‘Who to, indeed!’ Węgrowicz cried, ‘as if there weren’t enough Jews in Warsaw! Three or more of them will get together, and make Krakowskie Przedmieście horrible, thanks to Mr Wokulski, who keeps his own carriage and goes to visit the aristocracy in their country houses. Good God! I remember how the poor devil used to serve my beef cutlet at Hopfer’s … There’s nothing left now but to go to the wars and ransack the Turks.’
‘Why should he sell the store?’ I asked, pinching my knee to prevent my anger breaking out at the old wretch.
‘He’ll do well to sell it,’ Węgrowicz replied, taking up yet another tankard of beer, ‘what’s he doing among tradespeople, a gentleman like him, a diplomat, an innovator — who imports new merchandise? …’
‘I fancy there’s another reason,’ Szprott interrupted. ‘Wokulski is wooing Miss Łęcka, and although he’s been turned down, he keeps on calling, so he must have hopes … But Miss Łęcka wouldn’t marry a haberdashery merchant, not even if he is a diplomat and innovator.’
Sparks flew before my eyes. I banged my tankard on the table, and shouted: ‘You’re lying, sir, it’s all lies, Mr Szprott! And there’s my card,’ I added, casting my visiting-card on the table.
‘What are you giving me your card for?’ Szprott replied, ‘are you inviting me to a party, or what?’
‘I demand satisfaction, sir,’ I cried, still banging on the table.
‘Hoity-toity,’ said Szprott, wagging a finger at me. ‘It’s all right for you to demand satisfaction, for you’re a Hungarian officer. Murdering a man or two and having yourself chopped up into the bargain is bread and meat to you … But I, sir, am a commercial traveller, I have my wife, children and business to attend to.’
‘I’ll make you fight a duel!’
‘Make me? Will you get me there under police escort? If you was to say anything of the sort when you’re sober, I’d go to the police myself, and they’d show you what’s what.’
‘You’ve no pride, sir!’ I cried.
Now he began banging on the table too: ‘No pride? Who are you speaking to? Don’t I pay my bills, do I sell bad goods, have I ever gone bankrupt? We’ll see who has pride — in Court!’
‘Calm down,’ Councillor Węgrowicz implored, ‘duels were fashionable long ago, not now … Shake hands.’
I rose from the table, which was by now flooded with beer, paid my bill at the counter and left. I will never again set foot in that detestable hole.
Of course, after all the excitement I couldn’t go to Mrs Stawska’s. At first I thought I wouldn’t sleep a wink all night. But somehow I dropped off. And when Staś came into the store next day, I asked him: ‘Do you know what people are saying? That you’re selling the store!’
‘Suppose I am — what would be wrong in that?’
(True enough! What would be wrong in it? Just fancy — such a simple thought never struck me!) ‘But, d’you know,’ I whispered, ‘they also say you’re going to marry Miss Łęcka.’
‘Suppose I were?’ he replied.
(He’s right! What, isn’t he allowed to marry anyone he chooses, even Mrs Stawska? Fancy me not realising it, and squabbling unnecessarily with Szprott on that account!)
Of course I had to go out again that evening, not so much for the beer, as to be reconciled with the unjustly offended Szprott, so again I didn’t call on Mrs Stawska, and didn’t warn her not to sit at the windows. So it wasn’t without sorrow that I learned dislike for Wokulski was increasing among tradespeople, that our store was to be sold and Staś will marry Miss Łęcka. I say ‘will’, for if he were not certain he wouldn’t have expressed himself so decisively to me.
Now I know for sure whom he was yearning for in Bulgaria, whom he acquired a fortune for by tooth and claw … God’s will be done … Just look, though, how far I’ve wandered from my topic … But now I’ll really set about describing the episode of Mrs Stawska, and will narrate it quick as a flash.
XXIX
The Journal of the Old Clerk
JUST AFTER eight I went to visit the ladies. As usual, Mrs Stawska was giving lessons to some young ladies in the other room, and Mrs Misiewicz and little Helena were sitting at the window — as usual. I don’t know what they-could see at night, but certainly everyone could see them. I’d have sworn that the Baroness, in one of her unlit windows, was sitting with opera-glasses, staring into the ground floor, for her blinds were not drawn.
I retired behind the curtain so that the monster should not see me, at least, and immediately asked Mrs Misiewicz: ‘My dear madam, no offence meant, but why do you ladies sit at the windows all the time? It isn’t nice …’
‘I’m not afraid of draughts,’ said the respectable matron, ‘and I take great pleasure in it. How can we help looking out of the window, when it’s our only entertainment? Do we go anywhere? Do we see anyone? Since Ludwik went away, our relations with other people have been broken off. For some, we’re too poor, for others — suspect …’ She wiped her eyes, then pursued: ‘Oh, poor Ludwik did wrong to run away: even if they’d sent him to prison, his innocence would have come to light, and we’d all be together again. But God alone knows where he is, and Helena … You tell us not to look out! Yet she, poor thing, keeps waiting, listening and watching for Ludwik to come back, or at least for a letter from him. If anyone runs across the yard, she rushes to the window at once, thinking it’s the postman. Or if the postman comes to our door (we, Mr Rzecki, very rarely get letters), then if you were to see Helena … She changes, turns pale, trembles …’
I dared not open my mouth, and after a pause the old lady went on: ‘I, too, like sitting in the window, especially if it’s a fine day and the sky is bright, for then my late lamented husband comes to mind, as if he were still alive.’
‘Yes,’ I murmured, ‘the sky reminds you of him because he now dwells there.’
‘Not in that respect, Mr Rzecki,’ she interrupted, ‘I know he’s in Heaven, for where else should such a good-natured man be? But when I look at the sky and at the walls of this house, the happy day of our wedding comes into my mind at once. The late lamented Klemens was wearing a blue frock-coat and yellow nankeen trousers, the very same colour as our house. Oh, Mr Rzecki,’ the old lady sobbed, ‘believe me when I say that for the likes of us, a window sometimes is as good as the theatre, a concert and friends. What else do we have to look at?’
I cannot describe how sad I felt to hear such a dramatic account of merely looking out of windows … The pupils of Mrs Stawska, having finished their lessons, were setting off home, and their charming teacher made me happy with her appearance. When I greeted her, she had cold hands and an expression of weariness and sorrow on her heavenly face. On seeing me, however, she deigned to smile (dear angel! It was as though she guessed that her sweet smile illuminates for me the darkness of life for an entire week).
‘Mama, did you tell Mr Rzecki,’ said Mrs Stawska, ‘of the honour we had today?’
‘Ah no, I forgot,’ Mrs Misiewicz interposed.
Meanwhile, the two young ladies had gone, after curtsying, and we remained alone, so it was quite like a family circle. ‘Just think,’ said Mrs Stawska, ‘we had a visit from the Baroness today! At first I was almost frightened because she, poor thing, hasn’t a very attractive look, so pale, always in black, and she has a sort of expression, too … But she disarmed me in a moment when, on seeing Helena, she burst into tears and fell on her knees before me, crying: “My poor little child was just like her, and now’s she’s dead!” …’
I turned cold all over on hearing this. However, not wanting to alarm Mrs Stawska perhaps for no reason, I dared not speak to her of my forebodings. I merely asked: ‘What did she want?’
‘She came to ask me to help her set in order her linen, dresses, lace — in a word, all her household goods. She expects her husband to return to her soon, and she wants to freshen up some little trifles, and to buy others. And as she says she has no taste, she asked me to help, and promised to pay me two roubles fo
r three hours a day.’
‘What did you say to that?’
‘Goodness, what could I say? Of course I accepted gratefully. Admittedly, it is only temporary work, but very convenient, for only yesterday (I don’t know why), I lost one music lesson, at five złoty an hour …’
I sighed, guessing that the cause of the loss might be an anonymous letter, in the writing of which Baroness Krzeszowska had great fluency. But — I said nothing. For how could I advise Mrs Stawska to decline two roubles a day?
Oh dear, Staś, Staś! Why shouldn’t you marry her? Miss Łęcka has got into your head. I only hope you don’t regret it.
From then on, whenever I called on my respected lady friends, Mrs Stawska would tell me in the greatest detail the story of her relations with Baroness Krzeszowska, whose apartment she frequented every day, and naturally worked six hours instead of three, for the same two roubles. Mrs Stawska is a very mild-tempered lady, nevertheless, as I could see from her implied expressions both the Baroness’s apartment and her entire environment astounded and appalled Mrs Stawska. First, the Baroness makes no use of her large apartment. The drawing-room, boudoir, bedroom, dining room, the Baron’s room — all are empty. The furniture and mirrors are covered up; the plants which once bloomed are only dusty sticks today, or vases full of dried earth; dust on the costly tapestries. God knows what she eats, sometimes she doesn’t take a bite of anything hot for days on end, and she only keeps one servant in that great apartment, and treats her like a wanton and a criminal. When Mrs Stawska asked her whether she wasn’t unhappy living in that emptiness, she replied: ‘What am I to do, bereaved orphan and almost widow that I am? Unless the good Lord inspires my wicked husband to repent his wicked deeds and come back to me, only then will my hermit-like existence change. But as far as I can make out from the dreams and premonitions which Heaven sends me during my fervent prayers, my husband ought to return any day, for he has no money and no credit, that unfortunate, unhappy madman …’
Hearing this, Mrs Stawska made the private comment that the Baron’s fate, after repentance, might not be enviable.
The persons who call on the Baroness did not arouse Mrs Stawska’s confidence, either. Often, old ladies of disagreeable aspect visit her, with whom she talks of her husband in an undertone in the vestibule. Sometimes Maruszewicz comes, or an attorney in an old fur coat. The Baroness would take these gentlemen into the dining room, and when she talked to them, she would weep and complain so loudly that she was audible all over the apartment.
To Mrs Stawska’s timid inquiry as to why she didn’t live with her relatives, the Baroness replied: ‘Whom with, my dear lady? I have none, and even if I had, I wouldn’t receive such greedy and vulgar people in my house. My husband’s family won’t have anything to do with me, because I am not genteel: though this has not prevented them, all the same, from squeezing two hundred thousand roubles out of me. They were civil enough as long as I kept lending them money on permanent loan: but when I grew sick of it, they broke off relations, and they even persuaded my unhappy husband to place my estate under constraint. Oh, what I went through on account of those people …’ she added, weeping.
The only room (says Mrs Stawska) in which the Baroness spends the whole day, is the little room of her late daughter. This must be a very mournful and strange corner, for everything has been left as it was when the little girl died. So there’s her bed, on which the linen is changed every few days, a closet with her clothes, which are also brushed and cleaned in the drawing-room, for the Baroness won’t let these sacred relics be taken into the yard. There’s a little table, with books and an exercise book open at the page on which the poor little child wrote for the last time: ‘Holy Virgin, form …’ And, last of all, there’s a little shelf, full of large and small dolls, little beds and dolls’ garments.
In this room, Mrs Stawska darns laces or silks, of which the Baroness has a great deal. Mrs Stawska cannot divine whether she is ever likely to wear them again.
One day, the Baroness asked Mrs Stawska if she knew Wokulski. But, although she got the answer that Mrs Stawska hardly knows him, she began: ‘You’d be doing me a great favour, dear madam, a real charity, if you’d go and see that gentleman regarding a matter of great importance to me. I want to buy this house and will pay him ninety-five thousand roubles, but he, out of sheer obstinacy and nothing more, is asking a hundred thousand. That man wants to ruin me … Pray tell him he’s killing me … That he will draw down Heavenly punishment on himself for such greed!’ the Baroness shrieked and cried.
Mrs Stawska, very embarrassed, told the Baroness she couldn’t possibly speak to Wokulski of this: ‘I don’t know him … He’s only called on us once … Besides, would it be proper for me to interfere in such matters?’
‘Oh, you can make him do anything you choose,’ the Baroness retorted, ‘but if you don’t want to save me from death … God’s will be done. Pray do your Christian duty at least, and tell that man I am well disposed towards you.’
Hearing this, Mrs Stawska rose to leave. But the Baroness hastily embraced her, and begged her forgiveness, so that tears flowed from the excellent Mrs Stawska’s eyes and she stayed.
When she had told me all this, Mrs Stawska ended with a question that had the tone of a request: ‘So Mr Wokulski doesn’t want to sell this house?’
‘Of course he does,’ I replied, vexed, ‘he’s selling the house, the store, everything …’
A bright blush spread over Mrs Stawska’s face: she turned her chair back to the lamp, and quietly asked: ‘Why?’
‘As if I knew!’ I said, feeling that terrible pleasure caused by tormenting our dear ones, ‘as if I knew! They say he wants to get married’
‘Aha,’ Mrs Misiewicz interposed, ‘people are saying it’s Miss Łęcka.’
‘Is this true?’ Mrs Stawska whispered. Suddenly she pressed one hand to her bosom as if breathless, and went into the other room.
‘Here’s a fine to-do,’ thought I, ‘she sets eyes on him once, and here she is swooning away …’
‘I don’t know why he should get married,’ I told Mrs Misiewicz, ‘because he isn’t even lucky with women.’
‘Get along with you, Mr Rzecki,’ the old lady cried, ‘he not lucky with the ladies?’
‘After all, he isn’t handsome.’
‘He? … But he’s a perfectly handsome man! What a build, what a noble countenance, and what eyes! You, Mr Rzecki, surely don’t know anything about it. But I must confess (at my age, after all!) that although I have seen many handsome men (Ludwik was very handsome too), this is the first time I’ve seen anyone like Wokulski. He’d attract notice in a thousand.’
I was privately amazed at this flattery. For although I know Staś is very handsome, yet all the same, he’s not as handsome as all that …-Still, I’m not a woman!
When I bade my ladies goodnight at ten, Mrs Stawska was altered and mournful, and complained that her head ached. Oh, that donkey, Staś! The woman has fallen in love with him at first sight, and he, the madman, is running after Miss Łęcka. Is there order in this world? If I were the Lord God … But why chatter on in vain?
People are talking about laying drains in Warsaw. The Prince even called on us, and invited Staś to a meeting on the subject. When he finished his conversation about drains, he questioned him about the apartment house. I was present, and well remember every word: ‘Is it true (forgive me for asking about such matters) — is it true, Mr Wokulski, that you’re asking a hundred and twenty thousand from the Baroness Krzeszowska for your house?’
‘No, it isn’t,’ Staś replied, ‘I am asking a hundred thousand, and not a penny less will I take.’
‘The Baroness is eccentric, hysterical but … she’s also an unhappy woman,’ said the Prince. ‘She wants to buy that house because her beloved daughter died there, and also in order to protect the rest of her savings from her husband, who loves squandering money … Perhaps you, sir, will make her some concessions? It’s a fine thing to
do good to unhappy people,’ the Prince concluded with a sigh.
I admit that although I am only a shop-assistant, this charity at someone else’s expense surprised me. Staś felt this even more strongly, for he replied in a firm manner: ‘Am I to lose several thousand roubles just because the Baron squanders money and his wife would like to have my house? Why, pray?’
‘Well, don’t be offended, my dear sir,’ said the Prince, pressing Wokulski’s hand, ‘you know we all live with people: they help us attain our ends, so we too have certain obligations.’
‘No one helps me, indeed — many interfere,’ Staś replied. They parted very coldly. I noticed that the Prince was displeased.
What extraordinary people! Not only did Wokulski form a trading company with the Empire and give them the opportunity to make fifteen per cent on their capital, but now they want him to bestow several thousand roubles on the Baroness, at their request! What a mischief-maker she is, though, and there’s nowhere she won’t worm her way into … For there was even some priest came to see Staś, with a religious exhortation that he should sell his house to the Baroness for ninety-five thousand. And because Staś declined, we shall soon hear, no doubt, that he is an atheist.
Now comes the main incident, which I shall relate post-haste.
When I called again one evening on Mrs Stawska (the day when the Emperor Wilhelm took power after the incident with Nobiling), my goddess, that excellent woman, was in splendid fettle and full of admiration for — the Baroness!
‘Just think,’ said she, ‘what an excellent woman the Baroness Krzeszowska is, despite her eccentricities. She noticed I was unhappy without little Helena, and she asked me outright to take Helena with me to her apartment for the few hours.’
‘Those six hours for two roubles?’ I interrupted.
‘Not six — four, at most … Helena plays there very nicely, although she is not allowed to touch anything, but all the same, how she gazes at the late child’s dolls!’