In Vain

"I love."

"I have wept for so many years, but not such tears as I shed to-day. It is so bright in my soul! Let me close my eyes and look at that brightness. How much happiness in one word! Oh, Yosef, my Yosef, I know not even how to think of this."

It was grievous for him to hear words like those from Helena; he felt the immense falsehood and discord in which his life had to flow with that woman thenceforward, that woman so beautiful, so greatly loving, and loved so little.

He rose and took farewell of her.

Helena, left alone, placed her burning forehead against a pane of the window, and long did she stand thus in silence. At last she opened the window, and, placing her head on her palm, looked into the broad, sparkling summer night. Silent tears flowed down her face, her golden tresses fell upon her bosom, the moonlight was moving upon her forehead and putting a silvery whiteness on her dress.

CHAPTER XIV

A few days later Augustinovich was sitting in Yosef's lodgings; he was working vigorously in view of the approaching examination. Loving effect in all things, he had shaded the windows, and in the middle of the room had placed a table, before which he was standing at that moment. Evidently he was occupied with some experiment, for on the table was a multitude of old glass vessels and pots full of powders and fluids, and in the centre was burning a spirit lamp, which surrounded with a blue flame the stupid head of a retort which was quivering under the influence of boiling liquid contained in it.

Work burned, as they said, in the hands of Augustinovich; no one could labor so quickly as he. With a glad smile on his face he moved really with enthusiasm, frequently entertaining himself with a song or a dialogue with the first vessel he took up, or with a pious remark on the fleeting nature of this world.

Sometimes he left his work for a moment, and raising his eyes and his hands declaimed in tones which were very tragic, —

"Ah, Eurydice! before thy beautyI passed the rounds of success,And the sentence of Delphi was undoubted,That on earth I am the only one blest."

Then again in a hundred trills and cadences he sang, —

"O piano! piano! – Zitto! pia-ha-ha-no!"

Or similar creations of his own mind on a sudden, —

"And if thou fill a pipe, O Youth,And pressing the bowl with thy finger, put fire on it."

"By Mohammed! If Yosef should come, this work would go on more quickly; but he is marrying Helena at present – Ei! and as innocence is dear to me, I would fix it this way! Dear Helena, permit – And what farther? Oh, the farther the better – "

All at once some one pulled the bell.

Augustinovich turned toward the door and extending his hand intoned, —

"Road-weary traveller,Cross thou my threshold."

The door opened; a man young and elegantly dressed entered the room.

Augustinovich did not know him.

The most important notable trait of the newly arrived was a velvet sack-coat and light-colored trousers; besides, he was washed, shaven, and combed. His face was neither stupid nor clever, neither beautiful nor ugly, neither kind nor malicious, moreover he was neither tall nor of low stature. His nose, mouth, chin, and forehead were medium; special marks he had none.

"Does Pan Yosef Shvarts live here?"

"It is certain that he lives here."

"Is it possible to see him?"

"It is possible at this time; but in the night, when it is very dark, the case is different."

The newly arrived began to lose patience; but Augustinovich's face expressed rather gladness than malice.

"The owner of this house sent me to Pan Yosef as to a man who knows the address and the fate of Countess Leocadia N – . Could you give me some explanations as to her?"

"Oh yes, she is very nice!"

"That is not the question."

"Just that, indeed. Were I to answer that she is as ugly as night, would you be curious to make her acquaintance? No, no, by the prophet!"

"My name is Pelski; I am her cousin."

"Oh, I am not her cousin at all!"

The newly arrived frowned.

"Either you do not understand me, or you are trifling."

"Not at all, though Pani Visberg always insists that I am – But you are not acquainted with Pani Visberg. She is an excellent woman. She is distinguished by this, that she has a daughter, though it is nothing great to have a daughter; but she is as rich as Jupiter!"

"Sir!"

"Now I hear steps on the stairs, – Pan Yosef is coming surely. I will lay a wager with you that he is coming – "

Indeed, the door opened and Yosef walked in. One would have said that his severe and intelligent face had matured in the last few hours; in its expression was the calm energy of a man who had already decided on the means of advance in the future.

"This is Pan Pelski, Yosef," said Augustinovich.

Yosef looked at the newly arrived inquiringly.

Meanwhile Pelski explained to him the object of his coming; and though at news of the relationship of the young man to Lula his forehead wrinkled slightly, he gave him her address without hesitation.

"I take farewell of you," said Yosef, at last; "the countess will be greatly delighted to find in you a cousin, but it is a pity that she could not have found a relative two months ago."

Pelski muttered something unintelligible. Evidently Yosef's figure and style of intercourse imposed on him no little.

"Why give him Lula's address?" asked Augustinovich.

"Because I should have acted ridiculously had I refused."

"But I did not give it."

"What didst thou tell him?"

"A thousand things except the address. I did not know whether thou wouldst be satisfied if I gave it."

"He would have found the address anyhow."

"Oh, it will be pleasant at Pani Visberg's. Wilt thou go there to-day?"

"No."

"And to-morrow?"

"No."

"But when?"

"Never."

"It is no trick, old man, to flee before danger."

"I am no knight errant, I am not Don Quixote, I choose rather to avoid dangers and conquer than choose them and fall. Not Middle-Age boasting commands me, but reason."

A moment of silence followed.

"Wert thou at Helena's yesterday?" asked Augustinovich.

"I was."

"When will the marriage be?"

"Right away after I receive my degree."

"Maybe it is better for thee that the affair ends thus."

"Why dost thou say that?"

"I do not know but thou wilt be angry; but Lula – now, I do not believe her – "

Yosef's eyes gleamed with a wonderful light; he put his hand on Augustinovich's shoulder.

"Say nothing bad of her," said he, with emphasis.

He wished, indeed, that the countess, torn from him by the force of circumstances, should remain in his mind unblemished. He took pleasure in thinking of her.

"What am I to tell her when she asks about thee?" inquired Augustinovich, after a short silence.

"Tell her the truth, tell her that I am going to marry another."

"Ei, old man, I will tell her something else."

"Why?" asked Yosef, looking him in the eyes.

"Oh, so!"

"Speak clearly."

"She seems to love thee."

Yosef's face flushed; he knew Lula's feeling, but that information from the lips of another startled him. It filled his breast with sweetness and as it were with despair together with the sweetness.

"Who told thee that?" asked he.

"Malinka; she tells me everything."

"Then tell Lula that I marry another from inclination and duty."

"Amen!" concluded Augustinovich.

In the evening he went to Pani Visberg's; Malinka opened the door to him.

"Oh, is this you?" said she, with a blush.

Augustinovich seized her hands and kissed them repeatedly.

"Oh, Pan Adam! that is not permitted, not permitted," insisted the blushing girl.

"It is, it is!" answered he, in a tone of deep conviction. "But – but," continued he, removing his overcoat and buttoning his gloves (he was dressed with uncommon elegance), "was some young man here this afternoon?"

"He was; he will come in the evening."

"So much the better."

Augustinovich went into the drawing-room with Malinka. The drawing-room had somehow a look of importance, as if for the reception of a notable guest. On the table a double lamp was burning, the piano was open.

"Why did Pan Yosef not come with you?"

"The same question from the countess will meet me. In every case permit me to defer my answer till she asks."

The countess did not keep them waiting long. She entered, dressed in black, with simply a few pearls in her hair.

"But Pan Yosef?" asked she at once.

"He is not coming."

"Why?"

"He is occupied. Building his future."

The countess was wounded by the thought that Yosef would not come.

"But do you not help him in that labor?" asked she.

"May my guardian angel keep me from such work."

"It must be very difficult."

"Like every new building."

"Why does he work so?"

"Duty."

"I believe that Pan Yosef builds everything on that foundation."

"This time it will be more difficult for him than ever before. But somebody is coming – that is your cousin. What a splendid man!"

Pan Pelski entered the drawing-room; soon after came Pani Visberg also.

After the greetings conversation began to circle about in the ocean of commonplace.

Augustinovich took little part in it. He sat in an armchair, partly closed his eyes with an expression of indifference toward everything. He had the habit of closing his eyes while making observations, when nothing escaped his notice.

Count Pelski (we had forgotten to state that he had that title) sat near Lula, twirling in his fingers the string of his eyeglasses, and conversing with her vivaciously.

"Till I came to Kieff," said he, "I knew nothing of the misfortune which had met our whole family, but especially you, through the death of your esteemed father."

"Did you know my father?" asked Lula, with a sigh.

"No, cousin. I knew only that unfortunate quarrels and lawsuits separated our families for a number of years. I knew nothing of those quarrels, since I was young and always absent, and if I am to make a confession my present visit was undertaken only as an attempt at reconciliation."

"What was the degree of relationship between you and my father?"

"Reared abroad, I know little of our family relations in general; for example, I am indebted to a lucky chance for discovering not our relationship, of which I was aware, but other intimate bonds connecting our families from of old."

"Is it permitted to inquire about this circumstance?"

"With pleasure, cousin. Having taken on me, after the death of my father, the management of my property and family affairs, I looked into the papers and various documents touching my family. Well, in these documents I discovered that your family is not only related to the Pelskis, but has the same escutcheon."

"To a certain extent, then, we are to thank chance for our acquaintance."

"I bless this chance, cousin."

Lula dropped her eyes, her small hand twisted the end of her scarf; after a while she raised her head.

"And for me it is equally pleasant," said she.

The shadow of a smile flew over Augustinovich's face.

"I had much difficulty in finding your lodgings. This gentleman" (Pelski indicated Augustinovich with one eye) "has a marvellous method of giving answers. Fortunately his room-mate came; he gave me an answer at last."

"I lived in the same house as they," added the countess.

"How did you become acquainted with them, cousin?"

"When father fell ill, Pan Shvarts watched him in his last hours; afterward he found Pani Visberg, and I am much indebted to him."

Augustinovich's closed eyelids opened a little, and the sneering expression vanished from his face.

"Is he a doctor?" asked Pelski.

"He will be a doctor soon."

Pelski meditated a moment.

"I was acquainted in Heidelberg with a professor and writer of the same name. From what family is this man?"

"Oh, I do not know, indeed," answered the countess, blushing deeply.

Augustinovich's eyes opened to their full width, and with an indescribable expression of malice he turned toward the countess.

"I thought," said he, "that you knew perfectly whence Pan Yosef came, and what his family is."

Lula's confusion reached the highest degree.

"I – do not remember," groaned she.

"Do you not? Then I will remind you. Pan Yosef was born in Zvinogrodets, where his father in his day was a blacksmith."

Pelski looked at his cousin, and bending toward her said with sympathy, —

"I am pained, cousin, at the fatality which forced you to live with people of a different sphere."

Lula sighed.

Oh, evil, evil was that sigh. Lula knew that among those people of a different sphere she had found aid, protection, and kindness; that for this reason they should be for her something more than that cousin of recent acquaintance. But she was ashamed to tell him this, and she remained silent, a little angry and a little grieved.

Meanwhile Pani Visberg invited her guests to tea. Lula ran for a while to her own chamber, and sitting on her bed covered her face with her hands. At that moment she was in Yosef's chamber mentally. "He is toiling there," thought she, "and here they speak of him as of some one strange to me. Why did that other say that he was the son of a blacksmith?"

It seemed to her as if they were wronging Yosef, but she felt offended at him, too, because he was the son of a blacksmith.

At tea she sat near her cousin, a little thoughtful, a little sad, turning unquiet glances toward Augustinovich, who from the moment of his malicious interference filled her with a certain fear.

"Indeed thou art not thyself, Lula," said Pani Visberg, placing her hand on the girl's heated forehead.

Malinka, who was standing with the teapot in her hand, pouring tea in the light, stopped the yellowish stream, and turning her head said with a smile, —

"Lula is only serious. I find thee, Lula, in black colors – art thou in love?"

The countess understood Malinka's idea, but she was not confused.

"Black is the color of mourning; in every case it is my color."

"And beautiful as thy word, cousin," added Pelski.

After tea she seated herself at the piano, and from behind the music-rack could be seen her shapely forehead marked with regular brows. She played a certain melancholy mazurka of Chopin, but trouble and disquiet did not leave her face.

Augustinovich knew music, and from her playing he divined the condition of her mind. Still he thought, —

"She is sad, therefore she plays; but she plays because her cousin is listening."

But on the way home he thought more about Lula and Yosef than one might have expected from his frivolous nature.

"Oh, Satan take it, what will happen, what will happen?" muttered he.

In the midst of these thoughts he entered his lodgings. Yosef was not sleeping yet; he was sitting leaning on his elbows over some book.

"Hast thou been at Pani Visberg's?"

"I have."

Impatience and curiosity were quivering in Yosef's face; evidently he wished to ask about the evening, but on thinking the matter over he rested his head on his hands again, and began to read.

Suddenly he threw the book aside and walked a couple of times through the room.

"Thou wert at Pani Visberg's?"

"I was."

"Ha!"

"Well, what?"

"Nothing."

He sat down to his book again.

CHAPTER XV

A couple of weeks passed. The relations of the personages known to us had not undergone change.

Yosef did not visit Pani Visberg's, but, to make up, Pelski was a daily guest there in spite of Augustinovich, who tormented him, and whom the count could not endure.

"How does the countess's cousin seem to thee?" asked Yosef of him one day.

"Oh, my friend, he is a zero."

"With what dost thou reproach him?"

"Nothing; what does stupidity mean really? He talks with the ladies as far as he is able; he wears a fashionable coat, glossy gloves; he knots his cravat symmetrically, praises virtue, condemns vice, says it is better to be wise than not; still, O Yosef, he is a zero."

"Thou judgest people in masses."

"Again! in masses. As is known to thee, I judge the breast according to the measure of the tailor, not that of Phidias; and as I advance laughter seizes me, but my heart does not burst, it must have cause sufficient to burst."

"Speak more clearly."

"What shall I say to thee? Well, he is a middling man, a man of the mean, but not the golden one; honest, for he has not done anything dishonest or perverse. But let him go! Better speak of philosophy or sing an old contradance; which dost thou prefer?"

"Let us speak of him, I beg of thee," said Yosef, with decision.

"Well, fill me a pipe then."

Yosef filled a pipe for him, lighted a cigar for himself, and began to walk through the room.

"I will not give thee an account of the evenings there, for I do not wish to annoy thee," said Augustinovich, "but if thou desire this thing, then listen.

"The affair is as follows: Pelski learned that the old count left a daughter, and curiosity led him to look at her. Seest thou, people are vain; they love effect, and the rôle of a rich cousin in presence of a poor one is not devoid of effect, so this rôle has pleased Pelski. Whom would it not please? Thou art wealthy, and givest thy hand to her (that is, to thy cousin), thou shieldest her with thy most mighty protection, astonishest her with thy delicacy of feeling, with thy acts; thou becomest her king's son – her ideal. Ei, old man, how this tickles vanity! What romances these are, Satan take me!

'O gray rye, he is digging the earth!'

It is a whole novel. A steed, a noble figure, on her part smiles and tears – they are separated by fate; later they meet, they agree, they are reconciled, and Numa marries Pompilius!"

These last words Augustinovich pronounced with a certain maliciousness.

"Art thou speaking of Lula and Pelski?" asked Yosef, gloomily.

"Yes; Pelski looked at her through curiosity, and she, as thou knowest, is a fair maiden, and that rôle pleased him. Pelski is an ordinary man, an aristocrat, – in one word, zero, – but if she pays no attention to the statue – "

"Yes, if?" interrupted Yosef, catching at the last word.

"But thou – why deceive thyself? It must be all one to thee. Thou art not a child nor a woman; thou hadst full knowledge of what thou wert doing when going to Helena with a declaration."

Yosef was silent; Augustinovich continued: "I say: Pelski is a young man and wealthy, she pleases him very much, and she may not look at the statue; she pleases him, – that is the main thing."

"Let us suppose that she will not consider the statue, what further?"

"In that case Lula will become Countess Pelski."

"Will she consent? What sayst thou?"

Yosef's eyes flashed.

"Listen, old man, I say this: I know not the good of this conversation. Perhaps she might not consent to-day, but in half a year or a year she will consent. If thou wert there thou mightest contend with him; otherwise, I repeat, she will consent."

"On what dost thou rest that judgment?"

"On what? A certain evening when I saw Pelski I was listening, and he asked, 'Of what family is Shvarts?' and she answered, 'I know not, really.' Thou seest! But when I said that thou art the son of a blacksmith, she was in flames, and almost burst into weeping from anger at me. There it is for thee!"

Yosef also felt at that moment as it were a wish to weep from anger.

"Seest thou," continued Augustinovich, "Pelski unconsciously and unwittingly acts with great success; he brings her mind to ancient titles and brilliant relations; he cannot even do otherwise. And she is an aristocrat in every case. Thou rememberest how on a time that angered me and thee, and how much thou didst labor to shatter those principles in her. By the crocodile! there is nothing haughtier than proud poverty. Pelski acts wisely, he flatters her vanity, he rouses her self-love; that removes her from us. But we, my old man, are such counts as, without comparing – Oh, Satan take it! I cannot find here comparisons."

In fact, he did not find comparisons, and for want of them he fell to puffing out strong rings of smoke, and trying diligently to catch some of them on his fingers. Meanwhile Yosef looked stubbornly at one point in the ceiling, and asked at last, —

"Didst tell her that I was going to marry Helena?"

"No."

"Why not?"

"I said that thou wert toiling, and for that reason did not appear. Let the affair between thee and Pelski be decided in her mind, in her conscience and heart. Thy marriage is an external event which would decide the matter definitely on his side."

Yosef approached Augustinovich and fixed his fingers in his arm.

"Listen!" said he, violently; "but if I should win in this battle?"

"Go to the devil! and do not pinch me so hard. I throw the same question at thee: If thou shouldst win in this battle?"

They looked at each other, eye to eye; some kind of hostile feeling pressed their hearts.

At last Yosef dropped Augustinovich's arm, and hiding his face in his hands threw himself on the bed.

Augustinovich looked at him threateningly, then less threateningly, and still less threateningly; finally he pushed down to him and stroked him with his hand. He drew him by the skirt, and his voice now was soft and full of emotion.

"Old man!"

Yosef did not answer.

"My old man, be not angry. If thou win thou wilt preserve her in thy heart as a saint, and I will say to her: Go, bright angel, along the path of duty, as Yosef went."

CHAPTER XVI

Helena hardly believed her own happiness. She was preparing for her marriage. Her clouded past had vanished, life's night was over, the morning was shining.

From a woman of a wandering star, who knew not where and how low she might fall, from a woman who was a beggar, from a woman without a morrow, to enter into a new period of life, to receive the affection of a man whom she loved, to become in the future a wife, to begin a calm life, a life which had a to-morrow, surrounded by respect, filled with love and duty, – that was her future.

Helena understood, or rather had a prescience of the abnormal relation between her past and her future. "From such a life as mine that ought not to come. I am not worthy of this happiness," whispered she to Yosef, when he placed the ring of betrothal on her finger. "I am not worthy of such happiness."

That half-insane woman possessed of love was right. Out of the logic of life such a future could not bloom, but her life had ceased already to move in its own proper orbit.

There are stars which circle in solitude along undefined orbits, till swept away by more powerful planets they go farther, either around them or with them.

Something similar had happened to Helena.

A stronger will had attracted a weaker. Helena met Yosef on her track, and thenceforward she travelled in his course.

The knowledge of this made her more peaceful. "Oh, if he wishes I shall be happy," thought she, more than once.

She had unbounded belief, not only in Yosef's character, but in his strength. So the last shadow vanished from her soul; alarm disappeared, that indefinite fear of the future which she could not dismiss till the moment of Yosef's declaration, this fear which tortured her like a reproach of conscience.

Her head was full of imaginings. With a song on her lips she made preparations for marriage, amusing herself like a child with every detail of dress. Notwithstanding her widowhood she wished to wear a white dress, which would also please Yosef. Regaining cheerfulness, she regained her health also; she was busy, active, even minutely painstaking with reference to future housekeeping.

She grew more beautiful and more noble-looking under the influence of happiness. From being a misanthropic woman, a bird with plucked wings, she was changing into a woman who felt her own worth, even in this, that some one loved her.

The date of the marriage was approaching.

Meanwhile the time in which Yosef was to become a doctor was drawing near. He toiled, therefore, and toiled so intensely that his health tottered. Sleepless nights and mental effort marked his face with pallor; he grew thin, blue under the eyes; he lived in continual feverish labor, in reality he was losing his strength, but he kept on his feet as best he could, wishing at any price to win absolutely both position and an independent future.