The Comedienne Part 4

"Andrew!" she called after him forcibly.

Grzesikiewicz turned back from the door.

"Andrew," she said in a pleading voice, "I do not love you, but I respect you. . . . I cannot marry you, I cannot . . . but I will always think of you as of a n.o.ble man. Surely you will understand that it would be a base thing for me to marry a man whom I do not love . . . I know that you detest falsehood and hypocrisy and so do I. Forgive me for hurting you, but I also suffer . . . I also am not happy oh no!"

"Janina if you would only . . . if you would only . . ."

She regarded him with such a sorrowful expression that he became silent. Then slowly he left the room.

Janina still sat there dazed, staring at the door through which he had gone, when Orlowski entered the room.

He had met Grzesikiewicz on the stairs and in his face had read what had happened.

Janina uttered a little cry of fear, so great a change had come over him. His face was ashen-gray, his eyes seemed to bulge from their sockets, his head swayed violently from side to side.

He seated himself near the table and with a quiet, smothered voice asked, "What did you tell Grzesikiewicz?"

"What I told you yesterday; that I do not love him and will not marry him!" she answered boldly, but she was startled at the seeming calm with which her father spoke.

"Why?" he queried sharply, as though he did not understand her.

"I told him that I do not love him and do not wish to marry at all. . . ."

"You are a fool! . . . a fool! . . . a fool!" he hissed at her through his tightly set teeth.

She regarded him calmly and all her old obstinacy returned.

"I said that you would marry him. I gave my word that you would marry him, and you will marry him!"

"I will not! . . . no one is able to force me!" she answered sullenly, looking with steady gaze into her father's eyes.

"I will drag you to the altar. I will compel you! . . . You must! . . ." he cried hoa.r.s.ely.

"No!"

"You will marry Grzesikiewicz, I tell you; I, your father, command you to do so! You will obey me immediately, or I will kill you!"

"Very well, kill me, if you want to, but I'll not obey you!"

"I will drive you out of this house!" he shouted.

"Very well!"

"I will disown you!"

"Very well!" she answered with growing determination. Janina felt that with each word her heart was hardening with greater resolve.

"I'll drive you out . . . do you hear? . . . and even though you die of hunger, I never want to hear of you again!"

"Very well!"

"Janina! I warn you, don't drive me to extremity. I beg you marry Grzesikiewicz, my daughter, my child! . . . Isn't it for your good?

You have no one but me in the world and I am old . . . I will die . . . and you will remain alone without protection or support. . . . Janina, you have never loved me! . . . If you knew how unhappy I have been throughout my life, you would take pity on me!"

"No! . . . Never! . . ." she answered, unmoved even by his pleading.

"I ask you for the last time!" he shouted.

"For the last time I tell you no!" she flung back at him.

Orlowski hurled his chair to the floor with such force that it was shattered to pieces. He tore open the collar of his shirt, so violent was the paroxysm of fury that had seized him, and with the broken arm of the chair in his hand, he sprang at Janina to strike her, but the cold, almost scornful, expression of her face brought him to his senses.

"Get out of here!" he roared, pointing to the door, "get out! . . .

Do you hear? I turn you out of my home forever! . . . You will never again pa.s.s this threshold while I live, for I will kill you like a mad dog and throw you out of the door! . . . I have no longer any daughter!"

"Very well, I will go . . ." she answered mechanically.

"I no longer have any daughter! Henceforth I don't want to know you or hear anything of you! . . . Go and perish . . . I will kill you! . . ." he shouted, rushing up and down the room like a madman.

His insane violence now burst out in full force. He rushed out of the house and from the window Janina saw him running toward the woods.

She sat silent, dumb, and as though turned to ice. She had expected everything, but never this. She burned with resentment but not a single tear clouded her eye. She gazed about her distractedly, for that hoa.r.s.e cry still rang in her ears: "Get out of here! . . . get out!"

"I will go, I will go . . ." she whispered in a humble and broken voice through the tears that filled her heart, "I will go. . . ."

"G.o.d, my G.o.d! why am I so unhappy?" she cried after a while.

Krenska, who had heard all, approached her. With feigned tears in her eyes she began to comfort her, but Janina gently pushed her away. It was not that which she needed; not that kind of comforting.

"My father has driven me out . . . I must leave . . ." she said, marveling at her own words.

"But that is preposterous! . . . Surely your father can be placated. . . ."

"No . . . I will not stay here any longer. I have enough of this torment . . . enough . . . ."

"Are you going to your aunt's house?"

Janina was sunk in thought for a moment, but suddenly her gloomy face brightened with a flash of determination.

"I will go and join the theater. The die is cast! . . ."

Krenska glanced at her sharply.

"Come, help me pack my trunk. I will leave on the next train."

"The next pa.s.senger train does not go to Kielce."

"It doesn't matter. I will go to Strzemieszyce, and from there, by the Viennese line to Warsaw. . . ."