“So that’s what she’s driving at!” thought he. “Ah, Philip, Philip, now you’re going to catch it!”
But he summoned all the courage he had, and, turning his eyes away, answered:
“What a hurry you’re in, Galya, I declare! Thinking about the wedding already, are you? How can we get married when I am a miller and may soon be the richest man in the village, and you are only a poor widow’s daughter?”
The girl staggered back at these words as if a snake had bitten her. She jumped away from Philip and laid her hand on her heart.
“But I thought—oh, my poor head—then why did you knock at the window, you wicked man?”
“Eh hey!” answered the miller. “You ask why I knocked. Why shouldn’t I knock when your mother owes me money? And then you come jumping out and begin to kiss me. What can I do? I know how to kiss as well as any man——”
And he stretched out his hand toward her again, but the moment he touched the girl’s body she started as if an insect had stung her.
“Get away!” she screamed, so angrily that the miller fell back a step. “I’m not a rouble bill that you can lay your hands on as if I belonged to you. If you come back again I’ll warm you up so that you’ll forget how to make love for three years.”
The miller was taken aback.
“What a little firebrand it is! Do you think I’m a Jew that you howl at me so hatefully?”