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Pirka fed the dove and gave it water, and then stuck it into Michal's pocket again. "There now!" she said. "She feels all the better for that, I know." Then she covered up the pretty lady with a warm counterpane and a bearskin, and while doing so caught sight of the small silk sachet which was fastened round her neck. Pirka's eyes began to sparkle savagely.
And now she had another scrap of paper in her hand, on which was also written the word, Valentine! "Well, and how has my little lady been amusing herself all this time?" asked Pirka, stroking pretty Michal's hands. "Has she not been wishing that her Pirka was with her again?" Michal could not deny that she had.
At last the shape swathed in the red cloth, the shape so long expected in fear and trembling, came to the half-open door, and began the usual beggar's whine, "Praised be the " Michal did not let her finish the blasphemous salutation, but seized her by the hand and drew her rapidly into a side chamber. Here the beggar-woman took the cloth from her head, and laughed in Michal's face. "Well!
And during the whole of the dance he was cudgeling his brains as to the meaning of pretty Michal's words. "She had not learnt to dance because she was only a serving maid! Now serving maids can dance, and dance very well too! Yet surely she must have spoken the truth, for otherwise she would never have dared to publicly put to shame her host when he invited her to dance.
Then Barbara praised Michal greatly, and said that Master Henry would also make a fine show with the scratches he had received from her. And now she proceeded to answer Michal's first question. "So you want to know, my little poppet, what a wife should do who does not love her husband?
Nevertheless on extraordinary days extraordinary things must happen, and to-day has been no ordinary day, for it has seen a clergyman ordained and a maiden sued for." In an instant every trace of color had vanished from pretty Michal's face. The learned gentleman puffed away tremendously, and quoted these saws in the midst of volumes of smoke. "What saith Dubravius?
A mist swam before Michal's eyes, her feet tottered, her whole body was palsied. She could not speak, she only staggered, and sought with her hands for a support to keep her from falling. "If you faint," whispered Barbara, "it will be all the worse for you, for then I shall take you in my arms and carry you off. The sledge is close at hand, the mist is thick, and the snow is falling.
Then he drew his hand out of Michal's hands, but as she still kept kneeling at his feet as if expecting something more, the old man let his long sleeve fall right over his hands till the very tips of his fingers were covered, and then he laid them gently on Michal's head so that that innocent head might not be polluted by the touch of his bare hand. Then Michal arose from her knees.
We have said this much about the farogato in order to give some idea of the great joy which arose in Michal's heart, when she suddenly heard it playing her favorite song.
She wanted to make Michal a hot salt and bran poultice and prepare her a posset of centaury, but these and sundry other good offices Michal absolutely declined, declaring that she had no fear of catching cold. After putting the young woman to bed, she sat down beside her, and rubbed Michal's tiny white feet between her hands. She said it was good remedy against sleeplessness and anxiety.
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