Yuzka lay still, listening to the hum of the flies—and another strange buzzing, too, which ever and anon sounded within her head. She also, as in a dream, now and then heard someone of the household coming in to look at her and going away on tiptoe. And then she fancied there were boughs, laden with rosy apples, that hung very low above her head, but she was powerless to reach up and snatch them; and then a flock of sheep came crowding around her, bleating pitifully ... but Vitek came into the room, and she knew him at once. “Have you taken to Nastka my little sow?—What did she say?” “Why, she rejoiced over it so, she came near kissing its tail!” “Ye naughty fellow! Making fun even of Nastka!” “But I say true!—And she bade me tell you she will be here to-morrow.” All at once, Yuzka began to toss to and fro, crying out in dismay: “Drive them off!—They’ll trample me down!—Baa! Baa! Baa!” Then of a sudden she collapsed, lying still as in sleep. Vitek went out, but returned at frequent intervals. Once she asked him anxiously: “Is it noon yet?” “Nearer midnight: everybody is asleep.” “True: ’tis dark.” “Take those sparrows away: they are chirping like unfledged birds.” He was just telling her something about their nests, when she screamed and sat up.—“Where’s Grey One? Vitek, let it not stray, or Father will thrash you!” Then she told him to come near her, and talked to him in a whisper: “Hanka forbade me to go to Nastka’s wedding; yet will I go in despite of her ... dressed in a dark-blue corset ... and the skirt I wore for the Indulgence.... Vitek! pluck me some apples; but only let Hanka not catch you.” Then she was all at once still, as though plunged in swift sleep. Vitek was for hours at her side, brushing flies away and giving her water. Hanka had told him to stay at home, and watch over her, while little Matthias, Klemba’s son, tended Boryna’s cattle along with his father’s. The want of the free forest air made itself felt sorely to the boy; but, deeply affected as he was by Yuzka’s state, he would (as they say) have pulled the sky down for her, and have done anything to interest her and make her laugh. One day, he brought her a whole covey of little partridges. “Yuzka, stroke them! stroke them, and they will cry _pew-pew_ to you!” “How can I?” she moaned, raising her head. He undid her, and she took up the fluttering unfledged birds in those poor feeble nerveless hands of hers, and pressed them to her face and eyes. “Ah, how their souls throb within them! How frightened they are, poor things!” “What? I myself caught them, and shall I let them go?” he protested, unwilling to do so. Yet he did. Another time, he brought her a leveret, that he placed on the down coverlet over her, holding it up by the ears.