They could not say more, for that moment Osnovski, Kopovski, and Pani Aneta, who had been sitting in the drawing-room adjoining, came into the studio.
Pani Aneta, seeing Lineta’s blushing cheeks, looked quickly at Pan Ignas, and asked,—
“How is it going with you to-day?”
“Where is aunt?” inquired Lineta.
“She went out to make visits.”
“Long since?”
“A few minutes ago. How has it gone with you?”
“Well; but enough for to-day.”
Lineta put down her brush, and after a moment went to wash her hands. Pan Ignas remained there, answering, with more or less presence of mind, questions put to him; but he wanted to go. He feared the conversation with Pani Bronich, and, with the habit of cowards, he wished to defer it till the morrow; he wanted, besides, to remain a while with his own thoughts, to arrange them, to estimate better the significance of what had happened. For at that moment he had in his head merely a certain chaos of indefinite thoughts; he understood that something unparalleled had happened,—something from which a new epoch in life would begin. At the very thought of this, a quiver of happiness passed through him, but also a quiver of fear, for he felt that now it was too late to withdraw; through love, through confession, through declaration to the lady and to her family, he must advance to the altar. He desired this with his whole soul; but he was so accustomed to consider everything that was happiness as a poetic imagining, as something belonging exclusively to the world of thought, art, and dreams, that he almost lacked daring to believe that Lineta could become his wife really. Meanwhile he had barely endurance to sit out the time; and when Lineta returned, he rose to take leave.
She gave him her hand, cooled by fresh water, and said,—