It was a wonderful and beautiful bit of work--what furrows! And here and there among the furrows a blade of maize peeped out. In spite of this, the priest scratched himself once or twice, and then fairly often, behind the ear. It seemed as though something still weighed upon his mind. It was a difficult matter, which he hardly dare take in hand: the glebe lands. Up to now, they had been neglected; at present, he did not know what to do with them. He would have liked to work them himself. He would have liked to see his own men sowing them; he would have liked to take his wife there in the autumn. It was very tempting. He talked a great deal to his wife about the matter. They would need horses, a cart, a plough, a labourer, stables--they would want a quantity of things. Moreover, the priest did not understand agriculture. However, the vegetable-beds were growing green, the maize was springing up. The priest made up his mind; he took the residue of his wife's dowry and set to work. Marcu's plough was good enough to start with. The priest bought one horse from Mitru; a man in the Rapitza Valley had another one; Stan Schiopu had a cart with three wheels. The priest bought it as he got a wheel from Mitru, to make up for the horse being foundered. Cozonac, the bell-ringer, engaged himself as labourer to the priest, for his house was only a stone's throw away. The priest drove four posts into the ground at one end of the house, two long ones and two short, and he made three sides of plaited osiers and a roof of rushes, and there was the stable all ready. During these days, Father Trandafir had aged by about ten years; but he grew young again when he placed his wife and children in the cart, whipped up the horses, and drove off to see their ploughed land. The villagers saw him, and shook their heads, and said once more: "The priest is the devil's own man." The priest's wife had her own feminine worries. She had a beautiful Icon which had been given to her by the son of the priest at Vezura. At present the Icon was lying at the bottom of a box wrapped up in paper. For a long time she had wished to place it between the windows, to put flowers and sweet basil round it, and look at it often; because this Icon represented the Holy Virgin, and the priest's daughter was called Mary. But the walls were dirty and the Icon had no case. There was another thing that annoyed the priest's wife: one window was filled in with a pig's bladder, and in the other were three broken panes mended with paper. The house was rather dark. Easter drew near. There were only five days to Holy Week. If the priest wanted to spend Easter with his wife, he had still three important things to get: whitewash for the walls, windows for the house, and a case for the Icon of the most Blessed Virgin--all objects that could be found only in a town. To the market, then!