e was pleased to
think that Boehnke was to have this vexation, for was he treating the
master as he should? No, he did not wish him well, she felt that. The
woman was the Pani, she could do what she liked; but strangers were not
to hurt her master, she would not stand that. The maid grinned like a
gnome; it served the schoolmaster right. If the Pani had chosen this
man, then she, Marianna, would take Mr. Mikolai; he was not at all bad.
He was certainly not so well-built as this one, he was a little more
thick-set, but he too had a nice face with a little moustache; and when
she came to think of it, he was even kinder. He had clapped her on her
neck when he had come into the cow-shed with Rosa, where she was just
milking a cow. And he had said "Good evening" to her, and had asked her
with a merry laugh, "Who's your sweetheart, my girl?" Then she had had
to laugh too, laugh so that the cow had grown restive and had knocked
the pail, which she was holding between her knees, with its hind legs,
so that the milk had been upset, the stool had fallen, and she with it.

[Pg 194]

CHAPTER IX

Mrs. Tiralla was kneeling in the confessional.

When the turn came for the sins against the sixth and ninth
commandments, she trembled in all her limbs. How quickly and easily she
had hitherto been able to answer in the negative when the question,
"Have you had any unclean thoughts or desires?" had been put to her.
But what was she to say now? How Father Szypulski, who knew her so well
and whom she would probably meet again to-morrow or the day after,
would stare at her when she confessed to him what had tortured her day
and night for weeks and months, ever since Martin Becker had been at
Starydwor. Especially at night when she tossed about so restlessly. If
she were to whisper in a trembling voice that she longed for this man
as she longed for her eternal salvation? And if the priest then
questioned her further, if he went into particulars? If she had to
describe every thought, every wish that filled her soul and her body,
reveal them in such a way that her penitent confession might be
followed by absolution in the Sacrament of Penance?

She felt overwhelmed with shame; she bent her head so low and whispered
so softly that the confessor was not able to hear anything.

And Father Szypulski did not ask any questions; it was not necessary to
go any further into the matter [Pg 195] with this woman.