There was in him something that attracted her irresistibly, and stirred her up with such power that, in order not to follow him, she flew to the orchard, caught hold of a tree, and embraced it with all her might, hugging it in both arms. There she stood, breathless, almost beside herself, cloaked and hidden, as it were, by the apple-covered branches that bowed down over her, with eyelids half closed, and a faint smile of happiness on her lips, though she also felt a vague dread, and a fearful yet pleasant sense of agitation: something like what she had experienced when looking at him through the window, that night in spring. She too attracted him, though he was not aware of any attraction. He would now and then look in at her cabin for a short time, feeling an unaccountable gladness at the visit; and, seeing her daily in church, always on her knees during the whole of Mass, and seeming to be in a state of fervent, even ecstatic prayer, he could not witness this without a pleasing emotion. One day he spoke to his mother of that ardent piety of hers. “Oh, if anyone stands in need of prayer and pardon, she does!” was the reply. Now Yanek’s soul was as pure a white as the whitest flower in the world, and so he failed to catch the real meaning of those words. As, moreover, she used to frequent their house, where everybody liked her, and he saw her piety besides to be so great, he really had no suspicion of what she was. Only he thought it a curious thing that she had not come once since his return. His mother answered: “I have just sent for her; there is much ironing to be done.” And presently she came, but so finely dressed that he wondered. “What? are ye off to a wedding?” One of the girls here cried out: “Rather she has received an offer of marriage.” “Let them but dare! I should soon send them flying!” she replied with a laugh, blushing like a rose, for every eye was upon her. Yanek’s mother set her to iron at once; his sisters joined her, and Yanek went with them. In a short time they were all very merry, roaring with laughter over the merest trifles, and finally the old dame had to rebuke them. “Be quiet, ye magpies!—Yanek, better go into the garden. ’Tis not fitting you should sit grinning here.” So he had to go out, according to his wont, into the fields away beyond the village, or even as far as the boundaries of Lipka, where he would sit reading or meditating. Yagna knew well those haunts of his, and where to find him, if only with the mind’s eye; she was for ever flying round him, like a moth round a candle, and could not help herself; for she was driven towards him, and now followed her impulse without resistance, giving way with all her heart and soul to that gentle force, which like the rush of a foaming current impelled her onward; she never even wondered on what shores it would land her, nor how it all would end.