All were in a springtime humor, except Janina. She sat gloomily rapt in thought.
Kotlicki chatted jovially, Wawrzecki jested with Glogowski and the women took part in the merriment, but Janina hardly heard a thing that was being said. She was still pondering her conversation with Grzesikiewicz and the heavy feeling it had left in her heart.
"Is anything troubling you?" Kotlicki asked with anxiety in his voice.
"Me? Oh nothing! . . . I was just musing upon human misery," she answered.
"It is not worth thinking of anything that is not pleasure, full of life and youth . . ."
"Don't complete that nonsense. It is just as if you were to eat off the butter on a piece of bread and then muse over your dry crust that you did a foolish thing after all," interposed Glogowski, "I see you do not like to eat, only to lick at things."
"My dear sir, I have the honor of knowing that ever since I was a schoolboy," Kotlicki retorted sarcastically.
"That isn't the point; the point is that you advocate downright silly things. For instance indulgence, while you have had ample opportunity to prove upon yourself the sad results of that jolly theory."
"Both in life and in literature you are always paradoxical."
"I'll wager you have weak lungs, arthritis, neurasthenia and . . ."