She jumped up so quickly that the bowl of potatoes rolled on to the ground: there was no longer any doubt; Łysek was bounding up to his shoulder. The woman rushed forward, shouting in the full strength of her joy: 'Bartek! Bartek!'
'Magda, here I am!' Bartek cried, throwing her a kiss, and hurrying towards her. He opened the gate, stumbled over the step so that he all but fell, recovered himself,—and they were clasped in one anothers' arms.
The woman began to speak quickly:
'And I had thought that you would not come back. I thought "they will kill him!"—How are you?—Let me see. How good to look at you! You are terribly thin! Oh Jesu! Poor fellow!—Oh, my dearest!... He has come back, come back!'
For one moment she tore herself from his neck and looked at him, then threw herself on to it again.
'Come back! The Lord be praised! Bartek, my darling! How are you? Go indoors! Franek is at school being teased by that horrid German! The boy is well. He's as dull in the upper storey as you are. Oh, but it was time for you to come back! I didn't know any more which way to turn. I was miserable, I tell you, miserable! This whole poor house is going into ruins. The roof is off the barn. How are you? Oh, Bartek! Bartek! That I should actually see you, after all! What trouble I have had with the hay!—The neighbours helped me, but they did it to help themselves! How are you?—Well? Oh, but I am glad to have you,—glad! The Lord watched over you. Go indoors. By God, it's like Bartek, and not like Bartek! What's the matter with you? Oh dear! Oh dear!'
At that instant Magda had become aware of a long scar running along Bartek's face across his left temple and cheek and down to his beard.
'It's nothing.—A Cuirassier did it for me, but I did the same for him. I have been in hospital.'
'Oh Jesu!'
'Why, it's a mere flea-bite.'