“Koposio,” once on a time, when they were left alone for a minute, began to talk with her about it; but she put her finger first to her own lips, and then pointed from a distance toward his lips, in sign that she did not wish such conversation. What is more, even Pani Bronich spoke before her little and guardedly concerning her disappointment. But when “Nitechka” was not in the room, the old woman could not stop the flow to her mouth of that bitterness which had risen in her heart; this flow carried her a number of times so far that she lacked little of quarrelling with Osnovski.
Osnovski, casting from his soul that feeling of disappointment which he had not been able to ward off at first, tried now with all his power to decrease the significance of the catastrophe, and show that Ignas was in general an exceptional match, and even in a financial view, quite a good one.
“I do not think,” said he, “that he would have stopped writing had he been old Zavilovski’s heir; but the mere management of such an immense property would have taken so much time that his talent might have suffered. As the question is of Ignas, I remember, aunt, what Henry VIII. said, when some prince threatened Holbein: ‘I can make ten lords out of ten peasants, if the fancy comes to me; but out of ten lords I cannot make one Holbein.’ Ignas is an exceptional man. Believe me, aunt, I have always considered Lineta a charming and honest girl, and have always loved her; but she really rose in my eyes only when she appreciated Ignas. To be something in the life of a man like him, is what any woman might envy her. Is it not true, Anetka?”
“Of course,” answered Pani Osnovski; “it is pleasant for a woman to belong to a man who is something.”
Osnovski seized his wife’s hand, and, kissing it, said, half in jest, half in earnest,—
“And dost thou not think that this often torments me, that such a being as thou art should belong to such a zero as Yozio Osnovski? But it is hard to help it! The thing has happened; and, besides, the zero loves much.”
Then he turned to Pani Bronich,—
“Think, aunt,” said he, “Ignas has a number of thousands of rubles of his own; and, besides, after his father’s death he will have what old Zavilovski secured to him. Poor he will not be.”
“Oh, naturally,” answered Pani Bronich, shaking her head contemptuously; “Nitechka, in accepting Zavilovski, did not look for money, of course; if she had looked for money, it would have been enough for us to raise a hand at Pan Kanafaropulos.”
“Aunt! Mercy!” exclaimed Pani Aneta, laughing.