“That’s old Pietras, going to the tavern.—Here comes Valentova, scolding: someone’s geese have gone on to her field, belike.—Oh, she’s a vixen, not a woman!... This, I think, is Kozlova, shouting as she runs—yes, it is!... Here is Peter, son of Raphael ... when he talks, his mouth always seems full.—This is the priest’s mare, going for water.... Now she stops ... cart-wheels blocked by stones.—One of these days she will break a leg.” And so he went on, guessing at every sound he heard, going about all the village with quick thoughts and lively mental vision, and entering so into the whole life and troubles and worries of the place, he scarce noted that the day was declining, the wall darker in hue, the doorway dimmer, and the stable quite obscure. Ambrose arrived only when evening had set in. He was as yet only partly sober; he staggered a little, and spoke so quickly it was hard to follow him. “Hurt your leg, eh?” “Look and see what it is.” Silently he undid the bloodstained rags; they had dried and stuck so fast to the leg that Kuba could not help shrieking as he pulled them off. “A girl in childbed would not cry as you do!” Ambrose muttered scornfully. “But it hurts so! How you tear me! O God!” And Kuba all but howled. “Oho! you have caught it finely! Was it a dog that tore your leg like that?” Ambrose cried, wondering. The leg was horribly mangled, and swollen with matter to the size of a water-can. “It was—but pray tell no one—the forest-keeper that shot me....” “Yes I see.—And hit you from afar, eh? Well, well! your leg will never again be of any use. I feel the splinters of bone rattling about.... Ah, why did you not call me in at once?” “I feared ... lest they should know I had been after a hare.... But I was out of the forest, when the keeper shot at me.” “Once, in the tavern, he complained; someone was doing mischief, he said.” “The foul carrion! Is a hare, then, the property of anyone?... He laid a trap for me.... I was in the open field, and he let fly with both barrels.—Oh, the hell-hound!—But say nothing; they would take me to the law-court; the gun, too, is not mine, and they would seize it at once.... I thought it might heal by itself.—Oh, help me! It pains so! it is tearing me to bits!” “Ah, you cunning trickster, you! with your sly games and your forbidden quests, sharing the forest hares with the Squire!—But, you see, this partnership will have cost you your leg!” He examined it again, and looked sorely distressed. “Too late, ever so much too late!” Kuba was terrified. “Please do something for me,” he moaned. Ambrose, without replying, turned up his sleeves, whipped out a very keen clasp-knife, grasped the leg firmly, and set about extracting the shots and expressing the matter.