Page:Selected Czech tales - 1925.djvu/38

 groomsman. When Lukas saw her who shortly would be his bride he grew quite pale with excitement. ‘Lukas,’ she said, and held out her hand to him, while the tears poured from her eyes. Lukas greedily seized her hand and pressed it to his heart.

‘Lukas, believe me or not; perhaps it would have been better if we had never found each other than at this price. Maybe the poor woman had to die because I never thought of her except with bitterness, and grudging her the place at your side. I can’t get rid of the thought that my feeling like that may have hurt her, although father says it is a stupid idea, and God works His will without minding human wishes. But ever since I have learnt for whom the death knell was tolling, my tears have not ceased to flow.’

Lukas tried to comfort the weeping girl, but he himself had tears in his eyes.

Not indeed for his dead wife; but he thought how long it was since he had held Vendulka’s hand, and that he had had to pine through his best years without her, tied to a wife he did not love. Whoever saw these two young people standing together, holding each other’s hands and looking at each other with moist eyes, must have borne the old Moper a grudge