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When they paid him off he dodged the company gamblers and dramshops, and so they tried to kill him; but he escaped, and tramped it home, working at odd jobs, and sleeping always with one eye open. So in the summer time they had all set out for America. At the last moment there joined them Marija Berczynskas, who was a cousin of Ona's.
It was four o'clock when the ceremony was over and the carriages began to arrive. There had been a crowd following all the way, owing to the exuberance of Marija Berczynskas.
When in the end Tamoszius Kuszleika has reached her side, and is waving his magic wand above her, Ona's cheeks are scarlet, and she looks as if she would have to get up and run away. In this crisis, however, she is saved by Marija Berczynskas, whom the muses suddenly visit.
Once every ten minutes or so they would fail to begin again, but instead would sink back exhausted; a circumstance which invariably brought on a painful and terrifying scene, that made the fat policeman stir uneasily in his sleeping place behind the door. It was all Marija Berczynskas. Marija was one of those hungry souls who cling with desperation to the skirts of the retreating muse.
"Does Marija Berczynskas live here?" he inquired. "I dunno," said the girl. "What you want wid her?" "I want to see her," said he; "she's a relative of mine." The girl hesitated a moment. Then she opened the door and said, "Come in." Jurgis came and stood in the hall, and she continued: "I'll go see. What's yo' name?" "Tell her it's Jurgis," he answered, and the girl went upstairs.
Graicziau!" screams Marija Berczynskas, and falls to work herself for there is more upon the stove inside that will be spoiled if it be not eaten. So, with laughter and shouts and endless badinage and merriment, the guests take their places.
There is no fight that night perhaps because Jurgis, too, is watchful even more so than the policeman. Jurgis has drunk a great deal, as any one naturally would on an occasion when it all has to be paid for, whether it is drunk or not; but he is a very steady man, and does not easily lose his temper. Only once there is a tight shave and that is the fault of Marija Berczynskas.
And then there was Marija Berczynskas, who, fired with jealousy by the success of Jurgis, had set out upon her own responsibility to get a place. Marija had nothing to take with her save her two brawny arms and the word "job," laboriously learned; but with these she had marched about Packingtown all day, entering every door where there were signs of activity.
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