Janina lay sick in bed.
It seemed to her as though she were at the bottom of a well and,
from those depths into which they had shoved her she could see only
the pale, distant blue of the sky, sometimes complete darkness,
sometimes the twinkling of the stars, then again some wings, flying
past, would cast a shadow over her eyes so that she lost knowledge
of everything. She only felt that those eddies of life without, its
voices, noises, cries, fears, and despair oozed down the smooth
sides of the well and flowed into her soul as into a reservoir,
penetrating her whole soul with an unconscious pain which she,
however, felt with every fiber of her being.
The days dragged on as slowly as though they were strung on the
chain of ages, as slowly as they drag on for those who have lost
everything, even hope.
Janina sent word to the director that she was sick, but no one came
to see her. Cabinska merely sent Wicek to say that Yadzia was
longing for her piano lessons, and nothing more.
There, they were playing, learning, creating something and living!
Here, she lay sunken in a complete apathy, like a crushed soul that
hardly dares at moments to think that it still exists and then again
sinks into an agony which cannot, however, end in the oblivion of
death.
Janina was not really physically ill, for nothing pained her, but
was dying from inner exhaustion. It seemed to her as though she had
spent the whole store of her strength in those three months of
theatrical life and that she was now dying from the hunger of her
soul that had nothing left with which to keep it alive.
Throughout those long days, throughout that endless agony of silent
nights she slowly pondered the nature of everyone whom she had met
here; and that slow, but entirely one-sided, cognizance of her
environment filled her with bitter sadness.
"There is no happiness on earth . . ." Janina whispered to herself,
and it seemed to her that hitherto she had had a cataract blinding
her eyes which fate had now brutally torn off. She now saw, but
there were moments in which she yearned for her former blindness and
groping in the dark.
"There is no happiness!" she repeated bitterly, and rebellious
pessimism mastered her soul entirely.
Everywhere Janina saw only evil and baseness. There passed before
her the forms of all her acquaintances and she scornfully thrust
them all down into one pit, not excluding Wladek. He had dropped in
only once to see her and began to excuse himself for his absence,
but she impatiently interrupted him and asked him to go away.
She already knew him well enough and wondered as the thought
occurred to her that she had ever loved him.
"Why? Why?" Janina asked herself.
Shame and regret began to fill her at the thought that she had
fallen so low and for him. He now appeared to her miserable and
common. She could not forgive herself.
"What fatality placed him in my path of life?" Janina asked herself
further. In her own eyes she felt deeply humiliated.
"I did not love him," she pondered and a shudder of disgust shook
her. He began to grow hateful to her.
And the theater also, lost a great deal of its glamor for Janina in
those hours of reflection. She now looked at it through the prism of
those continual quarrels and behind-the-scenes intrigues, through
the vanity of its priests and through her own disappointments.
"It is not as I used to see it formerly!" she lamented.
Everything became increasingly smaller and grayer to Janina's inner
vision. Everywhere she began to discover rags, sham, and falsehood.
People obscured everything for her with their baseness and
pettiness. She no longer desired to reign as a queen upon the stage.
"What is that? What is that?" she whispered to herself and saw a
motley, heterogeneous public that was indifferent to the quality of
a play. It came to the theater to amuse itself and laugh; it
hankered for clownishness and the circus.
"What is that? Comedianism for profit and for the amusement of the
multitude," Janina answered herself. The stage now appeared to her
as a real arena for the feats of clowns and trained monkeys.
"I wanted to be an entertainer of the mob! And where does art come
in? What is pure art, the ideal, for which hundreds of people
sacrifice their lives?"
"What is it and where is it to be found?" she asked herself
uneasily, beginning to see that everything is rather an amusement
than an aim in itself.
Literature, poetry, music, painting, and all the fine arts passed
before Janina's mind. She could not separate their utilitarian
aspect from their purely artistic one. She saw that all artists
played, sang, and created only to amuse that vast, brutal, mob. For
it they sacrificed their lives, their strength, and their dreams;
for it they struggled and suffered, lived and died.
To Janina that vast multitude of Grzesikiewiczs, Kotlickis, and
counselors, appeared in its ignorance and low instincts like a cruel
master who, with a half-mocking, half-favoring smile, looked down
upon that entire human throng of artists that painted, played,
recited, created, and begged with a nervous look for his favor and
recognition.
And she saw one immense wave of human beings spreading over the wide
plains of earth, swaying slowly and going nowhere; and on the other
side all those artists who were passing through the mob in all
directions, loudly proclaiming something, singing with inspired
voices, pointing to the expanse of heaven, calling attention to the
stars, trying to bring about some order in this disorderly, teeming
multitude, opening paths among it, imploring it in deep tones. But
the multitude either laughed or merely nodded its assent, but did
not budge from its place. It surged and pushed about and trampled
the artists underfoot.
"What is that? Why?" Janina asked herself, greatly terrified. "If
they do not need us then we ought to let them alone, keeping
ourselves apart from them and living only for ourselves and with
ourselves." But again everything became confused in her mind and she
could not conceive how it would be possible to live apart from the
rest of humanity and concluded that it would not be worth living at
all in that way. Her thoughts whirled in confusion through her
brain.
Sowinska, who now took care of her with motherly solicitude, came in
and interrupted her frenzied thoughts.
"Why don't you go home?" she advised Janina sincerely.
"Never!" answered Janina.
"Why should you wear yourself out in that way? You will rest a
little, gain new strength, and return again to the theater."
"No," answered Janina quietly.
"I forgot to tell you that old Mrs. Niedzielska was here to see me
yesterday."
"Do you know her?" asked the younger woman.
"Not at all, but she had some business with me. Oh, she is a sly
fox, that old hag!" added Sowinska.
"Perhaps she is a bit too miserly, but otherwise she is a rather
honest woman."
"Honest? You'll find out yet for yourself how honest she is."
"Why?" asked Janina, but without curiosity, for it didn't at all
interest her now.
"I will only say this much . . . that she does not love you in the
least, not in the least!"
"That's strange, for I never did her any wrong," answered Janina.
Sowinska's demeanor suddenly changed, for she glanced angrily at
Janina and wanted to say something sharp, but seeing that Janina's
face wore an expression of complete indifference, she refrained and
left the room.
Janina thought about Bukowiec.
"I have no home," she thought, even without bitterness. "The whole
wide world is my home," she added, but suddenly remembered what
Grzesikiewicz had told her about her father and stirred as though
some hidden pain had awakened in her. An uneasiness, not such as
besets one on the eve of some event, but such as one feels on
remembering some good that one has lost forever, filled Janina's
heart. It was the pain of the past like the quiet remembrance of the
dead.
But those memories of Bukowiec and those lonely nights when she
dreamed, forgetting about everything, and created for herself such
wondrous worlds, now flashed upon her mind in all their vividness.
Only the memory of that exuberant and majestic nature, those vast
fields, and those silent glens full of murmurs and bird songs,
verdure, and wild grandeur swathed Janina in melancholy and lulled
her weary soul with its charms.
The woods in which she was reared, those dim depths full of
unspeakable wonders, those gigantic trees to which she was united by
a thousand affinities, outlined themselves in her mind ever more
powerfully. Janina longed for them now and listened through the
nights, for it seemed to her that she heard the grave autumnal
murmur of the forest, the somnolent rustling of its branches. It
seemed that she felt within herself the slow, endless swaying of
those giant trees, the soft motions of the verdure bathed in golden
sunlight, the joyous cry of the birds, the fragrance of the young
pine saplings and juniper bushes the whole leisurely life of nature.
Janina lay for whole hours at a time, without a word, thought, or
motion, for her soul was there in those verdant woods. She wandered
over the meadows covered with wild raspberries and waving grass,
strayed across the fields where the rye grew high like a wood,
swaying and murmuring in the breeze and gleaming with dew in the
sunlight, penetrated the groves full of the pungent smell of the
resin. She followed each road, each boundary, each wood path,
greeted everything that lived there and cried out to the fields,
woods, the hills, and the sky: "I have come! I have come!" smiling
as though she had found a lost happiness.
These invigorating memories restored Janina's health almost
entirely. On the eighth day she felt strong enough for a walk. She
was longing for the fresh air, the verdure unsoiled by city dust,
the sunlight, and the vast open spaces. She felt that the city was
stifling her, that here, at every step, she had to limit her own ego
and continually struggle against all the barriers of custom and
dependence.
Janina passed through the Place of Arms and, going beyond the
Citadel, she walked along the damp sand dunes to Bielany.
An unbroken silence enveloped her on all sides. The sun shone
brightly and warmly, but from the water there blew a brisk,
invigorating breeze.
She gazed at the quiet river flecked with spots of white foam and at
the indistinct silhouettes of boats trailing along in midstream. She
breathed in deeply the calm that surrounded her and felt a
resurgence of her wasted strength.
Janina lay down upon the yellowish sand of the bank and, gazing at
the gleaming expanse of waters, forgot everything. It seemed to her
as though she were flowing on with the current of the river, passing
the shores, houses, and woods and hurrying on continually into a
blue and boundless distance like the illimitable expanse of heaven
that hung over her. It seemed to her as though she no longer
remembered anything, but felt only the ineffable delight of rocking
with the waves.
Janina suddenly awoke from that half dream, for there passed near
her an old man with a fishing rod in his hand. He looked at her in
passing, sat down almost beside her on the very edge of the river,
cast his line into the water and waited.
He had so honest a face that she felt a desire to speak to him and
was thinking how to begin, when he addressed her first: "Would you
like to take a trip over to the other side?"
Janina glanced at him questioningly.
"Aha! I see that we don't understand each other. I thought that you
wanted to drown yourself," he said.
"I wasn't even thinking about death," she replied quietly.
"Ha! ha! It would be an unexpected honor for the river."
He adjusted his fishing tackle and became silent, centering all his
attention on the fish that had begun to circle about the bait and
the hook.
A deeper silence, as it were, diffused itself about and began to
fill Janina's soul with a blissful calm. She felt that an immense
goodness was pervading her, that the majesty of that expanse of
heaven, of the waters and the verdure was uplifting her and drawing
from her breast a hymn of thanksgiving and the pure joy of living,
free from all earthly things.
The old man cast a sidelong glance at her and on his narrow lips
there hovered an unfathomable smile.
Janina felt that look and in turn glanced at him. Their eyes met in
a long and friendly gaze.
She felt a sudden and irresistible impulse to reveal the depths of
her soul to him.
She moved closer to him and said quietly: "I was not thinking about
death."
"Then you were seeking calm?"
"Yes, I wanted to take a look at nature and to forget."
"Forget about what?"
"About life!" Janina whispered hoarsely and tears of violent grief
filled her eyes.
"You are a child. It must have been some disappointment in love,
some thwarted ambition, or perhaps the lack of a dinner that put you
in such a tragic mood."
"All that taken together is not enough to make one feel very, very
unhappy," answered Janina.
"All that taken together is one big zero, for according to my way of
thinking there is nothing that can make wholly unhappy an individual
who knows himself," he said.
"Who are you . . . that is, what do you do?" he asked, after pausing
a while.
"I am in the theater," answered the girl.
"Aha! the world of comedy! Simulation which you afterwards take for
reality. Chimeras! All that warps the human soul. The greatest
actors are merely phonographs wound up sometimes by sages, sometimes
by geniuses, but most often by fools. And they speak to even greater
fools. Actors, artists, creators are merely blind instruments of
nature which uses them to reveal itself and for ends known to itself
alone! To them it seems that they are something real, but that is a
sad deception, for they are merely instruments which are thrown into
the discard when they are no longer needed or have lost their
usefulness."
"Who are you?" Janina asked, almost unknowingly, stirred by his
words.
"An old man as you see, who fishes and likes to chat. Oh yes, I am
very old. I come here for a few hours every day in the summertime,
if the weather is fair, and catch fish, if they let themselves be
caught. What good will it do you to know who I am? My name will tell
you nothing. In the sum total of humanity I am merely a pawn which
is given a certain number upon entrance into this world and retains
the same at the time of its exit. I am a cell of feeling long ago
registered and classified by my fellow-beings as a 'ne'er-do-well,'"
he said, smiling.
"I had no intention of offending you by my question."
"I never get angry about anything. Only foolish people anger
themselves or rejoice. A man ought merely to look on, observe, and
go his own way," he added, drawing a gudgeon from his hook.
Janina was a bit chilled by his gravity and by his decisive way of
speaking which admitted of no discussion.
"Are you from the Warsaw Theater?" he asked, throwing out his line
again.
"No, I am in Cabinski's company. No doubt you know him."
"I don't know him, nor have I heard about him."
"Is it possible that you have never heard anything about Cabinski,
nor read about the Tivoli?" asked Janina greatly surprised that
there could be anyone in Warsaw who did not know and was not
interested in the theater.
"I do not go to the theater at all and I do not read the papers," he
answered.
"Impossible!"
"One can see right away that you must not be more than twenty years
old, for you cry out in amazement, 'Impossible!' and look at me as
though I were a lunatic or a barbarian."
"But after talking with you, it was impossible for me to assume even
for a moment that . . ."
"That I am not interested in the theater, yes, that I do not read
the papers," he concluded for her.
"I can't even understand why."
"Well, because that does not interest me at all," he answered
simply.
"Are you not at all interested in what is going on in the world, in
how people are living, what they are doing, what they are thinking?"
"No. To you that doubtless appears monstrous; nevertheless it is
entirely natural. Do our peasants interest themselves in the theater
or in world affairs? They do not. Isn't that true?"
"Yes, but they are peasants and that is entirely different."
"It is the same thing, merely with this addition; that for them your
famous and great men do not exist at all and it doesn't make the
slightest difference to them whether Newton or Shakespeare ever
lived or not. And they are just as well off with their ignorance,
just as well."
Janina became silent, for what he had said appeared to her
paradoxical and not very true.
"What will I learn from your newspapers and your theaters? Merely
that people love, hate, and fight one another the same as ever; that
evil and brute force continue to reign as they always have done;
that the world and life are merely a big mill in which brains and
consciences are ground to dust. It is more comfortable to know
nothing rather than that," he continued.
"But is it right for anyone to seclude himself so egoistically from
all that is going on in the world?" asked Janina.
"Precisely in that lies wisdom. To desire nothing for ourselves,
care for nothing, and be indifferent that is what we ought to aim
at."
"Is it possible to attain such a state of complete apathy?"
"It is attained through the experience of life and through thinking.
Remember that the smallest pleasure, a mere momentary satisfaction,
always costs us more dearly than it is really worth. The average man
will not, for instance, pay a thousand rubles for a pear, for he
knows that would be an insane absurdity, and moreover, he knows the
relative value of a thousand rubles and of a pear. But out of the
capital of his life he is ready to squander thousands for mere
trifles--for a light love affair that lasts only as long as it takes
a two cent pear to ripen, for he has never considered the almost
priceless value of his own vital energy and becomes blind to all,
like a bull when the toreador flashes a red rag before his eyes, and
pays for that blindness with a part of his life. The majority of
human beings die, not from natural necessity, like a lamp when its
oil has burned out, but from bankruptcy, from squandering their
powers and strength on foolish things that are worth a thousand
times less than one day of life."
"I would not want to live such a cold and calculated life without
frenzies, dreams, and love."
"The world would not come to an end, if people did not love."
"It would be better to kill one's self than to live and dry up like
a tree."
"Suicide is the vulgar cry of the animal who suffers; it is the
rebellion of the atom against the laws of the universe. One must
allow the candle of one's life to burn out slowly and calmly to the
very end--in that lies happiness."
"So that is happiness?" asked Janina, feeling a sudden chill
penetrating her soul.
"Yes. Peace is happiness. To negate everything, to kill one's
desires and passions, to tear out of oneself illusions and whims
that is the way to attain it. It means to hold fast your soul in the
grip of self-knowledge and prevent it from dissipating itself in
foolish things."
"Who would want to live under such a yoke? What soul could endure
it?"
"The soul is knowledge."
"So you advocate nothing but stony indifference and peace! Never to
know of feel anything else but this! No, I prefer the ordinary trend
of life."
"There is still another way: the best remedy for our mental
sufferings is to expand our hearts, to become one with nature."
"Let us drop that. I don't like to speak about it, for it stirs me
too strongly."
They both remained silent for a long while. The old man gazed into
the water and mumbled something to himself, while Janina was rapt in
thought.
"All is foolishness," he began anew. "Behold and wonder at the
water, if nothing more; it will suffice you for a long time. Observe
the birds, the stars, and the elements; trace the growth of the
trees, listen to the wind, drink in perfumes and hues and everywhere
you will find unparalleled, everlasting miracles. It will replace
for you entirely life among people. Only do not gaze at nature with
the eyes of the vulgar, for then the most beautiful bird songs will
sound to you like a mere screeching; the most majestic forest will
seem nothing but so much kindling wood; in animals you will see
nothing but meat for food; the meadows will appear to you as so much
hay; for then, instead of feeling, you will be calculating."
"All human beings are like that."
"There are a few who can read from the book of nature and find in it
sustenance for their life."
Again they became silent.
The sun began to sink behind the hills on the opposite shore and to
shine ever more coldly as though it were burnt out, dyeing the water
blood red with its parting rays. The thickets seemed to shrink, for
they appeared to grow lower and wider at their bases. The yellowish
sands on the river bank became shrouded by the gray dusk. The
distant horizon seemed to sink away in the mists which rose up as
though they were the smoke of the burnt-out, smoldering sun. An even
deeper silence descended and enveloped the earth in sleep, as though
it were weary of the labors of the day.
Janina pondered over the words of the old man and a quiet, gloomy
sadness filled her heart and cast a vague and shadowy fear over her
mind. A feeling of passive submission and torpor overcame her.
She arose to go, for it was already growing dark.
"Are you going?" she asked the old man.
"Yes, it is already time and it is quite a way to Warsaw."
"Then we shall go together."
He put away his fishing tackle in his cane, deposited the fish in a
small can and began to walk along with Janina at a swift enough
pace.
"I do not know your name," he began to say slowly, "and I'm not at
all interested in that, but I see that you must not be very happy in
life. I am a crazy old man, as my neighbors call me, and an old
mason, as the town gossips like to add; I'm alone and, reconciled to
my fate, I am awaiting the end. Some time ago I knew a little of
what it means to suffer and love, but that is past long ago, long
ago," he whispered, gazing as it were, into a distant past, with a
faint smile of remembrance on his face. "The greatest boon that man
possesses is his ability to forget, otherwise he could not live at
all. But all this does not interest you in the least, does it? I
sometimes chatter nonsense, catch myself talking to myself, and
often forget things, for I'm just an old man, you see. You have an
honest-looking face, so I will give you this bit of advice; whenever
you suffer, when everything disappoints you and life becomes
unbearable flee from the city, go into the open country, breathe in
the fresh air, bathe in the sunlight, gaze at the sky, think about
eternity and pray . . . and you will forget all your troubles. You
will feel better and stronger. The misery of the people of to-day
arises from their estrangement from nature and from God, from
loneliness of the soul. And I will tell you one more thing; forgive
everything and be merciful to all. People are bad only through their
ignorance, therefore you be good. The greatest wisdom is in the
greatest kindness. I am here every day while it is warm. Perhaps we
shall meet again sometime. Good-bye, and may you be happy." He
nodded his head kindly in farewell.
She gazed a long time after him until he vanished from her sight
near the church of St. Mary. Janina rubbed her eyes, for it seemed
to her that this meeting had been merely a hallucination.
"No, that cannot be," she whispered to herself, for she still felt
upon her face the pure gaze of his peaceful old eyes and heard his
voice saying: "Be good! Pray! Forgive!" She repeated the words to
herself as she walked along the street.
"Forgive!" and she saw her father and afterwards the theater,
Cabinski, Majkowska, Kotlicki, Mme. Anna, and Sowinska and
remembered those days of suffering, abuse, and insult.
"Be good!" and she saw again Mirowska, who bore the most painful
wrongs with a smile, who never did anyone any harm, and yet was the
laughing stock of the entire company. Then, there was Wolska, who at
the expense of her own life saved her child from death and who was
cheated and forced into poverty. There was Cabinska's nurse
sacrificing herself for a stranger's children. There was, too, the
old stage-director, slighted by everybody; there were the peasants
in the country, treated like animals, and the exploited workmen in
the cities. There were all the swindles, cheatings, and crimes which
were going on continually. Janina felt that something within her was
trembling, breaking, and crying out in protest; that the suffering
of all humanity was pouring into her soul; that all the injustice,
all the wrongs, all the suffering and tears stood before her, and a
grave voice from above was saying: "Be good, forgive, pray," while
round about her a jeering laughter arose, as though in response to
it.
She arrived at her home and for a long time could not calm herself.
She pressed her hands to her head as though trying to still those
tumultuous thoughts that were whirling through her brain in such
confusion that she could not distinguish truth from falsehood. For
in a moment of clairvoyant vision she had seen that both the good
and the bad suffered equally, that all were struggling, all were
clamoring for salvation and protesting against life.
"I shall go mad! I shall go mad!" Janina whispered to herself.
On the next morning Wladek came to see her. He seemed to be so good
and kissed her hand so tenderly that she could not help noticing his
devotion. He complained about Cabinski and aired at length his
grievances against his mother.
Janina regarded him with a cold look, for she understood almost at
once that he wished to borrow money from her.
"Go and buy me some powder, for I must go to the theater to-day,"
she said to him.
Wladek rose eagerly to fulfill her behest.
"Close the door after you, for I am going to dress."
He closed the door with the latch to which he had his own key, and
departed.
On the street, almost at the very door Wladek spied the counselor. A
sudden idea flashed through his mind, for he smiled and cordially
approached the old man.
"Good morning, esteemed counselor."
"Good morning, how are you feeling, eh?"
"Thank you, I am entirely well, only Miss Orlowska is ill. The
directress has just asked me to see how she was getting along."
"What? Miss Janina is ill? They told me so behind the scenes, but I
did not believe it, for I thought . . ."
"Yes, she is sick. I am just now going for some medicine."
"Is she dangerously ill?"
"Oh no, but would you like to convince yourself personally?"
The counselor started violently, but then, adjusting his glasses, he
said: "Indeed, I would like to. I wished to do so many times before,
but she is so inaccessible."
"I will smooth the way for you."
"You are joking. How can that be done? Although, considering my
friendly attitude toward her . . ."
"You can see her. Here is the latchkey to her room. She will receive
you; she even told me that she would be pleased to have her friends
visit her, for she spends entire days all alone."
"But if . . ."
"Go. If she received me, she will receive you all the more readily.
I will be back in about an hour and then we can have a chat." So
saying, Wladek left hurriedly.
The counselor wiped his glasses, fidgeted about nervously, and had
not yet made up his mind whether to enter or not, when Wladek turned
back and called:
"My dear counselor! Lend me four rubles, will you? I would first
have to look for Cabinski to get the money and the medicine is
needed here right away. I have taken an unpleasant task upon myself,
but what is one going to do when companionship demands it? I will
return the money to you this evening, only please don't say anything
about this. And pardon my boldness."
The counselor willingly reached for his pocket book and, handing
Wladek ten rubles said: "I am glad I can help you. If any more is
needed, tell Miss Janina to mention only a word to me and she can
have it."
Wladek went off with the money, whistling merrily.
The counselor entered the house, quietly opened the door to Janina's
apartment, took off his hat and coat and walked into the room.
Janina was combing her hair and paid no attention to the opening of
the door, for she thought that Wladek had returned.
The counselor coughed a few times and approached her with extended
hand.
Janina sprang up hastily and threw a scarf over her naked shoulders.
"Mr. Wladyslaw has just told me that you were ill, so I thought it
would be a sin not to come to see you," said the counselor, speaking
rapidly, adjusting his glasses and smiling a colorless, banal smile.
Janina stared at him in amazement, for a moment, but when she felt
the touch of his cold, clammy hand in her own, she grew red with
anger, sprang toward the door so violently that the scarf fell to
the floor, revealing the stately lines of her shoulders, and opening
the door with an energetic gesture, cried: "Leave the room!"
"But I give you my word of honor that I hadn't even the slightest
intention of offending you. As a well-wishing friend I came here
merely to offer you my sympathy. Mr. Wladyslaw . . ."
"Is a scoundrel!"
"To that I'll agree, but you needn't get angry at me and express
your indignation in such a drastic manner; that is a trifle
too . . ."
"Please leave the room immediately!" cried Janina, trembling with
anger.
"A comedienne! A comedienne, upon my word!" whispered the counselor
to himself, hastily putting on his overcoat, for he was irritated
and offended. He hurried out, angrily slamming the door after him.
"Oh, what a scoundrel! What a scoundrel! and I belong to such a
man . . . I! They are jackals, not human beings, jackals! Wherever
one turns there is mud and filth!"
And so great grew Janina's indignation, that she cried almost aloud
through her tears: "Base wretches! wretches! wretches!"
Soon afterwards, Wladek returned bringing with him the powder, a
bottle of whisky and a package of sandwiches. He eyed Janina
curiously and looked about the room.
"The counselor was here!" she flung at him harshly.
The actor laughed cynically and exclaimed in a barroom jargon, "I
cornered him. Now we can have a little feast."
Janina was about to tell him how base he was, but suddenly there
rang in her ears those words: "Be good! Forgive!"
She restrained herself and began to laugh, but so harshly and so
long that she fell upon the bed and, tossing about on it, began to
repeat amid that dreadful, hysterical laughter: "Be good! Forgive!"
After a week's intermission there began again for Janina her former
hard life and an even harder battle, because now it had become a
struggle for mere daily bread.
She sang, as before, in the chorus, dressed as a chorus girl, peered
through the curtain at the public, whose attendance at the theater
was decreasing every day, strayed about the stage and the
dressing-rooms during the intermissions, and listened to the
whispered conversations, the music, and the quarrels. But how
different now were her thoughts and her feelings, how different now
and unlike her former self was Janina!
She no longer sought in the eyes of the public enthusiasm and love
of art, nor did she cast challenging glances at the front rows of
seats, for poverty had taught her how to estimate from the stage the
size of the audience and from it to draw deductions as to the
proportionate size of her salary. Poverty taught her to take
covertly from the storeroom the bread that was often used on the
stage and to eat it on the way home; frequently this was her entire
daily sustenance. No one admired her now, or escorted her home; nor
did she contend with anyone about art.
Kotlicki had completely vanished, the counselor was angry at Janina
and kept away from the theater, while Wladek spoke with her only at
times and visited her ever more rarely, offering as his excuse his
mother's growing weakness and the need of being with her.
Janina knew that he was lying, but she did not contradict him, for
he was entirely indifferent to her. She felt a deep contempt for
him, but could not break with him entirely because there still
lingered deep down in her consciousness a memory of the happy hours
they had spent together. She treated him coldly and did not let him
kiss her, but she could not tell him outright that he was a
scoundrel, for he was, in a way, the last link uniting her strange
soul with the world.
Janina had grown frightfully thin. Her complexion became pale and
unhealthy, and from her enlarged glassy eyes there looked forth a
dreadful and constant hunger! She walked about the theater like a
shadow, apparently quiet and calm, but with that feeling of
unceasing hunger mercilessly tearing her within and with despair in
her face.
There were whole days when she had not a bite of food, when she felt
a painful emptiness in her head and heard only one thing echoing
through her brain: "If I could only get something to eat! Something
to eat!" Aside from that one desire, everything vanished from her
mind and had no importance.
A similar poverty existed throughout the whole company. The women
shifted as best they could, but the men, particularly the more
honest ones, sold everything they possessed, even their wigs, to
save themselves.
With what terror they awaited each evening! "Are we going to play
to-night?" This whisper could be heard all over the theater: in the
dressing-rooms, behind the scenes, in the restaurant-garden where
the autumn wind frolicked, and on the deserted veranda, where the
waiters, vainly waiting for guests, repeated it. It was also
repeated by Gold, who sat huddled in his box office, shivering with
cold.
An oppressive silence reigned in the dressing-rooms. The funniest
jokes of Glas could not chase the clouds of worry from the brows of
the actors. They became careless in their make-up and none of them
learned their roles, for everybody was waiting in dread suspense for
the performance and every now and then going to the box office and
asking in a whisper: "Are we going to play to-night?"
Cabinski presented a new play every day, but he could not draw the
public. He gave The Trip Around Warsaw and The Robbers, and still
the house was empty. They played such curtain-raisers as Don Cesar
de Bazan, The Statue of the Commander, and The Fortune Teller of La
Voisin, but the theater remained as deserted as ever.
"For goodness' sake, what do you want?" the director cried to the
public from behind the curtain.
"Do you think they themselves know what they want? If there were
three hundred people present, then another three hundred would
appear, but when there are only fifty with the addition of cold and
rain, then only twenty remain," the editor explained to Cabinski,
for of all those numerous acquaintances who used to come behind the
scenes he alone remained, the rest having dispersed with the first
rains.
"The public is a herd that does not know where it is going to graze
on the following day," said Mr. Peter, with animosity.
Oh yes, they hated that public, and yet prayed to it. They cursed
it, called it "a herd" and "cattle," threatened it with their fists
and spat upon it, but only let that public appear in larger numbers,
and they fell upon their faces before it and felt a deep gratitude
toward that capricious lady, who had a different humor each day and
each day bestowed her favors upon someone else.
"The public is a harlot! a harlot!" whispered Topolski threateningly.
"To-day she is with a monarch, to-morrow with a clown!"
"You have told the truth, but it will not give you even a ruble,"
answered Wawrzecki, whose humor still survived, but had already
become sharp and bitter, for Mimi had left the company and gone to
join another one at Posen.
Several members of the company had already left, although there
still remained a whole week till the end of the season. Especially
the choruses had almost entirely dispersed, for they suffered the
most from poverty.
The rains continued to fall in the morning, the afternoon, and the
evening. The atmosphere at the theater became unbearable. There were
draughts in the dressing-rooms, and mud covered the floors, for the
roof leaked everywhere. The cold was intense.
To Janina it seemed that this theater was slowly falling apart and
burying everyone among its ruins, while that other one on Theatrical
Place stood strong and invincible.
Its ponderous walls had grown black from the rains and it appeared
even sterner and mightier than before and filled Janina with a
pious, unexplainable awe whenever she gazed at it. It sometimes
seemed to her that this vast edifice rested its columns on piles of
corpses and that it drank the blood, the lives, and the brains of
the actors in the smaller theaters and throve and grew mighty on
them.
"I shall go mad! I shall go mad!" often whispered Janina, pressing
her burning head with her hands, for dreams and hallucinations
tormented her even more than hunger.
There was still another thing which made her deathly silent, so that
she would sit for whole hours listening within herself, and thinking
of those strange, indefinable impressions and feelings which
pervaded her ever more frequently. Janina felt that something
dreadful was happening within her, that those sudden fits of
trembling and weeping which would seize her without any explainable
cause, those violently changing moods to which she gave way and
those strange sufferings were somehow unnatural and resulted from
something about which she feared to think. She had no mother, nor
anyone in whom she could confide and who would enlighten her, but
there came a moment when with womanly instinct she knew that she was
about to become a mother.
Janina wept for a long time after that discovery, but her tears were
not tears of despair, but only of tender pity, sensitiveness and
shame at the same time. She felt then that death had crouched behind
her and was standing so close that it sent a shudder of frenzy
through her entire being and cast her into an apathetic
indifference. She ceased to think and surrendered herself passively,
with the fatalism of people who have suffered long or who have been
crushed by some overwhelming misfortune, to the wave that bore her
on and did not even ask whither it was taking her.
One day, unable to endure any longer the sharp pangs of hunger,
Janina began to look around her room for something which she might
sell. She began feverishly to rummage in her trunks. She had only a
few light theatrical costumes.
Sowinska was again reminding her almost every day about her overdue
rent and that daily nagging was an unbearable torment. Janina could
not ask her to sell those costumes, for she knew that Sowinska would
unscrupulously keep the money, so she decided to sell them herself.
She wrapped one of the costumes in a piece of paper and went to the
door to wait for a buyer of old clothes, but the porter was walking
about the yard, servant girls were going to and fro, and in the
windows of the houses she saw the faces of women who had often cast
scornful glances at her. No, she could not sell here, for in a
moment the whole house would know about her poverty. She went to one
of the adjoining houses and waited a short while.
"Any old things to buy! Any old things to buy!" came the hoarse
voice of an old Jew.
Janina called him. The Jew turned his head and came to her. He was
as dirty as he was old. She went with him to the stoop of some
house.
"Do you want to sell anything?" asked the Jew, laying his bag and
stick on the stairs and bending his thin face and red eyes over the
package.
"Yes," answered Janina, unwrapping the paper.
The Jew took the costume in his dirty hands, spread it out in the
sunlight, looked over it a few times, smiled imperceptibly, put it
back in the paper, wrapped it up, picked up his bag and stick and
said, "Such fineries are not for me." He began to descend the
stairway, derisively smacking his lips.
"I will sell it cheap," Janina called after him, thinking with fear
that perhaps she might get at least a ruble or a half-ruble for it.
"If you have some old shoes or pillow-slips, I will buy them, but
such a thing is of no use to me. Who will buy it? Rubbish!"
"I will sell it cheap," she whispered.
"Well, how much do you want for it?"
"A ruble."
"May I fall down dead, if that is worth more than twenty kopecks.
What is it worth, who will buy it?" and he came back, unwrapped the
costume, and again examined it indifferently.
"The ribbons alone cost me a few rubles," said Janina, and she
became silent, deciding that she would take the twenty kopecks.
"Ribbons! What's that . . . all pieces!" chattered the Jew, glancing
over the costume hastily. "Well, I will give you thirty kopecks. Do
you want it? As I'm an honest man, I can't give you more . . . I
have a good heart, but I can't. Well, do you want it?"
This barter filled Janina with such disgust, shame, and grief, that
she felt like throwing down everything and running away.
The Jew counted out the money to her, took the costume and went
away. From the window of her room Janina saw how in the full light
of the yard he examined the dress once more.
"What shall I do with this?" she whispered helplessly, pressing in
her hand the dirty and sticky kopecks.
Janina owed money to Mme. Anna for the rent of her room, to the
tender of the theater-buffet, and to a few of her companions of the
chorus, but she no longer thought of this, only took the thirty
kopecks and went out to the store to buy herself something to eat.
She returned home, and having eaten, she wished to take a little
nap, but Sowinska entered and told her that someone was waiting for
her for the last half-hour and immediately there entered
Niedzielska's servant girl with eyes all red from crying.
"Please Miss, come along with me, for my mistress is very sick and
wants to see you without fail," she said.
"Is Madame Niedzielska so seriously ill?" cried Janina, springing up
from the bed and hurriedly putting on her hat.
"The priest has already been there this afternoon with the sacrament
and she has only a few hours to live," whispered the faithful old
servant with tears in her eyes. "She can scarcely draw her breath
and all I understood her to say was that I should run to you and
tell you that she wants to see you right away. And where is Mr.
Wladyslaw?"
"How can I know? He ought to be with his mother," answered Janina.
"He ought to, but he is a worthless son," whispered the servant in
hollow tones. "Already for a week he has not been at home, for he
had an awful quarrel with his mother. My God! My God! how he swore
at her and abused her and even wanted to strike her. O merciful
Lord, that is the way he repaid her for loving him so dearly that
she even denied herself food to supply him with money. She was such
a miser that she did not want to spend money for a doctor or any
medicines and he . . . oh! oh, God will punish him severely for his
mother's tears! I know that you are not to blame for it, miss . . .
I can guess that . . . but . . ." she whispered quietly, hobbling
alongside of Janina and every now and then wiping her eyes, all red
from crying and loss of sleep.
Janina hardly heard a word of what she was saying for the noise and
the din in the street and the splashing of water flowing from the
drainpipes to the sidewalk drowned out everything else. She went
along only because the dying woman had summoned her.
The first room of Niedzielska's home was almost filled with people
and Janina greeted them as she passed through it, but no one
answered her and all eyes followed her with a peculiar curiosity.
In the room where Niedzielska lay, there were also a few persons
seated about her bed. Janina went straight to the sick woman. She
was lying flat on her back, but fixed her eyes upon Janina as soon
as she had crossed the threshold.
On Janina's entrance the persons in the room stopped talking so
abruptly that the sudden silence sent a strange thrill through her.
She met Niedzielska's gaze and could not tear her eyes away from it.
She sat down alongside of the bed, greeting her in a subdued voice.
The old woman grasped her hand tightly and in a quiet voice with a
very strong accent asked: "Where is Wladek?"
Her brows knit themselves in an expression of severity and something
like hatred gleamed in the yellowish whites of her eyes.
"I don't know. How am I to know?" answered Janina almost frightened
by her question.
"You don't know, you thief! You have stolen my son and yet, you dare
tell me that you don't know!" gasped Niedzielska, striving to raise
her voice a little, but it sounded hollow and wild. Her eyes opened
ever wider and gleamed with hatred and menace, her pale lips
quivered nervously, and her thin, yellow face twitched continually.
She raised herself a bit on her bed and in a hoarse voice, as though
rallying her remaining strength cried: "You streetwalker! You thief!
You . . ." and she fell back exhausted, with a hollow groan.
Janina sprang up, as though an electric shock had passed through
her, but the old woman gripped her wrist so tightly that she fell
back again on her chair, unable to free her hand. She glanced about
desperately at everybody, in the room, but their faces were stern.
She closed her eyes for a moment to shut out the sight of the
yellowish wrinkled faces of those women who stood facing her like
specters glaring at her with their skeleton-like faces in the
shadowy twilight of the room.
"So that is she! So young and already . . ."
"A base serpent."
"I would kill her like a dog, if she tried to do the same with my
son."
"I would have her locked up and sent to the workhouse."
"In my days such women as that were put into the pillory as a
punishment. I remember well."
"Be quiet! quiet!" whispered an old man trying to pacify the women.
"And for her he ran away to the comedians, for her he squandered so
much money, for such a low-down thing as she, he beat his mother!
May you perish, you base serpent!"
Such were the voices full of hatred and scorn that hissed all about
Janina and the poisonous malignity that dripped from their words and
glances flooded her heart with an ocean of pain and shame. She
wanted to cry out: "Mercy, people! I am innocent," but her head bent
ever lower on her breast and she had an ever dimmer consciousness of
where she was and what was happening to her. Janina's soul had
already been weakened too much by misery to resist this blow. An
immense wave of fear began to shake her, for it seemed to her that
the hand of the old woman which held her so tightly and those
dreadful eyes bulging from their sockets were drawing her down into
a dark abyss and that this was death and the end of everything.
Later, Janina no longer heard anything that was being said and saw
no one but the dying woman. At moments, she still felt a desire to
spring up and run away from there but it was a mere flicker of will
that passed through her nerves without reaching her consciousness.
So many previous sufferings, and now this blow at her very heart,
benumbed her brain with a quiet madness. She grew frightfully pale
and sat as though dead, gazing at the face of the dying woman. Those
same fragments of thoughts and visions now swarmed through her brain
that had done so once before: that same vast mass of greenish waters
seemed to submerge her consciousness. She was not even aware that
they had torn her away from Niedzielska and shoved her into a corner
where she stood immovable and bereft of her senses.
Niedzielska was dying. It seemed as though she had only been waiting
for Janina before giving herself up to death, for anger and hatred
kept her alive a few hours longer. Now, there followed a general
dissolution. She lay there rigid and straight, with her hands upon
the coverlet, which they tugged at automatically, and with her sad
eyes gazing upward as though into the eternity into which she was
entering.
The consecrated candle shed a yellowish light upon her face
impearled with the sweat of her last struggle and death agony. Her
gray hair, scattered in a disheveled mass upon the pillow, formed a
sort of background upon which appeared in sharper relief her
withered head, shaking with the unconscious and frightful
convulsions of death. She breathed heavily and slowly and gasped
with effort, catching the air with her pale lips. At moments her
face would writhe and her mouth twitch with a dreadful spasm of pain
and she would raise her hands as though she wanted to tear apart her
throat to get more air. Her white and fever-coated tongue slipped
spasmodically from her mouth and so tense did her body become in the
struggle with death that the veins stood out like black whip cords
on; her temples and throat.
The silence was full of weeping and sobbing of those kneeling about
and the awful groans of the dying woman. Feverishly whispered
prayers, tear-streaming eyes, the sobbing of the servant and the
children filled the room with an atmosphere of dreadful and
overwhelming tragedy. The dark shadows at the farther end of the
room trembled as though engulfing it all. The candles diffused a
yellowish, ghastly light that seemed to steep everything in
boundless grief.
The room filled up completely with kneeling people and only she, who
lay there rigid, unconscious, and dying, reigned from the throne of
death over that bowed throng begging for mercy.
An old man with silvery gray hair made his way to the bed, knelt
down, took a prayer book from his pocket and, by the light of the
candle, began to read the Penitential Psalms. He had a clear and
melodious voice and the words of the psalms, like a murmuring
rainbow, or like flashes of lightning full of terror, tears, might,
and heavenly grace, floated above the heads of all those present:
"Have mercy upon me, O Lord, for I am weak; O Lord, heal me, for my
bones are vexed."
"Thou art my hiding place; Thou shalt preserve me from trouble . . ."
"Many sorrows shall be to the wicked, but he that trusteth in the
Lord, mercy shall compass him about."
"My lovers and my friends stand aloof from my sore and my kinsmen
stand afar off."
"They also that seek after my life lay snares for me; and they that
seek for my hurt speak mischievous things and imagine deceits all
day long."
The words rang out ever stronger and eddied through the air like the
breath of a mighty power that bent low all foreheads and cast them
down into the dust with tears of sorrow, penance, and supplication.
All those present repeated them after the old man and that confused,
tearful and monotonous murmur of voices awoke Janina from her
torpor. She felt that she was still alive, so she knelt down on the
threshold of the room and with fever-parched lips whispered those
sweet words long since forgotten, and drew from them a deep comfort
full of sadness and tenderness.
"Purge me with hyssop and I shall be clean; wash me and I shall be
whiter than snow."
"Hide not thy face from me, lest I be like unto them that go down
into the pit."
"And of thy mercy cut off mine enemies, and destroy all them that
afflict my soul, for I am thy servant."
She repeated the words fervently and large tears rolled down her
face, uniting with the tears of all the other mourners and purging
her soul of all sorrows and memory of what had passed. But after a
while those tears began to stream so freely and stifle her so that
Janina quietly arose and left the place.
On the street she met Wladek running toward the house in haste and
fear. He stopped to ask her about his mother, but she went on
without even glancing at him.
Almost all feelings were dead within Janina, save that of a deathly
weariness. She entered the lighted Church of St. Ann on the Cracow
Suburb and, seating herself in one of the pews, gazed at the
illuminated altar and the throng of kneeling worshipers. She heard
the solemn tones of the organ and a wave of song rising above it.
She saw looking at her from the walls and the altars the peaceful
and happy faces of saints, but all this did not awaken a single
emotion in her.
"Thou wilt cut off mine enemies and destroy all them that afflict my
soul. Thou wilt destroy them . . ." Janina repeated mechanically and
left the church. No, no, she could not pray she could not.
Janina slept after all this with a deep, stony sleep that was free
from dreams.
On the following day Cabinski gave her a big role that used to be
Mimi's. Janina accepted it with indifference. With the same
indifference she went to Niedzielska's funeral. She walked at the
end of the procession unnoticed by anyone and gazed indifferently at
the thousands of graves in the cemetery and at the coffin and not a
scintilla of feeling stirred in her even at the sound of the sobbing
over the grave. Something had broken within her and she had lost all
ability to feel what was going on about her.
In the evening Janina went to the theater for the performance. She
dressed as usual and sat thoughtlessly gazing at the rows of candles
pasted to the tables, at the scribbled walls and at the rows of
actresses sitting before their mirrors.
Sowinska continually hung about the dressing-room and observed her
curiously.
Her companions spoke to Janina, but she did not answer them. Every
now and then, she fell into a state of torpor in which one beholds
without seeing anything and lives without feeling, while deep
within, at the very bottom of her consciousness, there was reflected
the image of that dying woman and there swarmed and hissed those
stinging and scornful whispers of her neighbors, mixed with the
words of the Penitential Psalms.
Suddenly, a tremor ran through Janina, for a voice reached her from
the stage which sounded like Grzesikiewicz's; so she arose and went
out.
Wladek was standing on the stage, engaged in a lively conversation
with Majkowska, whose naked shoulders he was kissing.
Janina paused behind one of the scenes, for some feeling without a
name passed through her heart, like the sharp, cold edge of a
dagger, but was swiftly gone again, awakening in her a certain
knowledge.
"Mr. Niedzielski!" she called.
The actor threw back his shoulders, while across his clean-shaven
face there passed a shadow of impatience and boredom. He whispered
yet a few words into the ear of Mela, who smiled and departed, and
then, without trying to disguise his ill humor, he approached
Janina.
"Did you want anything?" he asked irascibly.
"Yes . . ."
In the despondency that filled her at that moment Janina wanted to
tell him that she was unhappy and ill. She longed to hear a warm
word of sympathy and felt an irresistible need of telling her
troubles to someone and of weeping on some friendly breast, but on
hearing the sharp tone of Wladek's voice, she suddenly remembered
how much she had suffered through him and how base he was, so she
suppressed those desires within herself.
"Are we going to play to-day?" she asked.
"We are. There are about a hundred rubles in the treasury."
"Ask them for some money for me."
"What do you think! Do you want me to make a fool of myself?
Moreover, I'm going right home."
Janina glanced at him and said in a quiet, expressionless voice:
"Take me home, for I feel so very miserable."
"I have no time, I must immediately run to my own home, for already
they are all waiting for me there."
"Oh, how base you are! How base you are!" she whispered.
Wladek recoiled a few steps, not knowing whether he should smile, or
pretend to be offended.
"Are you saying that to me, to me?" he asked. He did not dare to
swear, for that girl with her proud face and glance of a lady
imposed respect upon him and thrust back into his throat, as it
were, the brutalities that he wanted to hurl at her.
"To you!" Janina answered. "You are base! You are the basest person
in the world . . . do you hear! . . . the basest!"
"Janina!" he cried endearingly, as though he wanted to shield
himself thereby from her accusation.
"I forbid you to address me in that manner, it insults me!"
"Have you gone crazy, or what has happened to you? What sort of
farce do you call that!" he choked out in anger.
"I have found out what you are and I scorn you with my whole soul."
"Whew! So that is the kind of pathetic role you have chosen to play?
Are you preparing it for your debut at the Warsaw Theater?"
Janina answered him only with a look of scorn and walked away.
Sowinska came up to her and with a mysterious and cruel pity in her
voice whispered: "It isn't good for you to get so irritated and
also, you ought not lace yourself so tightly."
"Why?"
"It may harm you, because . . . because . . ." and she whispered the
rest into Janina's ear.
The blood rushed to Janina's face with shame at the thought that
Sowinska had recognized her condition which she was seeking to
conceal. She had no more strength left to reply to her, nor time
either, for she had to go on the stage.
They were playing The Peasant Emigration and Janina appeared in the
first act as a super.
In the men's dressing-room that evening, a storm broke out. In the
intermission before the so-called "Christmas Eve" scene of the play,
Topolski, who was acting the part of "Bartek Kozica," sent to
Cabinski a letter, or a sort of ultimatum demanding fifty rubles for
himself and Majkowska and, in case of a denial, refusing to play any
further. While waiting for Cabinski's reply, he began slowly to
remove his make-up.
Cabinski came running almost with tears in his eyes and cried: "I
will give you twenty rubles. Oh, oh! you people have no mercy on
me!"
"Give me fifty rubles and we shall continue to play; if you don't
then . . ." Here he unglued one half of his mustache and began to
take off his leggings.
"For God's sake man! there is only one hundred rubles in all in the
treasury and that is hardly enough to cover the expenses."
"Let me have fifty rubles immediately, or else you can finish the
play yourself or return the public its money," calmly said Topolski,
pulling off his other legging.
"Up till now, I had thought that you, at least, were a man! Just
think what you are doing to us all," pleaded Cabinski.
"Don't you see, Director . . . I am undressing."
The intermission was being prolonged and the public outside was
beginning to shout and stamp its feet with impatience.
"No, I should sooner have expected death than that! And you, who are
my best friend, are you going to go back on me now?" continued
Cabinski.
"My dear Director, there's no use talking any further. You can fool
everyone else, but not me."
"But I haven't the money. If I give you thirty rubles now, I will
have nothing left with which to pay the rent of the theater!" cried
Cabinski in despair, running about the dressing-room.
"I have said: if you do not give us fifty rubles, we shall go
straight home."
In the hall there began to rise a very pandemonium of shouts and
catcalls.
"All right, here is fifty rubles, take them. You are robbing your
own companions, but you don't care a rap about that, for you'll have
something with which to organize your own company. Here, take them,
but that ends all relations between us!"
"Don't worry about my company; I shall reserve the position of a
stage-hand for you."
"Sooner will you check coats in my theater, before I join yours."
"Silence, you clown!"
"I'll call the police and they'll quiet you right away!" shouted the
infuriated Cabinski.
"I'll silence you immediately, you circus performer!" cried
Topolski, who had just finished dressing, and, taking Cabinski by
the collar, he gave him a kick that sent him flying out of the
dressing-room; then he himself went out on the stage.
The performance was concluded peacefully, but a new quarrel started
around the box office. The actors and actresses stood there in a
close group so that only their heads and faces, shining with the
grease used to wash off the paint, were visible in the gaslight.
They were all shouting for money and demanding their overdue
salaries. They shook their fists threateningly at the cashier's
window, their eyes flashed lightning, and their voices were hoarse
from shouting.
Cabinski, still red and trembling from the abuse that had just met
him, quarreled with everybody and swore and wanted to pay only the
usual installments.
"Whoever isn't satisfied with what he gets, let him go to Topolski!
It's all the same to me . . ." he cried.
Janina approached the window and said: "Director, you promised to
pay me to-day."
"I haven't the money!"
"But neither have I," she begged quietly.
"I am not paying the others either, and yet, they do not importune
me as you do."
"Mr. Cabinski, I am almost dying from hunger," she answered
straightforwardly.
"Then go and earn some money. All the others know how to help
themselves. I like naive women, but only on the stage. A comedienne!
Go to Topolski, he will advance you the money."
"Oh, Topolski assuredly won't let the members of his company suffer
poverty. He will pay each what is due him and will not cheat
people!" cried Janina impulsively.
"Then you can go straight to him and don't show up here again!"
shouted Cabinski, driven to fury by the mention of Topolski.
"Listen there, Director!" began Glas, but Janina listened no longer
and, pushing her way through the crowd, left the theater.
"Go and earn it . . ." she repeated to herself.
She walked along the almost empty streets. The gas-lamps cast a
ghastly, yellowish glare like that of funeral tapers on the silent
and deserted thoroughfares and alleys. The dark-blue vault of the
sky hung over the city like a huge canopy embroidered with brightly
scintillating stars. A cool breeze swept down the streets and
chilled Janina to the marrow.
"Go and earn it!" she again repeated to herself, passing before the
Grand Theater. She had come here without being aware of it.
Janina glanced at the building and turned back. An unbearable pain
racked her head, as though there was a burning iron ring about it.
She was so utterly weak and worn-out that at moments she could
scarcely resist the desire to sit down on the curbstone and remain
there. Then again, so desperate a realization of her poverty filled
her that she was almost ready to give herself to anyone who might
ask, if she could only relieve that agonized trembling within
herself, that almost deathly weakness and exhaustion.
She dragged herself heavily along the streets, for she no longer
knew what to do, and the chill night air, the silence, and that
deathly weariness gave her a sort of painful ecstasy. Before her
eyes there hovered only phantom forms and fiery spots, so that she
knew not where she was or what was happening to her. She felt only
one thing and that was that she would no longer be able to endure
it.
"What am I going to do further?" Janina asked thoughtlessly, looking
before herself.
The silence of the sleeping city and the silence of the dark heavens
seemed to be the only answer to her question.
Janina felt as though she were falling swiftly down a steep incline
and that there, at the very bottom, lay the outstretched corpse of
Niedzielska.
"Death!" she answered herself. "Death!" and she gazed fixedly at
that dead face with the congealed tears on its cheeks, and not fear,
but an immense silence enveloped her soul.
She looked all about her as though she were seeking for the cause of
that deep silence at her side.
Then, she began thinking of her father, of the theater, and of
herself, but as though they were things which she had only seen or
read about.
"What am I going to do?" Janina asked herself aloud after she had
returned home. It was impossible for her to see or even to imagine
what the morrow would be like.
"In this condition I can't go to the theater, I can't go anywhere.
But what am I going to do?" That question smote her now and then, as
with a club.
Day began to dawn and flood the room with its drab and gray light,
but Janina still sat on the same spot, gazing blankly out of the
window, with deeply sunken eyes and whispering with lips blackened
by fever: "What am I going to do? What am I going to do?"