Above Tatra the lightnings flash, The thunder wildly roars; But fear not, brothers, The skies will clear, And the Slovak's time will come. At the conclusion, a peculiar silence brooded in the room. Suddenly, little anxious twitchings might have been noticed. The singer turned. In the doorway stood the Notary with a wicked, sneering smile on his supercilious face. CHAPTER II MUSHROOM GATHERING JOZEF'S home was one of the high-roofed houses whose gable ends faced the broad, whitish main street. It was made of unburnt bricks, plastered outside, with hand-made shingles on the roof. Each window was outlined in pale green and the entrance porch was quite ornamental, having a pretty conventional design, also in green, painted around the door. This, as well as the lines around the window, was the work of Jozef's mother, who enjoyed a certain reputation in the village because she had once been asked to paint some borders around the walls of the rooms of a girls' school in the city of Brno, the capital of Moravia. Behind the house were the stalls for the cattle and pigs, and, back of all, a small vegetable garden, edged with sweet smelling herbs and brightly colored flowers. This garden ended in an alley way by a brook, surrounded by green meadows in which geese usually pastured. In the center of the main street was the Church, a small whitewashed building with a square tower. Next to it were a cross and a statue of the village saint. Through the middle of the street were rows of underground cellars, one belonging to each family, in which it was possible to keep food and milk ice cold. Vehicles made their way on each side of these cellars. Around the village were meadows dotted with red poppies and blue corn flowers. Some distance further were fields of potatoes, a few vineyards, and a large, privately owned wood. It was Helena, Jozef's cousin, who planned the day in the wood for a mushroom hunt, and secured the necessary permission from the forester in charge. She invited Jozef, his ten-year-old sister Ruzena, and two of Ruzena's girl friends to go with her. "Goody!" the little girls shouted, and ran for the permission which was readily granted on the one condition that they do not spend all the time in play but really bring home mushrooms, which are highly valued as food.