The Doll - Bolesaw Prus [169]
At this moment a carriage drove up to the building with Mr Łęcki inside. Ignacy was unable to restrain his feelings of respect for those fine grey whiskers and of admiration for Łęcki’s good humour. Mr Łęcki did not at all look like a bankrupt whose property was being auctioned off, but more like a millionaire come to his notary to take up the small sum of a hundred and more thousand roubles.
Mr Łęcki got ceremoniously out of the carriage, approached the court door with a triumphant step and at the same moment an individual who looked like an idler, but who was in reality a lawyer ran up to him. After a very brief and even casual greeting, Mr Łęcki asked this individual: ‘Well—what and when?’
‘In an hour or so, perhaps a little longer,’ the individual replied.
‘Just imagine,’ said Łęcki, with a benevolent smile, ‘that a week ago an acquaintance of mine got twice as much for a house which had cost him a hundred and fifty thousand. As mine cost a hundred thousand, I ought to get some hundred and twenty-five, in proportion.’
‘Hm…hm…’ muttered the lawyer.
‘You’ll no doubt laugh,’ Tomasz went on, ‘when I tell you (for you love laughing at premonitions and dreams) that today I dreamed my house went for a hundred and twenty thousand. Pray notice I’m telling you this before the auction! In a few hours you’ll see that dreams are not to be laughed at. There are more things in Heaven and earth…’
‘Hm…hm…’ the lawyer replied, and both went through the first door of the building.
‘Thank goodness,’ thought Ignacy. ‘If Łęcki gets a hundred and twenty thousand for his house, that will mean Staś won’t pay ninety thousand for it.’
Just then someone touched his arm slightly. Ignacy looked around and saw old Szlangbaum behind him. ‘Looking for me, eh?’ asked the venerable Jew, eyeing him sharply.
‘No, no…’ Ignacy replied in confusion.
‘You have no business matter to see me about?’ Szlangbaum repeated, blinking his red eyelids.
‘No, no …’
‘Gut,’ Szlangbaum muttered, and went off to join his co-religionists.
Ignacy felt chilly; Szlangbaum’s presence in this place aroused new suspicions within him. To dispel them, Ignacy asked the doorman where the auctions were held. The doorman showed him the stairs.
Ignacy hurried up them into a hall. He was impressed by a crowd of Jews listening to a speech with the utmost attention. Rzecki realised that at this moment a case was being heard, that the prosecutor was speaking and that it concerned fraud. It was stuffy in the court-room; the prosecutor’s speech was somewhat drowned by the rattle of droshkies outside. The magistrates looked as if they were dozing, the lawyer yawned, the accused looked as if he would be delighted to defraud the judges of the supreme court, the Hebrews were eyeing him with sympathy and listened to the charges with attention. Some grimaced and murmured: ‘Oh my!’ at the prosecutor’s more powerful charges.
Ignacy left the court-room; he had not come for this case. Finding himself in a vestibule, Ignacy thought of ascending to the second floor; at the same moment, Baroness Krzeszowska passed him, accompanied by a man who looked like a bored teacher of dead languages. However, he was a lawyer, as was shown by a silver badge in the lapel of his very shabby frock-coat; and the grey trousers of this high priest of justice were as baggy at the knees as if their owner were in the habit of making proposals to the goddess Temida, instead of defending clients.
‘If it is not for an hour,’ said Mme Krzeszowska in a plaintive voice, ‘I shall go to the Capucines. Do you not think? …’
‘I don’t think a visit to the Capucines will influence the course of the auction,’ replied the lawyer, bored.
‘But if you sincerely want it to go well …’
The lawyer in the baggy trousers made an impatient gesture: ‘Dear lady,’ said he, ‘I have already run about so much in the business of this auction