'What are you hitting me for?' he asked in amazement.

'Where are the horses, you thief?' shouted Slimak.

'Horses? what horses?'

He was suddenly seized with sickness. Coming to himself a little, he looked round. Yes, something seemed to be missing from the stable; he wiped his forehead, looked again... the stable was empty.

'But where are the horses?' he asked.

'Where?' cried Slimak, 'where your brothers have taken them, you thief.' The labourer held out his hands.

'I never took them out. I haven't stirred from here all night, something must have happened... I am ill.'

He staggered up and had to support himself.

'What is that? You are trying to make out that you have lost your wits.

You know quite well that the horses have been stolen. Whoever stole them must have opened the door and led them over you.'

'G.o.d help me! no one opened the door, no one led them over me,' cried Maciek, bursting into sobs.

'Dad! Burek is lying dead behind the fence,' cried Jendrek, who came running up with his mother.

'They have poisoned him,' said the woman, 'the foam has frozen on his mouth.'

Maciek sank down in the open door, unable to stand any longer.

'The devil has got him too, he isn't like himself, something has fallen on him,' said Slimak.

'And may he keep it till he dies,'cried the woman, 'here he is sleeping in the stable and lets the horses be stolen. May the ground spit him out!'

Jendrek was looking for a stone, but his parents, taking notice of the man's deathly pallor and his sunken eyes for the first time, restrained him.

'Maybe they have poisoned him too,' whispered Slimakowa.

Slimak shrugged his shoulders, not knowing what to make of it.

He began to question Maciek: Had anything happened in his absence?

Slowly and with difficulty, but concealing nothing, Maciek told his story.

'Of course they gave me some filthy stuff, and then they made off with the horses,' he added, sobbing.

But instead of taking pity on him, Slimak burst out afresh:

'What? you took drink from strangers and never told me anything about it?'

'Why should I have bothered you, gospodarz, when you were a little bit screwed yourself?'

'What's that to do with you?' bawled Slimak, 'dogs have no right to notice whether one is drunk or not, they have to be all the more watchful when one is! You are a thief like the others, only you are worse. I took you in when you were starving, and you've robbed me in return.'

'Don't talk like that,' groaned Maciek, crawling to Slimak's feet, 'I have saved a few roubles from my wages, and there is my little chest and a bit of sheepskin and my sukmana; take it all, but don't say I robbed you. Your dog has not been more faithful, and they have poisoned him too.'

'Don't bother me,' cried Slimak, thrusting him aside, 'the fellow offers me his wages and his box when the horses were worth twenty-eight roubles.

I haven't taken twenty-eight roubles the whole year. If you were my own son I wouldn't let you off; neither of the boys have ever cost me as much.'

His anger overcame him, he beat himself with his clenched fists.

'Find the horses,' he cried, 'or I will give you in charge, go where you like, look where you like, but don't show your face here without them or one of us will die! I loathe you. Take that b.a.s.t.a.r.d or we will let it starve, and be off!'

'I will find the horses,' said Maciek, and drew his old sheepskin round him with trembling hands; 'perhaps G.o.d will help me.'

'The devil will help you, you low scoundrel,' said Slimak, and turned away.

'And leave your box,' added Jendrek.

'He has paid us out for our kindness,' whimpered Slimakowa, wiping her eyes. They went into the house.

Not one of them had a kind glance to spare for Maciek, although he was leaving them forever.

Slowly and painfully he wrapped the child up in an old bit of a shirt and a shawl, fastened his belt round himself and looked for a stick.

His head was aching as if he were going through a severe illness; he was unable to reason out the situation. He felt no resentment towards Slimak for having beaten him and driven him away; the gospodarz was in the right, of course; neither was he afraid of having no roof over his head; people like him never had any roof of their own; he was not thinking of the future. Another thought was torturing him...the horses.

For Slimak the horses were part of his working machinery, for Maciek they were friends and brothers. Who but they in the whole world had longed for him, had greeted him heartily when he returned, or looked after him when he went out? No one but Wojtek and Kasztan. For years they had shared hardships together. Now they were gone, perhaps led away into misery, through his, Maciek's, fault.

He fancied he heard them neighing. They were becoming sensible of what was happening to them and were calling to him for help!

'I am coming, I am coming,' he muttered, took the child on his arm, seized the stick and limped forth. He did not look round, he would see the gospodarstwo again when he came back with the horses.

He saw Burek lying stark behind the barn, but he had no thought to spare for him; he peered for the traces of the horses' feet. There they were, stamped into the snow as into wax; Kasztan's large feet and the broken hoof of Wojtek; here the thieves had mounted and ridden off at a slow trot. How bold, how sure of themselves they had been! But Maciek will find you! The peasant rancour in him had been awakened. If you escape to the end of the world he will pursue you; if you dig yourselves into the ground he will dig you out with his hands; if you escape to Heaven he will stand at the gate and importune the saints until they fly all over the universe and give him back the horses!

On the highroad the tracks became less distinct, but they were still recognizable. Maciek could read the whole history of the peregrination in them. Here Kasztan had been startled and had shied; here the thief had dismounted and altered Wojtek's bridle. What gentlemen they were, these thieves, they came stealing in new boots, such as no gentleman need have been ashamed of!

Near the church the tracks became confused and, what was worse, divided. Kasztan had been ridden to the right and Wojtek to the left.

After reflecting for a moment, Maciek followed the latter track, possibly because it was clearer, but most likely because he loved that little horse the best. About noon he found himself near the village where Magda's uncle, the Soltys Grochowski, lived. He turned in there, hoping for a bite of food; he was hungry and the little girl was crying.

Grochowski was at home and in the middle of receiving a sound rating from his wife for no particular reason but just for the pleasure of it.

The huge man was sitting on the bench by the wall, with one arm on the table and the other on the window-sill, listening with an expression of fixed attention to his wife's homilies; this attention was, however, a.s.sumed, for whenever she buried her head among the pots and pans on the stove he yawned and stretched himself, pulling a face as if the conversation had long been distasteful to him.

As his wife was in the habit of relenting before strangers, so as not to prejudice his office, Grochowski hailed Maciek's arrival gladly, and ordered food for him and milk for the little girl, adding cold meat and vodka to the repast when he heard the news that Slimak's horses had been stolen and that Maciek was applying to him for advice. He even talked of drawing up a statement, but the necessary implements were not at hand. So he drew Maciek into the alcove for a long, whispered conversation, the upshot of which was that they must proceed with caution upon the track of the thieves, as certain strong influences tied Grochowski's hands until he had clearer evidence. Maciek was also given to understand why Jasiek Gryb had entertained the gospodarz and his family so liberally, and Grochowski even seemed to know the man who had presented Maciek with the monks' cordial and said that the woman in the sledge was not a woman at all.

'I will do whatever you tell me, Soltys,' said Maciek, embracing his knees, 'even if you should send me to my death.'

'It is no use tracking near here,' said the Soltys, 'we know all about that, but it would be useful to know where the other track leads to.

Follow that as far as you can, and if you find any clue let me know at once. You ought to be back here by to-morrow.'

'And shall we find the horses?'

'We shall find them even if we had to drag them out of the thieves'