'Jagna, get the butter ready; Maciek and Jendrek, go to the river for the crayfish; Magda, take three score of the finest cucumbers, and throw in an extra ten. Jesus Mary! Have we ever done business like this! You will have to buy yourself a new silk kerchief, and a new shirt for Jendrek.'
'Our luck has come,' said Slimakowa, 'and I must certainly buy a silk kerchief, or else no one in the village will believe that we have made so much money.'
'I don't quite like it that the new carriages will go without horses,' said Slimak; 'but that can't be helped.'
When they took their produce to the engineers' encampment, they received fresh orders, for there were more than a dozen men, who made him their general purveyor. Slimak went round to the neighbouring cottages and bought what he needed, making a penny profit on every penny he spent, while his customers praised the cheapness of the produce. After a week the party moved further off, and Slimak found himself in possession of twenty-five roubles that seemed to have fallen from the sky, not counting what he had earned for the hire of his horses and cart, and payment for the days of labour he had lost. But somehow the money made him feel ashamed.
'Do you know, Jagna,' he said, 'perhaps we ought to go after the gentlemen and give them back their money.'
'Oh nonsense!' cried the woman, 'trading is always like that. What did the Jew charge for the chickens? just double your price.'
'But it is the Jew's trade, and besides, he isn't a Christian.'
'Therefore he makes the greater profits. Come, Josef, the gentlemen did not pay for the things only, but for the trouble you took.'
This, and the thought that everybody who came from Warsaw obviously had much money to spend, reassured the peasant.
As he and the rest of the family were so much occupied with their new duties, all the harvesting fell to Maciek's share. He had to go to the hill from early dawn till late at night, and cut, bind, and shock the sheaves single-handed. But in spite of his industry the work took longer than usual, and Slimak hired old Sobieska to help him. She came at six o'clock, armed with a bottle of 'remedy' for a wound in the leg, did the work of two while she sang songs which made even Maciek blush, until the afternoon, and then took her 'remedy'. The cure then pulled her down so much that the scythe fell from her hand.