Part 4 (1/2)

Simon was surprised. Michael never used to look out into the street, but now he pressed against the window, staring at something. Simon also looked out, and saw that a well-dressed woman was really coming to his hut, leading by the hand two little girls in fur coats and woolen shawls. The girls could hardly be told one from the other, except that one of them was crippled in her left leg and walked with a limp.

The woman stepped into the porch and entered the pa.s.sage. Feeling about for the entrance she found the latch, which she lifted, and opened the door. She let the two girls go in first, and followed them into the hut.

”Good day, good folk!”

”Pray come in,” said Simon. ”What can we do for you?”

The woman sat down by the table. The two little girls pressed close to her knees, afraid of the people in the hut.

”I want leather shoes made for these two little girls for spring.”

”We can do that. We never have made such small shoes, but we can make them; either welted or turnover shoes, linen lined. My man, Michael, is a master at the work.”

Simon glanced at Michael and saw that he had left his work and was sitting with his eyes fixed on the little girls. Simon was surprised.

It was true the girls were pretty, with black eyes, plump, and rosy-cheeked, and they wore nice kerchiefs and fur coats, but still Simon could not understand why Michael should look at them like that--just as if he had known them before. He was puzzled, but went on talking with the woman, and arranging the price. Having fixed it, he prepared the measure. The woman lifted the lame girl on to her lap and said: ”Take two measures from this little girl. Make one shoe for the lame foot and three for the sound one. They both have the same size feet. They are twins.”

Simon took the measure and, speaking of the lame girl, said: ”How did it happen to her? She is such a pretty girl. Was she born so?”

”No, her mother crushed her leg.”

Then Matryona joined in. She wondered who this woman was, and whose the children were, so she said: ”Are not you their mother then?”

”No, my good woman; I am neither their mother nor any relation to them.

They were quite strangers to me, but I adopted them.”

”They are not your children and yet you are so fond of them?”

”How can I help being fond of them? I fed them both at my own b.r.e.a.s.t.s.

I had a child of my own, but G.o.d took him. I was not so fond of him as I now am of them.”

”Then whose children are they?”

IX

The woman, having begun talking, told them the whole story.

”It is about six years since their parents died, both in one week: their father was buried on the Tuesday, and their mother died on the Friday.

These orphans were born three days after their father's death, and their mother did not live another day. My husband and I were then living as peasants in the village. We were neighbors of theirs, our yard being next to theirs. Their father was a lonely man; a wood-cutter in the forest. When felling trees one day, they let one fall on him. It fell across his body and crushed his bowels out. They hardly got him home before his soul went to G.o.d; and that same week his wife gave birth to twins--these little girls. She was poor and alone; she had no one, young or old, with her. Alone she gave them birth, and alone she met her death.”

”The next morning I went to see her, but when I entered the hut, she, poor thing, was already stark and cold. In dying she had rolled on to this child and crushed her leg. The village folk came to the hut, washed the body, laid her out, made a coffin, and buried her. They were good folk. The babies were left alone. What was to be done with them? I was the only woman there who had a baby at the time. I was nursing my first-born--eight weeks old. So I took them for a time. The peasants came together, and thought and thought what to do with them; and at last they said to me: 'For the present, Mary, you had better keep the girls, and later on we will arrange what to do for them.' So I nursed the sound one at my breast, but at first I did not feed this crippled one. I did not suppose she would live. But then I thought to myself, why should the poor innocent suffer? I pitied her, and began to feed her. And so I fed my own boy and these two--the three of them--at my own breast. I was young and strong, and had good food, and G.o.d gave me so much milk that at times it even overflowed. I used sometimes to feed two at a time, while the third was waiting. When one had enough I nursed the third. And G.o.d so ordered it that these grew up, while my own was buried before he was two years old. And I had no more children, though we prospered.

Now my husband is working for the corn merchant at the mill. The pay is good, and we are well off. But I have no children of my own, and how lonely I should be without these little girls! How can I help loving them! They are the joy of my life!”

She pressed the lame little girl to her with one hand, while with the other she wiped the tears from her cheeks.