Children of the Soil

Here she seized Pan Ignas’s temples with her hands, and said through her tears, —

“But my Teodor answered, ‘Give;’ therefore I give her to thee, and my blessing besides.”

Tears quenched indeed further conversation in Pani Bronich. Pan Ignas knelt before her; “Nitechka,” who came in, as if at a fixed moment, dropped on her knees at his side; Pani Bronich stretched her hands and said sobbing, —

“She is thine, thine! I give her to thee; I and Teodor give her.”

Then the three rose. Aunt Bronich covered her eyes with her handkerchief, and remained some time without motion; gradually, however, she slipped away the handkerchief, looking from one side at the two young people. Suddenly she laughed, and, threatening with her finger, said, —

“Oi! I know what you would like now, – you would like to be alone. Surely you have something to say to each other. Is it not true?”

And she went out. Pan Ignas took Lineta’s hands that moment, and looked into her eyes with intoxication.

They sat down; and she, leaving her hands in his, rested her temple on his shoulder. It was like a song without words. Pan Ignas inclined his head toward her bright face. Lineta closed her eyes; but he was too young and too timid, he respected too much and he loved, hence he did not venture yet to touch her lips with his. He only kissed her golden hair, and even that caused the room in which they were sitting to spin with him; the world began to whirl round. Then all vanished from his eyes; he lost memory of where he was, and what was happening; he heard only the beating of his own heart; he felt the odor of the silken hair, which brushed his lips, and it seemed to him that in that was the universe.

But that was only a dream from which he had to wake. After a certain time the aunt began to open the door gently, as if wishing to lose the least possible of the romance, in which, with Teodor’s aid, she was playing the rôle of guardian spirit; in the adjoining chamber were heard the voices of the Osnovskis; and a moment later Lineta found herself in the arms of her aunt, from which she passed into the embraces of Pani Aneta. Osnovski, pressing Ignas’s hands with all his power, said, —

“But what a joy in the house, what a joy! for we have all fallen in love with thee, – I, and aunt, and Anetka, not to speak of this little one.”

Then he turned to his wife and said, —

“Knowest, Anetka, what I wished Ignas, even yesterday? that they should be to each other as we are.” And, seizing her hands, he began to kiss them with vehemence.

Pan Ignas, though he knew not in general what was happening to him, found still presence of mind enough to look into the face of Pani Aneta; but she answered joyously, withdrawing her hands from her husband, —

“No, they will be happier; for Castelka is not such a giddy thing as I, and Pan Ignas will not kiss her hands so stubbornly before people. But, Yozio, let me go!”

“Let him only love her as I thee, my treasure, my child,” answered the radiant Yozio.

Pan Ignas stayed at Pani Bronich’s till evening, and did not go to the counting-house. After lunch he drove out in the carriage with the aunt and Lineta, for Pani Bronich wanted absolutely to show them to society. But their drive in the Alley was not a success altogether, because of a sudden hard shower, which scattered the carriages. On their return, Pan Osnovski, good as he ever was, made a new proposition which delighted Pan Ignas.

“Prytulov will not escape us,” said he. “We live here as if we were half in the country; and since we have remained till the end of June, we may stay a couple of days longer. Let that loving couple exchange rings before our departure, and at the same time let it be free to Aneta and me to give them a betrothal party. Is it well, aunt? I see that they have nothing against it, and surely it will be agreeable for Ignas to have at the betrothal his friends the Polanyetskis and the Bigiels. It is true that we do not visit the latter, but that is nothing! We will visit them to-morrow, and the affair will be settled. Is it well, Ignas; is it well, aunt?”

Ignas was evidently in the seventh heaven; as to aunt, she didn’t know indeed what Teodor’s opinion would be in this matter, and she began to hesitate. But she might inquire of Teodor yet; and then she remembered that he had answered, “Give,” with such a great voice from his place of eternal rest that it was impossible to doubt his good wishes, – hence she agreed at last to everything.

After dinner Kopovski, the almost daily guest, came; and it turned out that he was the only being in the villa to whom news of the feelings and betrothal of the young couple did not cause delight. For a time his face expressed indescribable astonishment; at last he said, —

“I never should have guessed that Panna Lineta would marry Pan Ignas.”

Osnovski pushed Pan Ignas with his elbow, blinked, and whispered, with a very cunning mien, —

“Hast noticed? I told thee yesterday that he was making up to Castelka.”

Pan Ignas left the villa of the Osnovskis late in the evening. When he reached home he did not betake himself to verses, however, though it seemed to him then that he was a kind of harp, the strings of which played of themselves, but to the counting-house, to unfinished correspondence and accounts.

At the counting-house all were so pleased with this that when the Bigiels returned the visit of the Osnovskis, and at the same time made the first visit to Pani Bronich, Bigiel said, —

“The worth of Pan Zavilovski’s poetry is known to you ladies, but perhaps you do not know how conscientious a man he is. I say this because that is a rare quality among us. Since he remained all day with you here, and could not be at the counting-house, he asked to have it opened by the guard in the night; he took home the books and papers in his charge, and did what pertained to him. It is pleasant to think that one has to do with such a man, for such a man may be trusted.”

Here, however, the honorable partner of the house of Bigiel and Polanyetski was astonished that such high praise from his lips made so little impression, and that Pani Bronich, instead of showing gladness, replied, —

“Ah, we hope that in future Pan Zavilovski will be able to give himself to labor more in accordance with his powers and position.”

In general, the impression which both sides brought away from their acquaintance showed that somehow they were not at home with each other. Lineta pleased the Bigiels, it is true; but he, in going away, whispered to his wife, “How comfortably they live for themselves in this place!” He had a feeling that the spirit of that whole villa was a sort of unbroken holiday, or idling; but he was not able at once to express that idea, for he had not the gift of ready utterance.

But Pani Bronich, after their departure, said to “Nitechka,” —

“Of course, of course! They must be excellent people – true, perfect people! I am certain – yes, certain – ”

And somehow she did not finish her thought; but “Nitechka” must have understood her, however, for she said, —

“But they are no relatives of his.”

A few days later the relatives, too, made themselves heard. Pan Ignas, who, in spite of the wishes of Pani Bigiel, had not gone yet with excuses to old Zavilovski, received the following letter from him, —

Pan Wildcat! – Thou hast scratched me undeservedly, for I had no wish to offend thee; and if I say always what I think, it is permitted me because I am old. They must have told thee, too, that I never name, even to her eyes, thy young lady otherwise than Venetian half-devil. But how was I to know that thou wert in love and about to marry? I heard of this only yesterday, and only now do I understand why thou didst spring out of my sight; but since I prefer water-burners to dullards, and since through this devil of a gout I cannot go myself to thee to congratulate, do thou come to the old man, who is more thy well-wisher than seems to thee.

After this letter Pan Ignas went that same day, and was received cordially, though with scolding, but so kindly that this time the old truth-teller pleased him, and he felt in him really a relative.

“May God and the Most Holy Lady bless thee!” said the old man. “I know thee little; but I have heard such things of thee that I should be glad to hear the like touching all Zavilovskis.”

And he pressed his hand; then, turning to his daughter, he said, —

“He’s a genial rascal, isn’t he?”

And at parting he inquired, —

“But ‘Teodor,’ didn’t he trouble thee too much? Hei?”

Pan Ignas, who, as an artist, possessed in a high degree the sense of the ridiculous, and to whom in his soul that Teodor, too, seemed comical, laughed and answered, —

“No. On the contrary, he was on my side.”

The old man began to shake his head.

“That is a devil of an accommodating Teodor! Be on the lookout for him; he is a rogue.”

Pani Bronich had so much genuine respect for the property and social position of old Zavilovski that she visited him next day, and began almost to thank him for his cordial reception of his relative; but the old man grew angry unexpectedly.

“Do you think that I am some empty talker?” asked he. “You have heard from me that poor relatives are a plague; and you think that I take it ill of them that they are poor. No, you do not know me! But, know this, when a noble loses everything, and is poor, he becomes almost always a sort of shabby fellow. Such is our character, or rather, its weakness. But this Ignas, as I hear from every side, is a man of honor, though poor; and therefore I love him.”

“And I love him,” answered Pani Bronich. “But you will be at the betrothal?”

“C’est décidé. Even though I had to be carried.”

Pani Bronich returned radiant, and at lunch could not restrain herself from expressing suppositions which her active fancy had begun to create.

“Pan Zavilovski,” said she, “is a man of millions, and greatly attached to the name. I should not be astonished at all were he to make our Ignas his heir, if not of the chief, of a considerable part of his property, or if he were to entail some of his estates in Poznan on him. I should not be surprised at all.”