The old woman went out, and a few minutes later Lukáshka’s dumb sister came up the creaking steps and entered the hut. She was six years older than her brother and would have been extremely like him had it not been for the dull and coarsely changeable expression (common to all deaf and dumb people) of her face. She wore a coarse smock all patched; her feet were bare and muddy, and on her head she had an old blue kerchief. Her neck, arms, and face were sinewy like a peasant’s. Her clothing and her whole appearance indicated that she always did the hard work of a man. She brought in a heap of logs which she threw down by the oven. Then she went up to her brother, and with a joyful smile which made her whole face pucker up, touched him on the shoulder and began making rapid signs to him with her hands, her face, and whole body.
“That’s right, that’s right, Stëpka is a trump!” answered the brother, nodding. “She’s fetched everything and mended everything, she’s a trump! Here, take this for it!” He brought out two pieces of gingerbread from his pocket and gave them to her.
The dumb woman’s face flushed with pleasure, and she began making a weird noise for joy. Having seized the gingerbread she began to gesticulate still more rapidly, frequently pointing in one direction and passing her thick finger over her eyebrows and her face. Lukáshka understood her and kept nodding, while he smiled slightly. She was telling him to give the girls dainties, and that the girls liked him, and that one girl, Maryánka—the best of them all—loved him. She indicated Maryánka by rapidly pointing in the direction of Maryánka’s home and to her own eyebrows and face, and by smacking her lips and swaying her head. “Loves” she expressed by pressing her hands to her breast, kissing her hand, and pretending to embrace someone. Their mother returned to the hut, and seeing what her dumb daughter was saying, smiled and shook her head. Her daughter showed her the gingerbread and again made the noise which expressed joy.
“I told Ulítka the other day that I’d send a matchmaker to them,” said the mother. “She took my words well.”
Lukáshka looked silently at his mother.
“But how about selling the wine, mother? I need a horse.”
“I’ll cart it when I have time. I must get the barrels ready,” said the mother, evidently not wishing her son to meddle in domestic matters. “When you go out you’ll find a bag in the passage. I borrowed from the neighbours and got something for you to take back to the cordon; or shall I put it in your saddle-bag?”
“All right,” answered Lukáshka. “And if Giréy Khan should come across the river send him to me at the cordon, for I shan’t get leave again for a long time now; I have some business with him.”
He began to get ready to start.
“I will send him on,” said the old woman. “It seems you have been spreeing at Yámka’s all the time. I went out in the night to see the cattle, and I think it was your voice I heard singing songs.”