The Doll - Bolesaw Prus [241]
The doorman, whose heart Wokulski had won with a franc, took him to the door of the Baroness’s apartment, wishing him (with a smile) an agreeable time. Wokulski rang, and at once saw a footman in pink livery. ‘Hm…’ he muttered.
In the drawing-room, naturally enough, there were gilded articles of furniture, pictures, carpets, flowers. A moment later the Baroness appeared, with the look of an offended person who, nevertheless, is willing to forgive. In fact she forgave him. During a brief conversation, Wokulski mentioned the purpose of his visit, wrote down Stawski’s name and the locations where he had been, and urged the Baroness to provide him with accurate news of the missing man through her numerous contacts.
‘It is possible,’ said the great lady, ‘but…will not the expense discourage you? We must appeal to the German police, the English, the American…’
‘Well?…’
‘So you are prepared to spend some three thousand francs?’
‘Here’s four thousand,’ said Wokulski, giving her a cheque for the appropriate sum, ‘and when may I expect a reply?’
‘I cannot say,’ replied the Baroness, ‘perhaps within a month, perhaps not for a year. I think, however,’ she added severely, ‘that you have no doubt my search will be genuine?’
‘So much so, that I’m leaving an order for another two thousand francs, payable at Rothschild’s on receipt of news about this man.’
‘Are you leaving soon?’
‘Oh no. I shall stay here for a while yet.’
‘Ah, so Paris has charmed you,’ said the Baroness with a smile. ‘You will like it still better from the windows of my drawing-room. I am at home every evening.’
They parted with mutual gratification: the Baroness at her client’s wealth, and Wokulski because he had been able to take Suzin’s advice and to fulfil Rzecki’s request at one blow.
Now Wokulski was left entirely isolated in Paris, with nothing to do. Once again he visited the Exhibition, the theatres, unknown streets, forgotten halls in museums. Once again he admired the vast potential of France, the regularity in the erection and life of this city, with its population of a million, the influence of the mild climate on the expeditious development of civilisation…Again he drank cognac, ate costly dishes or played cards in the Baroness’s drawing-room, where he always lost…
This way of spending time tired him out well enough, but gave not a drop of joy. The hours dragged by like days, the days were interminable, and the nights did not bring tranquil sleep. For, although he slept fast, without unpleasant or agreeable dreams, and although he lost consciousness, he could not rid himself of a sensation of unfathomed bitterness in which his soul was drowning, seeking in vain either the abyss or the shore. ‘Give me an aim…or death,’ he sometimes said, looking at Heaven. Then a moment later he would smile and think: ‘To whom am I speaking? Who will listen to me in this machinery of blind forces I’ve become the plaything of? What a cruel destiny it is not to be attached to anything, not to wish for anything, yet to understand so much…’
It seemed to him he could see an immense factory, from which emerged new suns, new planets, new species, new nations—but in which there were people and hearts which the Furies were tearing apart—love, hope and pain. Which is the worst of these? Not pain, for it at least never lies: but hope, which hurls a man the deeper, the higher it has elevated him…And love, that butterfly with one wing called uncertainty, the other—deception.
‘It is all the same to me,’ he muttered. ‘If we must stupefy ourselves with something, then let us do so with no matter what…With what, though?’
Then, in the depths of obscurity called Nature, two stars seemed to appear to him. One was pallid but fixed—this was Geist and his metals; the