The Doll - Bolesaw Prus [215]
‘Helena,’ the old lady exclaimed sternly, ‘you have not said good-day.’
The little girl made two curtsies, to which I replied clumsily, and Mr Wirski like a prince, and she went on showing her grandma the needles from which a little black woollen square was dangling: ‘Please grandma, the winter is coming, and my dolly won’t have anything to wear in the street. Please grandma, I have dropped another stitch …’
(A perfectly lovely child …Goodness me, why isn’t Staś her father? Perhaps he would not behave so foolishly?)
Her grandma apologised to me, took the wool and the needles, and at this moment in came Mrs Stawska.
I must confess that at the sight of her I behaved with dignity: but Wirski quite lost his head. He jumped up like a student, fastened a button on his frock-coat, then blushed and began stammering: ‘May I present Mr Rzecki, our landlord’s plenipotentiary …’
‘How do you do?’ said Mrs Stawska, bowing, her eyes lowered. But a powerful blush and traces of alarm on her face suggested I was not a welcome visitor.
‘Just wait,’ thought I. And I imagined Wokulski in my place in the room: ‘Just wait, I’ll prove to you you have nothing to fear …’
Meanwhile, Mrs Stawska, having sat down, was so embarrassed that she began fidgeting with her daughter’s dress. Her mother lost her good humour too, and the agent became quite sheepish.
‘Just wait, all of you,’ thought I and, adopting a very stern expression, asked: ‘How long have you been living in this apartment, ladies?’
‘Five years,’ Mrs Stawska replied, blushing still more. Her mother quivered where she sat.
‘And how much do you pay?’
‘Twenty-five roubles a month,’ the younger lady whispered. At the same moment she went pale, began rubbing her dress and, certainly without realising it, cast such an imploring look at Wirski that …had I been in his place, I would have proposed to her at once.
‘We still owe,’ she added, still more softly, ‘for July …’
I scowled like Lucifer, and drawing in as much breath as there was air in the apartment, declared: ‘You ladies owe us nothing …until October. The fact is that Staś —I mean, Mr Wokulski — has written to me that it is sheer robbery to take three hundred roubles for three rooms on this street. Mr Wokulski cannot permit such extortion, and told me to inform you that from October this apartment will be rented at two hundred roubles. If you do not wish …’
The agent almost fell out of his chair. The old lady clasped her hands, and Mrs Stawska gazed at me with wide-open eyes. Such eyes! And how she could use them! I vow that if I were Wokulski, I’d have proposed to her on the spot. Obviously there is nothing doing with her husband, if he hasn’t written for two years. Besides, what are divorces for? Why has Staś such a fortune?
Again the door creaked, and a girl about twelve years old appeared, with a school hat on, and a bundle of school books in her hand. She was a child with a round, red face, not betraying much intelligence. She curtsied to us, to Mrs Stawska and to her mother, kissed little Helena on both cheeks, and went out, obviously going home. Then she came back from the kitchen and, blushing to the roots of her hair, asked Mrs Stawska: ‘Can I come the day after tomorrow?’
‘Yes, dear …come at four o’clock,’ Mrs Stawska replied, also embarrassed.
When the little girl had finally left, Mrs Stawska’s mother said in a displeased tone: ‘And that is called a lesson, for goodness sake …Helena has been working with her for an hour and a half, and gets forty groszy a lesson …’
‘Mother!’ Mrs Stawska interrupted, looking at her imploringly.
(Were I Wokulski, I’d already have come back from the wedding. What a woman! What features! What expressive looks! I never saw anything like it in my life …And her little hands, her figure, her height, her movements and those eyes!)
After a moment of embarrassing silence, the younger lady spoke again: ‘We are very grateful to Mr Wokulski for the terms on which