“If there is no place like the country, why do you not move out of the city in summer?”
“How do you say?” asked Plavitski. “Why do I not move out? Because in the city, on one side of the street there is sun, and on the other shade. If I wish to warm myself, I walk in the sun; if it is hot for me, I walk in the shade. There is no place in summer like the city. I wanted to go to Karlsbad, but—”
Here he was silent for a moment; and, remembering only then that what he was giving to understand might expose a young woman to the evil tongues of people, he looked with a gloomy resignation on those present, and added,—
“Is it worth while to think of that pair of years left of any life, that are of no value to me, or to any one?”
“Here it is!” cried Marynia. “If papa will not go to Karlsbad, he will drink Millbrun with us in Buchynek.”
“In what Buchynek?” asked Plavitski.
“True, we must announce la grande nouvelle.”
And she began to tell that Buchynek had been found and rented and probably would be bought; and that in three days she and her husband would move into that Buchynek for the whole summer.
Pani Mashko, hearing the narrative, raised her eyes to Pan Stanislav in wonder, and inquired,—
“Then are you really going to leave us?”