The Doll - Bolesaw Prus [32]
‘But, aunt — the marshal is hideous. It isn’t a wife he needs, but a nursemaid to wipe his mouth for him …’
‘I don’t insist on the marshal, but the Baron …’
‘The Baron is still older, he paints his face and there are revolting marks on his hands.’
The Countess rose from the sofa.
‘I don’t insist, my dear, I am no match-maker; leave that to Mrs Meliton. I merely wish to point out that disaster is hanging over your father’s head.’
‘We still have the house.’
‘Which they will sell by midsummer so that even your share will decrease.’
‘How so? … A house that cost a hundred thousand to be sold for sixty thousand?’
‘It’s not worth more, your father spent too much on it. I know this from the builder who surveyed it for the Baroness Krzeszowska.’
‘But we still have the dinner-service and silver,’ Izabela exclaimed, wringing her hands.
The Countess kissed her several times.
‘My dear, dear child,’ she said with a sob, ‘to think I must hurt you so … Listen to me! Your father still has debts in the form of bills of exchange — several thousand roubles. But these debts — mind this — these bills have been bought up by someone — a few days ago, at the end of March. We think it may have been Krzeszowska…’
‘How vile!’ Izabela whispered. ‘But less of this … My dinner-service and the silver will cover these few thousand roubles.’
‘They are worth far more, but who will buy such costly things nowadays?’
‘In any case, I will try,’ said the feverish Izabela. ‘I’ll ask Mrs Meliton to handle it for me …’
‘Just think, though — is it not a pity to dispose of such fine heirlooms?’
Izabela laughed.
‘Ah, aunt — so I am to hesitate between selling myself and the dinner-service? For I should never permit our furniture to be taken away … Ah, that Krzeszowska … buying up father’s bills of exchange … how monstrous!’
‘Well, perhaps it was not she.’
‘So some other enemy has turned up, worse than Krzeszowska?’
‘Perhaps it was Aunt Honorata,’ the Countess soothed her. ‘I don’t know. Perhaps she wants to help Tomasz by threatening him. But goodbye, dear child, adieu …’
At this point the conversation ceased; it had been in Polish, copiously ornamented with French, which made it resemble a face disfigured by a rash.
VI
How New People Appear on the Old Horizon
IT IS the beginning of April, one of those months which bridge winter and spring. The snow has already gone, but green leaves have not yet appeared; the trees are black, the grass-plots grey and the sky grey as marble cut across with silver and gilt veins.
It is about five in the afternoon. Izabela is in her boudoir, reading Zola’s latest novel, A Page of Love. She reads inattentively, every now and then raising her eyes to gaze out of the window, half-consciously thinking that the branches of the trees are black and the sky grey. Then she reads on, or looks round the boudoir and half-consciously thinks that her furniture, covered with that sky-blue material, and her blue gown have a sort of greyish tinge, and that the loops of the white curtains are like great icicles. Then she forgets what she was thinking and wonders: ‘What was I thinking of? … Ah, the Easter collection …’ Then suddenly she feels like taking a carriage drive, and at the same time regrets that the sky is so grey, that its gilded veins are so narrow … She is tormented by almost imperceptible uneasiness and expectancy, but is not sure what it is she is waiting for: whether for the clouds to part, or for the footman to come in with a letter inviting her to take part in the Easter collection. It is very soon now, but she has not yet been invited to take part.
She goes on with the novel, that chapter when Mr Rambaud repairs little Joanne’s broken doll one starry night, when Helene melts into