Page:Littell's Living Age - Volume 162.djvu/292

280 on the roof with a rustling, crackling noise; already half of the thatch was gone, and the fire had caught the empty cow-shed alongside as well, which, being but lightly covered with twigs and dried moss, was rapidly being consumed.

A number of the neighbors had been feebly attempting to extinguish the conflagration; but some of them were timid, and many were indifferent, and none of them knew how to work without a head to direct them. Luckily that head had appeared upon the scene in time, before it was too late to save the rest of the building. Wet sheets and blankets spread over the thatched roof prevented the flames from extending farther; and as the night was calm and still, the fire, thus discouraged, soon died out of itself. It smouldered away by degrees, showing still a red-white glow at places, while the crisp thatch crumbled away in the shape of fiery worms on to the ground below.

"How did it happen?" was Filip's first question when he could draw breath.

"It was the children," said the neighbors.

"No, father, it was the potatoes," said Kuba; and Kasza put in, "We were so hungry, Kuba and I, and there was nobody to give us our supper, and there was no milk, because the cow is gone; so we lighted the fire ourselves, but it wouldn't burn rightly, so we put in the hay and the straw out of the shed, and then the fire got too big, and all our potatoes were burnt up before we had eaten them;" and at the painful recollection Kasza's mouth began to quiver ominously. "And we are very hungry, Kuba and I; and please, father, will you give us our supper now?"

"I shall give you a beating," said the distracted father with a groan.

Next morning Filip stood looking at his burnt-down cow-shed and his charred roof for a long time, lost in thought, his foot pensively stirring the heap of grey ashes; then he seemed to come to a sudden resolution, for he shouldered his axe abruptly, and went off to the forest to cut new props and beams to replace those that had been destroyed.

In spite of his thrifty nature, he engaged two workmen to help him, and labored with indefatigable energy at the repairs; and when the roof was finished, he set to building up the shed again.

"What is the good of a cow-shed when you have no cow?" asked one of the neighbors. "You will not be buying another cow this year, I reckon, and what is left is big enough for the horses."

"How do you know that I shall not have a cow to put in it this year?" said Filip.

When all was finished, Filip one morning early harnessed his cart, and told Kuba and Kasza to get in. He was going away for the whole day, he said, and he would not trust them alone again. He locked the cottage door, and they drove away.

The villagers who saw them pass in the early dawn commented much on this unexpected move, and many and various were the explanations and conjectures.

"He has gone to buy a cow, — I had it from himself," said one.

"But where can he have gone for a cow?" objected another. "There is no fair this week anywhere in the country."

"And," said a third, "if he has gone to buy a cow, why take the children with him?"

"Perhaps he has gone quite away to settle elsewhere, or take service with some panie."

"But then, why should he have built up the cottage?"

"And the cow-shed?"

"That is for the new cow." "But he has not gone to buy a cow, I tell you; the children—"

"The children! Now I have it," said an old woman. "He has taken away the children to give them in charge to some relation. When a man has no wife to mind his house, what should he do with two bairns like that? Burning his house down over his head and getting him into fresh trouble every day! So mark my words—he will come back without the children."

"Yes, yes. Mother Halka," repeated a chorus; "you have hit the nail on the head; you are a wise woman. He will come back without the children."

That day and the next the cottage remained locked, but late in the evening of the second day a cart was seen returning from the direction which Filip had taken the day before. It was already wellnigh dark when the vehicle was seen driving into the little courtyard, the gate of which was immediately shut behind them. Despite the darkness, however, the neighbors had been able to distinguish the outlines of several figures—two larger and two smaller black silhouettes.

"He has brought back the children, after all," said one in surprise.

"And so old Mother Halka was wrong for once."

"A cow, a cow! " announced a lad who