Nina Balatka

by Anthony Trollope

But what would she do? For a few minutes she fell back, as is so natural with mortals in trouble, upon that religion which she had been so willing to outrage by marrying the Jew. She went to a little drawer and took out a string of beads which had lain there unused since she had been made to believe that the Virgin and the saints would not permit her marriage with Anton Trendellsohn. She took out the beads — but she did not use them. She passed no berries through her fingers to check the number of prayers said, for she found herself unable to say any prayer at all. If he would come back to her, and ask her pardon — ask it in truth at her feet — she would still forgive him, regardless of the Virgin and the saints. And if he did not come back, what was the fate that Lotta Luxa had predicted for her, and to which she had acknowledged to herself that she would be driven to submit? In either case how could she again come to terms with St John and St Nicholas? And how was she to live? Should she lose her lover, as she now told herself would certainly be her fate, what possibility of life was left to her? From day to day and from week to week she had put off to a future hour any definite consideration of what she and her father should do in their poverty, believing that it might be postponed till her marriage would make all things easy. Her future mode of living had often been discussed between her and her lover, and she had been candid enough in explaining to him that she could not leave her father desolate. He had always replied that his wife's father should want for nothing, and she had been delighted to think that she could with joy accept that from her husband which nothing would induce her to accept from her lover. This thought had sufficed to comfort her, as the evil of absolute destitution was close upon her. Surely the day of her marriage would come soon.

But now it seemed to her to be certain that the day of her marriage would never come. All those expectations must be banished, and she must look elsewhere — if elsewhere there might be any relief. She knew well that if she would separate herself from the Jew, the pocket of her aunt would be opened to relieve the distress of her father — would be opened so far as to save the old man from perishing of want. Aunt Sophie, if duly invoked, would not see her sister's husband die of starvation. Nay, aunt Sophie would doubtless so far stretch her Christian charity as to see that her niece was in some way fed, if that niece would be duly obedient. Further still, aunt Sophie would accept her niece as the very daughter of her house, as the rising mistress of her own establishment, if that niece would only consent to love her son. Ziska was there as a husband in Anton's place, if Ziska might only gain acceptance.

But Nina, as she rose from her chair and walked backwards and forwards through her chamber, telling herself all these things, clenched her fist, and stamped her foot, as she swore to herself that she would dare all that the saints could do to her, that she would face all the terrors of the black dark river, before she would succumb to her cousin Ziska. As she worked herself into wrath, thinking now of the man she loved, and then of the man she did not love, she thought that she could willingly perish — if it were not that her father lay there so old and so helpless. Gradually, as she magnified to herself the terrible distresses of her heart, the agony of her yearning love for a man who, though he loved her, was so unworthy of her perfect faith, she began to think that it would be well to be carried down by the quick, eternal, almighty stream beyond the reach of the sorrow which encompassed her. When her father should leave her she would be all alone — alone in the world, without a friend to regard her, or one living human being on whom she, a girl, might rely for protection, shelter, or even for a morsel of bread. Would St Nicholas cover her from the contumely of the world, or would St John of the Bridges feed her? Did she in her heart of hearts believe that even the Virgin would assist her in such a strait? No; she had no such belief. It might be that such real belief had never been hers. She hardly knew. But she did know that now, in the hour of her deep trouble, she could not say her prayers and tell her beads, and trust valiantly that the goodness of heaven would suffice to her in her need.

In the mean time Souchey had gone off to the Windberg-gasse, and had gladdened himself with the soup, with the hot mess of cabbage and the sausage, supplied by Madame Zamenoy's hospitality. The joys of such a moment are unknown to any but those who, like Souchey, have been driven by circumstances to sit at tables very ill supplied. On the previous day he had fed upon offal thrown away from a butcher's stall, and habit had made such feeding not unfamiliar to him. As he walked from the Kleinseite through the Old Town to Madame Zamenoy's bright-looking house in the New Town, he had comforted himself greatly with thoughts of the coming feast. The representation which his imagination made to him of the banquet sufficed to produce happiness, and he went along hardly envying any man. His propensities at the moment were the propensities of a beast. And yet he was submitting himself to the terrible poverty which made so small a matter now a matter of joy to him, because there was a something of nobility within him which made him true to the master who had been true to him, when they had both been young together. Even now he resolved, as he sharpened his teeth, that through all the soup and all the sausage he would be true to the Balatkas. He would be true even to Nina Balatka — though he recognised it as a paramount duty to do all in his power to save her from the Jew.

He was seated at the table in the kitchen almost as soon as he had entered the house in the Windberg-gasse, and found his plate full before him. Lotta had felt that there was no need of the delicacy of compliment in feeding a man who was so undoubtedly hungry, and she had therefore bade him at once fall to. "A hearty meal is a thing you are not used to," she had said, "and it will do your old bones a deal of good." The address was not complimentary, especially as coming from a lady in regard to whom he entertained tender feelings; but Souchey forgave the something of coarse familiarity which the words displayed, and, seating himself on the stool before the victuals, gave play to the feelings of the moment. "There's no one to measure what's left of the sausage," said Lotta, instigating him to new feats.

"Ain't there now?" said Souchey, responding to the sound of the trumpet. "I always thought she had the devil's own eye in looking after what was used in the kitchen."

"The devil himself winks sometimes," said Lotta, cutting another half-inch off from the unconsumed fragment, and picking the skin from the meat with her own fair fingers. Hitherto Souchey had been regardless of any such niceness in his eating, the skin having gone with the rest; but now he thought that the absence of the outside covering and the touch of Lotta's fingers were grateful to his appetite.

"Souchey," said Lotta, when he had altogether done, and had turned his stool round to the kitchen fire, "where do you think Nina would go if she were to marry — a Jew?" There was an abrupt solemnity in the manner of the question which at first baffled the man, whose breath was heavy with the comfortable repletion which had been bestowed upon him.

"Where would she go to?" he said, repeating Lotta's words.

"Yes, Souchey, where would she go to? Where would be her eternal home? What would become of her soul? Do you know that not a priest in Prague would give her absolution though she were on her dying bed? Oh, holy Mary, it's a terrible thing to think of! It's bad enough for the old man and her to be there day after day without a morsel to eat; and I suppose if it were not for Anton Trendellsohn it would be bad enough with them — "