"Gracious! An assault upon my virtue, neither more nor less.--Courage,
my boy!"
"I want to send a letter home, that's what it is," she said, her voice
was beseeching, soft, timid.
"Deuce take you!" I thought; but up I jumped, sat down at my table,
took a sheet of paper, and said:
"Come here, sit down, and dictate!"
She came, sat down very gingerly on a chair, and looked at me with a
guilty look.
"Well, to whom do you want to write?"
"To Boleslav Kashput, at the town of Svyeptsyana, on the Warsaw
Road...."
"Well, fire away!"
"My dear Bolés ... my darling ... my faithful lover. May the Mother of
God protect thee! Thou heart of gold, why hast thou not written for
such a long time to thy sorrowing little dove, Teresa?"
I very nearly burst out laughing. "A sorrowing little dove!" more than
five feet high, with fists a stone and more in weight, and as black a
face as if the little dove had lived all its life in a chimney, and had
never once washed itself! Restraining myself somehow, I asked:
"Who is this Bolest?"
"Bolés, Mr. Student," she said, as if offended with me for blundering
over the name, "he is Bolés--my young man."
"Young man!"
"Why are you so surprised, sir? Cannot I, a girl, have a young man?"
She? A girl? Well!
"Oh, why not?" I said, "all things are possible. And has he been your
young man long?"
"Six years."
"Oh, ho!" I thought. "Well, let us write your letter ..."
And I tell you plainly that I would willingly have changed places with
this Bolés if his fair correspondent had been not Teresa, but something
less than she.
"I thank you most heartily, sir, for your kind services," said Teresa
to me, with a curtsey. "Perhaps _I_ can show _you_ some service, eh?"
"No, I most humbly thank you all the same."
"Perhaps, sir, your shirts or your trousers may want a little mending?"
I felt that this mastodon in petticoats had made me grow quite red with
shame, and I told her pretty sharply that I had no need whatever of her
services.
She departed.
A week or two passed away. It was evening. I was sitting at my window
whistling and thinking of some expedient for enabling me to get away
from myself. I was bored, the weather was dirty. I didn't want to go
out, and out of sheer ennui I began a course of self-analysis and
reflection. This also was dull enough work, but I didn't care about
doing anything else. Then the door opened. Heaven be praised, someone
came in.
"Oh, Mr. Student, you have no pressing business, I hope?"
It was Teresa. Humph!
"No. What is it?"
"I was going to ask you, sir, to write me another letter."
"Very well! To Bolés, eh?"
"No, this time it is from him."
"Wha-at?"
"Stupid that I am! It is not for me, Mr. Student, I beg your pardon.
It is for a friend of mine, that is to say, not a friend but an
acquaintance--a man acquaintance. He has a sweetheart just like me
here, Teresa. That's how it is. Will you, sir, write a letter to this
Teresa?"
I looked at her--her face was troubled, her fingers were trembling. I
was a bit fogged at first--and then I guessed how it was.
"Look here, my lady," I said, "there are no Boleses or Teresas at all,
and you've been telling me a pack of lies. Don't you come sneaking
about me any longer. I have no wish whatever to cultivate your
acquaintance. Do you understand?"
And suddenly she grew strangely terrified and distraught; she began to
shift from foot to foot without moving from the place, and spluttered
comically, as if she wanted to say something and couldn't. I waited to
see what would come of all this, and I saw and felt that, apparently, I
had made a great mistake in suspecting her of wishing to draw me from
the path of righteousness. It was evidently something very different.
"Mr Student!" she began, and suddenly, waving her hand, she turned
abruptly towards the door and went out. I remained with a very
unpleasant feeling in my mind. I listened. Her door was flung violently
to--plainly the poor wench was very angry.... I thought it over,
and resolved to go to her, and, inviting her to come in here, write
everything she wanted.
I entered her apartment. I looked round. She was sitting at the table,
leaning on her elbows, with her head in her hands.
"Listen to me," I said.
Now, whenever I come to this point in my story, I always feel horribly
awkward and idiotic. Well, well!
"Listen to me," I said.
She leaped from her seat, came towards me with flashing eyes, and
laying her hands on my shoulders began to whisper, or rather to hum in
her peculiar bass voice:
"Look you, now! It's like this. There's no Bolés, at all, and there's
no Teresa either. But what's that to you? Is it a hard thing for you to
draw your pen over paper? Eh? Ah, and _you,_ too! Still such a little
fair-haired boy! There's nobody at all, neither Bolés, nor Teresa, only
me. There you have it, and much good may it do you!"
"Pardon me!" said I, altogether flabbergasted by such a reception,
"what is it all about? There's no, Bolés, you say?"
"No. So it is."
"And no Teresa either?"
"And no Teresa. I'm Teresa."
I didn't understand it at all. I fixed my eyes upon her, and tried to
make out which of us was taking leave of his or her senses. But she
went again to the table, searched about for something, came back to me,
and said in an offended tone:
"If it was so hard for you to write to Bolés, look, there's your
letter, take it! Others will write for me."