Such a will brings with it love, which lights like the sun, warms like its heat, and cherishes like the blue, mild sky. In this way life does not become a dry, thorny path, which pricks, but a flowery one, which blooms and delights. This country maiden, straightforward in thought, and at once simple and delicate in feelings, possessed that capacity for life and happiness in the highest degree. So, when Pan Stanislav had gone, she, in thinking about him, did not name him in her mind otherwise than “Pan Stas,” for he had indeed become her “Pan Stas.”
Pan Stanislav, on his part, when lying down to sleep, repeated to himself somewhat mechanically, “She considers herself my betrothed.”
Litka’s death, and the events of the last days, had pushed Marynia, not only in his thoughts, but in his heart, to more remote, and even very remote places. Now he began to think of her again, and at the same time of his future. All at once he beheld, as it were, a cloud of countless questions, to which, at that moment, at least, he had no answer. But he felt fear in presence of them; he felt that he lacked strength and willingness to undertake this labor. Again he began to live with the former life; again to fall into that sentimental, vicious circle; again to disquiet himself; again to make efforts, and struggle over things which bring only bitterness,—to struggle with himself over questions of feeling. Would it not be better to labor with Bigiel on accounts,—make money,—so as to go sometime, like Bukatski, to Italy, or some other place where there is sun, art, wine good for the stomach, and, above all, people to whom one is indifferent, whose happiness will not enliven the heart of a stranger, but in return whose death or misfortune will not press a single tear from him.
CHAPTER XX.
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.