Children of the Soil

Bukatski swallowed a cup of boiling coffee, and answered, “In this is the stupidity, that Mashko is the man, not in this, – that the love was after marriage. I have not said anything sensible. If I have, I beg pardon most earnestly, and promise not to do so a second time. I have burned my tongue evidently with the hot coffee! I drink it so hot because they tell me that it is good for headache; and my head aches, aches.”

Here Bukatski placed his palm on his neck and the back of his head, and blinked, remaining motionless for a few seconds.

“I am talking and talking,” said he, then, “but my head aches. I should have gone to my lodgings, but Svirski, the artist, is to come to me here. We are going to Florence together; he is a famous painter in water-colors, really famous. No one has brought greater force out of water-colors. But see, he is just coming!”

In fact, Svirski, as if summoned by a spell, appeared in the hall, and began to look around for Bukatski. Espying him at last, he approached the table.

He was a robust, short man, with hair as black as if he were an Italian. He had an ordinary face, but a wise, deep glance, and also mild. While walking, he swayed a little because of his wide hips.

Bukatski presented him to Marynia in the following words, —

“I present to you Pan Svirski, a painter, of the genus genius, who not only received his talent, but had the most happy idea of not burying it, which he might have done as well, and with equal benefit to mankind, as any other man. But he preferred to fill the world with water-colors and with fame.”

Svirski smiled, showing two rows of teeth, wonderfully small, but white as ivory, and said, —

“I wish that were true.”

“And I will tell you why he did not bury his talent,” continued Bukatski; “his reasons were so parochial that it would be a shame for any decent artist to avow them. He loves Pognembin, which is somewhere in Poznan, or thereabouts, and he loves it because he was born there. If he had been born in Guadeloupe he would have loved Guadeloupe, and love for Guadeloupe would have saved him in life also. This man makes me indignant; and will the lady tell me if I am not right?”

To this Marynia answered, raising her blue eyes to Svirski, “Pan Bukatski is not so bad as he seems, for he has said everything that is good of you.”

“I shall die with my qualities known,” whispered Bukatski.

Svirski was looking meanwhile at Marynia, as only an artist can permit himself to look at a woman, and not offend. Interest was evident in his eyes, and at last he muttered, —

“To see such a head all at once, here in Venice, is a genuine surprise.”

“What?” asked Bukatski.

“I say, that the lady is of a wonderfully well-defined type. Oh, this, for example” (here he drew a line with his thumb along his nose, mouth, and chin). “And also what purity of outline!”

“Well, isn’t it true?” asked Pan Stanislav, with excitement. “I have always thought the same.”

“I will lay a wager that thou hast never thought of it,” retorted Bukatski.

But Pan Stanislav was glad and proud of that interest which Marynia roused in the famous artist; hence he said, —

“If it would give you any pleasure to paint her portrait, it would give me much more to have it.”

“From the soul of my heart,” answered Svirski, with simplicity; “but I am going to Rome to-day. There I have begun the portrait of Pani Osnovski.”

“And we shall be in Rome no later than ten days from now.”

“Then we are agreed.”

Marynia returned thanks, blushing to her ears. But Bukatski began to take farewell, and drew Svirski after him. When they had gone out, he said, —

“We have time yet. Come to Floriani’s for a glass of cognac.”

Bukatski did not know how to drink, and didn’t like spirits; but since he had begun to take morphine, he drank more than he could endure, because some one had told him that one neutralized the other.

“What a delightful couple those Polanyetskis are!” said Svirski.

“They are not long married.”

“It is evident that he loves her immensely. When I praised her, his eyes were smiling, and he rose as if on yeast.”

“She loves him a hundred times more.”

“What knowledge hast thou in such matters?”

Bukatski did not answer; he only raised his pointed nose, and said, as if to himself, —

“Oh, marriage and love have disgusted me; for it is always profit on one side, and sacrifice on the other. Polanyetski is a good man, but what of that? She has just as much sense, just as much character, but she loves more; therefore life will fix itself for them in this way, – he will be the sun, he will be gracious enough to shine, to warm, will consider her as his property, as a planet made to circle around him. All this is indicated to-day. She has entered his sphere. There is in him a certain self-confidence which angers me. He will have her with an income, but she will have him alone without an income. He will permit himself to love, considering his love as virtue, kindness, and favor; she will love, considering her love as a happiness and a duty. Look, if you please, at him, the divine, the resplendent! I want to go back and tell them this, in the hope that they will be less happy.”

Meanwhile the two men had taken seats in front of Floriani’s, and soon cognac was brought to them. Svirski thought some time over the Polanyetskis, and then inquired, —

“But if the position is pleasant for her?”

“I know that she has short sight; she might be pleased quite as well to wear glasses.”

“Go to the deuce! glasses on a face like hers – ”

“This makes thee indignant; but the other makes me – ”

“Yes, for thou hast a kind of coffee-mill in thy head, which grinds, and grinds everything till it grinds it into fine dust. What dost thou want of love in general?”

“I, of love? I want nothing of love! Let the devil take him who wants anything of love! I have sharp pains in my shoulder-blades from it. But if I were other than I am, if I had to describe what love ought to be, if I wanted anything of it, then I should wish – “

“What? hop! jump over!”

“That it were composed in equal parts of desire and reverence.”

Then he drank a glass of cognac, and added after a while, —

“It seems to me that I have said something which may be wise, if it is not foolish. But it is all one to me.”

“No! it is not foolish.”

“As God lives, it is all one to me.”

CHAPTER XXXII

After a stay of one week in Florence, Pan Stanislav received his first letter from Bigiel concerning the business of the house, and news so favorable that it almost surpassed his expectations. The law prohibiting export of grain because of the famine was proclaimed. But the firm had enormous supplies bought and exported previously; and because prices, especially at the first moment, had risen excessively abroad, Bigiel and Polanyetski began to do perfect business. Speculation, planned and carried through on a great scale, turned out so profitable that from well-to-do people, which they were before, they had become almost rich. For that matter Pan Stanislav had been sure of his business from the beginning, and entertained no fears; the news, however, pleased him both with reference to profit and his own self-love. Success intoxicates a man and strengthens his self-confidence. So, in talking with Marynia, he was not able to refrain from giving her to understand that he had an uncommon head, unquestionably higher than all those around him, like a tree the loftiest in the forest; that he is a man who always reaches the place at which he has aimed, – in a word, a kind of phnix in that society, abounding in men who know not how to help themselves. In the whole world he could not have found a listener more willing and ready to accept everything with the deepest faith.

“Thou art a woman,” said he, not without a shade of loftiness; “therefore why tell thee the affair from the beginning, and enter into details. To thee, as a woman, I can explain all best if I say thus: I was not in a condition yesterday to buy the medallion with a black pearl which I showed thee at Godoni’s; to-day I am, and will buy it.”

Marynia thanked him, and begged that he would not do so; but he insisted, and said that nothing would restrain him, that that was resolved on, and Marynia must consider herself the owner of the great black pearl, which, on such a white neck as hers, would be beautiful. Then he fell to kissing that neck; and when finally he had satisfied himself, but still felt the need of a listener of some sort, he began to walk in the room, smiling at his wife and at his own thoughts, saying, —