‘Oh papa, if you only knew the tone aunt uses …’
‘Probably the tone of a woman with disordered nerves. You should not be vexed with her.’
‘If it were only that … But I am afraid she may be right, and that our silver may find its way to the table of some banker or other.’
She leaned her head on her father’s shoulder. Tomasz glanced involuntarily at the mirror and admitted to himself that they formed a remarkably fine couple. The uneasiness on his daughter’s face made a particularly striking contrast with his own tranquillity. He smiled.
‘Bankers’ tables!’ he echoed. ‘Our ancestral silver has already graced the table of Tartars, Cossacks and rebellious peasantry — far from disgracing us, this has only brought us honour. He who fights must risk losing.’
‘They were lost in wars …’ Izabela interposed.
‘And is there no war on today? It is the weapons that have changed, that’s all. Instead of an axe or scythe or scimitar, they fight with roubles. Joanna understood this very well when she sold her family estate — not merely a dinner-service — and demolished the ruins of her castle to build granaries.’
‘So we have lost…’ Izabela whispered.
‘No, my child,’ said Tomasz, straightening his back. ‘We are just beginning to win, and that no doubt is what my sister and her coterie are afraid of. They are so fast asleep that they take fright at every sign of vitality, every bold step I take,’ he added as if to himself.
‘You, papa?’
‘Yes. They thought I would beg them for help. Joanna would be glad to make me her plenipotentiary. But I declined a pension with thanks, and have drawn closer to the bourgeoisie. I have gained their respect, and this is beginning to alarm our little world. They expected me to go under, but now they see I may go forward to the top.’
‘You, papa?’
‘Yes, I. Hitherto I said nothing, for I lacked suitable partners. But today I met a man who understands my ideas, and I shall begin to act.’
‘Who can he be?’ Izabela looked at her father in surprise.
‘A certain Wokulski, a tradesman, a man of iron. With his help I plan to organize our bourgeoisie and form a company for trading with the East. In this way I will support our industry …’
‘You, papa?’
‘And then we shall see who will get to the top, albeit, perhaps, through elections to the city council …’
Izabela listened to this with wide-open eyes.
‘Is not this man of whom you speak, papa,’ she whispered, ‘is he not a speculator, an adventurer?’
‘So you do not know him?’ Tomasz inquired. ‘He is one of our tradesmen.’
‘Yes, I know his shop, it is very elegant,’ said Izabela, thoughtfully. ‘There’s an old clerk who looks eccentric but is really very civil … Ah, I believe I met the proprietor too. He looks like a boor …’
‘Wokulski a boor?’ asked Tomasz in surprise. ‘I agree he is somewhat stiff in his manners, but he is most civil.’
Izabela shook her head.
‘He’s a disagreeable man,’ she replied animatedly. ‘Now I remember him. When I was in his shop on Tuesday I asked him the price of a fan. You should have seen how he looked at me! He didn’t answer, but beckoned with that huge red hand of his to a clerk (quite an elegant young man), and muttered in a voice in which I could hear his anger: “Mr Morawski … or Mraczewski” (I don’t recall) “this lady wants to know the price of this fan.” Oh, you have picked on a very disappointing partner, papa,’ Izabela smiled.
‘He’s a man of extraordinary energy, a man of iron,’ replied Tomasz. ‘Such men behave like that. You will make their acquaintance, for I plan to hold a few evening parties here, at home. They’re all originals, but he is more so than the rest.’
‘You intend to receive these men, papa?’
‘I must have talks with some of them. And as for our own people,’ he added, looking his daughter in the eye, ‘I promise you that when they learn who has been here, not one of them will be absent from my drawing-room.’
At this moment Flora entered to announce dinner. Tomasz gave his hand to his daughter and the three went into the dining-room; the tureen and Mikołaj were already there, the latter in a frock coat and large white tie.
‘I can’t help smiling at Bela,’ said Tomasz to Flora, who was serving soup from the tureen, ‘just think, Flora — Wokulski makes the impression of a boor on her! Do you know him?’
‘Everyone knows Wokulski nowadays,’ Flora replied, handing Mikołaj a plate for his master. ‘He is not elegant, I agree — but he’s a striking man.’
‘Like a tree-trunk with red hands,’ Izabela interposed with a smile.
‘He reminds me of Trosti, that Colonel of the Rifles, in Paris,’ said Tomasz.
‘And he makes me think of the statue of the victorious gladiator,’ said Flora in a melodious tone. ‘Do you remember, Bela—the one with the uplifted sword that we saw in Florence. A stern face, even fierce — but handsome.’
‘And his red hands?’ Izabela asked.
‘He got them frozen in Siberia,’ Flora said significantly.
‘Repenting the enthusiasm of his youth,’ said Tomasz. ‘We can forgive him that.’
‘So he’s a hero too?’
‘And a millionaire,’ Flora added.
‘That too? I am beginning to think, papa, that you have chosen well in taking him as a partner. And yet …’
‘And yet?’ her father repeated.
‘What is the world going to say to the combination?’
‘He who has power in his hands has the world at his feet.’
Mikołaj had just brought in the roast pork when the bell rang in the hall. The old butler went out and presently reappeared with a letter on a silver or perhaps nickel-plated tray.
‘From the Countess,’ he said.
‘For you, Bela,’ added Tomasz taking the letter. ‘Allow me to swallow this new pill for you.’
And he opened the letter, began reading it, then said with a smile: ‘Here you have Countess Karolowa all over! Nerves, nerves …’
Izabela pushed her plate aside and uneasily glanced through the letter. But her face gradually cleared.
‘Listen, Flora,’ she said, ‘this is interesting.’
My dear Bela (my aunt writes) forget my previous letter, my angel. After all, your dinner-service is of no concern to me, and we will find you another when you get married. But I am most anxious that you should attend the Easter collection with me and no one else, and that was really what I meant to write about in my previous note, not about the dinner-service. My wretched nerves! If you do not want to upset me entirely, you must accept my invitation. The arrangements in our church will be quite splendid. My good, honest Wokulski is giving us a fountain, artificial singing-birds, music boxes that play solemn music and a number of fine carpets. Hozer will supply the flowers, and some amateurs are arranging a concert for the organ, violins, cellos and soloists. I am so pleased, but if you were absent amidst these wonders, I should be quite ill. So what is your reply to be?
Affectionately, and with a thousand hugs and kisses,
Joanna.
Post scriptum. Tomorrow we will visit the stores and order a spring outfit for you. I shall die if you do not accept.
Izabela was radiant. The letter fulfilled all her hopes.
‘Wokulski is incomparable!’ said Tomasz, smiling. ‘He has won her over and she will not only recognise him as my partner but even fight me for him.’
Mikołaj was serving the chicken.
‘He really must be something of a genius,’ Flora observed.
‘Wokulski? Well, no,’ said Tomasz. ‘He’s a man of tremendous energy, but as for the gift of foresight—no, I would not say he has that in any very high degree.’
‘Yet he is proving it.’
‘These things are nothing but proof of his energy,’ Tomasz replied. ‘The gift of foresight, of working out brilliant ideas can be seen in other fi
elds, such as … gambling. I often play whist with him, where foresight is essential. The result is that I would lose from eight to ten roubles, but win about seventeen, although I lay no claim to genius,’ he added modestly.
Izabela dropped her fork. She turned pale and put one hand to her temples, whispering:
‘Oh … oh! …’
Her father and Flora rose from their places.
‘What is it, Bela?’ asked Tomasz anxiously.
‘Nothing,’ she replied, also rising. ‘Migraine. I felt it coming on … It is nothing, papa.’
She kissed her father and went to her boudoir.
‘A sudden attack of migraine should pass very soon,’ said Tomasz. ‘Go to her, Flora. I must go out for a while, but will be home early. In the meantime, look after her, my dear Flora, I beg you,’ said Tomasz with the tranquil air of a man whose instructions can set all the world to rights.
‘I’ll go to her when I have tidied up here,’ replied Flora, to whom order in the household was a more important matter than anyone’s migraine.
Already night had fallen … Izabela was alone in her boudoir again; she reclined on the chaise-longue and covered her face with both hands. Her tiny slippers and a fragment of stocking appeared beneath the cascade of fabrics she wore, but no one saw and she did not think of it. At this moment her soul was again torn with anger, remorse and shame. Her aunt had invited her, she would attend the Easter collection in the smartest church in Warsaw and would wear the finest toilette; but she was unhappy … She felt as if she had entered a crowded drawing-room and suddenly noticed a great greasy stain of hideous shape and colour on her new gown, as though it had been soiled on some kitchen stairs. The thought was so hateful that her mouth filled with a bad taste.
What a terrible position, to be sure! For a month they had been getting into debt with their butler, and for two weeks her father had been winning money at cards for his day-to-day expenses … It is permissible to win money at cards, of course: men win thousands of roubles … but not for day-to-day expenses, and certainly not from tradesmen. If only she could fall at her father’s feet and beg him not to play cards with such people, or at least not just now, when their financial state was so precarious. In a few days, when she obtained the money for the dinner-service, she herself would hand her father a few hundred roubles so he could lose them to this Wokulski, so he could reward him generously, even more generously than she would reward Mikołaj for the debts incurred with him.
But was it proper to do so, or even mention it to her father?
‘Wokulski, Wokulski …’ Izabela whispers. Who is this Wokulski who had suddenly appeared on all sides, and in various aspects? What does he have to do with her aunt, with her father?
Now she recalls hearing about this man several times in the past weeks. Some merchant or other had recently donated several thousand roubles to charity, but she was uncertain whether he dealt in ladies’ gown or in furs. Then people talked of a merchant who had made a great fortune in the Bulgarian war, but she had not paid attention to whether he was a shoemaker from whom she purchased her shoes, or her hairdresser. Only now did she realise that this merchant who had donated money to charity and the man who had made the great fortune were one and the same person, none other than this Wokulski who had also lost money at cards to her father, and whom her aunt, the notoriously proud Countess Karolowa, called ‘my good honest Wokulski’.
At this moment she even recalled the face of this man, who had refused to speak to her in his shop and had withdrawn behind a huge Japanese vase to eye her sombrely. How he had looked at her!
One day, she and Flora had gone into a cafe for chocolate, just for a lark. They sat by the window, behind which several ragged children gathered. The children looked in at her, at the chocolate and the cakes with the curiosity and greed of starving animals, and this shop-keeper had looked at her in the same manner.
A slight shudder ran through Izabela. And he was to be her father’s partner? … What for? … How had it crossed her father’s mind to establish a commercial company, think up extensive plans he had never even dreamed of before? He hoped to rise to the forefront of the aristocracy with the help of the bourgeoisie; he hoped to be elected to a town council which never existed and probably never would …
Surely this Wokulski was nothing more than a speculator, perhaps a cheat, who needed an eminent name as shield for his enterprises? Such things happened. How many eminent names of the German and Hungarian aristocracy had been bedraggled in trade operations which Izabela did not understand, and of which her father hardly knew more.
It had grown quite dark; the lamps had been lit in the street, and their light outlined the window frame and folds of the curtain upon the ceiling of Izabela’s boudoir. The shadows looked like a cross against a dark background which was slowly being submerged by a dense cloud.
‘Where have I seen a cross like that, such a cloud and such brightness?’ Izabela asked herself. She began to recall places seen in her life — and to dream.
It seemed to her she was travelling by carriage in some familiar spot. The landscape was like a huge ring of forests and green mountains, and her carriage was on the edge of the ring, descending into it. Would it go down? For it was neither coming nor going, but seemed to be motionless. Yet it was moving: this was evident from the face of the sun reflected in the polished sides of the carriage, trembling slightly as it moved backwards. Moreover, the wheels could be heard … Or was it the rattle of a droshky in the street? … No, it was the roar of machinery somewhere far below, in the depths of that ring of mountains and trees. She could even see, down there, what looked like a lake of black smoke and white steam, framed in greenery.
Now Izabela caught sight of her father sitting by her, inspecting his finger-nails attentively, glancing from time to time at the landscape. The carriage continued to stand on the edge of the ring, as if motionless, and only the face of the sun, reflected in the polished wings of the carriage, slowly moved backwards. This apparent rest or mysterious movement irritated Izabela to a high degree. ‘Are we moving or standing still?’ she asked her father. But he said nothing, as though he had not heard: he was inspecting his fine nails, and sometimes glanced out at the surroundings …
Then (the carriage went on trembling and the rattling could still be heard) the figure of a man half emerged from the depths of the lake of black smoke and white steam. He had close-cropped hair, a swarthy face which reminded her of Trosti, the Colonel of Rifles (or was it perhaps the Florentine gladiator?), and huge red hands. He wore a pitch-stained shirt, his sleeves were rolled up above his elbows: in his left hand, against his chest, he held some cards arranged in a fan, while in his right hand, which was raised above his head, he held one card, clearly with the intention of throwing it upon the front seat of the carriage. The rest of his figure could not be seen through the smoke.
‘What is he doing, father?’ Izabela asked fearfully.
‘Playing whist with me,’ her father replied, also holding cards.
‘But he is dreadful, papa!’
‘Even men such as he will not harm a woman,’ Tomasz replied.
Only now did Izabela notice that the man in the shirt was looking at her with a peculiar expression as he continued to hold the card above his head. The smoke and steam, boiling in the valley, sometimes concealed his open shirt and stern features: he was sinking into them, he was gone. Only from behind the smoke, she could still see the pale glitter of his eyes, and his arm, naked to the elbow—and the card — rising above the smoke.
‘What does that card mean, papa?’ she asked her father.
But her father was calmly looking at his own cards, and did not answer, as if he did not hear her.
‘When are we going to leave this place …?’
But although the carriage shuddered and the sun reflected in the wings was still drawing backwards, the lake of smoke was still visible below and in it, the submerged man with his hand above his head — and that card.
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Izabela was overcome with nervous agitation, she summoned all her powers of recollection, marshalled all her thoughts in order to guess: that card the man was holding, what did it mean? … Was it the money he had lost to her father at whist? Surely not … Or perhaps the sum he had contributed to the Charitable Society? Not that either. Or the thousand roubles he had given her aunt for the orphanage, or perhaps a receipt for the fountain, birds and carpets to adorn the church at Easter? But no, it was not them either: for none of these things would alarm her.
Gradually Izabela was filled with a great dread. Perhaps it was her father’s bills of exchange, which someone recently bought up? If so, she would take the money for the dinner-service and silver, and would pay off this debt first and free herself from such a creditor. But the man submerged in smoke was still looking into her eyes and had not yet played his card. So perhaps … Oh!
Izabela jumps up, stumbles in the darkness against a stool and rings the bell with a hand that trembles. She rings again, no one answers, so she runs into the hall and in the doorway meets Flora, who seizes her hand and asks in surprise: ‘What is the matter, Bela?’
The light in the hall brings Izabela to her senses somewhat. She smiles. ‘Flora, bring a lamp to my room. Is Papa in?’
‘He just went out.’
‘And Mikołaj?’
‘He’ll be back directly, he took a letter for delivery. Is your headache worse?’ asks Flora.
‘No,’ Izabela smiles. ‘I dozed off, and had a dream.’
Flora takes the lamp and Bela goes with her cousin into the boudoir. Izabela sits down on the chaise-longue, shields her eyes from the light with one hand, and says: ‘You know, Flora, I have changed my mind. I won’t sell my silver to a stranger. It might get into the wrong hands. Sit down at my desk, if you will, and write to my aunt that … I accept her offer. Let her lend us three thousand roubles and take the dinner-service and silver.’
Flora looks at her in the utmost surprise, then says:
‘That is impossible, Bela.’