evening came, Dorothy, her eyes red with crying and her dress in disorder, returned to her hut with the neighbours who came to comfort her. Although the mischievous conduct of Yanechek had dug a deep gulf between her and the people about her, yet the grief of the mother built a bridge over it, and they came to comfort the bereaved widow. No sooner had they entered the hut than they were seized with terror, and rushed out of the door again, screaming, "A ghost! a ghost!"
Yanechek sat at the table at which a lamp was burning, and where a dish full of stewed red mushrooms was steaming. He was eating and evidently enjoying the savoury dish.
"You wicked boy!" exclaimed Dorothy, both surprised at the sight of her unexpected visitor and vexed at the rapid disappearance of her favourite delicacy; "is it right to treat your mother in this way?"
"Are you vexed, mother," cried Yanechek laughing at her, "that I have been eating mushrooms?"
Then he jumped upon the table, lay down, and putting his hands under his chin, made faces at her.
"The Water Demon take you!" cried the shepherdess, her cheeks turning red, really angry for the first time in her life with Yanechek. But the next instant her face grew deadly pale again, for through the window came the words,—
