Children of the Soil. Генрик Сенкевич

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СКАЧАТЬ is sleeping?” asked she, in a low voice, placing the lamp on the table beyond Litka’s head.

      “She is,” answered Pan Stanislav, in an equally low voice.

      Pani Emilia looked long at the sleeping child.

      “See,” whispered Pan Stanislav, “how regularly and calmly she breathes. To-morrow she will be healthier and stronger.”

      “Yes,” answered the mother, with a smile.

      “Now it is your turn. Sleep, sleep! otherwise I shall begin to command without pity.”

      Her eyes continued to smile at him thankfully. In the mild blue light of the night-lamp she seemed like an apparition. She had a perfectly angelic face; and Pan Stanislav thought in spite of himself that she and Litka looked really like forms from beyond the earth, which by pure chance had wandered into this world.

      “Yes,” answered she; “I will rest now. Marynia has come, and Professor Vaskovski. Marynia wishes absolutely to remain.”

      “So much the better. She manages so well near the little girl. Good-night.”

      “Good-night.”

      Pan Stanislav was alone again, and began to think of Marynia. At the very intelligence that he would see her soon he could not think of aught else; and now he put the question to himself: “In what lies this wonderful secret of nature in virtue of which I, for example, did not fall in love with Pani Emilia, decidedly more beautiful than Marynia, likely better, sweeter, more capable of loving, – but with that girl whom I know incomparably less, and, justly or unjustly, honor less?” Still with every approach of his to Marynia there rose in him immediately all those impulses which a man may feel at sight of a chosen woman, while a real womanly form, like that of Pani Emilia, made no other impression on him than if she had been a painting or a carving. Why is this, and why, the more culture a man has, the more his nerves become subtile, and his sensitiveness keener, the greater difference does he make between woman and woman? Pan Stanislav had no answer to this save the one which that doctor in love with Panna Kraslavski had given him: “I estimate her coolly, but I cannot tear my soul from her.” That was rather the description of a phenomenon than an answer, for which, moreover, he had not the time, since Marynia came in at that moment.

      They nodded in salutation; he raised a chair then, and put it down softly at Litka’s bed, letting Marynia know by a sign that she was to sit there. She began to speak first, or rather, to whisper.

      “Go to tea now. Professor Vaskovski is here.”

      “And Pani Emilia?”

      “She could not sit up. She said that it was a wonder to her, but she must sleep.”

      “I know why: the doctor hypnotized her, and he did well. The little girl is indeed better.”

      Marynia gazed into his eyes; but he repeated, —

      “She is really better – if the attack will not return, and there is hope that it will not.”

      “Ah! praise be to God! But go now and drink tea.”

      He preferred, however, to whisper to her near by and confidentially, so he said, —

      “I will, I will; but later. Let us arrange meanwhile so that you may rest. I have heard that your father is ill. Of course you have been watching over him.”

      “Father is well now, and I wish to take Emilia’s place absolutely. She told me that the servants had not slept either all last night, for the child’s condition was alarming before the attack. It is needful now that some one be on the watch always. I should wish, therefore, so to arrange that we – that is, I, you, and Emilka – should follow in turn.”

      “Very well; but to-day I will remain. If not here, I shall be at call in the next chamber. When did you hear of the attack?”

      “I did not hear of it. I came as I do usually in the evening to learn what was to be heard.”

      “Pani Emilia’s servant hurried to me while I was dining. You can imagine easily how I flew hither. I was not sure of finding her alive. What wonder, since during dinner I talked almost all the time of Litka with Bukatski and Vaskovski, till Mashko came with the announcement of his marriage.”

      “Is Mashko going to marry?”

      “Yes. The news has not gone around yet; but he announced it himself. He marries Panna Kraslavski; you remember her?”

      “She who was at the Bigiels that evening. She is a good match for Mashko, Panna Kraslavski.”

      There was silence for a moment. Marynia, who, not loving Mashko, had rejected his hand, but who more than once had reproached herself for her conduct with regard to him, thinking that she had exposed him to deception and suffering, could find only comfort in the news that the young advocate had borne the blow so easily. Still the news astonished her for the time, and also wounded her. Women, when they sympathize with some one, wish first that some one to be really unhappy, and, secondly, they wish to alleviate the misfortune themselves; when it turns out that another is able to do that, they undergo a certain disillusion. Marynia’s self-love was wounded also doubly. She had not thought that it would be so easy to forget her; hence she had to confess that her idea of Mashko as an exceptional man had no basis. He had been for her hitherto a kind of ace in the game against Pan Stanislav; now he had ceased to be that. She felt, therefore, let matters be as they might, somewhat conquered. This did not prevent her, it is true, from informing Pan Stanislav, with a certain accent of truth, that his news caused her sincere and deep joy, but at bottom she felt in some sort offended by him because he had told her.

      For a certain time Pan Stanislav had acted with her very reservedly, and in nothing had he betrayed what was happening within him. He did not feign to be too cool, for they had to meet; therefore, in meeting her he maintained even a certain kindly freedom, but for this very reason she judged that he had ceased to love her, and such is human nature, that though the old offence was existing yet, and had even increased in the soul of the young woman, though her first disillusion had changed as it were into a spring, giving forth new bitterness continually, still the thought that her repugnance was indifferent to him irritated Marynia. Now it seemed to her that Pan Stanislav must even triumph over her mistake as to Mashko; and at this, that in every case she, who shortly before had the choice between Mashko and him, has that choice no longer, and will fall, as it were, into a kind of neglect somewhat humiliating.

      But he was far from such thoughts. He was glad, it is true, that Marynia should know that, by exalting Mashko above him, she had been mistaken fundamentally; but he had not dreamed even of taking pleasure in this or triumphing because of her isolation, for at every moment and at that time more than any other he was ready to open his arms to her, press her to his bosom, and love her. He was working, it is true, continually and even with stubbornness to break in himself those feelings; but he did this only because he saw no hope before him, and considered it an offence against his dignity as a man to put all the powers of his soul and heart into a feeling which was not returned. To use his own expression, he wished to avoid surrender, and he did avoid surrender, to the best of his power; but he understood perfectly that such a struggle exhausts, and that even if it ends with victory it brings a void, instead of happiness. Besides, he was far yet from victory. After all his efforts he had arrived at this only, – that his feeling was mingled with bitterness. Such a ferment dissolves love, it is true, for the simple reason that it poisons it; and in time this bitterness might have dissolved love in Pan Stanislav’s heart. But what an empty result! Sitting then near Marynia and looking at her face and head, shone on by the light of the lamp, he said to СКАЧАТЬ