Hanka cleared the things away, going to the window every now and then to peep at Antek, who was taking his supper under the porch in front of the house. He sat at a civil distance from the platter, taking spoonful after spoonful with a hard but leisurely scrape against the sides of the vessel. At times he would cast a glance over the pond, whose waters gleamed with moving circles of purple and gold, iridescent in the sunset. Amongst these, like white clouds round a rainbow, swam a flock of geese, gabbling and spurting streams of blood-red jewels from their beaks. The village was seething with life and crowds of people. On the road at either side of the pond, the dust flew and carts rattled; and lowing cattle stood knee-deep in the pond, drinking at leisure and lifting their ponderous heads, while from their jaws streams of water trickled down like strings of opals. Meanwhile, on the farther side, washerwomen were at work, and the bats they wielded clattered loudly on the linen they were beating. “Antek, please split the firewood for me; I cannot manage it by myself,” said his wife timorously, for the man thought nothing of treating her to an oath—nay, even to a blow—on the slightest pretext. He did not so much as reply, feigning not to have heard her. She dared not repeat her request, but went to hack off such splinters of firewood as she could, while he, moody and spent with a long day’s hard work, sat looking over to the other side of the pond, where a large cottage shone with whitewashed walls and window-panes that reflected the sunset glow. A low stone fence, over which some clusters of dahlias nodded their heads, standing out vividly on the white background of cottage wall, ran round the garden; and in front of the house a tall figure was seen to pass from beneath the orchard trees, disappearing in the passage before it could be recognized. From the porch where he sat, Antek heard his father’s snores and growled fiercely. “The Master sleeps; and _you_, toil on, labourer, toil on!” He went out into the yard and eyed the cow again. “She was father’s cow, but it is also a loss for us,” he remarked to his wife, who had left off hacking wood and gone to the cart which Kuba had now driven home. “The pits are not yet ready for the potatoes; we must dump them upon the threshing-floor.” “But father said you were to flay the cow and quarter it on the threshing-floor, with Kuba to help you.” “There will be room enough for both cow and potatoes,” muttered Kuba, throwing the barn door wide open. “I,” said Antek, “am no slaughter-house workman, that I should flay carcasses!” No more was said; the potatoes rattled noisily on the barn-floor. The sun was down, but the dark blood and dead gold of the after-glow were still mistily reflected in the pond; and the quiet waters just trembled, shimmering ruddily with a drowsy murmur.