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Updated: June 2, 2025
'If you can drink through six roubles, you can take her, Zoska cried vehemently, pulling the child out of the shawl and laying it on the floor. It looked frightened, but did not utter a sound. 'Shut up, Jagna, and don't talk nonsense, said Slimak. Zoska stood up and stretched herself.
Zoska lay down on the bench in her rags and Slimak went into the alcove. He sat on the bed, determined to be on the watch. He did not know that this strange state of mind is called 'nerves'. Yet a kind of relief had come in with Zoska; she had driven away the spectre of Maciek and the child. But an iron ring was beginning to press on his head.
When everybody else had forgotten Slimakowa, Stasiek, Maciek, and the child, he often remembered them, and also the dog Burek and the cow doomed to the butcher's knife for want of fodder. Silly Zoska died in prison, old Sobieska at the inn. The others with whom my story is concerned, not excepting old Jonah, are alive and well.
'Look, Zoska, said the latter to the woman who was standing by indifferently, 'that is your little girl. She approached without seeming to understand; slowly, however, her face acquired a human expression. 'What's fallen upon them? 'They have been frozen. 'Why have they been frozen? 'Slimak drove them out of the house.
But she ate greedily like a wild animal, and asked nothing further. 'Does she know? he thought. Zoska had finished and struck her hand cheerfully on her knee. He took courage. 'Can I stop the night? Uneasiness seized him; any other guest would have been a blessing in his solitude, but Zoska.... If she did not know the truth, what ill wind had blown her here? And if she knew?... He reflected.
He looked into the room; Zoska had disappeared. 'I knew it! he exclaimed, and ran out into the yard. His house was indeed on fire; the roof towards the highroad was alight, but owing to the thick layers of snow the flames spread but slowly; he could still have saved the house, but he did not even think of this. 'Get up, Jagna, he cried, running back into the alcove, 'the house is on fire!
'A girl, whispered Zoska, with her eyes fixed on Maciek, 'she is two years old... yes, he can have her, if he likes. 'She'd be a deal of trouble to me, muttered the labourer, 'all the same, it's a pity. 'Take her, repeated Zoska, 'Slimak is rich, you are rich.... 'Oh yes, Maciek is rich, laughed Slimakowa, 'he drinks through six roubles in one Sunday.
However, 'Silly Zoska' stayed for six years, and when she went into service at the manor the work at the cottage had not grown less. So the gospodyni engaged a fifteen-year-old orphan, Magda, who preferred to go into service, although she had a cow, a bit of land, and half a cottage of her own.
The idea of Maciek and the child and Zoska had become confused in Slimak's mind; he looked at her as if she were an apparition from the other world. 'Where do you come from? His voice was choked. 'They sent me back to the parish and told me to look out for work. They said they wouldn't keep loafers. Seeing the food in the saucepan, she began to lick her lips like a dog.
'Why, Maciek, that sounds as if you had a bad conscience, said the gospodyni disagreeably. 'It makes one feel bad, to see such wretchedness, he murmured. 'The man whose fault it is would feel it most! 'It isn't my fault, but I'm sorry for them all the same. 'Why don't you take the child, then, if you are so sorry? sneered Slimakowa, 'you'll give him the child, Zoska, won't you? Is it a boy?
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