The Doll - Bolesaw Prus [166]
So Wokulski fell silent too, and left the shop with bitterness in his soul: ‘They are all turning away from me,’ he told himself, ‘even Ignacy. Even he…But you will be my reward,’ he added in the street, looking in the direction of Aleje Ujazdowskie.
When Wokulski had left the store, Rzecki cautiously asked the ‘gentlemen’ in which court-room and at what time the auctions of houses took place. Then he asked Lisiecki to deputise for him next day between ten in the morning and two in the afternoon, and set about his accounts with redoubled fervour. Mechanically (though without a mistake) he added up columns of figures as long as Nowy Świat Street, and in the intervals he thought: ‘I have wasted nearly an hour today, tomorrow I’ll waste about five, and all because Staś trusts Szlangbaum more than me. What does he want an apartment house for? Why the devil is he taking up with that bankrupt Łęcki? What put it into his head to rush off to the Italian company and on top of it all to give expensive gifts to that strolling player Rossi?’
He sat at the cash-desk till six o’clock without looking up from the ledgers, and was so absorbed that he not only declined to take money but did not even see or hear the customers who flocked in and made a noise in the store like so many bumble-bees in a hive. He did not even notice a most unexpected visitor whom the ‘gentlemen’ greeted with loud cries and embraces. Not until the newcomer stopped in front of him and shouted into his ear: ‘Ignacy, it’s me!’ did Rzecki awaken, raise his head, brows and eyes and perceive Mraczewski.
‘Ha?’ Ignacy inquired, eyeing the young dandy, who had got sunburned, grown manlier and—above all—plumper.
‘Well, what’s the news?’ Ignacy went on, shaking his hand, ‘what about politics?’
‘Nothing new,’ Mraczewski replied, ‘the Berlin congress is doing its job, the Austrians will take Bosnia…’
‘Well, well, jokes—that’s all. But what’s the news about young Bonaparte?’
‘He’s studying at a military school in England and they say he’s in love with some actress or other.’
‘There, he falls in love right away,’ Ignacy repeated, ‘why doesn’t he go back to France? What do you think? And what are you doing here? Come, let’s hear it!’ Rzecki exclaimed cheerfully, taking him by the arm, ‘when did you arrive?’
‘It’s a long story,’ Mraczewski replied, throwing himself into a chair, ‘Suzin and I arrived at eleven…We were at Wokulski’s from one to three, and after that I called on my mother and on Mrs Stawska…A fine woman, ain’t she?’
‘Stawska? Stawska?…’ Rzecki recollected, frowning
‘Go on—you know her! That pretty woman with the little daughter. The one you took such a fancy to…’
‘Oh her…I know…It wasn’t that I took a fancy to her,’ Rzecki sighed, ‘only I thought she’d make a good wife for Staś.’
‘You’re a card, you are,’ Mraczewski laughed, ‘she’s already got one husband.’
‘Already got one?’
‘Certainly. Besides, the name is well-known. Four years ago the poor devil ran away abroad, for they accused him of murdering that…’
‘Yes, I remember. So that’s the man? Why didn’t he come back, after all it turned out he wasn’t guilty.’
‘Of course he wasn’t,’ Mraczewski agreed, ‘but anyhow, since he got away to America there has been no word of him to this day. I daresay the poor wretch has perished somewhere and Mrs S. is left neither a spinster nor a widow. Awful fate! To keep a household going by embroidery, piano lessons, English lessons…To work all day like a horse and still not to have a husband…Poor woman! We wouldn’t remain virtuous so long, would we, Ignacy, eh? That old madman…’
‘Who’s a madman?’ Rzecki asked, astonished by the sudden change in the conversation.
‘Who—if not Wokulski?’ retorted Mraczewski, ‘Suzin is going to Paris and insists on taking him