“Do not stop for me. Let us talk on the street. The light is so sharp to-day that I cannot work; therefore I will walk to your door with you.”
“In every case I should have been forced to beg your pardon,” said Pan Stanislav. “My Marynia goes out to-day for the first time, and we are to dine with the Bigiels. She must be dressed by this time, but we have twenty minutes yet.”
“As she goes out, she is well?”
“Praise be to God, as well as a bird!” answered Pan Stanislav, with delight.
“And the little Aryan?”
“The little Aryan bears himself stoutly.”
“O happy man, if I had such a toad at home, not to mention such a wife, I should not know what to do—unless to walk upon house-tops.”
“You will not believe how that boy takes my heart. Every day more, and in general, in a way that I did not expect, for you must know that I wanted a daughter.”
“It is not evening yet; the daughter will come. But you are in a hurry; let us go then.”
Pan Stanislav took his fur coat, and they went to the street. The day was frosty, clear. Around was heard the hurried sound of sleigh-bells. Men had their collars over their ears, their mustaches were frosty, and they threw columns of steam from their mouths.