Lineta, taking the box, bent her charming figure to kiss him on the shoulder; he embraced her neck, and said to the bridegroom,—
“But thou might come.”
And he kissed both on the forehead, and said, with greater emotion than he wished to show,—
“Now love and revere each other, like honest people.”
Lineta opened the case, in which on a sapphire-colored satin cushion gleamed a splendid rivière of diamonds. The old man said once more with emphasis, “From the family of the Zavilovskis,” wishing evidently to show that the young lady who married a Zavilovski, even without property, was not doing badly. But no one heard him, for the heads of the ladies—of Lineta, Pani Aneta, Pani Mashko, Pani Bronich and even Marynia—bent over the flashing stones; and breath was stopped in their mouths for a time, till at last a murmur of admiration and praise broke the silence.
“It is not a question of diamonds!” cried Pani Bronich, casting herself almost into the arms of old Zavilovski, “but as the gift, so the heart.”
“Do not mention it Pani; do not mention it!” said the old man, warding her off.
Now the society broke into pairs or small groups; the betrothed were so occupied with each other that the whole world vanished from before them. Osnovski and Svirski went up to Marynia and Pani Bigiel. Kopovski undertook to entertain the lady of the house; Pan Stanislav was occupied with Pani Mashko. As to Mashko himself, he was anxious evidently to make a nearer acquaintance with the Crsus, for he so fenced him off with his armchair that no one could approach him, and began then to talk of remote times and the present, which, as he divined easily, had become a favorite theme for the old man.
But he was too keen-witted to be of Zavilovski’s opinion in all things. Moreover, the old man did not attack recent times always; nay, he admired them in part. He acknowledged that in many regards they were moving toward the better; still he could not take them in. But Mashko explained to him that everything must change on earth; hence nobles, as well as other strata of society.
“I, respected sir,” said he, “hold to the land through a certain inherited instinct,—through that something which attracts to land the man who came from it; but, while managing my own property, I am an advocate, and I am one on principle. We should have our own people in that department; if we do not, we shall be at the mercy of men coming from other spheres, and often directly opposed to us. And I must render our landholders this justice, that for the greater part they understand this well, and choose to confide their business to me rather than to others. Some think it even a duty.”