“What dost thou say?” asked Plavitski, sitting down in an armchair.
“I say that uncle has come here for conquest.”
“I have no thought whatever of that. Thou art a lunatic!”
“But Pani Yamish? or haven’t I seen with my own eyes—”
“What?”
Here Plavitski shut one eye and thrust out the point of his tongue; but that lasted only an instant, then he raised his brows, and said,—
“Well, as to Pani Yamish? She is well enough in Kremen. Between thee and me, I cannot endure affectation,—it savors of the country. May the Lord God not remember, for Pani Yamish, how much she has tortured me with her affectation: a woman should have courage to grow old, then a relation would end in friendship; otherwise it becomes slavery.”
“And my dear uncle felt like a butterfly in bonds?”
“But don’t talk in that way,” answered Plavitski, with dignity, “and do not imagine that there was anything between us. Even if there had been, thou wouldst not have heard a word about it from me. Believe me, there is a great difference between you of this and us of the preceding generation. We were not saints, perhaps; but we knew how to be silent, and that is a great virtue, without which what is called true nobility cannot exist.”
“From this I infer that uncle will not confess to me where he is going, with this carnation in his buttonhole?”