During all the mental struggles through which Pan Stanislav had passed,
the interests of his commercial house were developed favorably. Thanks
to Bigiel's sound judgment, diligence, and care, current business was
transacted with a uniform thoroughness which removed every chance
of dissatisfaction or complaint from the patrons of the house. The
house gained reputation every day, extended its activity slowly and
regularly, and was growing rich. Pan Stanislav, on his part, labored,
not indeed with such mental peace as hitherto, but no less than Bigiel.
He passed the morning hours daily in the office; and the greater his
mental vexation, the deeper his misunderstanding with Marynia since
her coming to Warsaw, the more earnest was his labor. This labor,
often difficult, and at times requiring even much intense thought, but
unconnected with the question which pained him, and incapable of giving
any internal solace, became, at last, a kind of haven, in which he
hid from the storm. Pan Stanislav began to love it. "Here, at least,
I know what I am doing, and whither I am tending; here everything is
very clear. If I do not find happiness, I shall find at least that
enlargement of life, that freedom, which money gives; and all the
better for me if I succeed in stopping at that." Recent events had
merely confirmed him in those thoughts; in fact, nothing but suffering
had come to him from his feelings. That sowing had yielded a bitter
harvest, while the only successes which he had known, and which in
every case strengthen and defend one against misfortune, were given by
that mercantile house. Pan Stanislav thought with a certain surprise
that this was true; but it was not. He himself felt the narrowness of
that satisfaction which the house could give; but he said to himself at
the same time, "Since it cannot be otherwise, this must be accepted;
and it is safer to stop here, for it is better to be only a merchant,
who succeeds, than a dreamer, who fails in everything." Since Litka's
death, then, he resolved all the more to stifle in himself those
impulses to which reality did not answer, and which had brought him
nothing but regrets. Evidently Bigiel was pleased with a state of mind
in his partner which could bring only profit to the house.
Still Pan Stanislav could not grow wholly indifferent in a few weeks
to all that with which, on a time, his heart had been connected.
Hence he went sometimes to visit Litka, whose gravestone was covered
in the morning with white winter frost. Twice he met Pani Emilia and
Marynia in the cemetery. Once he attended them home to the city, and
Pani Emilia thanked him for remembering the little girl. Pan Stanislav
noticed that she did this with evident calmness; he understood the
cause of this calmness when, at parting, she said to him,--
"I keep always in mind now that for her separation from me is as short
as one twinkle of an eye; and you know not what comfort it is to me
that at least she is not yearning."
"Well, what I know not, I know not," said Pan Stanislav, in his soul.
Still the deep conviction of Pani Emilia's speech struck him. "If these
are illusions," thought he, "they are really life-giving, since they
are able to draw forth juices for life from the dungeon of the grave."
Marynia asserted, besides, in her first conversation with Pan
Stanislav, that Pani Emilia lived only through that thought, which
alone softened her grief. For whole days she mentioned nothing else,
and said, with such persistence, that from God's point of view death is
separation for one twinkle of an eye, that she began to alarm Marynia.
"She talks, too, of Litka," said Marynia, in conclusion, "as if the
child had not died, and as if she should see her to-morrow."
"That is happy," answered Pan Stanislav. "Vaskovski rendered tangible
service; such a nail in the head gives no pain."
"Still, she is right, for it is so."
"I will not contradict you."
Marynia was alarmed, it is true, by the persistence with which Pani
Emilia returned to one thought; but on the other hand she herself did
not look on death otherwise. Hence that tinge of scepticism, evident in
Pan Stanislav's words, touched her a little, and pained her; but, not
wishing to let this be evident, she changed the conversation.
"I gave directions to enlarge Litka's photograph," said she. "Yesterday
they brought me three copies; one I will give Emilia. I feared at first
that it would excite her too much, but now I see that I may give it;
nay, more, it will be very dear to her."
She rose then, and went to a bookcase on which were some photographs in
a wrapper; these she took, and, sitting at Pan Stanislav's side before
a small table, opened them.
"Emilia told me of a certain talk which you had with Litka a short time
before her death, when the child wished you three to be birches growing
near one another. Do you remember that talk?"
"I do. Litka wondered that trees live so long; she thought awhile what
kind of tree she would like to be, and the birch pleased her most."
"True; and you said that you would like to grow near by, therefore,
around these photographs I wish to paint birches on a passe-partout.
Here I have begun, you see, but I have no great success. I cannot paint
from memory."
Then she took one of the photographs, and showed Pan Stanislav
the birches painted in water-colors; but since she was a little
near-sighted, she bent over her work, so that her temple for one moment
was near Pan Stanislav's face. She was no longer that Marynia of whom
he had dreamed when returning evenings from Pani Emilia's, and who at
that time had filled his whole soul for him. That period had passed:
his thoughts had gone in another direction; but Marynia had not ceased
to be that type of woman which produced on his masculine nerves an
impression exceptionally vivid; and now, when her temple almost touched
his own, when, with one glance of the eye, he took in her face, her
cheeks slightly colored, and her form bent over the picture, he felt
the old attraction with its former intensity, and the quick blood sent
equally quick thoughts to his brain. "Were I to kiss her eyes and mouth
now," thought he, "I am curious to know what she would do;" and in a
twinkle the desire seized him to do so, even were he to offend Marynia
mortally. In return for long rejection, for so much fear and suffering,
he would like such a moment of recompense, and of revenge, perhaps,
with it. Meanwhile, Marynia, while examining the painting, continued,--
"This seems worse to-day than yesterday; unfortunately trees have no
leaves now, and I cannot find a model."
"The group is not bad at all," said Pan Stanislav; "but if these trees
are to represent Pani Emilia, Litka, and me, why have you painted four
birches?"
"The fourth represents me," said Marynia, with a certain timidity; "I,
too, have a wish sometimes to grow with you."
Pan Stanislav looked at her quickly; and she, wrapping the photographs
up again, said, as it were, hurriedly,--
"So many things are connected in my mind with the memory of that child.
During her last days I was with her and Emilia almost continually.
At present Emilia is one of the nearest persons on earth to me. I
belong to them as well as you do; I know not clearly how to explain
this. There were four of us, and now there are three, bound together
by Litka, for she bound us. When I think of her now, I think also of
Emilia and of you. This is why I decided to paint the four birches; and
you see there are three photographs,--one for Emilia, one for me, and
one for you."
"I thank you," said Pan Stanislav, extending his hand to her. Marynia
returned the pressure very cordially, and said,--
"For the sake of her memory, too, we should forget all our former
resentments."
"This has happened already," answered Pan Stanislav; "and as for me, I
wish that it had happened long before Litka's death."
"My fault began then; for this I beg forgiveness," and she extended her
hand to him.
Pan Stanislav hesitated awhile whether to raise it to his lips; but he
did not raise it, he only said,--
"Now there is agreement."
"And friendship?" asked Marynia.
"And friendship."
In her eyes a deep, quiet joy was reflected, which enlivened her whole
face with a mild radiance. There was in her at the moment so much
kindness and trustfulness that she reminded Pan Stanislav of that first
Marynia whom he had seen at Kremen when she was sitting on the garden
veranda in the rays of the setting sun. But since Litka's death he had
been in such a frame of mind that he considered remembrances like that
as unworthy of him; hence he rose and began to take leave.
"Will you not remain the whole evening?" asked Marynia.
"No, I must return."
"I will tell Emilia that you are going," said she, approaching the door
of the adjoining room.
"She is either thinking of Litka at present, or is praying; otherwise
she would have come of herself. Better not interrupt her; I will come
to-morrow in any case."
Marynia approached him, and, looking into his eyes, said with great
cordiality, "To-morrow and every day. Is it not true? Remember that you
are 'Pan Stas' for us now."
Since Litka's death Marynia had named him thus for the second time, so
in going home he thought, "Her relations to me are changed thoroughly.
She feels herself simply as belonging to me, for she bound herself to
that by the promise given the dying child; she is ready even to fall in
love with me, and will not permit herself not to love. With us there
are such women by the dozen." And all at once he fell into anger.
"I know those fish natures with cold hearts, but sentimental heads
filled with so-called principles,--everything for principle, everything
for duty, nothing spontaneous in the heart. I might sigh out my last
breath at her feet and gain nothing; but when _duty_ commands her to
love me, she will love even really."
Evidently Pan Stanislav in his wanderings abroad had grown used to
another kind of women, or at least he had read of them in books. But
since with all this he had a little sound judgment too, that judgment
began to speak thus to him,--
"Listen, Polanyetski," it said. "These are exceptional natures because
they are uncommonly reliable: on them one may build; on them a life
may be founded. Art thou mad? With thee it was a question of finding a
wife, not an ephemeral love affair."
But Pan Stanislav did not cease to resist, and he answered his
judgment, "If I am to be loved, I want to be loved for my own sake."
Judgment tried once more to explain that it was all one how love began;
since later on he could be loved only for his own sake, that in the
present case, after his recent efforts and vexations, it was almost
miraculous, almost providential, that something natural had intervened
in a way to break resistance immediately; but Pan Stanislav did not
cease from being furious. At last judgment was strengthened by that
attraction and pleasure which he found in Marynia, by virtue of which
he saw in her more charms than in any other woman; this attraction
spoke in its turn,--
"I do not know if thou love her, and I care not; but to-day, when her
arm and face approached thee, thou wert near jumping out of thy skin.
Why is it that such a shiver does not pass through thee when thou art
near another? Think what a difference in that."
But to everything Pan Stanislav answered: "A fish, a duty-bound fish."
And again the thought came to him, "Catch her, if thou prefer that
to any other kind. People marry; and for thee, it is time. What more
dost thou want, is it a kind of love which thou wouldst be the first
to laugh into ridicule? Thy love has died out. Suppose it has; but
the attraction remains, and the conviction, too, that this woman is
reliable and honest."
"True," thought he further, "but from love, whether stupid or wise,
comes choice, and have I that at present? No, for I hesitate, while
formerly I did not hesitate; second, I ought to decide which is
better,--Panna Plavitski, or debit and credit in the house of Bigiel
and Polanyetski. Money gives power and freedom; the best use is made of
freedom when a man carries no one in his heart or on his shoulders."
Thus meditating, he reached home, and lay down to sleep. During the
night he dreamed of birches on sand hills, calm blue eyes, and a
forehead shaded with dark hair, from which warmth was beating.