Children of the Soil

Still he quarrelled once with Marynia very seriously, because of a letter from Vaskovski, which Pan Stanislav received from Rome a few weeks after the professor’s departure, and which he read in its integrity to Marynia. This letter was as follows: —

My Dear, – I am lodging at Via Tritone, Pension Française. Visit my Warsaw lodgings; see if Snopchinski looks after my little boys properly, and if the birds of Saint Francis have seeds and water in plenty. When spring comes, it will be needful to open the windows and cages; whichever bird wishes to stay, let it stay, and whichever one wishes to go, let it fly. The boys of the genus homo sapiens should have good food, since I left money therefor, and besides little moralizing, but much love. Snopchinski is a worthy man, but a hypochondriac. He says this comes from snows. When he is attacked by what he calls “chandra,” he looks for whole weeks on his boots, and is silent; but one must talk with little boys, to give them confidence. This is all that touches Warsaw.

I am printing here in French, in the typography of the journal “L’Italie,” that work of mine which I discussed with thee. They laugh at my French a little, and at me, but I am used to that. Bukatski came here. He is a good, beloved fellow! he has grown strange to the last degree, and says that he drags his feet after him, though I have not noticed it. He loves both Marynia and thee, and indeed every one, though he denies it. But when he begins to talk, one’s ears wither. May the Lord God bless thee, dear boy, and thy honest Marynia! I should like to be at thy wedding, but I know not whether I shall finish my work before Easter; listen, therefore, now to what I tell thee, and know that I write this letter to that end. Do not think that the old man is talking just to talk. Thou knowest, besides, that I have been a teacher; that the inheritance from my brother freed me from that occupation; that I have had experience and have seen things. If ye have children, do not torture them with knowledge; let them grow up as God wills. I might stop here; but thou art fond of figures, hence I will give thee figures. A little child has as many hours of labor as a grown man in office, with this difference, that the man talks during office hours with his colleagues, or smokes cigarettes; the child must strain its attention continually, or lose the clew of lessons, and cease to understand what is said to it. The man goes home when his work is done; the child must prepare for the following day, which takes four hours from a capable child, from one less capable six. Add to this, that poorer pupils give lessons frequently, the rich take them, which, added, gives twelve hours. Twelve hours’ labor for a child! Dost understand that, my dear? Canst thou realize what sickly natures must grow up in such conditions, – natures out of joint, inclined to the wildest manias, crooked, wilful? Dost thou understand how we are filling cemeteries with our children, and why the most monstrous ideas find supporters? Ah, at present they are limiting the hours of labor in factories even for grown people, but touching children at school philanthropy is silent. Oh, but that is a field! that is a service to be rendered; that is a coming glory and sainthood. Do not torture thy children with learning, I beg thee – and I beg Marynia; promise me both of you. I do not speak just to speak, as Bukatski says sometimes, but I speak from the heart; and this is the greatest reform for which future ages are waiting, the greatest after the introduction of Christ into history. Something wonderful happened to me in Perugia a few days since, but of that I will tell thee sometime, and now I embrace both of you.

Marynia listened to this letter, looking at the tips of her shoes, like that Snopchinski of whom the Professor wrote. But Pan Stanislav laughed, and said, —

“Have you ever heard anything like this? It is long before our marriage; but he is lamenting over our children, and takes the field on their behalf. This is somewhat the history of my nest.”

After a while he added, “To tell the truth, the fault is mine; for I made him various promises.” And, inclining so that he could see Marynia’s eyes, he asked, “But what do you say to this letter?”

Pan Stanislav, inquiring thus, had chanced on that unhappy moment when a man is not himself, and acts not in accordance with his own nature. He was rather a harsh person generally, but not brutal, and at times was even capable of delicate acts, really womanlike. But now, in his look and in the question directed to a young lady so mimosa-like as Marynia, there was something simply brutal. She knew as well as others that after marriage come children; but this seemed to her something indefinite, not to be mentioned, or if mentioned, mentioned in allusions as delicate as lace, or in a moment of emotion, with beating heart, with loving lips at the ear, with solemnity, – as touching what is most sacred in a mutual future. Hence Pan Stanislav’s careless tone outraged and pained her. She thought, “Why does he not understand this?” and she in turn acted not in accordance with her nature; for, as happens frequently with timid persons in moments of bitterness and confusion, they exhibit greater anger than they feel.

“You should not treat me in this way!” cried she, indignantly. “You should not speak to me in this way!”

Pan Stanislav laughed again with feigned gayety.

“Why are you angry?” inquired he.

“You do not act with me as is proper.”

“I do not understand the question.”

“So much the worse.”

The smile vanished from his lips; his face grew dark, and he spoke quickly, like a man who has ceased to reckon with his words.

“Perhaps I am stupid; but I know what is right and what is not. In this way life becomes impossible. Whoever makes great things out of nothing must not blame others. But, since my presence is disagreeable, I go!”

And, seizing his hat, he bowed, and went out. Marynia did not try to detain him. For a while offence and anger stifled in her all other sensations; then there remained to her only an impression, as if from the blow of a club. Her thoughts scattered like a flock of birds. Above them towered only one dim idea: “All is over! he will not return!” Thus fell the structure which had begun to unite in such beautiful lines. Emptiness, nothingness, a torturing, because objectless life, and a chilled heart, – that is what remained to her. And happiness had been so near! But that which had taken place so suddenly was something so strange that she could not explain immediately. She went to the writing-desk, and began mechanically to arrange papers in it, with a certain objectless haste, as if there could be any reason at that moment for arranging them. Then she looked at Litka’s photograph, and sat down quickly with her hands on her eyes and temples. After a time it occurred to her that Litka’s will must be stronger than the will of them both, and a ray of hope shone in on her suddenly. She began to walk in the room, and to think on what had passed; she recalled Pan Stanislav, not only as he had been just then, but earlier, – two, three days, a week before. Her regret became greater than her feeling of offence, and it increased with her affection for Pan Stanislav. After a time she said in her soul that she was not free to forget herself; that it was her duty to accept and love Pan Stanislav as he was, and not strive to fix him to her ideas. “That is, he is a living man, not a puppet,” repeated she, a number of times. And a growing feeling of fault seized her, and after that compunction. A heart submissive by nature, and greatly capable of loving, struggled against sound sense, which she possessed undoubtedly, and which now told her in vain that reason was not on Pan Stanislav’s side, and that, moreover, she had said nothing which needed pardon. She said to herself, “If he has a good heart, even to a small extent, he will return;” but she was seized also with fear in view of the self-love of men in general, and of Pan Stanislav in particular, – she was too intelligent not to note that he cared greatly to pass for an unbending person. But considerations of that kind, which an unfriendly heart would have turned to his disadvantage, had made her tender only on his behalf.

Half an hour later she was convinced to the depth of her soul that the fault lay only on her side; that “she had tormented him so much already” that she ought to yield now, – that is, to be the first to extend a hand in conciliation. That meant in her mind to write a few peace-making words. He had suffered so much from that affair of Kremen that this was due to him. And she was ready even to weep over his fate. She hoped, withal, that he, the bad, ugly man, would estimate what it cost her to write to him, and would come that same evening.

It had seemed to her that nothing was easier than to write a few cordial phrases, which go directly from one heart to another. But how difficult! A letter has no eyes, which fill with tears; no face, which smiles both sadly and sweetly; no voice, which trembles; no hands to stretch forth. You may read and understand a letter as you like; it is merely black letters on paper as impassive as death.

Marynia had just torn the third sheet, when the face of Pan Plavitski, as wrinkled as a roast apple, and with mustaches freshly dyed, showed itself at the door partly open.

“Is Polanyetski not here?” inquired he.

“He is not, papa.”

“But will he come this evening?”

“I do not know,” answered she, with a sigh.

“If he comes, my child, tell him that I will return not later than an hour from now; and that I wish to speak with him.”

“And I too wish to speak with him,” thought Marynia.

And when she had torn the third sheet she took the fourth and was thinking whether to turn the whole quarrel into a jest, or simply to beg his pardon. The jest might not please him; in the pardon there was something warmer, but how difficult it was! If he had not fled, it would have sufficed to extend her hand; but he flew out as if shot from a sling, the irritable man, though so much loved.

And, raising her eyes, she began to work intently with her dark head, when on a sudden the bell sounded in the entrance. Marynia’s heart was beating like a hammer; and through her head flew these questions, like lightning, —

“Is it he? Is it not he?”

The door opened; it was he.

He came in with the look of a wolf, his head down, his face gloomy. Evidently he was very uncertain how she would receive him; but she sprang up, her heart beating like a bird’s heart; her eyes radiant, happy, touched greatly by his return; and, running to him, she laid her hands on his shoulders.

“But how good! how nice! And do you know, I wanted to write to you.”

Pan Stanislav, pressing her hands to his lips, was silent for some time; at last he said, —

“You ought to give the order to throw me downstairs.” In a rapture of thankfulness he drew her up to him, kissed her lips, eyes, temples, and hair, which became unbound in the pressure. In such moments it seemed to him always that he would find everything that goes to make great and perfect love. At last he released her and continued, —

“You are too good. Though that is better, it subdues me. I came to beg your forgiveness, nothing more. I regained my senses at once. I reproached myself for my last words, and I cannot tell you how sorry I was. I walked along the street, thinking to see you in the window, perhaps, and note from your face whether I might come in. After that I could not restrain myself, and returned.”

“I beg pardon; it was my fault. You see the torn paper; I wrote and wrote.”

He devoured with his eyes her hair, which she had arranged hastily. With blushing face, from which joy was beaming, with eyes laughing from happiness, she seemed to him more beautiful than ever, and desired as never before.

Marynia noticed, too, that he was looking at her hair; and confusion struggled with pure womanly coquetry. She had fastened it awkwardly by design, so that the tresses were falling more and more on her shoulders; while she said, —

“Do not look, or I’ll go to my room.”

“But that is my wealth,” said Pan Stanislav; “and in my life I have never seen anything like it.”

He stretched his hands to her again, but she evaded.

“Not permitted, not permitted,” said she; “as it is; I am ashamed. I ought to have left you.”

Her hair, however, came gradually to order; then both sat down and conversed quietly, though looking into each other’s eyes.

“And you wished really to write?” asked Pan Stanislav.

“You see the torn paper.”

“I say that, in truth, you are too good.”

She raised her eyes, and, looking at the shelf above the bureau, said, —

“Because the fault was mine. Yes; only mine.”

And, judging that she could not be too magnanimous, she added after a moment, blushing to her ears and dropping her eyes, —

“For, after all, the professor is correct in what he writes about learning.”

Pan Stanislav wanted to kneel down and kiss her feet. Her charm and goodness not only disarmed him, but conquered him thoroughly.