in which suddenly something gives way beneath you, and you feel yourself
sinking, sinking, down into bottomless abysses. As if in a flash of
lightning they saw themselves--victims of a relentless fate, cornered,
trapped, in the grip of destruction. All the fair structure of their
hopes came crashing about their ears.--And all the time the old woman
was going on talking. They wished that she would be still; her voice
sounded like the croaking of some dismal raven. Jurgis sat with his
hands clenched and beads of perspiration on his forehead, and there was
a great lump in Ona's throat, choking her. Then suddenly Teta Elzbieta
broke the silence with a wail, and Marija began to wring her hands and
sob, "Ai! Ai! Beda man!"

All their outcry did them no good, of course. There sat Grandmother
Majauszkiene, unrelenting, typifying fate. No, of course it was not
fair, but then fairness had nothing to do with it. And of course they
had not known it. They had not been intended to know it. But it was in
the deed, and that was all that was necessary, as they would find when
the time came.

Somehow or other they got rid of their guest, and then they passed a
night of lamentation. The children woke up and found out that something
was wrong, and they wailed and would not be comforted. In the morning,
of course, most of them had to go to work, the packing houses would not
stop for their sorrows; but by seven o'clock Ona and her stepmother were
standing at the door of the office of the agent. Yes, he told them, when
he came, it was quite true that they would have to pay interest. And
then Teta Elzbieta broke forth into protestations and reproaches, so
that the people outside stopped and peered in at the window. The agent
was as bland as ever. He was deeply pained, he said. He had not told
them, simply because he had supposed they would understand that they had