The brothers looked with amazement one at another.
"Why say unsavory?" asked Marek. "You do not think we brought it for Yatsek to eat, do you?"
"I thank you from my soul for your good wishes," said Tachevski. "I think that ye did not bring it to me to be stored away."
"It has grown a little green--it might be smoke-dried."
"Let a man bury it at once," said the priest with severity; "it is the ear of a Christian in every case."
"In Kieff we have seen better treatment," growled out Mateush.
"Krepetski came hither undoubtedly," remarked Yatsek, "to make a new attack on Anulka."
"He will not take her away from the king's palace," said the prudent Pan Serafin, "but he did not come for that, if I think correctly. His attack failed, so I suppose he only wanted to learn whether we know that he arranged it, and if we have complained of him. Perhaps old Krepetski did not know of his son's undertaking; but perhaps he did know; if he did, then both must be greatly alarmed, and I am not at all surprised that Martsian came here to investigate."
"Well," said Stanislav, laughing, "he has no luck with the Bukoyemskis, indeed he has not."
"Let him go," said Tachevski. "To-day I am ready to forgive him."