“To-morrow morning, when she has gone to church, you can carry everything out into your own larder without noise or fuss. Surely she will not break in and take it back by force!” Such was the advice of Yagustynka, as she pressed the ingredients of the sausages into the long dried guts, writhing upon the table like serpents, and every now and then hung them up to be smoked in the chimney. “Ah! the stroke was planned between them, and they came on purpose for that!” She was exasperated. “The sausages will all be made ere Ambrose be back here,” the old woman observed. Hanka would speak no more, absorbed in work, and in planning how to get the hams and flitches into her possession again. The fire crackled on the hearth with a lively flame; the whole room was in a glow, and the various ingredients of the blood-puddings were bubbling in several cauldrons. “O Lord! my mouth waters at the very smell!” sighed Vitek, sniffing greedily. “Do not stand sniffing here, or I will know why!” cried Hanka. “Give the kine to drink, fill the mangers with hay, and put straw under them. ’Tis late already ... when will you have done it all?” “Pete is coming; I cannot do all by myself.” “And whither has he gone?” “What, know ye not? He is helping them to put things in order on the other side.” “Oho!—Hey, you, Pete!” she cried, calling out into the passage. “See to the cattle for the night—at once!” Her tone, as she gave that order, had been such that the man came out instantly into the yard. “Let her stir herself and clean her own room at least! Look at her, that grand lady—will not soil her hands—must needs employ a manservant!” So said Hanka, in a towering passion, whilst pouring out a steaming potful of liver and chitterlings. The sound of a bell and a cart clattering by outside gave another turn to her thoughts. It was the priest, carrying the Holy Viaticum to someone, as her father, old Bylitsa, who then came in, told her. “But who can it be? No one was ill, so far as I know.” “He has passed the Voyt’s cabin!” Vitek, out of breath, came shouting outside the window. “To one of the _Komorniki_? I think not.” “Perhaps to your people, the Prycheks, Yagustynka; they live that way.” “Ah, nothing ever was the matter with them, the miscreants; no evil ever comes nigh them!” she said, in a faltering voice: though constantly at odds with her children, she felt a quiver of anxiety. “I’ll see how matters stand and return at once.” And she hurried out. But the evening dragged on, and yet she was not back.—Ambrose, who had returned, said the priest had been called in to Agata, a kinswoman of the Klembas: she had come back from begging only the Saturday before. “But how is that? Is she not at the Klembas’?” “No; she has removed to die: either at Koziol’s or at the Prycheks’.” There was no more talk then, for there was much work to get through, especially as both Yuzka and Hanka were often obliged to leave it for the byre or the stable.