In the doorway appeared a woman with a large bunch of keys in her hand.
It was a tall bony shape in a yellow frock, with its head wrapped in a red cloth, from beneath which coal-black, stubbly bristles peeped forth.
There had been a time when this woman was beautiful. She had oval features, a dimpled chin, red cheeks, black eyebrows, sparkling eyes, and a lofty forehead, but her whole face was now full of wrinkles, and the furrows on her forehead looked like the stave lines in a music-book.
"Jesus, Mary, and St. Anna protect me!" cried the wagoner, with chattering teeth. "If it is not Barbara Pirka in the flesh!"
The woman laughed aloud when she perceived the sledge.
"What! do even the clergy ride on besoms nowadays?" she cried, with rough pleasantry, while a couple of serving-men, whose shirt-sleeves were tucked up to their elbows, drew the bridge up again behind the in-gliding sledge and then shut the groaning door.
"A pleasant evening, Mother Pirka," said Simplex, chucking the woman under the chin; "'tis a long time since we two met together. Do you recognize me, eh?"
"Hah!" stammered the wagoner, "you'll pay for chucking her chin like that. The old hag will twist your neck for you this very night. Mark my words!"
"Be off, you devil's student!" cried the woman; "why can't you get out of my way? Where, pray, is the pastor of Great Leta?"
"He is lifting his wife out of the sledge yonder. Is the master at home?" The hangman was usually styled the master.