Page:Three stories by Vítězslav Hálek (1886).pdf/406

 Loyka smiled and walked about the room, and said as he did so, “It is all a very well concocted plan, but I am already old, why should I not allow myself to take a few steps in a room which was once my own.”

“It is yours, so long as you are pleased to stay in it,” said Bartos.

“Good lad, I must trust you, although I do not know yet whether you speak the truth.” And Loyka looked out of the window at the courtyard.

“I wonder who that is standing in the courtyard?” he said, “If I am not mistaken it is the old harvester.”

“He has been already waiting two days to see you and to have a talk with you,” they said.

“Well let him come and say his say,” responded Loyka, “I always gladly talk with him.”

They called to the harvester and he came. “I am come to you, pantata, to enquire whether you will require the services of the old harvester this summer? Because they are ready to engage us in Caslavska, and I said that we would go if our old pantata Loyka did not require our services.”

“Have you spoken to the young folk,” enquired Loyka.

“They told me that everything depended on you,” answered the harvester.

“Well, if they said that to you come all of you to our harvesting. To be sure, where else would you go, when we need your services here.”