Page:Three stories by Vítězslav Hálek (1886).pdf/287

 Here Loyka, as he sat, so he got up, burning with ill-repressed emotions, and said “How, pray, dare you act thus when these chambers are mine.’

“If you are so sorry for your poor lodgers, call them back again,” said Joseph with a mocking smile.”

“And so I will call them back! Let one of the servants go and call them back.”

“The servants will go when I send them, dear father,” said Joseph with the same mocking smile. “The estate is once for all adjudged to me, and I think that the servants belong to me also.”

“What is that!” shrieked old Loyka.

“Come, come, there is no need to explain what you know quite as well as I do; the servants belong to the estate, and the estate belongs to me.”

“How so? And can I not venture to dismiss a servant if I choose,” enquired old Loyka in just the same sharp tones as at first.

“You can, just as I can take him on again if I choose. If you send him away, perhaps I shall take him on again, if he suits me.”

“And how, pray, dare you act thus when I am to be hospodar here six years longer?” And for this question he mustered all his self-importance.

“On my estate?” enquired Joseph drily.

“On thy estate!” screamed old Loyka, and here already his voice quivered with the welling tears. “And so, perhaps, you will tell me after a while that