Where he stood the blood-red sun bathed him in heroic glory. Yet, in spite of all, Ivanka the Wolf-Slayer had the mien of a fruit-stealing culprit before the _Chinovnik_. The Prince regarded him with mock severity. "What is this I hear of you, Ivanka?" he began. "They say that you have slain a wolf!" Ivanka would have hung his head but that his collar prevented it. So he dropped his eyes in guilty silence. The peasant, behind the Prince's back, rubbed his hands and chuckled. "Come here," commanded the Prince, his moustached lip twitching with a whimsical smile. The coat moved to the Prince's feet. Then the small boy inside it felt himself caught up in strong arms and borne into the hut. Now, though it was a ruddy winter sunset outside, in the hut it was quite gloomy. The window was very small. A dull yellow glow, like a big bull's-eye, came from the open door of the stove, and a glimmer like a glow-worm from the tiny lamp that burned before the Holy Image. The dim outline of a woman with a child in her arms could be discerned by the stove. She came forward as the Prince entered, and bending low raised the hem of his fur mantle to her lips and silently returned to her seat. The Prince sat by the window, and Ivanka stood between his knees where he had been placed. He trembled inside his sheep's skin. Yet it was a gentle hand that lifted the _baranka_ from his curly head and raised his chin. "How old are you, Ivanka?" inquired the Prince. "Ten years, Noble Prince," faltered the boy. But his eyes meeting those of the Prince at that moment he ceased to tremble. And the longer he looked the more comfortable he felt. "And you have slain a wolf?" continued the Prince. "Yes, Noble Prince." "And what had the wolf done to you, Ivanka, that you should have taken his life?" "He had seized our little Minka and would have eaten her up." Ivanka drew a sharp breath. "How terrible!" exclaimed the Prince. "But you--midge! How did you dare to tackle such a foe? It is incredible! Come, tell me all about it. Begin at the beginning, Ivanka." Ivanka gazed at the ground in silence. He twisted one leg round the other, cracked all his knuckles in succession, but the words would not come. "Speak, Ivanka, do," came a woman's coaxing voice from the gloom. "Tell his High Nobility how it happened." Another pause, and at length in a shy, hesitating voice, Ivanka began:-- "Mother had gone to the town in the sledge, and father lay asleep on the top of the stove. It was afternoon. I was minding Minka, and we played at having a shop with the bits of pot from the mug Minka broke. Then I remembered it was time to cut the fodder and feed the beasts, which I can do as well as father now. So I took the fodder knife and stole out. I left the door open a bit--not enough to let the cold in on father, but enough to hear Minka if she cried. I had fed the cows in the byre and had got to the corner of the house coming back, when I heard Minka scream."