
The sun had now gone down, the earth was bathed in the afterglow, as with a golden dew. All was still; all things held their peace, listening, as it were, to the sounds of the Angelus; everything seemed in orison—a prayer of quietude and thanksgiving for the blessing of the day that was over.—And they then went forth through the dusky fields, along the pathways overgrown with wild flowers, across the ripe cornlands, brushing aside the drooping ears as they walked; on they went, with eyes fixed upon the western fires, on the vast golden abysses of heaven, with heaven in their eyes, and heaven in their hearts, and a heaven-like aureole around them!
Not a word was spoken—not a single one; but at times their looks crossed like lightning flashes: each, wearied out in self-conflagration, was unconscious of what the other felt.
Nor were they conscious, either, of the wonderful hymn they were singing, which, having sprung up within their souls, was flying afar on every side, over the darkening fields.
Neither did they so much as know where they were, or whither going, or to what end.
A harsh hoarse voice broke upon their dreams on a sudden:
“Yanek!—Home!”
He was instantly recalled to his senses, and found himself in the poplar road, his mother standing in front of them both, grim-visaged and inexorable!—At the sight, he faltered, stammered, and uttered some unmeaning words.
“Home!”
She caught hold of his unresisting hand, and he followed meekly as she pulled him along.
Yagna, as if spellbound, was coming after them. The old dame picked up a stone from the road, and hurled it at her with all her strength.
“Hence!—Bitch, to your kennel!” she shrieked with foul-mouthed abuse.
Yagna looked round, really unaware that the words were meant for her. When they had disappeared, she wandered about the lanes for a long time, and when all the lights were out, she went and sat outside her cabin till it was again broad day.
The hours passed by; the villagers one by one rose and went to their daily duties; and she still sat plunged in daydreams of her Yanek; of his speech with her, of their mutual glances—and so near together! of their having gone somewhere and sung something … something she could not remember. … And always, always the same dream, endlessly repeated!
Her mother woke her to reality; but Hanka did the waking yet more effectually. She came, dressed for her journey, and timidly stretched out her hand to make peace with them.
“I am going to Chenstohova. Pray forgive me if I have sinned in aught against you.”
“Your words are kind, and I thank you,” the old dame growled; “but what ye have done, ye have done.”
“Let us not go into that!—I entreat you most sincerely to pardon me.”
“I bear you no malice in my heart,” Dominikova returned, sighing heavily.
“Nor do I, though I have suffered not a little,” Yagna said gravely; and then, as the Mass-bell was ringing, went to dress for church.
“Do you know,” Hanka said, after a pause, “that Yanek, our organist’s son, is coming with us to Chenstohova? His mother told me herself that he has insisted on making the pilgrimage.”
Hearing these words, Yagna rushed out half dressed.
“In the company of our little priest, we shall journey better and more respectably. … And so, farewell!”
They parted on friendly terms, and she went on to church, telling her news as she went. Everybody was surprised, and old Yagustynka shook her head, saying:
“There’s more in this than meets the eye! If he goes, it is not willingly. Not he!”
But there was no discussing the matter now: half the village was in church, and the Pilgrimage Mass had already begun.
Yanek was serving, as usual; but his face looked paler, and bore an unusual expression of pain. Then his eyes were discoloured, and still brimmed with tears, through which he saw, as through a mist, the church, and Teresa lying on the pavement all the time with outstretched arms, and Yagna’s terrified glances, and his mother, sitting in the Manor pew, and the pilgrims coming up to receive Holy Communion: all these were dimly seen through his tears, while pang after pang rent his heart, overwhelmed with mortal anguish.
From the altar, the priest took leave of the pilgrims, and, as they pushed their way out of the church, sprinkled them with holy water, and gave them his blessing. The banner was raised, the glittering cross opened the way before them, a hymn was struck up—and they set off upon their journey.
Yagna accompanied them, along with her mother and the rest of the village. She looked very ill, and her soul was quivering in the grip of agony. Swallowing down her bitter burning tears, she kept her eyes fixed on the boy who was all in all to her; but now she viewed him from afar, because his mother and brothers and sisters crowded jealously round him, and she could not even see him properly, much less have speech with him.
Matthew, her mother, and several others addressed her, but she paid them scant attention. She thought of this only: that her Yanek was going away forever; that never, never should she see him more!
They accompanied the pilgrims as far as the crucifix at the edge of the forest; these continued their march, singing until they were out of sight, and only a cloud of dust told vaguely of their whereabouts.
“Why is this?” she moaned, dragging herself wearily back to the village.
“I shall fall down, I shall die!” What she felt within her she really took for the coming of death, so completely had the agonies she had endured shorn her of her strength.
“What, oh, what shall I do now?” she said, looking out upon the day, so desolate for her, so hateful with its dazzling light.
She longed, how intensely! for the silent hours of night; but they brought her no consolation. Until dawn, she went wandering about the premises, along the road, even as far as Podlesie and that cross where she had for the last time seen Yanek; and with eyes that smarted with the strain, she looked up the long wide sandy track, as though seeking some trace of his footsteps, the place where his shadow had passed—a clod of earth his foot had touched.
Alas! there was nothing—nothing for her anywhere—no more love—no more hope!
Even her tears failed her in the end, although her eyes, full of awful desolation and despair, glittered like fathomless fountains of sorrow.
Now and then, when she prayed, there would burst from her lips the bitter complaint: “O my God! wherefore, whereto, is all this suffering?” …