Chapter VIII (2)

And they looked with hardening eyes at the world around; at the waving corn; at the forest, clear-cut and plain in the distance; at the green-growing fields, and at the bright warm day of springtide: and their spirits settled down in a stony resignation to the will of God.

“No; man cannot shun what is to be.”

And so they parted.

Others, too, both on that day and afterwards, came to visit the dying man: but he recognized no one, and at last they came no longer.

The priest had said: “All he needs is prayers for a speedy departure.”

And as everyone was full of his own cares and troubles, they naturally forgot him, or spoke of him as of one dead.

Who was there, indeed, to take thought of him?

There were even days when he remained without a drop of water, and might have died of starvation, but for the kind heart of Vitek, who would snatch up anything he could get and take it to “Master”; and he would sometimes milk the cows in secret, and bring him to drink. He was indeed filled with attention and respect for the sufferer, and with disquietude also: which made him at last question Pete:

“Is’t true that whosoever dies without confession must go to hell?”

“Most true. Why, the priest tells us so in church ever so often.”

“Then ... Master shall also go to hell?” And he crossed himself in dismay.

“He’s a man like any other!”

“What? Master a man like any other?”

“You are as senseless as a cabbage-head!” said Pete, growing angry; for he saw that Vitek did not believe him....

And thus did the days go by at Boryna’s cabin.

The village meanwhile, on account of the Voyt’s battle, was in a state of great animation, each party eagerly looking for witnesses in its favour.

It was of no great importance in itself: yet the Voyt exerted himself with might and main; and his influence in Lipka proved so considerable that more than half the inhabitants were on his side. They knew him to be no saint; but he was their Voyt all the same, and able to make things hot for opponents. So, by dint of insistence, flattery, and vodka, he got together as many witnesses as he required.

Koziol was very ill in bed, and the priest had been to him with the last sacraments. As to that illness, opinions differed: some went so far as to whisper low that it was only a feint to give the Voyt more trouble.—But who knew really what to think of it?

In the meantime Kozlova was going about all day, telling the people that she had sold her sow and farrow to purchase medicines for her goodman; and well-nigh daily she stationed herself outside the Voyt’s house, loading him with invectives, shrieking that her Bartek was about to die, and calling God and all honest people to witness in her favour and take sides with her.

Only the riff-raff of the community, however, and a few tender-hearted women, were with her; Kobus also, a third-rate farmer and a most litigious and quarrelsome man. The others would not listen to her. Some paid no notice to what she said; others, in her own interest, advised her to make friends with the Voyt.

Many broils arose thence; for Kobus had an ungovernable tongue, and was very ready with his fists; while the women, on their side, used extremely violent language. Their anger and acrimony were most intense: for how could they hope to get the better of the farmers and the Voyt together?

In the end, the Jew himself treated the Koziols with contempt, and refused them credit.

Within a week after the battle, everyone had enough of the affair, and the complaints and lamentations connected therewith, and would not listen any longer.

But at that juncture, new helpers came, and the village was again in an uproar.

Ploshka, joining forces with the miller, now stood up openly and strongly for the Koziols.

Not that they cared for their cause in the least: each had his own aims and sought his own advantage.

Ploshka, an underhanded and much-aspiring man, put unbounded trust in his own wealth and cleverness: and as to the miller, he would have risked his life for money.

And thus the struggle between the two parties began, fierce, yet courteous: they treated each other to shows of friendship, and conversed as before, and even went sometimes arm in arm to the tavern together.

The shrewder Lipka folk were soon aware that this coalition aimed at something more than the mere redress of Koziol’s grievance—possibly at the Voyt’s office itself.

And the elders nodded their heads, saying:

“One man has made a good thing by the office: others may do so too!”

And as the days passed by, the village dissensions increased.

Once, about that time, there came round to every hut the news that there were Germans stopping at the tavern.

As someone guessed, they were no doubt bound for Podlesie.

The people were taken with a fit of uneasy curiosity. The news flew from orchard to orchard, it was discussed over the fences, and many a one hurried to the tavern to see.

It was true. Five large tilted wagons, each painted yellow and blue, and fitted with iron axle-trees, stood outside the inn. They were laden with articles of furniture, and women were sitting inside. In the tavern bar, ten Germans were drinking.

They were tall, stout, bearded fellows, clad in dark-blue capotes, with silver chains that dangled from their bulging waists, and faces that literally shone with good feeding.

The peasants stood grouped together at a distance from them, calling for vodka, looking on and listening to their talk, but unable to make anything out. Matthew, who could speak Yiddish, tried speech with them by that means, and so fluently that the tavern-keeper looked at him in amazement. The Germans eyed him, but answered nothing. Gregory, the Voyt’s brother, then said a few German words to them: at which, grunting among themselves as swine do over a trough, they turned their backs on the peasants.

Matthew took fire at this. “Let’s punch their snouts for them!” he cried.

“Aye; or tickle their sides with a cudgel to make them speak.”

And Adam Klemba, a fiery young fellow, exclaimed:

“I’ll hit this nearest one in the stomach; and if he strikes back, ye all come in for fair play.”

But they restrained him; and the Germans, probably guessing some harm was intended them, took with them a barrel of beer, and left the place.

“Hey, ye Long Trousers, do not hurry so: they might fall down by the way!”

And as they drove off, the peasants shouted after them:

“Breed of swine!”

No sooner had they left than the Jew informed the peasants that the Germans had almost completed the purchase of Podlesie: fifteen families were to settle on that farm.

“And then we shall be hemmed in and squeezed to death on our poor strips of land, while they stretch and multiply over those broad acres!”

“Then let us bid higher and keep them out!” said Staho Ploshka to Gregory, who had spoken last. “Use your wits, since ye think yourself clever!”

“Blood of a dog!” Matthew shouted, thumping the bar with his fist; “’tis a ruinous business, this! If they settle down in Podlesie, ’twill be a hard thing for us to keep our homesteads in Lipka.” Of this he was sure: he had been about the world, and knew what Germans were.

His hearers were at first incredulous. All the same, it troubled them, and they fell a-thinking: how could evil come to them in Lipka from neighbours in Podlesie?

Every day, herdsmen and wayfarers came to tell how the lands of Podlesie were being measured, and landmarks laid down, and wells dug. Of this, too, so many as wandered out of curiosity in the direction of Vola had ocular demonstration.

But what was the true situation of affairs? That as yet they had not ascertained.

They urged the smith to find out, for he had made friends with the Germans and shod their horses; but he fought shy, and either learned or told them nothing.

It was Gregory who at last sought information and got at the truth.

The fact was that the Squire owed a certain German fifteen thousand roubles, which he could not pay. The latter proposed taking Podlesie for the debt, and paying the difference in ready money. The Squire seemed inclined to agree to this, but secretly looked out for some other purchaser, the German offering only sixty roubles an acre.

“He will have to agree,” Gregory declared. “The Manor is swarming with Jews, all crying out for their money. And the forester told me the Manor cows had been attached for the taxes. How, then, can he pay them? Everything is sold! And he may not cut down the forest, so long as his lawsuit with us is not ended.—No, he must sell Podlesie at any price.”

“Why, such land is worth a hundred roubles an acre!”

“Then buy it at that price, and he will be only too glad to sell!”

“Alas, money is short! Whence is it to come?”

“So then, the Germans must get all, and we nothing!”

They talked on, with sad forebodings. How hard it was that such land should be lost to them—so near, so fruitful, so suitable for their sons and sons-in-law! They could have founded another village there, with fertile meadows and water in abundance.... But there, all was of no avail! The Germans were there, they would get the upper hand and crush the life out of the poor peasants.

“And whither shall all these go?” the old men murmured sadly, looking on while their children played about the roads in the evening—so numerous that the huts could scarce contain them. “But how is it possible to purchase any land, since we get barely enough to live on out of ours?”

They cudgelled their brains not a little; they even went to the priest for advice. But he could give them none. “Out of an empty pot, nothing is ever got!”

“Ah! ‘money makes the mare go’; but, ‘wherever the poor man goes, the wind against him blows!’”

Useless complaints, useless lamentations!

To make matters worse, the weather grew excessively hot: July weather in May. The sun rose in the very East, a vast fire in the azure: on every height, in all sandy soil, the vegetables drooped and faded. The grass was sear and burnt upon the fallows; and the potato-plants, which had at first sprouted well, hardly covered the ground with their poor puny shoots. The autumn-sown lands were alone to suffer little; being already in the ear, they grew splendidly and very high: the low cottages they surrounded seemed to have shrunk yet lower, crouching earthwards with only their roofs well above the forest of waving corn.

The nights being so hot and sultry that it was painful to lie in the huts, people slept in the orchards.

As a consequence of the great heats, of those troubles which beset them in troops, and also of the hard times preceding the harvest (harder than usual that year), it came to pass that the people of Lipka quarrelled and fought among themselves more than ever. Everyone seemed to enjoy thwarting his neighbour, and life there became a real torment. From the peep of day, the village rang with bickerings and angry words, some new contest taking place every day. Now it was Kobus and his wife, who had such a set-to that the priest had to go and rebuke and reconcile them; now Balcerek’s wife, who came to blows with Gulbas over a pig that had strayed into her carrot-patch; now Ploshkova, who had a row with the Soltys, on account of their goslings’ getting mixed: besides countless wrangles about the children, or unneighbourly behaviour, or anything that could serve for a squabble and outcries and noisy invectives. There seemed to be a curse on the village, bringing no end of altercations, breaches of the peace, and lawsuits.

Ambrose even made fun of this waspish disposition before strangers.

“This year times are not so very hard for me before harvest, by the goodness of Providence! No one dies, no one is born, no one is married; but they daily offer me vodka, and flatter me, and beg me to bear witness for them! Let them but wrangle so a few years more, and I shall have drunk myself to death!”

Lipka was in a bad way indeed; but things went worst of all at Dominikova’s.

Simon had returned with the others, Andrew’s leg was well now; they were not in sore straits as others were, and things ought to have gone on as of old. Far from it! Her sons would no longer obey her. They were grown rebellious, always at loggerheads with her, objected to being beaten, and refused to do woman’s work!

“Ye must hire a maidservant,” they said tartly, “or do the work yourself.”

Now Dominikova had ruled them with a rod of iron, and tyrannized over them for many a year; so she was very much shocked to see her own children rise up against her now.

“Grant me patience!” she would scream on such occasions, flying in a rage, and taking up her stick; but they made stout resistance, and were as stubborn as she. Every day there were fearful quarrels, hunts all over the premises, and so on, till the neighbours would rush in to smooth matters over.

The priest himself called her sons to him, and exhorted them to live in concord and obedience. They heard him out with patient respect, kissed his hand and humbly embraced his knees as in duty bound; but they behaved as before.

“We are no children; we know what to do, and Mother must yield. Why, the whole village was making laughing-stocks of us!”

Choler and exasperation had made the old dame yellow as a quince. Do what she might, she could not get the better of them; and now, instead of attending church services or gossiping as she had been accustomed, she had to work at home! She was always calling on Yagna to assist her; but from her too she got shame and sorrow in plenty.

The Voyt would look in frequently, to take her advice, he said: in reality, to get Yagna out with him, and play pranks with her in the garden.

Nothing can be hidden in a village: all knew perfectly well what was going on. And their guilty love becoming more and more openly scandalous, certain good people spoke several times to the old woman on the subject.

What was she to do? Yagna, notwithstanding prayers and supplications, flaunted her wantonness as though to spite her mother. The most grievous sin, the most shameful obloquy, was preferable in her eyes to staying by that husband whom she loathed.

Hanka too did nothing to oppose this state of things, and said so openly.

“So long as there is no one to prevent the Voyt from wasting the community’s money, she may do as she pleases. He grudges her naught, fetches her all he can from town, and would, if he could, put her in a frame of gold. Let them have their sport ... and see the end of it!—I have naught in common with them!”

And truly, she had troubles enough of her own. She had given the lawyer whatever he asked, but could as yet not tell when Antek was to be tried, nor what destiny awaited him. And meanwhile he was pining away in prison, hoping God would have mercy on him.—In the cabin, besides, things went ill.

Pete had grown insolent of late—no doubt the smith had tampered with him; he did no more work than he chose. Once she had been in town: he had spent the whole day out of doors; and as she threatened to call him to account before Antek on his return:

“On his return?” was the jeering reply. “Bandits are never set free in such wise!”

The impertinent words made her blood boil, and she would have longed to strike him on the mouth; but what good would that have done? She had to pocket her affronts, till the right time should come. Otherwise, the man would leave, and all would be thrown on her hands. She could hardly manage to pull through as it was, and her health was breaking down under the strain. “Steel is devoured by rust, and rocks last but for a season”; how, then, could a feeble woman hold out for ever?

One day—May was then drawing to an end—the priest had driven off with the organist to a local festival. Ambrose had been drinking so deep with the Germans (who now looked frequently in at the tavern) that he was not there to toll the evening Angelus, nor to open the church-door for the May service!

It was therefore decided to have the service in the burying-ground, where, close to the lich-gate, there stood a little shrine containing a statue of the Mother of God. Every May, the girls adorned it with paper ribbons and a gilt crown, and cast wild flowers all around, doing likewise all they could to preserve it from complete ruin. It was of great antiquity, and so cracked and crumbling and dilapidated that the birds no longer made their nests in it; and if a shepherd-boy ever took shelter there, it was only during the autumn rains. To some extent it was screened from the winter storms by the churchyard trees, the old lindens, some slender birches, and a few crosses which stood near, leaning out of the perpendicular.

A good many people had assembled, and quickly decked the shrine with flowers and verdure; and, having placed a taper and some small lamps at the feet of the statue, they knelt down piously.

The blacksmith bent in front before the threshold, sprinkled with tulips and eglantine blossoms; and he struck up a hymn.

It was then much after sunset, and growing dark; but the sky was still burning and golden in the West, with pale emerald higher up. All was very still; the long locks of the birches streamed down in cascades, and the corn stooped down, as though listening to the shrill quavering of the crickets.

The herds were wending their way home; and from field and village and pathways now unseen, there floated the graziers’ noisy songs, mingled with long melancholy lowings. And the people looked into their Mother’s face, and lifted up their voices, while she stretched her hands out in benediction over the world.

“Good night, O Lily white!
Good night!”

The scent of the young birch-trees filled the air, and the nightingales began to try their notes, first in broken bursts, then gathering force, and finally breaking out into foaming streams of golden euphony—wonderful trills of long-drawn music, of melody dropping like pearls; while at no great distance resounded the violin of Mr. Yacek, which accompanied the human singers so sweetly, so gently, and so powerfully at once, it seemed that it came from the rye-stalks rustling against each other, or that the soil itself were breathing that chant of May.

All then sang together in ecstasies: the people, the birds, the violin; and when they paused to take breath awhile, an innumerable choir of frogs raised their husky voices all in tune and whirringly, as if hurrying them on to begin again.

So the chant went on—now these singers, now those.

The service lasted very long, and in the end the smith called out more than once to those behind him:

“Pray, do not drag the words so!” For many of them were lengthening out the notes beyond measure.

His remark to Matthias Klemba went even farther: “Don’t bellow so; you’re not following the oxen!” And at last they sang together all in harmony, and their voices were like a flock of doves soaring up in the dusky sky.

“Good night, O Lily white!
Good night!
Mary, our hearts’ delight,
Good night!”

It was now black overhead, warm, and very quiet; but a few stars began to appear and sparkle and twinkle like dewdrops.

The girls in couples, arms about waists, sang together as they went home.

Hanka was returning alone, carrying her baby and absorbed in thought, when the smith approached and walked by her side.

She held her peace until close to her home; then, seeing him still beside her, she said:

“Are ye coming in, Michael?”

“Only into the porch,” he answered in a low tone; “I have to speak with you.”

She felt somewhat agitated. Had he any fresh misery in store for her?

“You have probably been to see Antek,” he said.

“Yes, but was not let in.”

“’Tis what I feared!”

“Say, then, what ye know!” She was shaking with apprehension.

“What I know? Only so much as I could get out of the police inspector.”

“And what is that?” She pressed her little one closer.

“That Antek is not to be released until after the trial.”

“How is that?” she stammered hoarsely. “The lawyer told me the contrary.”

“’Tis because he would take to flight. In such cases, a prisoner is never set at liberty. Bear in mind that I come to you as a friend to-day.—Bygones are bygones.... Though you will see one day that I was right.... But hear what I have to say now: I am speaking the truth as in the confessional.—Antek is in a very sorry plight, and sure to be cruelly punished: perchance for ten years! You hear?”

“I do, and believe not one word,” she said, with sudden self-control.

“Seeing is believing; and I have told you the truth.”

“After your fashion,” she replied, smiling ironically.

He seemed offended, and assured her warmly that he had come for no other purpose but to give her friendly advice. She listened as he talked, looking round impatiently; the cows lowed unmilked in their byres, the geese were still out of doors, the colt and Lapa sporting in the enclosure, and the little ones playing in the barn: while of all he was telling her she believed nothing. “But I’ll let him talk on,” she thought, “till I find out what he’s aiming at”; and she held herself on the alert.

“What is to be done?” she asked mechanically.

“There is something,” he whispered.

She faced him suddenly.

“Pay down enough money, and he will be released even before the trial. And then he can escape. Even to ‘Hamerica’! They will not catch him there.”

“Lord! to ‘Hamerica’!” she cried, appalled.

“Hush! I tell you in great secrecy. ’Tis what the Squire said to me. ‘Let him get away,’ he said; ‘ten years of Siberia will ruin any man’s life.’ ... That he told me but yesterday.”

“What! and flee from our village ... our children ... our lands?” It was the only misfortune that appealed to her.

“Pay the sum wanted, and Antek will do all the rest.—Give it to them.”

“But where—where am I to get it?... O my God!... Away to the very back of the world.... So far from everyone!”

“They ask for five hundred roubles. Why, ye have father-in-law’s money: take it and pay; we shall reckon together later—only save Antek!”

She saw the trap, and started to her feet.

“Obstinate dog! Always on the same trail!” she said, about to leave him.

“This is foolishness!” he exclaimed, losing patience. “’Twas but a word that escaped me. Must ye take offence at a word, when your man is rotting in jail?—Oh, he shall know how much ye do to set him free!”

She sat down again, quite bewildered.

He talked to her for some time about “Hamerica,” and folk he knew that had gone there, who wrote letters home, and even sent their families money. Antek might get away at once; Michael knew a Jew who had wafted many a one over the frontier. Multitudes got away thus. Hanka, too, might follow later, without attracting attention. Gregory would return from the army, and repay all from the inheritance; or if he could not, a purchaser would readily be found.

“Take ye counsel of the priest,” he concluded; “he will approve my plan, as ye will see. I have only urged you to do right, and for no profit of my own.—But breathe not a word of this to anyone else, or the gendarmes will know of it. And then he would not get out of prison at all, and be perchance put in irons into the bargain,” he concluded grimly.

“But where is the money to come from that will set him free?” she said, with a groan.

“I know a man in Modlitsa who would lend it—at high interest. Oh, the money can be found! I’ll lay my life I could manage that!”

For a long while he went on counselling her, and at last slipped away abruptly. She, lost in thought, took no note of his going.

Everybody else had gone to bed, except Vitek, who seemed to be waiting for his mistress. The moon went up through the heavens, a silver reaping-hook moving athwart the deep expanse. Over the meadows crept white sheets of mist; above the rye was hanging the dust of its saffron pollen; moveless as an ice-field, the mill-pond glittered amongst the trees. Broken by the nightingales’ rills of bubbling music, the silence made the ears ring and tingle.

“Heavens! To flee one’s village, and one’s land—and all!” she thought, the same idea ever returning; and her dread grew more intense, and she felt her trembling heart shrink in the clutch of pain.

Lapa then howled aloud; the birds sang no more, and the gales whistled and moaned among the dark shadows of the branches.

“Lapa now sees Kuba’s ghost!” Vitek muttered, and crossed himself with awe.

“Foolish one! go to bed!” said Hanka.

“But indeed he does come, and looks after the horses, and brings them their fodder. Aye, and not once only!”

She took no notice of his words. All was now plunged in deep stillness; and there she sat, repeating, as one paralysed with appalling anguish: “To flee a whole world away!—And for ever, merciful Jesus!—For ever!”