Yet even by this deadly winter the germ of hope was not to be kept
from sprouting in their hearts. It was just at this time that the great
adventure befell Marija.

The victim was Tamoszius Kuszleika, who played the violin. Everybody
laughed at them, for Tamoszius was petite and frail, and Marija could
have picked him up and carried him off under one arm. But perhaps that
was why she fascinated him; the sheer volume of Marija's energy was
overwhelming. That first night at the wedding Tamoszius had hardly taken
his eyes off her; and later on, when he came to find that she had really
the heart of a baby, her voice and her violence ceased to terrify him,
and he got the habit of coming to pay her visits on Sunday afternoons.
There was no place to entertain company except in the kitchen, in the
midst of the family, and Tamoszius would sit there with his hat between
his knees, never saying more than half a dozen words at a time, and
turning red in the face before he managed to say those; until finally
Jurgis would clap him upon the back, in his hearty way, crying, "Come
now, brother, give us a tune." And then Tamoszius' face would light up
and he would get out his fiddle, tuck it under his chin, and play. And
forthwith the soul of him would flame up and become eloquent--it was
almost an impropriety, for all the while his gaze would be fixed upon
Marija's face, until she would begin to turn red and lower her eyes.
There was no resisting the music of Tamoszius, however; even the
children would sit awed and wondering, and the tears would run down Teta
Elzbieta's cheeks. A wonderful privilege it was to be thus admitted into
the soul of a man of genius, to be allowed to share the ecstasies and
the agonies of his inmost life.