'They might, but the stable was locked and the key with the foreman.'
The conversation passed on to other topics.
'Look after Sukiennik and Rogacz,' the sergeant said, on his departure, when he and his mare had been sufficiently rested.
'Am I their father, or are they in my service?'
'They might rob you.'
'Oh! I'll see to that all right!'
The sergeant returned home, half asleep, half awake. Sukiennik and Rogacz kept passing before his vision; they had their hands full of locks and were surrounded by horses. Josel's smiling face was hovering over them and now and then old Gryb and his son Jasiek jeered from behind a cloud. He sat up…startled. But there was nothing near him except the white hen under the box and the trees by the wayside. He spat.
'Bah…dreams!' he muttered.
The peasants were relieved when day after day passed and there was no sign of building in the camp. They jumped to the conclusion that either the Germans had not been able to come to terms with Hirschgold, or had quarrelled with the Hamers, or that they had lost heart because of the horse-thieves.
'Why, they haven't so much as measured out the ground!' cried
Orzchewski, and washed down the remark with a huge glass of beer.
He had, however, not yet wiped his mouth when a cart pulled up at the inn and the surveyor alighted. They knew him directly by his moustaches, which were trimmed to the resemblance of eels, and by his sloeberry-coloured nose.