III + 

“Yuzka, kindle the fire; fill all our pots with water, and put them on to boil. I am off to Yankel’s to get the seasonings.” + 

“Then hurry; Ambrose will be here straightway.” + 

“No fear; he cannot come so early. He has his duties to perform in church.” + 

“Only to ring the bell for Mass. Roch is going to take his place for all the rest.” + 

“Well, I shall be in time. Meanwhile, you hurry the lads, make them scour the trough quickly, and bring it outside the cabin.⁠—Yagustynka will be here presently: let her wash the tubs.⁠—Also the empty barrels must be taken out of the larder and rolled into the pond, to get the staves properly soaked and swollen out.⁠—Do not wake the little ones; so long as they sleep, they’ll be less in the way.”⁠—And, having given her orders and tied her apron over her head, she hastened out into the air of an early and very muggy and rainy morning. + 

The day was dismal, wet, and most unpleasantly cold; grey mists dripped and drizzled, the slippery roads were sodden and dank, the drab-coloured huts loomed faintly through the rain that fell; the trees, drooping gloomily over the pond, were seen like tremulous shrinking swaying shadows, as dim as if they had been made of mist; in this foul weather, there was scarce any landscape visible, and no one was out as yet. It was only when the Mass-bell began to tinkle that a few red petticoats were seen picking their way through the mire to church. + 

Hanka tripped on swiftly, thinking she might perhaps meet Ambrose at the turning of the road; but he was nowhere in sight. Only the priest’s old blind horse, as usual at that hour of the day, was going down to the pond with a large barrel, drawn on sledge-runners, stopping and stumbling at every rut, yet finding its way to the place by scent: the farm-lad waiting for it having sheltered himself from the rain in the bushes, and begun smoking a cigarette. + 

Just in front of the priest’s house, a britzka drawn by a couple of well-fed chestnut horses, had pulled up and the ruddy-faced incumbent of Laznov stepped out of it. + 

“Come to hear confessions, along with his Reverence of Slupia,” she thought, as she looked in vain for Ambrose. She went on round the church by the poplar road, where the mire was yet more abundant, and the trees, plunged in the vapoury mizzle, looked like shadows seen through a steam-clouded pane. Passing the tavern, she struck off in the squashy pathway that led to her sister’s. + 

She would, she reckoned, have time enough for a call on her father, and a talk with her sister, with whom, now that she had removed to Boryna’s, she was on very friendly terms. + 

“Yuzka told me yesterday that Father was not well!” she exclaimed on entering. + 

“Ah, what’s to be done? He is lying in bed under his sheepskin, and moaning, and talking about being ill,” Veronka moodily replied. + 

“How cold it is here! I feel it creeping up the calves of my legs!” + 

“And have I any fuel at all? Who will go and fetch me a few dry faggots? How can I trudge to the forest and come home with a load of brushwood when there’s so much other work to do? You see, I must manage all by myself.” + 

They then both fell to lamenting over their sad fate. + 

“When Staho was here, I thought nothing of all he did at home. When the husband is gone, ah! then one knows what a help he is!⁠—Are you going to town?” + 

“Certainly; I should have gone before, but Roch told me that visits would not be allowed until Eastertide. Therefore shall I go on Sunday, and take my poor husband a few morsels of our Hallow-fare.” + 

“I fain would do the same for mine; but what have I to take to him? A mouthful of bread?” + 

“Be easy; I will prepare enough for them both; and we shall take it together.” + 

“God reward you for your kindness; I will work for you in return.” + 

“Do not speak of work in return: ’tis a gift I make you from my heart.” She lowered her voice. “Well do I know poverty: it is a dog whose teeth bite deep.” + 

“And that is so faithful and attached that it never will leave us till we die!⁠—I thought I had a little money laid by, and hoped to purchase a pig in spring, and fatten it up, with no small profit when autumn came. Well, I had to give all to Staho, and my savings have run out like water: I have naught now. That is what comes of his standing up for the rights of our folk!” + 

“Nay, say not so. He went freely to protect them, and an acre or so of the wood will be yours.” + 

“Will be! Aye, but ‘while the grass grows, the steed starves!’ And ‘To him that can pay, the musicians play.’ But ‘Poor man, coin to money your sweat, and be glad that ye ever have eat!’ ” + 

“Are ye greatly in want?” she inquired, hesitatingly. + 

“I have naught in the world,” she cried, flinging out her hands in despair, “but what the Jew or the miller will give me on credit!” + 

“Would I could help you! But the homestead where I dwell is not mine. I am baited as with dogs around me, and must take such heed lest they drive me from the cabin that I am at times clean out of my wits.” + 

The previous night’s experience came back to her forcibly. + 

“Meantime,” her sister put in, “Yagna takes no care. She is a shrewd one, she, and enjoys herself to the full!” + 

“How so?” + 

She had risen from her seat, and was looking at her sister with alarm. Had Yagna found and taken the money? + 

“Oh, she only takes what pleasure she can get out of life: dresses well, calls on her good friends, and has seven holidays a week. She was seen sitting with the Voyt in the tavern parlour yesterday, and the Jew could not fetch them drinks fast enough!” + 

“Everything must come to an end,” Hanka muttered sullenly, tying her apron over her head to go. + 

“True: but then ‘Pleasure, once taken, cannot be snatched from you’⁠—and she knows it.” + 

“ ’Tis easy to be wise in that way, if one has naught to care about!⁠—But, Veronka, we are to kill the pig today: come you this evening to help.” And, cutting short her sister’s everlasting complaints, she made her way out. + 

Her father, who was now in the room she had once occupied, lay moaning and almost hidden under a heap of straw. + 

“What ails ye, Father?” + 

She sat down by his side. + 

“Nothing, my dear daughter, nothing: only the ague shakes me sorely, and my inwards are wrung and twisted.” + 

“Because ’tis here as wet and as cold as out of doors. Rise and come over to us; ye can tend the children. And then⁠—we shall kill the pig⁠ ⁠… if so be as ye have a mind to eat of it?” + 

“To eat? Aye, a little. They forgot to give me any food yesterday.⁠—I shall come, Hanka, I shall come!” And he sighed, but with pleasure, as he crept out of the straw bed. + 

Hanka, her mind full of the thought of Yagna, walked over to the tavern as fast as she could. + 

The Jew no longer exacted payment in advance, but with the most obsequious eagerness weighed and measured out all she wanted, setting out many another article besides, to tempt her. + 

She was very short with him. “Yankel!” she said haughtily; “give what I ask, and no more. I am no child, and know what I wish to have.” + 

But the Jew only smiled. She had bought things for between ten and twenty zloty, and also enough vodka to suffice for the coming festival of Easter besides; and rolls in scores, and loaves of fine bread, and eight salt herrings⁠ ⁠… and even, to crown all, a small bottle of rum. Hardly could she carry the parcel, when made up. + 

“What! That Yagna enjoys herself: and I, who work so hard, am I to be worse off than a dog?” + 

But, though such was her thought on setting out, it was speedily followed by remorse. The expense was unnecessary.⁠—But for shame, she would have made the Jew take the rum back again. + 

She found everybody in the cabin busy preparing things. Ambrose sat by the fire, exchanging verbal thrusts with Yagustynka, who was engaged in scalding the various vessels to be used; and the room was full of steam. + 

“We were waiting for you, to knock your little pig on the head!” + 

“Ye have arrived very early!” + 

“I made Roch take my place in the sacristy; the priest’s manservant is to blow the organ-bellows, and Magda will sweep out the church. I have arranged everything, so that you may not be disappointed. The priests will not begin hearing confessions till they have finished breakfast.⁠—But how cold it is today!” he cried out querulously; “I feel it to the very marrow.” + 

“Broiling at the fire, can you talk of the cold?” Yuzka cried out in amazement. + 

“You are silly: I feel so cold within, that even my wooden leg’s quite numb!” + 

“Ye shall soon have something to warm you.⁠—Yuzka, soak a herring directly.” + 

“Give it me salt as it is; nothing takes the salt out like vodka⁠—when there’s enough of it.” + 

“Ye’re always the same,” Yagustynka observed snappishly. “Should ye hear glasses jingle even at midnight, ye’d rise on the spot for a drink.” + 

“Right, my good woman. But your tongue is very dry, is it not? you too would like to wet it in vodka, eh?” He laughed and rubbed his hands. + 

“My ancient! I’ll drink glass for glass with you any day!” + 

Here Hanka interrupted them; their continual hints and innuendoes about vodka were teasing her. + 

“Very few people are going to church as yet,” she remarked, to change the subject. + 

“ ’Tis early. They will presently come with a rush to get rid of their sins.” + 

“Aye,” said Yagustynka, “to spend the time, hear something new, and prepare to sin again!” + 

Here Yuzka’s shrill voice piped: “The girls were already preparing confessions yesternight.” + 

“Because,” Yagustynka said, “they are ashamed to confess to their own priest.” + 

“Better, old crone, ye sat in the church-porch and said your beads and did penance, than backbite your neighbours so!” + 

“I will, Wooden Leg! when ye sit by my side there!” + 

“Oh, I am in no hurry. I intend first to toll for you and put you to bed with a shovel!” + 

The words enraged her. “Bait me not, or you’ll rue it!” she snarled. + 

“My stick will ward off your bites; and ’twere pity to lose your last teeth!” + 

She made no answer. Just then Hanka filled a glass, and drank to them both, and Yuzka brought a herring to Ambrose, who slapped it against his wooden leg, skinned it, broiled it over the coals, and ate it with relish. + 

“To work! We have been dawdling too long!” he cried, taking off his coat, tucking up his shirtsleeves, and giving his knife a last edge on his whetstone. Then, seizing a large club, used to mash potatoes, for the pig, he hastened out, everybody following him. + 

Pete aided him, and the beast, though resisting with all its might, was dragged out into the yard. + 

“Quick! the dish for the blood!” + 

All stood round, eyeing its plump creamy sides and trailing belly, which the drizzle from the mists that filled the orchard was wetting fast. A few women stood outside the yard, and several children, eager to look on, had climbed the palings. + 

Ambrose crossed himself, and came forward slantwise towards the pig, his club held back at an angle on one side. Then, coming to a standstill, he suddenly lifted his arm, and, twisting his body round with so forcible a writhe that his neck shirt-button flew off, brought his weapon down right between the ears. The animal’s forelegs gave way, and it went down squealing. He redoubled the blow, this time with both hands. The pig rolled on to one side, kicking convulsively: Ambrose then, astride on its belly, thrust the whole of his knife’s gleaming blade into its heart. + 

A dish was at hand: the blood, streaming like warm water, spurted out in rhythmical squirts, with a bubbling sound. + 

“Away, Lapa!⁠—Look at that wicked dog!⁠—Wants to lap some, and Lent not over yet!” he cried, breathless with exertion, as he drove the dog from the dish: for a centenarian, the effort had been considerable. + 

“Shall we do the scalding in the passage?” + 

“Rather take the trough into the room where the carcass is to hang till we quarter it.” + 

“Will there not be too little space in the room?” + 

“Not in the larger room⁠—your father-in-law’s. He will suffer nothing. Only let’s hurry: the bristles come out more readily while the carcass is yet warm.” + 

As he gave his directions, he was busy pulling out the long bristles down the back. + 

In a short time the carcass was scalded, unhaired, thoroughly cleansed, hung up in Boryna’s room, and stretched out wide open with a lath tied to a rafter. + 

Yagna was out, having gone to church early in the morning, and never dreaming that such a liberty would be taken. Her husband lay as usual, staring with lacklustre eyes. + 

They worked noiselessly at first, often looking round at him; but soon they forgot his presence, interested as they were in the pig, whose thick layer of fat far exceeded their expectations. + 

“We have lulled him to sleep, we have brought him in here: ’tis time that some vodka should flow in his honour!” cried Ambrose, washing his hands over the trough. + 

“Come to breakfast, and you’ll have some drink.” + 

Indeed, before he sat down to the potatoes and barszcz which formed the meal, he had tossed off a copious draught of vodka. He ate little, though, being in a hurry to go on with the work, and urged the others to make haste, especially Yagustynka, who was by no means his inferior in the salting and seasoning line, and knew as much as ever he did. + 

Hanka, too, did her best to give aid, and so did Yuzka, eager to stay in the hut beside the newly killed porker, and not at all willing to go out. + 

But Hanka cried out to her: “Be off at once, and order them to cart the dung away, and lend them a hand yourself, while they are spreading it! The sluggards! I fear the work will not be over by this evening.” + 

So Yuzka, much against her will, ran out into the yard, where she was heard for a long while, venting all her ill humour on the two farm-lads, and scolding them violently. + 

The cabin became noisier, little by little, as gossip after gossip dropped in to chat in neighbourly wise, and clasp their hands, and admire the porker. + 

“So fine! so laden with fat! Far finer a one than either the miller’s or the organist’s!” + 

Hanka felt much pleased, and was puffed up with these praises of the fatted beast; and though indeed she grudged the vodka, she could not help inviting them, according to the custom among the peasants to offer drinks, and bread and salt, on such an occasion. And she became very talkative to all the folk who crossed the threshold one after another and came in, as one comes into church for a short visit on the feast of the patron saint.⁠—Children, too, were plentiful all round the house, and peeping in at every window. + 

All through Lipka, besides, there now began to be a good deal of unusual movement: folk splashing along in the mud, and carts clattering in from other villages, all crowding to church for their Easter confession, in spite of the detestable roads and the dismal weather, so wretchedly changeable! Every now and then there came a flaw of rain, and then a warm breeze would blow athwart the orchards, or frozen snow pour down like groats, or the sun look smiling out of the clouds and scatter its gold over all the world. But the weather is usually so in the first days of spring⁠—like a young lass that laughs and cries, and is blithe or sullen, just as it occurs to her, and she herself cannot tell why. + 

But no one in Hanka’s surroundings had any care for the weather just now: work and talk went on with equal noise. Ambrose bustled about, and kept the others lively with his merry jests. He was obliged, however, to pay frequent visits to the church and see that everything there was going on well: on his return, he would complain of the cold and want something to warm him up. + 

“I have so well beset the priests with penitents, that neither will stir till noon,” he said. + 

“Of the priest from Slupia they say,” Yagustynka observed, after a gibe at the incumbent of Laznov which nettled Ambrose not a little, “that he always bears a scent-bottle with him, for that he dislikes the scent of common folk, and fans himself with his handkerchief after every confession.” + 

“You hold your peace, and let priests alone!” Ambrose cried out in a rage. + 

“Is Roch in church?” Hanka hastened to inquire; she too disliked the old woman’s waspish tongue. + 

“He has been there all the morning, serving Masses, and putting things in order.” + 

“And where is Michael, then?” + 

“Gone to Rzepki with the organist’s son, to make out the confession-list.” + 

“ ‘Plough with a goose-quill, sow paper with sand: ye will get much more pelf than by tilling the land!’ ” muttered Yagustynka. + 

“Truly it is so. He gets an egg at least for each name he puts down.” + 

“And the confession-tickets come to a kopek and a half! No wonder his wallets are crammed with good things. Last week the organist’s wife sold near upon fifteen hundred eggs.” + 

“Folk say they came on foot, carrying only one small bundle with them: now they could fill over four of the biggest wagons.” + 

Ambrose tried to defend him. “Well, but he has lived and worked here for a score of years and more; and the parish is a big one; and he is hardworking, shrewd and thrifty: of course he has put money by.” + 

“Put money by! Money wrung from the people, and as much as he possibly could! Ere the man will do a service to anyone, he must know what he’s to get thereby. Why, he is paid thirty roubles at a funeral: for what?⁠—for thumping on the organ and bleating Latin chants!” + 

“At any rate, he’s a skilled craftsman in his own line, and takes great pains to do his best.” + 

“Aye, aye, he is skilled: knows when to sing shrill and when gruff⁠—and especially how to diddle folk out of their money.” + 

“Another would have drunk away all his earnings; and he is breeding up his son to become a priest.” + 

“To his own exceeding glory and profit,” the rancorous beldame rejoined. + 

At this most interesting point they broke off. Yagna had come in, and stood petrified on the threshold. + 

“Is it our pig’s size that amazes you?” Yagustynka asked, with a laugh. + 

“Could ye not have done this work on the other side?” she stammered, red as a peony. “My room is all befouled with it.” + 

“Wash and scour it, then! Ye are not short of time,” Hanka replied coolly, with a stress on the last words. + 

Yagna made an angry gesture, but said no more. She walked about the room, took up her “Rosary of the Passion,” threw a shawl over her yet unmade bed, and left the hut in silence, her lips twitching with the fury she sought to hide. + 

Yuzka, who met her in the passage, said: “Ye might well help us, we have so much to do!” + 

She only stormed at her in reply, and rushed away in a frenzy. Vitek, who had remarked which way she had gone, said she had stepped over straight to the blacksmith’s. + 

“Why should she not? It will relieve her to talk of her grievance.” + 

“But,” Yagustynka said, lowering her voice, “ye will have him here speedily⁠ ⁠… and it will be war!” + 

“Good woman, what’s my whole life but warfare?” Hanka answered quietly, but she felt that her words were true, and that a savage quarrel was at hand. + 

“He will come in a trice,” Yagustynka declared, not without compassion. + 

“Fear not⁠—I shall stand the brunt of the battle,” she replied, smiling. + 

Yagustynka, nodding her admiration, looked significantly at Ambrose, who had just laid his work aside. + 

“I must look in at church and ring the Angelus,” he said. “I shall be back for dinner directly.” + 

And so he was, and told them that the clergymen were dining, and the miller had brought them a netful of fish as a present, and they were to go on hearing confessions in the afternoon, as so many people were waiting. + 

The dinner, though short and hurried, was well provided with liquor, Ambrose complaining bitterly that, for such herrings⁠—salt as Lot’s wife⁠—the vodka was far too weak. Then they set to work again, and he quartered the beast, cutting off the parts fit for sausages; while Yagustynka, having unhinged a door and made it do duty for a table, placed the sides upon it, and was busy cutting them into flitches and salting them carefully. Just at that moment the smith came in; his face showed that he was fighting for self-control. + 

“I was not aware,” he began, sarcastically, “that ye had bought so large a porker.” + 

“Well, I have⁠—and killed it too.” + 

She felt somewhat frightened. + 

“A fine beast. It must have cost you some thirty roubles.” + 

He eyed it over scrutinizingly. + 

“ ’Twere hard to find a pig so thickly lined with fat,” the old woman remarked, laughing and offering him the bacon to examine. + 

“ ’Tis Boryna’s pig!” he suddenly burst out, unable any more to contain his rage. + 

“A shrewd guess!” Yagustynka jeered; “why, to know whose it is, you need only to see the tail!” + 

“And by what right have ye dared to slaughter it?” he cried indignantly. + 

“No shouting, please. This is not a tavern.⁠—By what right? Because Antek sent me word by Roch to kill it.” + 

“And who is Antek to give orders here? Is the beast his?” + 

“Most surely,” she replied: her fear had gone from her now. + 

“No, it is ours!⁠—For what ye have done, ye shall pay dear.” + 

“In this matter I am not answerable to you!” + 

“No?⁠—To whom then?” + 

“Peace! and hold your tongue. Here lies the sick man to whom it belongs.” + 

“Which you, not he, will eat!” + 

“But you, at any rate, shall not so much as smell it!” + 

“Give me,” he said, changing his tone, “one-half of the carcass. Ye would not have me raise the devil, would ye?” + 

“Not one trotter of it shall you have on compulsion!” + 

“Then let me have a quarter⁠—and a flitch thrown in⁠—of your own free will.” + 

“I will, if Antek orders me. Else you shall not get one bone.” + 

“Antek! Antek!” he cried, again roused to fury. “Is it Antek’s, then? Are you raving?” + 

“It is Father’s,” she said firmly, “but Antek is now in his place and disposes of all. Later, it shall be whose our Lord may will it to be.” + 

“Let him dispose in jail of what he has! If he likes husbandry, he may play the husbandman down in Siberia, where he is to go!” he shrieked, foaming at the mouth. + 

“He may go thither,” she retorted fiercely, though fear for Antek was stabbing at her heart; “but were you yet a greater Judas than you are, you would not gain one inch of land thereby.” + 

The smith’s feet were shuffling on the floor with excitement, and his hands closing on his capote convulsively, so strong a craving he felt to clutch her by the throat. But he still mastered himself: he was not alone. She had no longer any fear at all: wielding the knife she used to cut the strips of flesh, she looked on the man with quiet scorn. After a time he sat down, lit a cigarette, and gazed about the room with red-rimmed eyes, revolving something in his mind. Presently he got up, and spoke to her calmly. + 

“Come round to the other side of the hut; we may yet find something to agree upon.” + 

Wiping her hands, she went out of the room, but left the door ajar. + 

“I wish not only not to go to law, but not even to quarrel,” he began, puffing at his cigarette. + 

“Because it will not serve,” she retorted. + 

“Did Father-in-law say aught to you yesternight?” + 

The smith was by now quite friendly and smiling. + 

“Oh, no; he lay as still as he lies now.” Full of suspicion, she was on her guard to divulge nothing. + 

“That pig is but a small matter; let us trouble no longer about it. Cut it up⁠ ⁠… eat it up by yourselves, just as you please: no very great loss for me.⁠—One often says things of which one repents afterwards.⁠—Pray forget what I said.⁠—I want to speak of something more important. You ought to know that they talk in the village of cash⁠—large sums⁠—concealed within this hut.⁠ ⁠…” He paused and fixed his piercing eyes upon her face. “Now ’twere well worth while to seek for it, lest, should he die (which God forbid!), it might be mislaid, or fall into some stranger’s hand.” + 

“But will he say where he has hidden it?” + 

“To you he might, would you but draw him out with cunning words.” + 

“Well, I will do my best; but he must first come to his wits again.” + 

“And if ye keep it secret, and we find the money, then we might share and share alike. Nay, if the sum were large enough, a part might serve to set Antek free. Let no one else know of it: why should any know? Yagna’s deed of gift makes her quite rich enough; we might even go to law, and have it annulled.⁠—As to Gregory, think how much he has received during his service in the army!” He approached her more closely. + 

“You are right⁠ ⁠… quite, quite right,” she stammered, struggling hard to give him no inkling of the secret she knew. + 

“I think he must have concealed it somewhere about the cabin; what think ye?” + 

“How should I know? He never spoke a word to me about that.” + 

“But he said something yesternight⁠ ⁠… something about corn, I think?” the smith suggested. + 

“Aye. He said it was to be sown.” + 

“About barrels too, did he not?” he persisted, looking her intently in the face. + 

“Of course. The seed-corn that’s in the barrels,” she made answer, apparently not making out to what those questions were tending. + 

He cursed silently, with bitter disappointment. And yet he felt more and more that she must be privy to the secret. Her face was so stiffly set, her eyes so carefully deprived of expression. + 

“Tell no one this thing I confide to you.” + 

“Am I such a talebearer and everlasting gossip?” + 

“Well, well, I only caution you.⁠—Now give good heed. The old man has had a glimmer already: his wits may quite come back to him any day.” + 

“God grant it be soon!” + 

His glance lingered over her. At length, pulling at his moustache, he left her to herself and went out, she following him the while with a contemptuous look. + 

“A Judas, a traitor, and a thief!” + 

Exploding with hate, she took a few steps after him.⁠—It was not for the first time that he had flourished before her eyes the awful possibility of Siberia’s mines and Antek working in them, fettered to a wheelbarrow! + 

Not that she believed implicitly all he said; she knew that he spoke out of spite and to make her afraid, so as to get the most he could out of her by bullying. + 

Nevertheless, she was in great dread, and had carefully sought to be informed what Antek’s punishment might be: she had no hope that he would be acquitted. + 

True, he had acted in defence of his father; but there must be some punishment for the death of the forester. There must! + 

Such was the opinion of all the more intelligent folk. She had been to consult a lawyer in the town, with a letter from his Reverence to introduce her. He had explained that the penalty might be either very heavy or very light; that patience and money spent without grudging were absolutely requisite here. But she was most terrified by the village people, who shared the blacksmith’s view of things. + 

The words he had now spoken had therefore oppressed her most cruelly. She went on with her work, but felt almost unable to stand; and conversation was impossible. Moreover, when the smith had gone away, his wife came to tend the sick man, drive away the flies (there were none!), and certainly spy over all she did. + 

Magda, however, was soon tired of the task, and offered to help her in the work. But Hanka replied: + 

“Do not trouble, we can do all by ourselves: have you not work enough in your house?” + 

Her tone was so decided that Magda gave up the attempt, and only tried at times to join timidly in the talk, being by nature a shy and reticent woman. + 

But that same evening, who should make her appearance once more but Yagna, in her mother’s company! + 

They greeted her as if on excellent terms, and in so friendly and flattering a way that Hanka, touched by their kindness, answered them in like manner, sparing neither pleasant speeches nor vodka, though she kept on the watch nevertheless. But Dominikova put the glass away from her. + 

“What! in the Holy Week? How could I drink vodka at such a time?” + 

Hanka maintained that it was no sin to drink even then, on such an occasion and in one’s own house. + 

“Ah!” groaned Dominikova, “one is always but too ready to find an excuse to let oneself go, and enjoy pleasure!” + 

“Mistress, drink to me,” Ambrose exclaimed; “I have not an organist’s scruples.” + 

“To you the very sound of glasses when they clink is a temptation,” Dominikova grumbled, as she set to work at the sick man’s bandages. + 

“Poor creature!” she cried in pity; “lying there insensible, with all God’s world lost to him!” + 

“And not to taste sausage or vodka again forever!” Yagustynka chimed in, turning the pity into a gibe. + 

Dominikova rebuked her tartly: “You laugh at everything, you!” + 

“Shall weeping lessen my pain? My laughter is all my fortune.” + 

Ambrose remarked: “Let those only that have sown evil garner in sorrow, and atone for it by penance!” This was a shrewd hit at Dominikova, who retorted, glaring on him sternly: + 

“They say truly that Ambrose, though he serves in church, curries favour with sin in order to enjoy the good things of this life!” And she added, lowering her tone threateningly: “But he alone will turn away from the good and befriend the wicked, who considereth not the punishment which he shall receive hereafter!” + 

Silence fell upon all. Ambrose worked on, though surly. He had a sharp retort ready, but kept it back, knowing well that anything he said would be reported to his Reverence the next day, and after Mass at latest: it was to some purpose that the old dame was such a churchgoer. Everyone, besides, shrank from the fixed gaze of those owlish eyes of hers; even Yagustynka, the defiant, was overawed and quailed before her. + 

Yes, and so did all the village. More than one had experienced the power of those evil eyes; more than one, on whom she had laid a spell, now groaned with twisted limbs, or in the clutch of some dire disease! + 

They worked on then, with bowed heads: only her face, rugged, withered, and white as bleached wax, was seen towering amongst them in the room. She too remained silent, along with Yagna; but they were both so active and diligent that Hanka had not the heart to refuse the aid they were giving. + 

But after Ambrose had left, called away to church by the priest’s servant, they remained alone, diligently packing flitches and pork into the tubs and barrels. + 

“The meat will be cooler in the larder that’s on this side, for the fire here is much smaller,” the old dame decided, rolling the vessels in there at once, with the help of Yagna. + 

All this was done so quickly that they were put in the larder before Hanka had time even to protest. She was extremely mortified, and, immediately calling Pete and Yuzka to her aid, carried over to her own side all that remained. + 

At dusk and by lamplight they set to making sausages, blood-puddings, and brawn. Hanka, whose annoyance had not passed away, sat mincing the materials with a sort of dark rage. + 

“Leave the things here, for her to eat or steal? Not I!⁠—⁠ ⁠… But oh, the cunning hag!” she hissed through her clenched teeth. + 

“Tomorrow morning, when she has gone to church, you can carry everything out into your own larder without noise or fuss. Surely she will not break in and take it back by force!” Such was the advice of Yagustynka, as she pressed the ingredients of the sausages into the long dried guts, writhing upon the table like serpents, and every now and then hung them up to be smoked in the chimney. + 

“Ah! the stroke was planned between them, and they came on purpose for that!” + 

She was exasperated. + 

“The sausages will all be made ere Ambrose be back here,” the old woman observed. + 

Hanka would speak no more, absorbed in work, and in planning how to get the hams and flitches into her possession again. + 

The fire crackled on the hearth with a lively flame; the whole room was in a glow, and the various ingredients of the blood-puddings were bubbling in several cauldrons. + 

“O Lord! my mouth waters at the very smell!” sighed Vitek, sniffing greedily. + 

“Do not stand sniffing here, or I will know why!” cried Hanka. “Give the kine to drink, fill the mangers with hay, and put straw under them. ’Tis late already⁠ ⁠… when will you have done it all?” + 

“Pete is coming; I cannot do all by myself.” + 

“And whither has he gone?” + 

“What, know ye not? He is helping them to put things in order on the other side.” + 

“Oho!⁠—Hey, you, Pete!” she cried, calling out into the passage. “See to the cattle for the night⁠—at once!” + 

Her tone, as she gave that order, had been such that the man came out instantly into the yard. + 

“Let her stir herself and clean her own room at least! Look at her, that grand lady⁠—will not soil her hands⁠—must needs employ a manservant!” So said Hanka, in a towering passion, whilst pouring out a steaming potful of liver and chitterlings. The sound of a bell and a cart clattering by outside gave another turn to her thoughts. + 

It was the priest, carrying the Holy Viaticum to someone, as her father, old Bylitsa, who then came in, told her. + 

“But who can it be? No one was ill, so far as I know.” + 

“He has passed the Voyt’s cabin!” Vitek, out of breath, came shouting outside the window. + 

“To one of the komorniki? I think not.” + 

“Perhaps to your people, the Prycheks, Yagustynka; they live that way.” + 

“Ah, nothing ever was the matter with them, the miscreants; no evil ever comes nigh them!” she said, in a faltering voice: though constantly at odds with her children, she felt a quiver of anxiety. + 

“I’ll see how matters stand and return at once.” And she hurried out. + 

But the evening dragged on, and yet she was not back.⁠—Ambrose, who had returned, said the priest had been called in to Agata, a kinswoman of the Klembas: she had come back from begging only the Saturday before. + 

“But how is that? Is she not at the Klembas’?” + 

“No; she has removed to die: either at Koziol’s or at the Prycheks’.” + 

There was no more talk then, for there was much work to get through, especially as both Yuzka and Hanka were often obliged to leave it for the byre or the stable. + 

It was dark outside, and irksome within. + 

A chilly rain was pelting, and the wind lashed the walls, whistled through the orchards, made the trees rustle and murmur, and sometimes blew down the chimneys, scattering firebrands about. + 

It was hard upon midnight when all the work was over⁠—and Yagustynka had not yet returned. + 

“In such foul weather, she must have been loath to grope her way back!” Hanka thought, while she patrolled the premises before going to bed. + 

Truly, it had been a pity to turn a dog out of doors on such a night! The roof creaked with the wild blasts; all over the sky, brown masses of rain-clouds were pouring down their heavy burden of water; and nowhere on high was there the least twinkle of starlight. Everybody else had long ago gone to sleep; the wind danced and revelled in the fields, and swept great sheets of water from off the pond. + 

So they waited no longer for her, but went to bed. + 

She appeared the next morning, but as louring and sullen as the swampy miry day itself. She just warmed her hands at the cabin fire, and then made for the granary, to pick out seed-potatoes from the heap which had been dumped down on the threshing-floor. + 

She was mostly alone at that work, Yuzka having to go and scatter the dung which Pete had been carting since daybreak. Having been soundly rated by Hanka for sloth on the day before, he now, to make amends, stormed at Vitek, flogged the horses furiously, and made them splash through the mud at full speed. + 

“The rascal!” muttered the old woman. “To punish the horses because he himself was lazy!” + 

When Yuzka spoke to her, she gave her no answer, but sat gloomily, hiding her eyes red with tears under the apron she had thrown over her head. + 

Hanka looked in, but only once. She was waiting for Yagna to come out, that she might have an opportunity both to take the meat over to her own side, and to examine the corn-barrels. But, as if of set purpose, Yagna never left the hut. + 

Impatient, Hanka at last went in to see Boryna, and then⁠—apparently seeking for something⁠—she entered the larder. + 

“Whatever ye want I can find for you!” Yagna exclaimed, and, seeing her go in, followed before she had done more than plunge her hand into the corn.⁠—Fruitlessly; but the money might be lying quite at the bottom. She left the place; and, certain that Yagna was on the watch, resolved to put off the attempt to a more convenient season. + 

“And now for the gifts we must make,” she thought, looking sorrowfully at the sausages that dangled in a row from a horizontal pole. Boryna and all the foremost husbandmen were in the habit, whenever they killed a pig, to send their next relations and best friends a sausage, or some other dainty bit. + 

“ ’Tis hard, in truth; but you can do no otherwise, or they would say you grudge them,” Bylitsa advised her, guessing aright what was in her thoughts. + 

In spite, then, of the temptation to shirk that duty, she put the intended presents on a number of plates and dishes, now substituting a larger for a smaller piece, now the reverse, now adding, now taking away a blood-pudding⁠ ⁠… and so on: until she had done, and, dejected and weary, called for Yuzka. + 

“Put on your best garments, and take these things round.” + 

“O Lord! what a quantity of meat is here!” + 

“What can I do? I must give it away. We have to live with folk.⁠—‘Jack his flail can whisk alone, but not dance and frisk alone.’⁠—This big piece take to Uncle’s wife. She hates and rates me; but there’s no help for it.⁠—This to the Voyt: a rascal, but on good terms with Matthias, and (it may be) serviceable one day.⁠—For Magda and her smith, a whole blood-pudding, a sausage, and a piece of bacon. They shall not say we have eaten Father’s pig by ourselves. Talk against us they will, of course, but less.⁠—This sausage is for Prychkova. She’s saucy, bitter of tongue, but one of our best friends.⁠—And this last piece for Klembova.” + 

“Shall Dominikova get naught?” + 

“Later in the afternoon. Of course she shall. She’s to be dealt with as filth: with care and from afar.⁠ ⁠… Now take these things round separately, and waste no time in talk with other girls, for there is work at home for you.” + 

“Do give Nastka something: they are all so poor!” Yuzka said beseechingly. “They have scarce wherewith to buy salt!” + 

“Let her come: she shall get something.⁠—Father, take this to Veronka; she was to have looked in yesterday.” + 

“She had to clean the miller’s cabin in the afternoon; they are expecting visitors.” + 

Hanka, having sent Yuzka off, and put on a warmer dress, ran out to see that the lads worked properly, and to assist Yagustynka. + 

To the old woman, now so strangely reticent, she said: “We hoped you would come back for supper.” + 

“What I saw was supper enough for me⁠—and it lies on my stomach yet.” + 

“It was Agata, I believe?” + 

“Yes, poor thing! Passing away⁠ ⁠… and in Koziol’s hut!” + 

“Why is she not at the Klembas’?” + 

“Because those folk, as long as a kinsman asks for naught, or comes full-handed, allow him to claim kindred; but would set their dogs on any other, how near soever!” + 

“What say you? Surely they have not driven her out?” + 

“Well, she came to them on Saturday, and was taken with a sickness that same night.⁠ ⁠… They say that Klembova took away her featherbed, and turned her out almost naked.” + 

“Klembova? Can it be? So good a woman!⁠—Nay, it must be a slander.” + 

“I invent naught, and tell you only what mine ears have heard.” + 

“At Koziol’s too! Who would have thought the woman so merciful?” + 

“ ‘For ready money⁠—’tis strange, but true⁠—even a priest will be kind to you!’⁠—Koziol’s wife has got a score of zloty out of Agata in cash. For that sum she will keep her till she drops off⁠—which she expects to do any day.⁠ ⁠… Funeral extra, of course.⁠—She will give up the ghost one of these days: there will be no long waiting, oh, no!” + 

She broke down, unable to choke down a sob. + 

“What ails you, my dear?” Hanka asked, in a kindly tone. + 

“I have supped full of human woes, and have eaten over measure! One’s heart is not a stone; one tries to harden it by churlishness towards everyone; but it will not do. And there comes a time when it can bear no more, and crumbles away to sand with the pain of it!” + 

She burst into a tempest of tears, shaking all over; but, after a time, went on speaking, but with such heat and bitterness that the words burned into Hanka’s tender heart. + 

“And to this desolation there is no end⁠—none! When the priest left Agata, I stayed by her side. Then there came one from over the water⁠—Philip’s wife⁠—crying out that her eldest daughter was a-dying.⁠ ⁠… Away I hurried to her.⁠—Lord, what a hut! as cold as ice itself! Windowpanes gone, wisps of straw instead. Only one bed: the others sleep on litter, like kennelled dogs.⁠—Aye, the girl is dying, but of what? Of hunger! Their last potato is eaten, their featherbed sold: every litre of groats is got from the miller by begging, for no one will lend aught to tide things over till harvest. Who could pay? Philip is in jail with the rest of them.⁠—Scarcely had I left these, when Gregory’s wife told me that Florka Prychkova had been brought to bed and was in want of aid.⁠ ⁠… Vile wretches they are, and have defrauded me: but I went notwithstanding. In their hut, too, misery shows her teeth! Lots of children⁠—Florka abed⁠—not a kopek of savings⁠—and no help from anywhither. True, the land is theirs: but can they eat it?⁠—No one to cook for them.⁠ ⁠… And their land is untilled, for Adam, her goodman, is in prison likewise.⁠—A son has been born to her⁠—a strong lusty little fellow⁠—but will he get food to live? Florka is thin as a lath⁠—not one drop of milk can she give him; and their cow has but just calved. All is for the worst everywhere. No one to work, and no work to be got; and neither money nor help from any quarter.⁠ ⁠… Oh, would that our Lord might send all these poorest folk a merciful death! They would not then suffer so!” + 

“Has anyone in the village aught to spare?” said Hanka. “All are poor, and the cry of misery is heard everywhere.” + 

“ ‘Who has no goodwill shirks his duty still.’⁠—I do not say this to you; the farm is not yours, and I know well what ye have to undergo. But there be those who might do something: the miller⁠—the priest⁠—the organist⁠—and many others.” + 

“Perhaps they would, if they were but told of all,” Hanka said, taking their part. + 

“He that has a kindly heart needs no telling, and finds it out by himself. My dear, they are well aware of what the poor have to endure: it is on their very poverty that they thrive and grow fat. Why, ’tis now the miller’s harvest-home, when folk are crowding round him for flour and groats, giving up their last mite to him, or taking loans at high interest, to be paid in future work: money for food must be found, even should one be forced to sell one’s bed to the Jew!” + 

“Indeed, no one is willing to give things gratis,” Hanka said with a heavy sigh, as the memory of her recent past surged up. + 

“I sat with Florka for a long time,” Yagustynka went on to say; “and many women came in, telling us what was going on in Lipka. They said⁠—” + 

“Mercy on us!” Hanka suddenly exclaimed, starting to her feet. A gust had just blown the door in, so violently as almost to wrench it off its hinges. And she had closed it with such care, and placed stakes to prop it up against the wind! + 

“With such a gale as this, I fear there will soon be more rain.” + 

“As it is, the carts afield already sink axle-deep in mire!” + 

“But with a few days of warm sun, the ground will soon be dry again: ’tis spring.” + 

“Ah, if we could but begin to plant potatoes ere Eastertide!” + 

So they went on talking, busy with their work, and the potatoes drummed upon the floor continuously: those too small thrown on to one heap, and the damaged ones on to another. + 

“These will fatten your sow, and the kine will drink the boiled water.” + 

But Hanka was scarcely listening, pondering how to get at her father-in-law’s money. At times she looked out through the open door at the trees, waving and wrestling with the blasts, that were cold and damp, and pungent with the smell of the dunghill close by. The farmyard was empty, save for a few fowls running about with ruffled feathers. The geese all sat in a corner close to the hedge, and gathered their chuckling little ones under their wings. Now and again Pete came in, driving his empty wagon, and slapping his arms against his sides; then, giving the horses a bundle of hay, and (Vitek aiding) filling the cart with dung, he pushed it on over the ruts and holes, and drove away into the fields once more. + 

Many a time, too, did Yuzka hurry in, loud-voiced, blowzed, breathless, on her way to somebody’s cabin with presents, and chattering all the way as she came and went. + 

Unquestioned, she talked and talked, and was presently seen starting again, bearing a dish carefully wrapped up in a napkin. + 

“A chatterbox that girl is, but no fool,” Yagustynka observed. + 

“No fool, indeed; only she has naught in her head but mischief and games.” + 

“What would you have? Such a tiny thing!” + 

“Vitek!” Hanka cried on a sudden. “Someone has entered the cabin. See who it is.” + 

“ ’Tis the blacksmith, just come in.” + 

A misgiving took hold of her, and she went straightway to her father’s side, where he was lying⁠—on his back, as usual⁠—while Yagna sewed at the window. No one else was there. + 

“What has become of Michael?” + 

“Somewhere about, seeking a key he lent to Matthias not long ago,” she explained, without looking Hanka in the face. + 

The latter went into the passage, into her own room, where Bylitsa was sitting with the children by the fire, and making them little toy windmills⁠—even into the farmyard buildings: he was nowhere in sight. Then back she darted straight to the larder on her father’s side, though the door was shut. + 

And there she saw the blacksmith, standing beside a corn-barrel, with his arms buried in the corn up to the elbows, and seeking something there with might and main! + 

“What!” she cried with a gasp; “your key is hidden in the corn, is it?” And she placed herself in front of him with a threatening air. + 

“No.⁠ ⁠… I am seeing⁠ ⁠… whether it is not mildewed⁠ ⁠… and whether it will do for seed-corn,” he said, stuttering, taken quite by surprise. + 

“What business of yours is that? Say, what brings you in here?” she cried. + 

Unwillingly, he drew his arms out, and muttered with ill-concealed anger: + 

“Ye spy upon me as if I were a thief!” + 

“How should I know what business brings you in here? Here’s a fellow who enters other people’s premises: why? I find him groping in the corn-barrels: why should he not also wrench the padlocks off, or break open the chests?” Her voice was rising to a scream. + 

“Did I not tell you yesterday what we have to look for?” he answered, striving to be calm. + 

“What ye said was all a blind. You sought to throw dust in my eyes, while you were after something else. But I saw through your plotting, you traitor, you!” + 

“Hanka!” he shrieked, to terrify her; “stop that talk, or I will stop your mouth!” + 

“Would ye? Lay but a finger on me, and I’ll raise such an outcry that half the village will be here in a trice, to learn what sort of a jailbird you are!” + 

As she uttered the threat, he cast one more glance around; then, with a blasphemous oath, he left the room; exchanging with her, as he did so, looks that⁠—had it been possible⁠—would have stabbed to the very heart. + 

Hanka’s outbreak had completely upset her, but a cup of water presently brought her round again. + 

“It must be found!⁠—And also concealed in a safe place: for what money soever that man finds, he will make off with,” was her mental comment, going back to the granary. But, halfway there, she stopped and went back to the cottage. Opening the door, she apostrophized Yagna thus: + 

“You who sit here in the cabin to watch over it, how do you let a stranger enter the inmost room?” + 

Yagna answered scornfully: “Michael is not a stranger: he has as much right in there as you have.” + 

“A dog barks, and you lie! Ye two are in league together; but mark well what I say.⁠—If aught disappear from the cottage, then, as sure as there’s a God in heaven, I’ll bring action and denounce you as his accomplice. Remember that!” she screamed, infuriated. + 

Yagna, snatching the first weapon at hand, leaped from her seat. + 

“Would you fight me? Do but try: I’ll tear the beauty off your dainty face, and paint it such a scarlet that your own mother shall not know you!” + 

And she went on upbraiding and vilifying her to the fullest powers of her voice and of her enmity. + 

How this might have ended cannot be guessed. They were about to close with each other, when Roch happened to come in. This brought Hanka to her senses in so far that she spoke no more. But she rushed from the room, and the door slammed like thunder behind her. + 

Yagna remained still for some time, her bosom palpitating, her lips trembling like one with the ague. At length, flinging into a corner the small hand-mangle she had clutched, she threw herself upon the bed, and gave way to an uncontrollable burst of pitiful wailing. + 

Meanwhile, Hanka, on her side of the house, was telling Roch what had taken place. He listened patiently to her tale; but it was so incoherent and broken with sobs that he could scarcely make out a word, and rebuked her very severely. Putting aside the food she had set before him, he reached out for his cap, in great indignation. + 

“I am going away, never to set eyes on Lipka again, since ye behave thus! Oh, how all this must rejoice the Evil One, aye, and those Jews who make a mock at us Christians, calling us brawling idiots! O merciful Jesus! was there too little of distress and sickness and starvation, that, to crown all, women must also fly at one another!” + 

He stood panting after this appeal; and Hanka, seized with contrition and dread lest he should leave them in anger, kissed his hand and earnestly begged for pardon. + 

“Ah!” she added, “if ye but knew how hard it is to dwell with her! She does everything to spite and injure me.⁠ ⁠… Her very being here is a wrong done to us all!⁠ ⁠… So many an acre of land made over to her!⁠ ⁠… And then⁠—know ye not what manner of woman she is? and what she does with young men?” (No, it was beyond her power to bring in Antek’s name.) “And now,” she added with bated breath, “they say that she is sinning with the Voyt!⁠—Therefore, when I behold her, all within me seethes with hatred, even to slaying!” + 

“Vengeance is mine, saith the Lord! She too is human, and she feels it, if any do her wrong. And for her sins she must some day suffer heavy chastisement. I tell you, then, do no wrong to her.” + 

“What! have I wronged her in aught?” + 

She stood amazed, unable to conceive in what way Yagna could have suffered wrong at her hands. + 

Roch ate a morsel of bread, looking out into vacancy meanwhile, and thinking deeply. At last he departed, after having patted the heads of the little ones that came to his knees. + 

“One of these days, I shall look in again at eventide. But now I say to you only this: Let her alone, do your duty, and our Lord will see to all the rest.” + 