Генрик Сенкевич
Children of the Soil
“Mashko detained me,” answered he. “What is to be heard here?”
“The same as ever. All happy.”
“And how art thou?”
“As well as a fish!” answered she, joyously, giving him her forehead for a kiss.
Then she began to inquire about Pan Ignas. Pan Stanislav, after the disagreeable talk with Mashko, breathed for the first time more freely. “She is in health, and all is right,” thought he, as if in wonder. And really he felt well in that bright room, in that great peace, among those friendly souls and at the side of that person so good and reliable. He felt that everything was there which he needed for happiness; but he felt that he had spoiled that happiness of his own will; that he had brought into the clear atmosphere of his house the elements of corruption and evil, and that he was living under that roof without a right.
CHAPTER LX
In the middle of September such cold days came that the Polanyetskis moved from Buchynek to their house in the city. Pan Stanislav, before the arrival of his wife, had the house aired and ornamented with flowers. It seemed to him, it is true, that he had lost the right to love her, but he had lost only his former freedom with reference to her; but perhaps, just because of this, he became far more attentive and careful. The right to love no one gives, and nothing can take away. It is another case when a man has fallen, and in presence of a soul incomparably more noble than his own, feels that he is not worthy to love; he loves then with humility, and does not dare to call his feeling by its name. What Pan Stanislav had lost really was his self-confidence, his commanding ways, and his former unceremoniousness in his treatment of his wife. At present in his intercourse with her he bore himself sometimes as if she were Panna Plavitski, and he a suitor not sure of his fate yet.
Still that uncertainty of his had the aspect of coldness at times. Finally, their relation, in spite of Pan Stanislav’s increased care and efforts, had become more distant than hitherto. “I have not the right!” repeated Pan Stanislav, at every more lively movement of his heart. And Marynia at last observed that they were living now somehow differently, but she interpreted this to herself variously.
First, there were guests in the house, before whom, be what may, freedom of life must be diminished; second, that misfortune had happened to Pan Ignas, – a thing to shock “Stas” and carry his mind in another direction; and finally Marynia, accustomed now to various changes in his disposition, had ceased also to attach to them as much meaning as formerly.
Having gone through long hours of meditation and sadness, she came at last to the conviction that in the first period, while certain inequalities and bends of character are not accommodated into one common line, such various shades and changes in the disposition are inevitable, though transient. The sober judgment of Pani Bigiel helped her also to the discovery of this truth; she, on a time when Marynia began to praise her perfect accord with her husband, said, —
“Ai! it didn’t come to that at once. At first we loved each other as it were more passionately, but we were far less fitted for each other; sometimes one pulled in one and the other in another direction. But because we both had honesty and good-will the Lord God saw that and blessed us. After the first child all went at once in the best way; and this day I wouldn’t give my old husband for all the treasures of earth, though he is growing heavy, and when I persuade him to Karlsbad he will not listen to me.”
“After the first child,” inquired Marynia, with great attention. “Ah! I would have guessed at once that it was after the first child.”
Pani Bigiel began to laugh.
“And how amusing he was when our first boy was born! During the first days he said nothing at all; he would only raise his spectacles to his forehead and look at him, as at some wonder from beyond the sea, and then come to me and kiss my hands.”
The hope of a child was also a reason why Marynia did not take this new change in “Stas” to heart too much. First, she promised herself to enchant him completely both with the child, which she knew in advance would be simply phenomenal, and with her own beauty after sickness; and second, she judged that it was not permitted her to think of herself now, or even exclusively of “Stas.” She was occupied in preparing a place for the coming guest, as well in the house, as in her affections. She felt that she must infold such a figure not only in swaddling clothes, but in love. Hence she accumulated necessary supplies. She said to herself at once that life for two living together might be changeable; but for three living together it could not be anything but happiness and the accomplishment of that expected grace and mercy of God.
In general, she looked at the future with uncommon cheerfulness. If, finally, Pan Stanislav was for her in some way a different person, more ceremonious, as it were, and more distant, he showed such delicacy as he had never shown before. The care and anxiety which she saw on his face she referred to his feeling for Pan Ignas, for whose life there was no fear, it is true, but whose misfortune she felt with a woman’s heart, understanding that it might continue as long as his life lasted. The knowledge of this gave more than one moment of sadness to her, and to the Bigiels, and to all to whom Pan Ignas had become near.
Moreover, soon after the arrival of the Polanyetskis in the city, news came all at once from Ostend which threatened new complications. A certain morning Svirski burst into the counting-house like a bomb, and, taking Bigiel and Pan Stanislav to a separate room, said, with a mien of mysteriousness, —
“Do you know what has happened? Kresovski has just been at my studio, and he returned yesterday from Ostend. Osnovski has separated from his wife, and broken Kopovski’s bones for him. A fabulous scandal! All Ostend is talking of nothing else.”
Both were silent under the impression of the news; at last Pan Stanislav said, —
“That had to come sooner or later. Osnovski was blind.”
“But I understand nothing,” said Bigiel.
“An unheard of history!” continued Svirski. “Who could have supposed anything like it?”
“What does Kresovski say?”
“He says that Osnovski made an arrangement one day to go with some Englishmen to Blanckenberg to shoot dolphins. Meanwhile he was late at the railroad, or tramway. Having an hour’s time before him, he went home again and found Kopovski in his house. You can imagine what he must have seen, since a man so mild was carried away, and lost his head to that degree that, without thinking of the scandal, he pounded Kopovski, so that Kopovski is in bed.”
“He was so much in love with his wife that he might have gone mad even, or killed her,” said Bigiel. “What a misfortune for the man!”
“See what women are!” exclaimed Svirski.
Pan Stanislav was silent. Bigiel, who was very sorry for Osnovski, began to walk back and forth in the room. At last he stopped before Svirski, and, thrusting his hands into his pockets, said, —
“But still I don’t understand anything.”
Svirski, not answering directly, said, turning to Pan Stanislav, “You remember what I said of her in Rome, when I was painting your wife’s portrait? Old Zavilovski called her a crested lark. I understand how just that was; for a crested lark has another name, – ‘the soiler.’ What a woman! I knew that she was not of high worth, but I did not suppose that she could go so far – and with such a man as Kopovski! Now I see various things more clearly. Kopovski was there all the time, as if courting Panna Castelli, then as if courting Panna Ratkovski; and of course he and the lady were in agreement, inventing appearances together. What a cheery life the fellow had! Castelli for dinner, and Pani Osnovski for dessert! Pleasant for such a man! Between those two women there must have been rivalry; one vying with the other in concessions to attract him to herself. You can understand that in such a place woman’s self-esteem had small value.”
“You are perfectly right,” said Pan Stanislav. “Pani Osnovski was always most opposed to the marriage of Kopovski to Castelli; and very likely for that reason she was so eager to have her marry Pan Ignas. When, in spite of everything, Kopovski and Castelli came to an agreement, she went to extremes to keep Kopovski for herself. Their relation is an old story.”
“I begin to understand a little,” said Bigiel; “but how sad this is!”
“Sad?” said Svirski; “on the contrary. It was cheerful for Kopovski. Still, it was not. ‘The beginning of evil is pleasant, but the end is bitter.’ There is no reason to envy him. Do you know that Osnovski is hardly any weaker than I? for, through regard for his wife, he was afraid of growing fat, and from morning till evening practised every kind of exercise? Oh, how he loved her! what a kind man he is! and how sorry I am for him! In him that woman had everything, – heart, property, a dog’s attachment, – and she trampled on everything. Castelli, at least, was not a wife yet.”
“And have they separated really?”
“So really that she has gone. What a position, when a man like Osnovski left her! In truth, the case is a hard one.”
But Bigiel, who liked to take things on the practical side, said, “I am curious to know what she will do, for all the property is his.”
“If he has not killed her on the spot, he will not let her die of hunger, that is certain; he is not a man of that kind. Kresovski told me that he remained in Ostend, and that he is going to challenge Kopovski to a duel. But Kopovski will not rise out of bed for a week. There will be a duel when he recovers. Pani Bronich and Panna Castelli have gone away, too, to Paris.”
“And the marriage with Kopovski?”
“What do you wish? In view of such open infidelity, it is broken, of course. Evil does not prosper; they, too, were left in the lurch. Ha! let them hunt abroad for some Prince Crapulescu14 – for after what they have done to Ignas, no one in this country would take Castelli, save a swindler, or an idiot. Pan Ignas will not return to her.”
“I told Pan Stanislav that, too,” said Bigiel; “but he answered, ‘Who knows?’”
“Ai!” said Svirski, “do you suppose really?”
“I don’t know! I don’t know anything!” answered Pan Stanislav, with an outburst. “I guarantee nothing; I guarantee nobody; I don’t guarantee myself even.”
Svirski looked at him with a certain astonishment.
“Ha! maybe that is right,” said he, after a while. “If any one had told me yesterday that the Osnovskis would ever separate, I should have looked on him as a madman.”
And he rose to take farewell; he was in a hurry to work, but wishing to hear more about the catastrophe of the Osnovskis, had engaged to dine with Kresovski. Bigiel and Pan Stanislav remained alone.
“Evil must always pay the penalty,” said Bigiel, after some thought. “But do you know what sets me thinking? that the moral level is lowering among us. Take such persons as Bronich, Castelli, Pani Osnovski, – how dishonest they are! how spoiled! and, in addition, how stupid! What a mixture, deuce knows of what! what boundless pretensions! and with those pretensions the nature of a waiting-maid. So that it brings nausea to think of them, does it not? And men, such as Ignas and Osnovski, must pay for them.”
“And that logic is not understood,” answered Pan Stanislav, gloomily.
Bigiel began to walk up and down in the room again, clicking his tongue and shaking his head; all at once he stopped before Pan Stanislav with a radiant face, and, slapping him on the shoulder, said, —
“Well, my old man, thou and I can say to ourselves that we drew great prizes in life’s lottery. We were not saints either; but perhaps the Lord God gave us luck because we have not undermined other men’s houses like bandits.”
Pan Stanislav gave no answer; he merely made ready to go.
Conditions had so arranged themselves lately that everything which took place around him, and everything which he heard, became, as it were, a saw, which was tearing his nerves. In addition, he had the feeling that that was not only terribly torturing and painful, but was beginning to be ridiculous also. At moments it came to his head to take Marynia and hide with her somewhere in some tumbledown village, if only far away from that insufferable comedy of life which was growing viler and viler. But he saw that he could not do that, even for this reason, – that Marynia’s condition hindered it. He stopped, however, the bargaining for Buchynek, which had been almost finished, so as to find for himself a more distant and less accessible summer place. In general, relations with people began to weigh on him greatly; but he felt that he was in the vortex, and could not get out of it. Sometimes the former man rose in him, full of energy and freshness, and he asked himself with wonder, “What the devil! why does a fault which thousands of men commit daily, swell up in my case beyond every measure?” But the sense of truth answered straightway that as in medicine there are no diseases, only patients, so in the moral world there are no offences, only offenders. What one man bears easily, another pays for with his life; and he tried in vain to defend himself. For a man of principles, for a man who, barely half a year before, had married such a woman as Marynia, for a man whom fatherhood was awaiting, his offence was beyond measure; and it was so inexcusable, so unheard of, that at times he was amazed that he could have committed it. Now, while returning home under the impression of Osnovski’s misfortune, and turning it over in his head in every way, he had again the feeling as if a part of the responsibility for what had happened weighed on him. “For I,” said he to himself, “am a shareholder in that factory in which are formed such relations and such women as Castelli or Pani Osnovski.” Then it occurred to him that Bigiel was right in saying that the moral level was lowering, and that the general state of mind which does not exclude the possibility of such acts is simply dangerous. For he understood that all these deviations flowed neither from exceptional misfortunes, nor uncommon passions, nor over-turbulent natures, but from social wantonness, and that the name of such deviations is legion. “See,” thought he, “only in the circle of my acquaintances, Pani Mashko, Pani Osnovski, Panna Castelli; and over against them whom shall I place? My Marynia alone.” And at that moment it did not occur to him that, besides Marynia, there were in his circle Pani Emilia, Pani Bigiel, Panna Helena, and Panna Ratkovski. But Marynia stood out before him on that ground of corruption and frivolity so unlike them, so pure and reliable, that he was moved to the depth of his soul by the mere thought of her. “That is another world; that is another kind,” thought he. For a moment he remembered that Osnovski, too, had called his own wife an exception; but he rejected this evil thought immediately. “Osnovski deceived himself, but I do not deceive myself.” And he felt that the skepticism which would not yield before Marynia would be not only stupid, but pitiable. In her there was simply no place for evil. Only swamp birds can sit in a swamp. He himself had said once in a jest to her, that if she wore heels, she would have inflammation of the conscience from remorse, because she was deceiving people. And there was truth in this jest; he saw her now just there before him as clearly as one always sees the person one thinks of with concentrated feeling. He saw her changed form and changed face, in which there remained always, however, that same shapely mouth, a little too wide, and those same clear eyes; and he was more and more moved. “Indeed, I did win a great prize in life’s lottery,” thought he; “but I did not know how to value it. ‘Evil must always pay the penalty,’ said Bigiel.” And Pan Stanislav, to whom a similar thought had come more than once, felt now a superstitious fear before it. “There is,” thought he, “a certain logic, in virtue of which evil returns, like a wave hurled from the shore, so that evil must return to me.” And all at once it seemed to him perfectly impossible that he could possess such a woman in peace, and such happiness. Just in that was lacking the logic which commands the return of the wave of evil. And then what? Marynia may die at childbirth, for instance. Pani Mashko, through revenge, may say some word about him, which will stick in Marynia’s mind, and in view of her condition, will emerge afterward in the form of a fever. Not even the whole truth is needed for that effect. On the contrary, Pani Mashko may boast even that she resisted his attempts. “And who knows,” said Pan Stanislav to himself, “if Pani Mashko is not making a visit to Marynia this moment? in such an event the first conversation about men – and a few jesting words are sufficient.”
Thinking thus, he felt that the cap was burning on his head; and he reached home with a feeling of alarm. At home he did not find Pani Mashko; but Marynia gave him a card from Panna Helena, asking him to come after dinner to see her.
“I fear that Ignas is worse,” said Marynia.
“No; I ran in there for a moment in the morning. Panna Helena was at some conference with the attorney, Kononovich; but I saw Panna Ratkovski and Pan Ignas. He was perfectly well, and spoke to me joyously.”
At dinner Pan Stanislav resolved to tell Marynia of the news which he had heard, for he knew that it could not be concealed from her anyhow, and he did not wish that it should be brought to her too suddenly and incautiously.
When she asked what was to be heard in the counting-house and the city, he said, —
“Nothing new in the counting-house; but in the city they are talking about certain misunderstandings between the Osnovskis.”
“Between the Osnovskis?”
“Yes; something has happened in Ostend. Likely the cause of all is Kopovski.”
Marynia flushed from curiosity, and asked, —
“What dost thou say, Stas?”
“I say what I heard. Thou wilt remember my remarks on the evening of Pan Ignas’s betrothal? It seems that I was right; I will say, in brief, that there was a certain history, and, in general, that it was bad.”
“But thou hast said that Kopovski is the betrothed of Panna Castelli.”
“He has been, but he is not now. Everything may be broken in their case.”
The news made a great impression on Marynia; she wanted to inquire further, but when Pan Stanislav told her that he knew nothing more, and that in all likelihood more detailed news would come in some days, she fell to lamenting the fate of Osnovski, whom she had always liked much, and was indignant at Pani Aneta.
“I thought,” said she, “that he would change her, and attract her by his love; but she is not worthy of him, and Pan Svirski is right in what he says about women.”
The conversation was interrupted by Plavitski, who, after an early dinner at the restaurant, had come to tell the “great news,” which he had just heard, for all the city was talking of it. Pan Stanislav thought then that he had done well to prepare Marynia, for in Plavitski’s narrative the affair took on colors which were too glaring. Plavitski mentioned, it is true, in the course of his story, “principles and matrons” of the old time; but apparently he was satisfied that something of such rousing interest had happened, and evidently he took the affair, too, from the comic side, for at the end he said, —
“But she is a mettlesome woman! she is a frolicker! Whoever was before her was an opponent! She let no man pass, no man! Poor Osnosio! but she let no man pass.”
Here he raised his brows, and looked at Marynia and Pan Stanislav, as if wishing to see whether they understood what “no man” meant. But on Marynia’s face disgust was depicted.
“Fe! Stas,” said she, “how all that is not only dishonorable, but disgusting!”
CHAPTER LXI
After dinner Pan Stanislav went to Panna Helena’s. Pan Ignas wore a black bandage on his forehead yet, with a wider plaster in the centre, covering a wound; he stuttered, and, when looking, squinted somewhat; but, in general, he was coming to himself more and more, and looked on himself as recovered already. The doctor asserted that those marks which remained from the wound yet were disappearing without a trace. When Pan Stanislav entered, the young man was sitting at a table in a deep armchair, in which old Pan Zavilovski used to sit formerly, and was listening with closed eyes to verses which Panna Ratkovski was reading. But she closed the book at sight of a visitor.
“Good-evening,” said Pan Stanislav to her. “How art thou, Ignas? I see that I have interrupted a reading. In what are you so interested?”
Panna Ratkovski turned her closely-clipped head to the book, – her hair had been luxuriant before, but she cut it so as not to occupy time needed for the sick man, – and answered, —
“This is Pan Zavilovski’s poetry.”
“Thou art listening to thy own poetry?” said Pan Stanislav, laughing. “Well, how does it please thee?”
“I hear it as if it were not my own,” replied Pan Ignas. After a while he added, speaking slowly, and stuttering a little, “But I shall write again as soon as I recover.”
It was evident that this thought occupied him greatly, and that he must have mentioned it more than once; for Panna Ratkovski, as if wishing to give him pleasure, said, —
“And the same kind of beautiful verses, and not too long.”
He smiled at her with gratitude, and was silent. But at that moment Panna Helena entered the room, and pressing Pan Stanislav’s hand, said, —
“How well it is that you have come! I wanted to take counsel with you.”
“I am at your service.”
“I beg you to come to my room.”
She conducted him to the adjoining room, indicated a chair to him, then, sitting down opposite, was silent, as if collecting her thoughts.
Pan Stanislav, looking at her under the lamp, noticed, for the first time, a number of silvery threads in her bright hair, and remembered that that woman was not thirty yet.
She began to speak in her cool and decisive voice, —
“I do not request counsel precisely, but assistance for my relative. I know that you are a real friend of his, and, besides, you have shown me so much kindness at the death of my father that I shall be grateful the rest of my life for it; and now I will speak more openly with you than with any one else. For personal reasons, which I will not touch, and of which I can only say that they are very painful, I have decided to create for myself other conditions of life, – conditions for me more endurable. I should have done so long since, but while my father was living I could not. Then Ignas’s misfortune came. It seemed to me my duty not to desert the last relative bearing our name, for whom, besides, I have a heartfelt and real friendship. But now, thanks be to God! he is saved. The doctors answer for his life; and if God has given him exceptional capacities and predestined him to great things, nothing stands in the way of his activity.”
Here she stopped, as if she had fallen to thinking suddenly of something in the future, after which, when she had roused herself, she spoke on, —
“But by his recovery my last task is finished, and I am permitted to return to my original plan. There remains only the property of which my father left a considerable amount, and which would be altogether useless to me in my coming mode of life. If I could consider this property my own personally, I might dispose of it otherwise, perhaps; but since it is family property, I consider that I have no right to devote it to foreign objects while any one of the family is alive who bears the name. I do not conceal from you that attachment to my cousin moves me; but I judge that I do above all that which conscience commands, and besides carry out the wish of my father, who did not succeed in writing his will, but who – I know with all certainty – wished to leave a part of his property to Ignas. I have provided for myself not in the degree which my father thought of doing, but still I take more than I need. Ignas inherits the rest. The act of conveyance has been written by Pan Kononovich according to all legal rules. It includes this house, Yasmen, the property in Kutno, the estates in Poznan and the moneys with the exception of that portion which I have retained for myself, and a small part which I have reserved for Panna Ratkovski. It is a question now only of delivering this document to Ignas. I have asked two doctors if it is not too early, and if the excitement might not harm him. They assure me that it is not too early, and that every agreeable news may only act on his health beneficially. This being the case, I wish to finish the matter at once, for I am in a hurry.”
Here she smiled faintly. Pan Stanislav, pressing her hand, asked, with unfeigned emotion, —
“Dear lady, I do not inquire through curiosity, What do you intend?”
Not wishing evidently to give an explicit answer, she said, —
“A person has the right always to take refuge under the care of God. As to Ignas, he has an honest heart and a noble character, which will not be injured by wealth; but the property is very considerable, and he is young, inexperienced; he will begin life in conditions changed altogether, – hence I wish to ask you, as a man of honor and his friend, to have guardianship over him. Care for him, keep him from evil people, but above all remind him that his duty is to write and work further. For me it was a question, not only of saving his life, but his gifts. Let him write; let him pay society, not for himself only, but for those too whom God created for His own glory and the assistance of men, but who destroyed both themselves and their gifts.”
Here her lips became pale on a sudden, her hands closed, and the voice stopped in her throat. It might seem that the despair accumulated in her soul would break all bounds immediately; but she mastered herself after a while, and only her clinched hands testified what the effort was which that action had cost her.
Pan Stanislav, seeing her suffering, judged that it would be better to turn her thought in another direction, toward practical and current affairs; hence he said, —
“Evidently this will be an unheard of change in the life of Ignas; but I too hope that it will result only in good. Knowing him, it is difficult to admit another issue. But could you not defer the act for a year, or at least half a year?”
“Why?”
“For reasons which do not lie in Ignas himself, but which might have connection with him. I do not know whether the news has reached you that the marriage of Panna Castelli to Kopovski is broken, and that the position of those ladies is tremendously awkward in consequence. Through breaking with Ignas, they have made public opinion indignant, and now their names are on people’s tongues again. It would be for them a perfect escape to return to Ignas; and it is possible to suppose that when they learn of your gift, they will surely attempt this, and it is unknown whether Ignas, especially after so short an interval, and weakened as he is, might not let himself be involved by them.”
Panna Helena looked at Pan Stanislav with brows contracted from attention, and, dwelling on what he said, she answered, —
“No. I judge that Ignas will choose otherwise.”
“I divine your thought,” said Pan Stanislav; “but think, – he was attached to that other one beyond every estimate, to such a degree that he did not wish to outlive the loss of her.”
Here something happened which Pan Stanislav had not expected, for Panna Helena, who had always such control of herself and was almost stern, opened her thin arms in helplessness, and said, —
“Ah, if that were true, – if there were not for him any other happiness save in her! Oh, Pan Polanyetski, I knew that he ought not to do that; but there are things stronger than man, and they are things which he needs for life absolutely – and besides – ”
Pan Stanislav looked at her with astonishment; after a while she added, —
“Besides, while one lives, one may enter on a better road any moment.”
“I did not suppose that I should hear anything like this from her,” thought Pan Stanislav. And he said aloud, —
“Then let us go to Ignas.”
Pan Ignas received the news first with amazement, and then with delight; but that delight was as if external. It might be supposed that, by the aid of his brain, he understood that something immensely favorable had met him, and that he had told himself that he must be pleased with it, but that he did not feel it with his heart. His heart declared itself only in the care and interest with which he asked Panna Helena what she intended to do with herself, and what would become of her. She was not willing to answer him, and stated, in general terms, that she would withdraw from the world, and that her resolve was unchangeable. She implored of him this, which clearly concerned her most, not to waste his powers and disappoint people who were attached to him. She spoke as a mother, and he, repeating, “I will write again the moment I recover,” kissed her hands and had tears in his eyes. It was not known, however, whether those tears meant sympathy for her, or the regret of a child abandoned by a good and kind nurse; for Panna Helena told him that from that moment she considered herself a guest in his house, and in two days would withdraw. Pan Ignas would not agree to this, and extorted the promise from her to remain a week longer. She yielded at last, through fear of exciting him and injuring his health. Then he grew calm, and was as gladsome as a little boy whose prayer has been granted. Toward the end of the evening, however, he grew thoughtful, as if remembering something, looked around with astonished eyes on those present, and said, —
“It is wonderful, but it seems to me as if all this had happened before some time.”
Pan Stanislav, wishing to give a more cheerful tone to the conversation, asked, laughing, —
“Was it during previous existences on other planets? It was, was it not?”
