Janina exhilarated by the wine, conversed with Wawrzecki about the theater. Afterwards she strayed about the rooms, watched the men playing cards, and listened to a variety of conversations and arguments.
Janina roused herself from her meditations, for Kotlicki stood before her with a cup of tea in his hand and with his sharp ennuied voice began to speak: "You are observing the company, mademoiselle? Truly, what remarkable energy there is in all their actions, what strong souls they now appear to be!"
"Your malice also has strength . . ." she replied slowly.
"And is wasted on slander and ridicule, you wished to add, didn't you?"
"Almost so."
"We shall see, we shall see . . ." he said slowly, standing his cup upon the table and then, taking leave of Janina he left quietly.
In the anteroom where the sleepy Wicek handed him his overcoat, he heard the monotonous whispering of the children's voices behind the screen. He raised the curtain and saw Cabinski's four little boys kneeling in their nightgowns and repeating their prayers after the nurse.
A small night-lamp, glowing before a holy picture above the nurse's bed, faintly illumined that group of children and the old, gray-haired woman, who humbly bowed to the ground, struck her breast with her hand and whispered in a tearful voice: "O Lamb of God, who purgest the sins of the world!"
The children repeated the words after her with drowsy voices and beat their breasts with their little hands.
Kotlicki withdrew quietly and without a smile. Only when he had reached the stairs, he whispered: "Well, well! We shall see, we shall see. . . ."