down beside Bára on the grass, said: “It was only a passing thought. I believe in him as I do in God! Oh, if I were only that little bird and could fly to him and tell him all that grieves me!”
To Bára at once occurred the song, “If I were a nightingale!” and she began to sing, but it did not go merrily, for in the middle of the song she paused suddenly, as if terror-stricken. Her cheeks, too, became red.
“What frightened you? Why did you stop singing?” Elška asked, but Bára did not answer, only gazed off into the forest.
“Bára, Bára!” Elška shook her finger reproachfully. “You are hiding something from me and I haven’t a secret thought before you. That isn’t nice of you.”
“I don’t know myself what I’d say,” replied Bára.
“Why did you start just now! You are never afraid of anything? Who was that in the forest?”
“A huntsman, perhaps,” Bára said evasively.
“You know very well who it was. Your fright wasn’t over nothing. Maybe it was the ghost you saw?”
“No, no! I wouldn’t be afraid of that,” laughed Bára heartily, and wished to change the subject, but Elška persisted in unreeling the same thread until finally she asked directly if Bára would marry Josífek in case he did not become a priest. Bára burst into even louder laughter than before.
‘God save me!” she cried. “The sexton’s wife
