“Foolish girl, that was but a dream! What you were thinking of during the day, you dreamed at night! And anyway,” the boyar added after a pause, “and anyway, you will never see him again!”
“Never see him?” cried Peace-Renown, alarmed. “Why won’t I see him? Is he dead?”
“Even if he lived to be a hundred, you won’t ever see him again because we will never return to that region.”
“Not return? Why?”
“Because,” replied the boyar with a forced casualness, “because those KIND people of yours and first of all, that old devil, the father of your Maxim, passed a unanimous resolution at their town meeting to drive us out of their village, to tear down our house and destroy all signs of our ever having lived there! But just wait, you churlish boors and you will learn with whom you have to deal! Tuhar Wolf is not just a common Tukholian wolf, but knows how to get the best of even the Tukholian bears!”
These words struck like a dagger in Peace-Renown’s heart.
“Drive us away, father? Why do they want to drive us out? Oh yes, I think I know, it must be because of that forester whom you ordered so cruelly beaten though I begged you to the point of tears to let him go?”
“How you always do remember the unpleasant things!” broke in Tuhar Wolf splenetically although deep in his heart he was pained at this reproach coming from his own daughter’s lips.
“Oh, I know very well that if you had been present at their meeting you would have sided with them against your own father! But what can one do? Your father is old and crabbed, does not know how to make his eyes twinkle or how to sigh. No, you are not satisfied with such a companion! And what does it matter to you that your father has become prematurely grey trying his best to insure your future, while
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