But time fails for further explanations, since Hela appears at that moment already dressed, and breakfast is announced.
Both ladies pass into the dining-room. Hela wishes to seat me at the table; but I refuse, and sit with my lyre at the threshold. Soon I receive a plate so filled with food that if six grandfathers of the Ukraine were to eat all of it, they might have a fit of indigestion. But I eat, for I am hungry, and while eating I look at Hela.
In truth, a more beautiful head there is not in any gallery on earth. As I live, I have not seen such transparent eyes; it is simply possible to see all thoughts through them, just as the bottom of a clear stream is seen. Those eyes possess this power also, that they begin to laugh before the mouth; by this the face is brightened, as if a sun-ray had fallen on it. What incomparable sweetness in the form of the mouth! That is a head somewhat in the style of Carlo Dolce, though the outline of the brows and the eyes bring to mind Raphael in his noblest type.
At last I cease to eat; I gaze and gaze; I would gaze till death.
"Thou wert not here yesterday," says Hela to Eva. "I hoped all the afternoon to see thee run in."
"In the morning I had a rehearsal, and in the afternoon I wanted to see Magorski's picture."
"Didst see it?"
"Not well, for there was a crowd—and thou?"
"I went in the morning. What a poet!—one wishes to weep with those Jews."
Eva looks at me, and my soul rises.