Having finished, he put on his hat and left, without any well-defined object, for the city. For a while a desire rose in him to call upon his mother and Pani Otocka, but he stifled it at once. For what? It seemed to him that he had nothing to tell his mother about himself and his intentions; and that he could talk with her only about this unheard-of intelligence, the discussion of which would be for him, beyond all expression, afflicting. Unconsciously, he reached the Holy Cross Church and wanted to enter it, but the hour was late and the church was locked. The morning of that day and the joint prayer with her stood vividly before his eyes. Ah, how sincerely he prayed; how he loved her; how he loved her! And now he could not resist the impression that this light-haired, idolized lady, with whom he said in that chapel "Under Thy Protection," and Hanka Skibianka were two different beings. And he felt in his heart a kind of disenchantment with which he began to contend. For why was he nevertheless so acutely affected by it? Was it because Hanka was a peasant girl and he a nobleman? No! Miss Anney never represented herself as an English noblewoman, and a Polish peasant is no worse than an English commoner. He could not clearly perceive that the reason of it lay in this: that Miss Anney through her descent alone, foreign and distant, appeared to him a sort of princess, and Hanka was a near and domestic girl from Zarnow. She aroused less curiosity and therefore was less attractive. She was so much easier, therefore, cheaper to him. In vain he recalled and repeated that this Hanka is that same light-haired lady, charming as a dream, alluring, genteel, womanly, responding in sentiment to every thought and every word; the feeling of disenchantment was more powerful than those thoughts, and that charm of exoticism, which suddenly was lacking in the girl, minimized her worth in his eyes.
But, besides this, there was something else, in view of which the disenchantment and all unexpected impressions stood aside and became matters of secondary importance. This was, that he had once possessed that girl--body and soul. She was at that time almost a child--a flower not yet in full bloom which he plucked and carried for some time at his bosom. The memory of that could be a reproach only for him; no fault whatever weighed on her. He recollected those moonlight nights on which he stole to the mill; those whispers which were one quiet song of love and intoxication, interrupted only by kisses; he recalled how he clasped to his heart her girlish body, fragrant with the hay of the fields; how he drank the tears from her eyes and how he said to her that he would give up for her all the ladies of all the courts. The idyl passed, but now there wafted upon him from her the breath of the first youthful years, the first love, the first ecstasy, and the truly great poetry of life. Besides, there was truth in what he had confided to Gronski in Jastrzeb: that the girl loved him as no other woman in the world surely would love him. And at the thought of this, his heart began to melt. Together with the wave of recollection, Hanka returned and again engaged his thoughts.
Yes. But that was Hanka and she is Miss Anney. In Ladislaus, from the time he fell in love with her, his senses leaped wildly towards her like a pack of yelping hounds; but he held them in leash because at the same time he knelt before his beloved. She was to him an object of desire but at the same time a sacred relic; something so inaccessible, exalted, pure, and mysterious in its virginity that at the thought that the moment would arrive when he would be the master of those treasures and secrets appeared to him a delight beyond all measure of delight; all the more fathomless as it was, united, as it were, with a sacrilege. And now he had to say to himself that this sacrilege he had already committed; that the charm of something unknown was dispelled; that in this vestal there were for him no mysteries and that he had already drunk from that cup. And this again was one lure less; one disenchantment more. In this manner Miss Anney muddied his recollection of the field peasant-girl, Hanka,--Hanka depreciated the charm of Miss Anney. Both were so different, so unlike each other, that, being unable to merge them into one entity, he vainly intensified that jarring impression with a feeling of disquietude and pain.
In this vexation of spirit there occurred to him one wicked, low, and ugly thought. In what manner did the poor and simple Hanka change into the brilliant Miss Anney? In what manner could a gray sparrow from under a village thatched hut be transformed into a paradisiacal bird? Hanka was a betrayed girl; therefore the bridges had been burnt behind her. Amidst the wealth of a foreign land, beautiful but poor girls have before them only one road to the acquisition of affluence and even polish, and that was the road of shame. Hanka found one patron who took care of her in the appropriate manner; how many similar patrons and protectors could Miss Anney find? At the thought of this Krzycki's head swam. Conscience said to him, "You opened those gates before her," and at the same time he was seized by such anger at Miss Anney and himself that if the life or death of both rested in his hands, he would at that moment have selected death. Something within him was rent asunder; something crashed. It seemed to him that again, just above his head, pealed lightning, which stunned him and burnt, within him, to a crisp, the ability to think.
He wandered a long time over the city. He himself did not know in what manner he again found himself before Pani Otocka's home, but he did not enter for he once more felt that at that time he could not speak with his mother. He returned to his own house late at night. Gronski was already at home, and for an hour had been waiting for him with the tea.
"Good evening," he said, "I have returned from your mother's."
And Ladislaus asked him with blunt impetuosity, "Do you know who Miss Anney is?"
"I do. Pani Otocka told me."
A moment of silence followed.
"What do you say to this?"