“But have you the money to pay?” she cried, overwhelmed with a sense of helplessness; and the tears started to her eyes, as she gazed at her father-in-law’s fields—that land, precious as pure gold, whereon, aye, on every inch of it, wheat and rye and barley and beets might be grown. “Don’t cry, you silly thing; at any rate, we shall have eight acres of our own one day.” “Oh, if we had but half as many, with the hut and the cabbagepatch!” She pointed to the long stretch of ground, bluish-green with heads of cabbages; and they both bent their steps that way. At its edge they sat down under a bush; Hanka suckled the child, which had begun to cry for food, while Antek rolled a cigarette, lit it, puffed, and scowled. He said not a word to his wife of the pain that was devouring him, and burned within his heart like coals of fire. For neither could he have told her, nor she have understood him: as is usual with women, who have no sort of initiative, who neither reflect nor catch the sense of things, but who live—so to say—only as the shadows which men throw. “But,” Hanka went on to say, “Father has ready money by him, has he not?” “That he has!” “Why, he brought Yuzka a coral necklace worth as much as a cow; and he is always sending money to Gregory through the Voyt.” Antek assented, but his mind was wandering elsewhere. “It is wronging us all!—And the clothes your mother left! he has them locked up, nor so much as lets them see the light: skirts and kerchiefs, caps and beads....” She went on thus a long time, telling of all these things, and of wrongs done, and grievances, and hopes: but Antek remained obstinately silent. At last, out of patience, she shook him by the shoulder: “Are you awake?” “Aye, and listening. Talk away, it will do you good. And when you have done, say so.” Hanka, who was naturally inclined to weep, and had many a cause for sadness besides, here burst into tears; he spoke to her, she cried, as to a girl he scorned: he cared neither for her nor for her child. At this, Antek rose to his feet, and replied contemptuously: “Lift up your voice: these”—with a toss of his head towards some crows flying past them—“these will hear and take pity on you!” and, settling his cap on his head, he made for the village with great strides. “Antek! Antek!” she called after him, in sorrow; but he did not even turn his head.