The Doll - Bolesaw Prus [41]
‘I don’t understand you, Bela,’ Flora interposed, clasping her hands.
‘Then you are no woman.’
Flora made a gesture of denial, then of uncertainty.
‘Listen,’ Izabela exclaimed. ‘A year ago we lost our position in society. No, don’t deny it, for it is so, everyone knows it. Today we’re ruined …’
‘You exaggerate …’
‘Flora, don’t console me, don’t lie to me … Didn’t you hear at dinner that even those few roubles my father has were won at cards from …’
As she spoke, Izabela shuddered from top to toe. Her eyes glittered, her face flushed.
‘And at such a time this … this tradesman comes, acquires our bills of exchange, our dinner-service, binds my father and aunt to him, in other words — surrounds me on all sides with his snares, like a hunter trapping an animal. He’s no mournful admirer, not a suitor for my hand who can be rejected, but — a conqueror! He doesn’t sit and sigh, but wheedles his way into my aunt’s good graces, binds my father’s hands and feet, and hopes to make off with me by force, if he cannot make me yield myself to him … Don’t you understand this subtle villainy?’
Flora was horrified. ‘If this is so, you have one very simple recourse. Tell …’
‘Tell whom what? My aunt, who is only too ready to support this man in the hope of marrying me off to the marshal? Or perhaps I should tell my father, and alarm him and so hasten the disaster? I’ll do one thing: I shall not let my father be drawn into any kind of commercial undertaking with this man, even if I have to go on my knees to him, even if I have to forbid it in the name of my dead mother.’
Flora gazed at her with admiration. ‘Really, Bela,’ she said, ‘you exaggerate. With your will-power, your ingenuity …’
‘You do not know such people, but I have seen them at work. They can crush iron bars in their bare hands. They are terrible. They know how to move all earthly powers which we are not even aware of, to suit their own ends. They can smash us, snare us, grovel before us, risk everything and even—wait patiently …’
‘You talk like a novel.’
‘I speak from the knowledge of my own forebodings, which warn me … they cry out that this man went to the wars to acquire me. And hardly has he returned than he lays siege to me on all sides … But let him beware! He wishes to buy me, does he? Well, let him … He will find out that I am very expensive … He wishes to trap me in his snares? Let him lay them … I will elude him even if it means yielding to the marshal … Good God, I had not even guessed the depths of the abyss into which we are descending until I saw this … From the drawing-rooms of the Quirinal — to a tradesman’s shop. This is more than a decline; it is shame; it is humiliation.’
She sat down on the chaise-longue, covered her face with both hands, and sobbed.
VII
The Dove Goes Out to Encounter the Serpent
THE dinner-service and the silver of the Łęcki family were already sold, and the jeweller had brought Tomasz the money, deducting a hundred or so roubles for his services. Nevertheless, Countess Karolowa did not cease loving Izabela; on the contrary, the energy and self-sacrifice Izabela had displayed in selling the heirlooms aroused a new source of family affection in the old lady’s heart. Not only did she persuade Izabela to accept a beautiful gown, not only did she call