sed him and held her tighter. Pavel tried to drag her away.
In the struggle, the groom rose. Pavel knocked him over the side of the
sledge and threw the girl after him. He said he never remembered exactly
how he did it, or what happened afterward. Peter, crouching in the front
seat, saw nothing. The first thing either of them noticed was a new sound
that broke into the clear air, louder than they had ever heard it
before--the bell of the monastery of their own village, ringing for early
prayers.

Pavel and Peter drove into the village alone, and they had been alone ever
since. They were run out of their village. Pavel's own mother would not
look at him. They went away to strange towns, but when people learned
where they came from, they were always asked if they knew the two men who
had fed the bride to the wolves. Wherever they went, the story followed
them. It took them five years to save money enough to come to America.
They worked in Chicago, Des Moines, Fort Wayne, but they were always
unfortunate. When Pavel's health grew so bad, they decided to try farming.

Pavel died a few days after he unburdened his mind to Mr. Shimerda, and
was buried in the Norwegian graveyard. Peter sold off everything, and left
the country--went to be cook in a railway construction camp where gangs of
Russians were employed.

At his sale we bought Peter's wheelbarrow and some of his harness. During
the auction he went about with his head down, and never lifted his eyes.
He seemed not to care about anything. The Black Hawk money-lender who held
mortgages on Peter's live-stock was there, and he bought in the sale notes
at about fifty cents on the dollar. Every one said Peter kissed the cow
before she was led away by her new owner. I did not see him do it, but
this I know: after all his furniture and his cook-stove and pots and pans
had been hauled off by the purchasers, when his house was stripped and
bare, he sat down on the floor with his clasp-knife and ate all the melons
that he had put away for winter. When Mr. Shimerda and Krajiek drove up in
their wagon to take Peter to the train, they found him with a dripping
beard, surrounded by heaps of melon rinds.

The loss of his two friends had a depressing effect upon old Mr. Shimerda.
When he was out hunting, he used to go into the empty log house and sit
there, brooding. This cabin was his hermitage until the winter snows
penned him in his cave. For Antonia and me, the story of the weddin