The Doll

by Bolesław Prus

  Wokulski did so, then mounted his own horse. Mrs Wąsowska was agitated. She rode ahead in silence for a while: suddenly she turned back to him and said: ‘My last word. I know people better than you may suppose … I am afraid you may be disillusioned. If that ever happens, remember my advice: don’t act under the influence of passion, but wait. Things often look worse than they really are.’

  ‘Satan!’ Wokulski muttered. The whole world began revolving around him and seemed infused with blood.

  They rode on without speaking. At Zasławek, Wokulski went to the Duchess. ‘I’m leaving tomorrow,’ he said, ‘and as for the sugar-factory, don’t build one.’

  ‘Tomorrow?’ the old lady echoed, ‘and what will happen about the stone?’

  ‘If you permit, I’ll go to Zasław, I’ll inspect the stone, and I have other business there, too.’

  ‘Then God be with you … There is nothing for you to do here. And call on me in Warsaw. I shall be going back at the same time as the Countess and the Łęckis.’

  That evening Ochocki came to his room. ‘Confound it!’ he cried, ‘I had so many things to discuss with you … But there, you were with the ladies all the time, and now you’re leaving.’

  ‘Don’t you care for the ladies?’ asked Wokulski with a smile, ‘perhaps you are right!’

  ‘It isn’t that I don’t care for them. But since I found out that great ladies are no different than chambermaids, I prefer the latter. These women,’ he went on, ‘are all geese, even the cleverest of them. Yesterday, for instance, I spent a half-hour explaining to Wąsowska the advantages of steering a balloon, I told her frontiers would disappear, nations be brothers, civilisation progress … She gazed into my eyes so that I’d have sworn she understood. Then, when I’d finished, she asked: “Mr Ochocki, why don’t you get married?” Did you ever hear anything like it! Of course, it took me another half hour to explain that I had no thought of marrying, that I wouldn’t marry Felicja, or Izabela, or even her … Good God, I don’t know a single woman in whose constant company I wouldn’t turn stupid in six months.’ He stopped, and began taking his leave.

  ‘One moment,’ said Wokulski, ‘when you come back to Warsaw, pray call on me. Perhaps I shall be able to give you news of an invention which admittedly will take half a lifetime, but — you’ll like it.’

  ‘Balloons?’ asked Ochocki with a fiery look.

  ‘Something better. Goodnight.’

  Next day, towards noon, Wokulski bade goodbye to the Duchess’s household. A few hours later he was in Zasław. He called on the priest, and told Węgiełek to be ready to set off for Warsaw. Having done this, he went to the castle ruins.

  The four lines were already engraved on the stone. Wokulski read them several times, and his gaze rested on the words: ‘… always, everywhere I shall be with you …’

  ‘And if not?’ he murmured.

  Despair gripped him at this thought. Just then he only had one longing — that the earth might give way and swallow him up, along with these ruins, this stone and this inscription.

  When he went back to the village, the horses had been fed, Węgiełek was standing by the carriage with his green trunk. ‘Do you know when you’ll be coming back?’ Wokulski asked.

  ‘In God’s good time, sir,’ Węgiełek replied.

  ‘Get up.’

  He threw himself upon the cushions and they moved off. An old woman made a sign of the Cross to them from a distance. Węgiełek caught sight of her and took off his cap: ‘Take care of yourself, mama!’ he called from the box.

  XXVIII

  The Journal of the Old Clerk

  SO HERE we are in 1879. If I were superstitious, or didn’t know that bad times are followed by better, I’d be afraid of this year 1879. For whereas its predecessor ended badly, it has started off even worse. For example — England went to war- with Afghanistan at the end of last year, and in December things went badly for her. Austria had a great deal of trouble with Bosnia, and an insurrection broke out in Macedonia. In October and November, there were attempts on the lives of King Alfonso of Spain and King Umberto of Italy. Both escaped unharmed. Also in October, Prince Jósef Zamoyski, a great friend of Wokulski’s, died. I think his death interfered in more than one way with Wokulski’s plans.

  Scarcely has 1879 started than — may the devil take it! — the English, still not yet disentangled from Afghanistan, have a war in Africa, down in the Cape of Good Hope, against some Zulus or other. Here in Europe we have nothing less than an outbreak of typhus in the Astrakhan district, and it may reach us any day.

  What a lot of trouble this typhus creates! Everyone I meet says: ‘Well now, serve you right for importing calico from Moscow. You’ll see, you’ll bring the plague with it!’ And the anonymous letters, roundly cursing us! I fancy, however, that their writers are mostly our rivals, or Lodz manufacturers of calico. The latter would be only too glad to see us break our necks, even if there were no plague. Of course, I don’t repeat even a hundredth part of these insults to Wokulski: but I think he hears and reads them more than I.

  Strictly speaking, I intended to set down in these pages the story of an amazing court case, a criminal case, which Baroness Krzeszowska has brought against none other than the pretty, virtuous, adorable Mrs Helena Stawska. But such rage overcomes me that I cannot collect my thoughts. So to distract my attention, I write about other things …

  She brought a criminal case against Mrs Stawska for theft! Theft! Her! … Of course we emerged victorious from the mud. But at what a cost … I, for instance, couldn’t sleep for well nigh two months. And if today I go out for a beer in the evenings, a thing I never used to do, and even sit in saloons till midnight, I do so from sheer mortification. To bring a charge of theft against that divine creature! Goodness knows, only a half-crazy woman like the Baroness would do such a thing.

  Because of it, the ferocious harpy paid us ten thousand roubles … Ah, if it depended on me, I’d have squeezed out a hundred thousand. Let her weep, let her have spasms, let her die even. Vile woman! But let’s think of something other than human iniquities.

  Strictly speaking, who knows whether honest Staś wasn’t the involuntary cause of Mrs Stawska’s misfortunes: or perhaps not so much he, as I myself … I introduced him to her by force, I advised Staś not to call on that monster, the Baroness, and finally I wrote to Wokulski, when he was in Paris, that he should try to obtain news of Ludwik Stawski. In a word, it was I who vexed that serpent Krzeszowska. I paid for it for two months! But there’s no help for it. Good God, if you exist, have mercy on my soul, if I have a soul — as a soldier of the French Revolution once said. (Ah, how old I’m growing, how old I’m growing! Instead of getting to the point at once I prattle, I repeat myself, I ramble … Although, upon my word, I believe I’d have a fit if I began to write at once about that monstrous, that shameful court case …)

  Now, let me collect my thoughts. Staś was in the country during September, at the Duchess’s. I cannot imagine why he went there, nor what he did. But I could see, from the few letters he wrote me, that it didn’t go very well. What the devil took Izabela Łęcka there? Surely he isn’t interested in her any more? I’ll be damned if I don’t make a match of it between him and Mrs Stawska. I’ll make a match of it, I’ll lead them to the altar, I’ll make sure he makes the vows properly, and then … Maybe I’ll blow out my brains, I don’t know? … (Old fool! … Is it for you to think of such an angel! … Besides, I don’t think of her at all, particularly since I became convinced that she loves Wokulski. Let her love him, providing both are happy. And I? Come, Katz, my old friend, would you have been any bolder than I?

  In November, on the very day that the house in Wspolna Street collapsed, Wokulski returned from Moscow. Again, I don’t know what he was doing there: suffice it that he made some seventy thousand roubles … These profits are beyond my grasp, but I am sure that any business in which Staś was involved must have been honest.

  A few days after his return, a respec
table merchant comes up to me and says: ‘My dear Mr Rzecki, I am not in the habit of interfering in other people’s business, but — pray warn Wokulski, not from me, but from you, that his partner Suzin is a great scoundrel and will certainly go bankrupt very soon. Warn him, sir, for I pity him … Wokulski, even though he has got on to the wrong road, always deserves sympathy.’

  ‘What do you mean by a “wrong road”?’ I asked.

  ‘Well, now, Mr Rzecki,’ said he, ‘anyone who goes to Paris and buys ships when England is involved in an incident and so forth — he, Mr Rzecki, is not marked by a citizen’s virtues.’

  ‘My dear sir,’ said I, ‘how does the buying of ships differ from the buying of hops? Bigger profits, no doubt …’

  ‘Well,’ said he, ‘let’s not make an issue of it, Mr Rzecki. I’d have nothing against anyone else doing it, but not Wokulski … After all, we both know his past, and I perhaps better than you, for sometimes the late lamented Hopfer placed orders with me through him …’

  ‘My dear sir,’ said I to this merchant, ‘are you casting aspersions on Wokulski?’

  ‘No, sir,’ said he to this, ‘I’m simply repeating what the whole town is saying. I don’t want to harm Wokulski in the least, especially in your eyes, as you are his friend (and very properly, for you knew him when he was different from today), but … You must admit, sir, that this man is damaging trade. I don’t judge his patriotism, Mr Rzecki, but I’ll tell you frankly (for I must be frank with you) that those Muscovite calicos … Do you understand me, sir?’

  I was furious. For although I am a lieutenant of Hungarian infantry, I couldn’t comprehend in what way German calico is better than Muscovite calico. But there was no talking to my merchant. The brute raised his eyebrows, shrugged and waved his hands about so that in the end I thought he must be a fine patriot, and I a dummy, although when he was filling his pockets with roubles and imperials, hundreds of bullets were flying past my head…

  Of course, I told Staś all this, and he replied with a sigh: ‘Calm yourself, my dear fellow. These very people who are warning me Suzin is a scoundrel, were writing to Suzin a month ago to say that I’m a bankrupt, a robber, an ex-rebel.’

  After my talk with the honest merchant, whose name I won’t even mention, and after all the anonymous letters I received, I decided to make a note of the various views expressed by respectable people about Wokulski. Here’s the first: Staś is a bad patriot because his cheap calicos have spoiled the Lodz manufacturers’ business a little. Very well! What’s next?

  In October, about the time when Matejko finished painting his Battle of Grünwald (a large and showy picture, which should not be exhibited to soldiers who took part in real battles), Maruszewicz — that friend of Baroness Krzeszowska — rushed into the shop. What a change — he’s gone up in the world! He’d a golden charm on his chest or rather on the place where people have stomachs, so thick and long that he might have used it for a dog-collar. A diamond pin in his tie, new gloves, new shoes, and his body (a wretched enough body, goodness knows!) dressed in a new suit. In addition, he looked as though he hadn’t a penny in debts, but paid cash for everything. Klein, who lives in the same house, later explained to me that Maruszewicz plays cards regularly, and has been lucky for some time past.

  So in rushed my dandy, with his hat on and an ebony walking-stick in his hand, and after looking around uneasily (he has a rather furtive look), he asked: ‘Is Mr Wokulski here? Ah, Mr Rzecki … A word, I beg.’

  We went behind a cupboard. ‘I’m here with excellent news,’ he said, pressing my hand affectionately, ‘you can sell your apartment house, the one the Łęckis used to own … Baroness Krzeszowska will buy it. She has regained her capital by a law-suit against her husband, and (if you want to drive a bargain) she’ll pay ninety thousand roubles, and even something extra to help you leave.’

  He must have seen the gratification on my face (the purchase of that house was never to my taste), for he pressed my hand still more fervently — if a live corpse can do anything fervently — and, smiling at me sweetly (I felt nauseated by his sweetness), he began murmuring: ‘I can be of service to you gentlemen … an important service … The Baroness depends very much on my advice, and if …’

  Here he was taken with a slight fit of coughing: ‘I understand,’ said I, guessing who I was dealing with, ‘and Mr Wokulski won’t make any difficulties about a bonus …’

  ‘Come, sir,’ he exclaimed, ‘whatever do you mean? The more so as the Baroness’s attorney will come to you gentlemen with a definite offer. In any case, I’m not concerned. What I have is quite adequate … But I have some poor relatives, to whom you gentlemen may want, on my recommendation, to …’

  ‘If you please, sir,’ I interrupted, ‘we prefer to place a sum directly into your hands, providing of course that the business goes through.’

  ‘Oh, it will — I can give you my word,’ Mr Maruszewicz assured me.

  But because I didn’t promise him an honorarium, he lurked about the shop for a while, then left, whistling.

  Towards evening, I told Staś this: but he defeated me by silence, which made me think. So next day I hurried to our attorney (who is also the Prince’s attorney), and communicated Maruszewicz’s news to him.

  ‘So she’ll pay ninety thousand?’ said the attorney in surprise (he is a very eminent person), ‘but, my dear Mr Rzecki, apartment houses are going up, and next year they’re going to build some two hundred new ones. In these conditions, my dear Rzecki, we’d be doing her a favour if we sold the house for a hundred thousand. The Baroness is very interested in this apartment house (if one may use that word in connection with such a distinguished lady), and we might get a much larger sum from her, my dear Mr Rzecki.’

  I bade farewell to the eminent attorney, and went back to the store, firmly resolved not to interfere in the sale of the apartment house. Not until then did it occur to me that Maruszewicz is a great scoundrel.

  Now that I’ve calmed down sufficiently to collect my wits, I’ll describe the repulsive law-suit the Baroness brought against that angel, that perfect lady, Mrs Stawska. If I don’t write it all down, in a year or two I won’t be able to credit my memory that such a monstrous thing could happen.

  Please note that firstly, Baroness Krzeszowska has long detested Mrs Stawska, because she thought everyone was in love with her, and secondly, that this very same Baroness wanted to buy the apartment house from Wokulski as cheaply as possible. These are two important facts, whose significance I’m only just beginning to understand (I’m getting old, my goodness, that I am …)

  I have visited Mrs Stawska often since meeting her. Not every day. Sometimes once in a few days, though sometimes twice on the same day. After all, I was responsible for the house, that’s one thing. Then I had to tell Mrs Stawska I’d written to Wokulski with regard to finding her husband. Furthermore, I had to call on her with the news that Wokulski hadn’t found out anything definite. Then I visited her to study Maruszewicz’s habits through the windows of her apartment, as he lodges in the opposite wing. Then too, I was concerned with investigating Baroness Krzeszowska and her relations with the students who live upstairs, and whom she was everlastingly complaining of.

  An outsider might think I visited Mrs Stawska too often. However, after mature consideration, I decided I didn’t visit her often enough. After all, I had an excellent post in her apartment for observing the entire building, and in addition I was cordially made welcome. Whenever I called, Mrs Misiewicz (the respectable mother of Mrs Helena) would greet me with open arms, little Helena would climb into my lap and Mrs Stawska herself livened up, and said that during the hours I spent in their apartment, she forgot her troubles. So how could I help visiting them often since they welcomed me so? Upon my word, I did not visit them enough, I think, and had I greater chivalrous leanings I should have sat there from morning till night. Even if Mrs Stawska were to dress in my presence. What harm would it have done?

  During these visits I mad
e several important observations. First, those students on the third-floor front were really restless spirits. They sang and they shouted until two in the morning, sometimes they even howled and, all in all, tried to use the most inhuman sounds possible. During the day, if only one was home — and there was always someone — whenever Baroness Krzeszowska put her head out of the window (she did so a dozen or more times a day), someone would always try to pour slops down on her.

  I must even say that a sort of game developed between her and the students overhead, which consisted of her peeping out of the window, then trying to draw her head back in again as quick as she could, while they tried to pour slops down as often and as copiously as possible.

  Then, in the evenings, these young men who had no one overhead to soak them with slops, would call the washerwomen and servant-girls of the entire building into their room. Shrieks and spasms of weeping could be heard in the Baroness’s apartment.

  My second observation related to Maruszewicz, who lived almost vis-à-vis Mrs Stawska. This man followed a very peculiar way of life, marked by unusual regularity. He failed to pay his rent regularly, regularly every few weeks they removed a quantity of objects from his apartment: statues, mirrors, carpets, clocks. But what was more interesting — just as regularly they brought in new mirrors, new carpets, new clocks and statues to his apartment … After each removal, Mr Maruszewicz would appear for the next few days at one of his windows. He shaved at it, combed his hair, waxed his moustache, even dressed in it, casting very ambiguous looks in the direction of Mrs Stawska’s windows. But when his apartment filled again with new articles of luxury and comfort, then Mr Maruszewicz drew the blinds again. Then (incredible though it sounds!) lights burned day and night in his apartment, and the voices of many men, and sometimes even of women, could be heard. But what concern of mine is another man’s business?

  One day early in November, Staś said to me: ‘Apparently you’re visiting Mrs Stawska?’