Page:Halek's Stories and Evensongs.pdf/222

 the “hee!” was forcibly expressed and sharply pronounced. Similarly, if he congratulated himself about some trifle or if he felt a bit of self-satisfaction, the horses knew it, for then the “hee!” was scarcely audible, it was only softly murmured as if spoken in a sort of a soliloquy. At such times it would happen that the horses stopped at the ale-house of their own accord. But something much out of the common way must have staggered the soul of Poldik before he prolonged the “hee!” and made of it “heesta!” Then the horses gathered themselves together and took several steps at a quicker rate, so that it was only on these occasions that, comparing them to a watch, they could be said to gain a little. But, indeed, these irregularities were so rare that they were almost lost in the distance of ages. Only to us who are Poldik’s biographers, are even these irregularities matters of importance; as we shall see in the sequel.

ND a time came when Poldik’s irregularities became almost the rule.

At midday he stopped with his vehicle not far from Naplavka in the shadow of a lofty wall, where he and his horses celebrated the dinner-hour. Having hung the oat-bags to the horses’ muzzles, he waited for the coming of Malka.

Malka, his little neighbour, brought his dinner to him, from the same house where Poldik dwelt or rather where he and his horses just bivouacked for the night. His neighbour herself, Malka’s mother, it must be understood, used to cook and bring his dinner, but when she fell sick her daughter brought it, and not till then did Poldik become aware that his neighbour had a daughter. Then this neighbour died, and Malka was crying when she brought his dinner.

Poldik could have wept with her, for under all his apparent roughness lay a tender heart. And here he was prompted to say, “Poor thing!” By this he meant the dead mother.

But when Malka only cried the more, he looked at her and said, “Poor, poor thing, don’t cry any more, it can’t be helped.”

When that afternoon he drove off with his sand, he felt as though all the time he had Malka’s tears in his own heart, and sometimes for a score paces his throat was parched, and “hee!” remained only “in posse”, or it stuck in his throat, and he felt as