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 Pepinka to forgive Bára, who had done it all to rid her of the steward. Miss Pepinka would not relinquish her plan and insisted that since Bára had so deeply affronted the steward she must be punished.

“And, moreover, if you don’t marry the steward, you’ll not get so much as a thread from me!” she threatened Elška, who only shrugged her shoulders.

The priest was not so stubborn. He did not wish to reprove his niece, but he could not wholly, of his own volition, forgive Bára. Elška was eager to go at once to Bára, but was not permitted to do so.

Jacob, knowing nothing of his daughter’s secret doings, as usual took his horn the next morning and went out to call together his herd. But, to his amazement, nowhere were the gates opened—just as if during the night all the cattle had perished or as if the servants had overslept. He went up to the very houses and sounded his horn—loudly enough to call the dead from their graves. The cows bellowed, to be sure, but no one went to let them out. The maid-servants came out and said: “You are not to drive out our cows any more. Someone else is to do it!”

“What’s that?” thought Jacob to himself, and went immediately to the mayor. Here he learned what had happened.

“We have nothing against you, personally, but your Bára is bewitched and the peasant women are afraid that she will cast a spell on them.”

“Why, has anything ever happened to any of the herd?”