“Come to hear confessions, along with his Reverence of Slupia,” she thought, as she looked in vain for Ambrose. She went on round the church by the poplar road, where the mire was yet more abundant, and the trees, plunged in the vapoury mizzle, looked like shadows seen through a steam-clouded pane. Passing the tavern, she struck off in the squashy pathway that led to her sister’s. She would, she reckoned, have time enough for a call on her father, and a talk with her sister, with whom, now that she had removed to Boryna’s, she was on very friendly terms. “Yuzka told me yesterday that Father was not well!” she exclaimed on entering. “Ah, what’s to be done? He is lying in bed under his sheepskin, and moaning, and talking about being ill,” Veronka moodily replied. “How cold it is here! I feel it creeping up the calves of my legs!” “And have I any fuel at all? Who will go and fetch me a few dry faggots? How can I trudge to the forest and come home with a load of brushwood when there’s so much other work to do? You see, I must manage all by myself.” They then both fell to lamenting over their sad fate. “When Staho was here, I thought nothing of all he did at home. When the husband is gone, ah! then one knows what a help he is!—Are you going to town?” “Certainly; I should have gone before, but Roch told me that visits would not be allowed until Eastertide. Therefore shall I go on Sunday, and take my poor husband a few morsels of our Hallow-fare.” “I fain would do the same for mine; but what have I to take to him? A mouthful of bread?” “Be easy; I will prepare enough for them both; and we shall take it together.” “God reward you for your kindness; I will work for you in return.” “Do not speak of work in return: ’tis a gift I make you from my heart.” She lowered her voice. “Well do I know poverty: it is a dog whose teeth bite deep.” “And that is so faithful and attached that it never will leave us till we die!—I thought I had a little money laid by, and hoped to purchase a pig in spring, and fatten it up, with no small profit when autumn came. Well, I had to give all to Staho, and my savings have run out like water: I have naught now. That is what comes of his standing up for the rights of our folk!” “Nay, say not so. He went freely to protect them, and an acre or so of the wood will be yours.” “_Will be!_ Aye, but ‘while the grass grows, the steed starves!’ And ‘To him that can pay, the musicians play.’ But ‘Poor man, coin to money your sweat, and be glad that ye ever have eat!’” “Are ye greatly in want?” she inquired, hesitatingly. “I have naught in the world,” she cried, flinging out her hands in despair, “but what the Jew or the miller will give me on credit!” “Would I could help you! But the homestead where I dwell is not mine. I am baited as with dogs around me, and must take such heed lest they drive me from the cabin that I am at times clean out of my wits.” The previous night’s experience came back to her forcibly.