In spite, then, of the temptation to shirk that duty, she put the intended presents on a number of plates and dishes, now substituting a larger for a smaller piece, now the reverse, now adding, now taking away a blood-pudding ... and so on: until she had done, and, dejected and weary, called for Yuzka. “Put on your best garments, and take these things round.” “O Lord! what a quantity of meat is here!” “What can I do? I must give it away. We have to live with folk.—‘Jack his flail can whisk alone, but not dance and frisk alone.’—This big piece take to Uncle’s wife. She hates and rates me; but there’s no help for it.—This to the Voyt: a rascal, but on good terms with Matthias, and (it may be) serviceable one day.—For Magda and her smith, a whole blood-pudding, a sausage, and a piece of bacon. They shall not say we have eaten Father’s pig by ourselves. Talk against us they will, of course, but less.—This sausage is for Prychkova. She’s saucy, bitter of tongue, but one of our best friends.—And this last piece for Klembova.” “Shall Dominikova get naught?” “Later in the afternoon. Of course she shall. She’s to be dealt with as filth: with care and from afar.... Now take these things round separately, and waste no time in talk with other girls, for there is work at home for you.” “Do give Nastka something: they are all so poor!” Yuzka said beseechingly. “They have scarce wherewith to buy salt!” “Let her come: she shall get something.—Father, take this to Veronka; she was to have looked in yesterday.” “She had to clean the miller’s cabin in the afternoon; they are expecting visitors.” Hanka, having sent Yuzka off, and put on a warmer dress, ran out to see that the lads worked properly, and to assist Yagustynka. To the old woman, now so strangely reticent, she said: “We hoped you would come back for supper.” “What I saw was supper enough for me—and it lies on my stomach yet.” “It was Agata, I believe?” “Yes, poor thing! Passing away ... and in Koziol’s hut!” “Why is she not at the Klembas’?” “Because those folk, as long as a kinsman asks for naught, or comes full-handed, allow him to claim kindred; but would set their dogs on any other, how near soever!” “What say you? Surely they have not driven her out?” “Well, she came to them on Saturday, and was taken with a sickness that same night.... They say that Klembova took away her feather-bed, and turned her out almost naked.” “Klembova? Can it be? So good a woman!—Nay, it must be a slander.” “I invent naught, and tell you only what mine ears have heard.” “At Koziol’s too! Who would have thought the woman so merciful?” “‘For ready money—’tis strange, but true—even a priest will be kind to you!’—Koziol’s wife has got a score of _zloty_ out of Agata in cash. For that sum she will keep her till she drops off—which she expects to do any day.... Funeral extra, of course.—She will give up the ghost one of these days: there will be no long waiting, oh, no!”