Complete Works of Henryk Sienkiewicz

by Henryk Sienkiewicz

  There was, however, in the Jastrzeb manor-house another who did not sleep and who talked with a person not present, and that was Laskowicz. After all that had taken place and what had been revealed in the past few days, he was prepared for his farewell parting with the Krzycki family, as he well knew that his further presence in Jastrzeb would be intolerable. And nevertheless he desired at present to stay in it, even though for a few days, in order that he might gaze longer upon Panna Marynia and, as he called it, “further narcotize himself.” Somehow, from the first moment he had heard her play, she actually absorbed his thoughts in a way that no woman up to that time had done. Foremost among the prepared formulæ which he, with dogmatic faith, had adopted to judge mankind with, was the precept that a woman belonging to the so-called pampered class was a thoughtless creature. In the meantime he had to dissent at once from that formula as a soul had spoken to him through the violin. Later he was astonished to find in that young lady two entities, one of which manifested itself in music as a finished artist, concentrated, filled with exaltation within herself, dissolved in the waves of tones and playing as if she drew the bow over her own nerves; the other appeared in every-day life in her customary relations with people. The latter seemed at the first glance of the eye, if not an insignificant, a common girl, full of simplicity and even gaiety, who screamed like a cat when Dolhanski, for instance, said things disagreeable to her; who jested with Gronski, telling him absurdities about spirits or, to the great alarm of Gronski and her older sister, fled into the garden for a boat ride on the pond. Laskowicz did not fully comprehend the world and was not a subtle person; nevertheless, he observed in the “common girl” something which made her, as it were, a little divinity, haloed with a quiet worship. Evidently she herself did not appear to be conscious of this and, viewing such a state of affairs as something which was self-understood, she lived the life of a flower or a bird. Confident that she will not suffer any harm from any one, gentle, bright, living beyond the misery and wretchedness of life, beyond its cares, beyond its chilling winds which dim the eyes with tears, beyond the dust which defiles, she resembled a pure spring which people look upon as blessed and whose translucency they fear to muddy. It seemed that the environment did not exact of her anything more than that she should exist, just as nothing more is demanded of a masterpiece.

  To Laskowicz, as often as he gazed at her, there came recollection of his childhood days. He and his older brother, who, a few years before falling into consumption had committed suicide on the Riviera, were the sons of a woman who conducted near one of the churches in Warsaw a shop for the sale of consecrated wax candles, medals, rosaries, and pictures. Owing to this, both brothers were, in a way, bred upon the church portals and were in constant relations with the priests. Once it happened that the aged canon, the rector of the church, bought at an auction an alabaster statuette of some saint, and for an unknown reason took it for granted that it was not only the work, but the masterpiece of Canova. The statuette, which, in reality, was pretty and finely executed, after consecration, was placed in a separate niche near one of the altars under the name of Saint Apollonia and from that time the gentle old rector surrounded it with great worship as a holy relic and with more particular care as the greatest church rarity. He led his guests and more pious parishioners before it and commanded them to admire the work and got angry if any one ventured to make any critical observation. In fact, the admiration of the canon was shared by the organist, the sexton, the church servants, and both boys. The thought that Panna Marynia amidst her environment was such a Saint Apollonia unwittingly suggested itself to Laskowicz. For that reason, after the first impression he called her “a saintly doll.” But he also recalled that when in the course of time he lost his faith — and he lost it in the gymnasium where, speaking parenthetically, he completed his studies with the aid of the venerable canon — he often was beset with a desire to demolish that alabaster statuette. At present he was consumed with a greater desire, for it bordered upon a passion, to destroy this living one. And yet he did not in the least bear her any hatred. On the contrary, he could not resist the charm of this maiden, so loved by all, any more than one can resist the charm of dawn or spring. It even happened that what vexed and exasperated him also at the same time attracted him towards her with an uncontrollable force. Consequently he was drawn to her by her appurtenance to this world, the existence of which he deemed a social injustice, crime, and wrong; she attracted him in spite of his internal anguish, and even by the thought that beside such a flower the proletariat was but manure. A lure for him was her refined culture and her art, though he regarded such things as superfluous and unnecessary for people of deflorated life; the fascination was her utter dissimilarity to the women whom he met up to the time of his arrival at the village, and her whole form was an intoxication. Never before was he under the same roof with a being like her; therefore he forgot himself and lost his head at the sight of her, and though he had not yet familiarized himself with the power which began to play in his bosom and had not christened it with the name of love, the truth was that during the past few days he was aflame like a volcano and loved her to distraction. He vaguely felt, however, that in this passion there was something of the lust of a negro for a white woman, and what was more, that in that particular love there was apostasy to principles. So then in the same germ he poisoned her with the virus of hatred and the wolfish propensity of annihilation.

  And now he was summoning this “saintly doll” to come to him. Accepting, indiscriminately, and also with all that exaggeration peculiar to fanaticism and youth, everything which the books published as the results of the latest researches or phenomena in the domain of science, he believed that hypnotism was a secret and gigantic power which, when applied, would become invincible. Holding himself on the strength of experiments tried among his classmates as a hypnotizer, and considering the delicate and impressionable young girl an excellent medium, he was most firmly convinced that he could put her to sleep and command her from a distance. Conscience, indeed, whispered to him that what he contemplated doing was an abuse of science, but he silenced that voice, persuading himself that it would at the same time be a triumph of a proletaire over this world, for which it is not permissible to have any pity, and that a man belonging to the camp which had declared a war of life and death on the entire social structure and “had appraised at their true worth” all current ideas has the right to and must be heedless.

  Above all, however, he yearned to subjugate this elegant and immaculate maiden, to dominate not merely her body and soul, but also her will; to transform her into something like himself; to draw her to himself, to awaken within her the slumbering feminine instincts, to open before her the closed doors of passion; to inflame her, to embrace her, to toy with her, and afterwards keep her forever close to his bosom. And at that thought he was beset by a strange joy like that which madmen feel while profaning objects held in reverence and fear, and, simultaneously, lust and love within him intensified. He felt that after all that and for all of that, he would love this booty of his, this sacrifice, to distraction.

  But as he was a madman only about the heart of a maid, and not a depraved man, he was at times possessed by a tenderness so great that if his summons were productive of any results he might not pass the bounds of transgression. But these were transient moments; after which, straining the whole strength of his will and the sight of his closely set eyes in the direction of Marynia’s sleeping chamber he said and commanded: “Rise! — do not light the candles — do not awaken your sister — open the door quietly and walk in darkness on the path of my thoughts until you come to me, to my arms, to my bosom!” And he imagined that at any moment he would behold her, resembling that alabaster statuette, entering with the mechanical step of a somnambulist in a single gown, silvery, dreamy, with head tilted backward, with closed eyes and opened lips drinking the lustre of the moon which shone in the windows. Afterwards he listened in the silence and, concentrating yet mor
e powerfully his will, he repeated again with emphasis as if each word was chiselled out of stone: “Rise! do not light the candles — do not waken your sister — open the door — go on the path of my thoughts — and come!”

  Horrible indeed would have been the fate of the young lady were it not for one fortunate circumstance, and that was that she never dreamt of rising, opening the door, going on the path of his thoughts, etc. On the contrary, she slept as peacefully as if an angel had bent over her and with the movements of her wings had driven away from her disquieting and feverish dreams. The little household fairies of Jastrzeb, such as those about which she spoke to Gronski, also did not disturb her repose. Perhaps some of them chased the moths from the windows in order that they might not make any noise by striking the window-panes; perhaps others, climbing the curtains and window sashes, gazed at her from a distance with their keen little eyes and whispered to each other: “Sleep, little maiden, who played for us on the violin — sleep — hush — let us not waken her.” And though a desire to turn the pins of the violin and touch the chords with their tiny fingers may have taken hold of them, they did not, however, do so, through honesty and hospitality. Through the openings of the shutters the moonlight streamed in, brightening the interior and slowly advancing on the opposite wall. The silence was great; only somewhere beyond the house the night-watch on the premises whistled; while within the house the old standing clock, which measured the lives of several generations, continued to speak with resignation the “Tick! — Tack! — Tick!” of the seconds sinking into the past.

  And Laskowicz in the course of time issued further commands from his room which reached no one’s knowledge. A strange thing! Inwardly something was telling him with sober, almost absolute certainty that the maid would not come and he nevertheless believed that she ought to have come. Not until a long time elapsed, did the consciousness dawn upon him that if she did not come, then he, together with his hypnotism, played the rôle of an addle-pated fool. Finally fatigue, disaffection, and anger at himself gripped him. Sleep irrevocably left him. Hour flew after hour. In the east the sky was deepening and it was becoming green. Soon the rosy lower border was striped with the transparent riband of dawn. The young student, not undressing himself at all, opened the window to breathe the bracing morning air. In the garden the first chirp of the birds began, and from the direction of the not distant pond, with the odor of the acacias, came the cries of herons and the subdued, as if yet sleepy, quacks of the wild ducks. After a while the sweep of the well creaked in the village.

  It then occurred to Laskowicz that this was the last daybreak he was to behold in Jastrzeb; that on the morrow he would wake in the city and would not see either Panna Marynia or little Anusia whom only, of all the inmates of that Jastrzeb mansion, he liked; and he felt a little sorrow. But as he understood that, after the arrival of his party associates at Rzeslewo and yesterday’s visit of the steward Kapuscinski to Krzycki, it was unavoidable, he preferred to tender his resignation rather than suffer a dismissal. With this intention, he decided to write a letter to Ladislaus and inform him that he had enough of pedagogical work. He foresaw that eventually they would have to see each other, if only at the payment of the salary, and as a dispute about principles might arise which might go very far, he had a revolver ready for certain contingencies. He deemed that, before that happened, a dry, peremptory letter would be a step more consonant with his pride; therefore, when it was quite bright, he sat down immediately to write.

  Krzycki awoke, though not in the dusk, nevertheless with the rise of the sun, for in the country he thus habituated himself to wake, regardless of whether he retired to bed early or late. He felt in his bones that he had had too little rest and, stretching out his arms, he said to himself that he would be repaid only in case Miss Anney at some time would learn that he lost that sleep for her sake and would pity him, though slightly. Meanwhile he recalled to his mind all that he was to do that day and formulated the following plan; he would rouse himself, drive out the lassitude in his bones; afterwards, before breakfast, would drive over to Rzeslewo and “look a little in the eyes of those worthies;” and if possible talk with the peasants; later he would return; after breakfast he would finish with Laskowicz and send him away with the team which was to bring the physician; the balance of his time, he would devote to the guests, to writing letters, and to the farm. He positively determined to go to Rzeslewo, because, though he agreed in his heart with Dolhanski that for the nonce he would be unable to accomplish anything, nevertheless, he did not wish the ladies to think that he stayed away through fear.

  Having arranged everything in this manner, he carelessly put on his clothes and, slipping his feet into his slippers, repaired to the bath-room, without any foreboding that he would meet with an unusual accident and that he was soon to see, not in truth such an alabaster statuette as the one Laskowicz was raving about all night, but, at any rate, something resembling Diana in a fountain. In the second in which he opened the door he saw streams of water splashing and beheld under a shower-sprinkler a nude, female figure, strewed with pearls of azure, with head somewhat inclined, and hands raised to her hair, whose black waves concealed her face. This lasted only a twinkle of the eye. A suppressed scream and the slam of the closed door resounded simultaneously. Krzycki rushed like the gale for his room; excited and at the same time shocked, he clutched with shaking hand a decanter, filled a glass of water, gulped it, and began to repeat confusedly: “What has happened? Who is she? For God’s sake, what has happened?” In the first moments he conjectured that she might have been Pani Otocka, or Marynia, and in such a case the misadventure would be appalling. Those ladies would undoubtedly leave Jastrzeb at once and it would perhaps be incumbent upon him to propose marriage to the one whom he had seen in such paradisiacal shape. “But was it my fault?” he thought. “Why didn’t she lock the door? There was a bolt.” He drank another glass of water to cool his agitated blood and to think more calmly of what he was to do and who that nymph was. Somehow after an interval he reached the conclusion that she could not have been either of the sisters. Firstly, why should they rise so early? and again, both were slim, while this form was stouter and on the whole was built so, that — Oh! Oh! Finally, he became satisfied that it surely must have been no other than the brunette who obstructed his view of Miss Anney during the mass and whom he met on the dark walk when returning with Gronski from the hunt. If such was the case, nothing terrible had happened, but rather the contrary. It occurred to his mind that those blue window-panes were an excellent device, for in such a light the spectacle was delightful. At the thought of this, he felt the necessity of drinking a third glass of water. This, however, he did not do, but instead, after an interval, went again to the bath-room, which now was vacant, and after a cool bath dressed himself and hastened to the stable. There he ordered a horse to be saddled and sped away on a gallop for adjacent Rzeslewo.

  The day was mild; the hour very early. But all nature was already awake and bedewed, bathed in the sun, she appeared to simply cry out with joy, just as village maids from an excess of life and health sing unto forgetfulness, “Oj dana! Oj dana!” Birds carolled until the leaves on the trees trembled. In the distant oak grove resounded the coo-cooing of the cuckoo; yellow thrushes whistled amidst the boughs of lofty trees; from the depths of the forest, sounding like the noise of a sawmill, came the outcries of an old raven, watching a crowded nest, while from time to time the shrieks of a jay, resembling a laugh, burst forth.

  Ladislaus rode out of the woods onto the open roadway. Here on one side was a stretch of waving grain; on the other a meadow — from which odors of turf and spring were wafted, — all overgrown with marigold and rose-campion, quivering in the solar warmth and under the gentle breath of the wind, as if in delight. This delight, this widespread joy and luxuriance of life overflowed in the breast of Ladislaus. He felt within himself such a vigor of youth and strength that he was prepared to challenge to a hand-to-hand combat full hundreds of so
cialists and at the same time press the whole world to his heart, especially women under the age of thirty. The white vision of that Diana, enveloped in a shell of blue pearls, again began to glide before his eyes, but he now thought that if, instead of dark tresses on the bowed head of that goddess, he had seen golden, he would have probably toppled over.

  Amidst such sights and impressions he arrived at Rzeslewo, where, however, in conformity with Dolhanski’s prediction, he was unable to accomplish anything. The “worthies” whom he wanted to look in the eyes had left during the night time for the city; the husbandmen were in the field, each upon his own patch of ground; the blinds of the rectory were shut, as the rector for the last few days was feeling unwell. In the manor out-building where the laborers dwelt there was not a sign of a living soul. Later the old keeper of the stockyard informed him that the hired help, after watering the stock, drove it out into the pasture and went without asking the permission of any one to a church festival at Brzesno, whither many of the husbandmen and tenants had also gone.