The Doll - Bolesaw Prus [349]
The Baroness solemnly assured the lawyer that her husband the Baron, despite all the depravities and the torments to which he had subjected her, possessed no funds at all. At this point, she had an attack of the spasms, which induced the lawyer to beat a hasty retreat. However, when the high priest of justice had quit her apartment, she returned to her senses very swiftly, and, after calling Marysia, said to her in an unusual calm voice: ‘It will be necessary, Marysia, to put up new curtains, for I have a feeling that our unfortunate master is coming back.’
A few days later, the Prince in person was at the Baroness’s house. They were closeted together in the most distant room, and held a long conversation, during which the Baroness burst into tears several times and swooned away once. What could they have been talking of? Even Marysia didn’t know. But when the Prince had gone, the Baroness at once ordered Maruszewicz to be summoned, and when he hastened in, she said in a strangely mild voice, interwoven with sighs: ‘I have the idea, Mr Maruszewicz, that my errant husband has finally come to his senses. Pray be kind enough, therefore, to go into town and buy a man’s robe and a pair of slippers. Buy them in your size, for the two of you, poor things, are both equally slender.’
Mr Maruszewicz’s eyebrows went up, but he took the money and made the purchases. The Baroness thought that the price of forty roubles for a robe, and six roubles for slippers was rather high, but Mr Maruszewicz told her he didn’t know anything about prices, and that he’d bought them in the best stores, so nothing further was said.
Then, a few days later, two Jews called at Baroness Krzeszowska’s apartment to ask whether the Baron was at home…Instead of falling upon them with a shriek, as she usually did, the Baroness very calmly invited them to leave. Then, calling Kasper, she said: ‘I have the idea, my dear Kasper, that our poor master will be moving in today or tomorrow. You must put a carpet on the stairs to the second floor. But mind, my child, that they don’t steal the rods…And it must be beaten every few days.’
Henceforward she no longer scolded Marysia, wrote no letters, didn’t torment the janitor…All she did was to walk about in the large apartment, arms folded, pale, quiet, agitated. At the sound of a droshky stopping in front of the house, she would rush to the window: at the sound of the door-bell, she would rush to the threshold and eavesdrop through the half-open door to know who was talking to Marysia. After a few days of this kind of life, she grew still paler and more agitated. She ran faster for shorter distances, often sank into a chair with her heart beating, and finally took to her bed.
‘Tell them to take up the carpet on the stairs,’ she said to Marysia in a hoarse voice, ‘some scoundrel must have lent your master money again.’
Hardly had she said this, than there was a brisk ring at the door-bell. The Baroness sent Marysia first and she herself, touched by a premonition, began dressing despite her headache. Everything slithered through her fingers. Meanwhile, Marysia, opening the door on its chain, saw a very distinguished gentleman with a silk umbrella and valise on the landing. Behind the gentleman, who looked rather like a butler despite his carefully trimmed moustache and copious side-whiskers, were porters with trunks and bags.
‘What is it?’ the servant girl asked automatically.
‘Open the door,’ replied the gentleman with the valise, ‘it’s the Baron’s things, and mine,’ The door opened, the gentleman ordered the porters to put the trunks and bags in the vestibule, and inquired: ‘Where’s His Excellency’s study?’
At this moment the Baroness hurried in, her robe undone, hair in disorder. ‘What’s this?’ she cried, in an emotional voice. ‘Oh, it’s