Presently grandfather came in and spoke to me: ‘Jimmy, we will not have prayers this morning, because we have a great deal to do. Old Mr. Shimerda is dead, and his family are in great distress. Ambrosch came over here in the middle of the night, and Jake and Otto went back with him. The boys have had a hard night, and you must not bother them with questions. That is Ambrosch, asleep on the bench. Come in to breakfast, boys.’
After Jake and Otto had swallowed their first cup of coffee, they began to talk excitedly, disregarding grandmother’s warning glances. I held my tongue, but I listened with all my ears.
‘No, sir,’ Fuchs said in answer to a question from grandfather, ‘nobody heard the gun go off. Ambrosch was out with the ox-team, trying to break a road, and the women-folks was shut up tight in their cave. When Ambrosch come in, it was dark and he didn’t see nothing, but the oxen acted kind of queer. One of ‘em ripped around and got away from him—bolted clean out of the stable. His hands is blistered where the rope run through. He got a lantern and went back and found the old man, just as we seen him.’
‘Poor soul, poor soul!’ grandmother groaned. ‘I’d like to think he never done it. He was always considerate and un-wishful to give trouble. How could he forget himself and bring this on us!’
‘I don’t think he was out of his head for a minute, Mrs. Burden,’ Fuchs declared. ‘He done everything natural. You know he was always sort of fixy, and fixy he was to the last. He shaved after dinner, and washed hisself all over after the girls had done the dishes. Ántonia heated the water for him. Then he put on a clean shirt and clean socks, and after he was dressed he kissed her and the little one and took his gun and said he was going out to hunt rabbits. He must have gone right down to the barn and done it then. He layed down on that bunk-bed, close to the ox stalls, where he always slept. When we found him, everything was decent except’—Fuchs wrinkled his brow and hesitated—‘except what he couldn’t nowise foresee. His coat was hung on a peg, and his boots was under the bed. He’d took off that silk neckcloth he always wore, and folded it smooth and stuck his pin through it. He turned back his shirt at the neck and rolled up his sleeves.’
‘I don’t see how he could do it!’ grandmother kept saying.
Otto misunderstood her. ‘Why, ma’am, it was simple enough; he pulled the trigger with his big toe. He layed over on his side and put the end of the barrel in his mouth, then he drew up one foot and felt for the trigger. He found it all right!’
‘Maybe he did,’ said Jake grimly. ‘There’s something mighty queer about it.’
‘Now what do you mean, Jake?’ grandmother asked sharply.
‘Well, ma’m, I found Krajiek’s axe under the manger, and I picks it up and carries it over to the corpse, and I take my oath it just fit the gash in the front of the old man’s face. That there Krajiek had been sneakin’ round, pale and quiet, and when he seen me examinin’ the axe, he begun whimperin’, “My God, man, don’t do that!” “I reckon I’m a-goin’ to look into this,” says I. Then he begun to squeal like a rat and run about wringin’ his hands. “They’ll hang me!” says he. “My God, they’ll hang me sure!”’