Page:Selected Czech tales - 1925.djvu/271

 He put his gun down at the poacher’s feet, stepped back a few paces, leant his back against a tree and waited.

Novák stood motionless, he grew paler still, his eyes glowed with a dull, smouldering fire. He stooped slowly and picked up the gun; he held it in his hand, weighing it greedily and cunningly without taking his eyes off Martin’s face. Martin knew that now at last the moment for simple, natural justice had arrived. He had crippled this man, had meant to murder him, and now the man would settle up with him. Martin had been asking for this ten times daily.

Novák was still standing and weighing the gun in his hands; only his jaw was working, and his terrible, far-off, sorrowful look searched the forester’s face, to try and understand from his expression what he meant. ‘Why the devil don’t you shoot?’ cried Martin. His teeth were chattering in short spasms, as if he were in a fever. He was hungering for the shot, but he could hardly bear the delay, and the poacher’s irony was not a part of his programme and the whole composition.

‘Young Martin, you think I’ll be generous and spare you, but what if I do shoot? You’d