The Comedienne Part 3

"I am afraid that this one will not end so smoothly. Your father has such a dreadful temper. . . . I can't understand how you are able to bear as much as you do. . . . If I were in your place, Miss Janina, I know what I should do . . . and do it now, immediately!"

"I am anxious to know . . . give me your advice."

"First of all, I would leave home to avoid all this trouble before it begins. I would go to Warsaw."

"Well, and what would you do next?" asked Janina with trembling voice.

"I would join some theater and let happen what will!"

"Yes, that's a good idea, but . . . but--"

And she broke off, for the old helplessness and fears rea.s.serted themselves. She sat silent without answering Krenska.

Janina put on a jacket and felt hat and taking a stick wandered off into the woods.

She climbed to the top of that rocky hill from which spread out below her a wide view of the woods, the villages beyond them, and an endless expanse of fields. She sat gazing about her for a while, but the calm that reigned all around, contrasted with the feeling of unquiet and foreboding in her own soul, as before an impending storm, gave her no peace.

At dusk Janina returned home. She did not speak either to her father or to Krenska but immediately after supper went to her own room and sat reading George Sand's Consuelo until a late hour.

During the night she was perturbed with unquiet dreams from which she started up every now and then, perspiring heavily, and awoke fully before dawn, unable to sleep any longer. She lay upon her bed with wide open eyes, gazing fixedly at the ceiling on which flickered a patch of light reflected from the station lamp. A train went roaring by and she listened for a long while to its rhythmic rumbling and clatter that seemed like a whole choir of voices and tones streaming in through her window.

At the farther end of the room, steeped in a twilight full of pale gleams that flickered like severed rays from a light long since extinguished, she seemed to see apparitions and vague outlines of mysterious scenes, figures, and sounds. Her wearied brain peopled the room with the phantoms of hallucination. She beheld, as it were, a vast edifice with a long row of columns that seemed to emerge from the dusk and take shape. In the morning she arose so worn out that she could scarcely stand on her feet.

She heard her father issuing orders for a sumptuous dinner and saw them making preparations. Krenska circled about her on tiptoe and smiled at her with a subtle, ironical smile that irritated Janina.

She felt dazed with exhaustion and the storm that was brewing within her, and beheld everything with indifference, for her mind was continually dwelling on the impending battle with her father. She tried to read or occupy herself with something, but was too nervous.

She ran off to the woods, but immediately came back, for she knew not what to do there. A lethargy seemed to take hold of her and benumb her with an ever greater fear. Try as she would, Janina could not shake off this depressing mood.

She sat down at the piano and began mechanically to play scales, but the somnolent monotony of the tones only added to her nervousness.

Later she played some of Chopin's Nocturnes, lingered over those mysterious tones that seemed like strains from another world, full of tears, pain, cries of anguish, and bleak despair; the radiance of cold moonlight nights, moans like the whisper of departing souls, the laughter of parting, the soft vibrations of subtle, sad life.

Suddenly, Janina stopped playing and burst into tears. She wept for a long time, not knowing why she wept she who since her mother's death had not shed a single tear.

For the first time in her life which up till now had been one continuous struggle, revolt, and protest she felt overcome by distress. There awakened in her an irresistible longing to share her sorrows with someone, a longing to confide to some sympathetic heart those bewildered thoughts and feelings, that unexplainable misery and fear. She yearned for sympathy, feeling that her distress would be smaller, her anguish less violent, her tears not so bitter, if she could open her heart before some sincere woman friend.

Krenska summoned her to dinner, announcing that Grzesikiewicz was already waiting.

She wiped away the traces of tears from her eyes, arranged her hair and went.

Grzesikiewicz kissed her hand and seated himself beside her at the table.

Orlowski was in a holiday humor and every now and then twitted Janina and hurled triumphant glances at her.

Grzesikiewicz was silent and uneasy; occasionally he would speak, but in such a low tone, Janina could scarcely hear what he said.

Mrs. Krenska was plainly excited.

A gloomy atmosphere hung over them all. The dinner dragged wearily on. Orlowski at times became wrapt in thought, and would then knit his brows, angrily tug at his beard, and fling murderous glances at his daughter.

After dinner they went to the parlor. Black coffee and cognac were served. Orlowski quickly gulped down his coffee and left the room, kissing Janina on the forehead and growling some unintelligible remark as he departed.

They remained alone.

Janina kept looking out of the window. Grzesikiewicz, all flushed and fl.u.s.tered and unlike himself, began to say something, taking little swallows of coffee in between, until, finally, he drained it off at the gulp and shoved his cup and saucer aside so vigorously that they went tumbling over the table.

She laughed at his violence and embarra.s.sment.

"At a moment like this a man could swallow a lamp without noticing it," he remarked.

"That would be quite a feat," she answered, again bursting into empty laughter.

"Are you laughing at me?" he asked uneasily.

"No, only the idea of swallowing a lamp seemed comical."

They relapsed into silence. Janina fidgeted with the window-shade, while Grzesikiewicz tore at his gloves and impulsively bit his moustache; he was literally shaking with emotion.

"It is so hard for me, so awfully hard!" he began, raising his eyes to her entreatingly.

"Why?" she queried tersely and evasively.

"Well, because . . . because . . . For G.o.d's sake, I can't stand it any longer! No, I can't endure this torment any longer, so I'll come right out with it: I love you, Miss Janina, and beg you for your hand," he cried aloud, at once sighing with immense relief. But immediately he struck his forehead with his hand and, taking Janina's hand, began anew:

"I have loved you ever so long, but feared to tell you. And now I don't know how to express it as I would like to. . . . I love you and beg you to be my wife. . . ."

He kissed her hand fervently and gazed at her with his blue, honest eyes burning with blind love. His lips twitched nervously and a pallor overspread his features.

Janina arose from her chair and, looking straight into his eyes, answered slowly and quietly: "I do not love you."

All her nervousness had vanished.

Grzesikiewicz recoiled violently, as though someone had struck him, as though he did not understand. He said with a trembling voice:

"Miss Janina . . . be my wife . . . I love you!"

"I do not love you . . . I cannot therefore marry you . . . I will not marry at all!" she answered in the same cold tone, but at the last word her voice wavered with an accent of pity for him.

"G.o.d!" cried Grzesikiewicz, holding his hand to his head. "What does it mean? . . . You will not marry! . . . You will not be my wife! . . . You do not love me!"

He threw himself impulsively on his knees before her, seized her hands, and, covering them with kisses, began, with what seemed almost tears of feverish terror, to entreat her fervently, humbly.

"You do not love me? . . . You will love me in time. I swear that I, my mother, and my father will be your slaves. I will wait if you wish . . . Say that in a year, or two, or even five, you will love me. . . . I will wait. . . . I swear to you that I will wait! But do not say no to me! For G.o.d's sake do not say that, for I shall go mad with despair! How can it be? You do not love me! . . . But I love you . . . we all love you . . . we cannot live without you! . . .

no. . . . Your father told me that . . . that . . . and now . . .

G.o.d! I will go crazy! What are you doing to me! What are you doing to me!"

Springing up from the floor he fairly cried aloud with pain.

Mechanically he pulled off his gloves, tore them to pieces and flung them on the floor, b.u.t.toned up his coat to the topmost b.u.t.ton, and struggling to control himself said: "Farewell, Miss Janina. But always . . . everywhere . . . forever . . . I will . . ." he whispered with great effort, bowed his head and went toward the door.