“Now, it came that in one of those moments of oblivion, when I felt I was happy, I told him I would be his affianced wife.
“Then he gathered me in his arms—Oh, with what a movement, admirable in its tenderness—and pressed me gently to his heart, that he might kiss my lips.
“And then came the most astonishing instant in all my life. I had, to put it simply, a vision. Upon his lips I saw blood—clotted, dried blood—the ashes as it were of thousands and thousands of kisses. It was neither loathing nor hatred that I felt; only an exceeding horror for what is as much against Nature as was any elaborate excruciating torture of Medieval times—as a crime committed in secret and hidden under flowers to conceal its every trace. And from beneath those flowers—a sea of them there was—I seemed to hear the groans as it were of those slain at some banquet of Heliogabalus: or rather I heard laughter, artificial, forced, metallic laughter—the laughter which ‘women of that sort’ always utter, it being the paid merriment to which they are bound:—such a laugh as breaks off suddenly, abruptly, as though startled at its own sound. And I saw my white lilies plunged in that sea of tainted blood!
“So I repulsed him, as I would have repulsed a foe. And here,” she concluded suddenly, in a falsetto of spasmodic laughter, “here my little idyll comes to an end.”
“But do you love the man still?”
“I do.”
From the farmyard comes the crowing of a cock: as a key that grates in a rusty lock, it grates on our ears. Dawn is here.
I like the man; or it may be that I rather like his surroundings, inseparably connected in thought with him. I like those rooms of severe aspect, with their high ceilings, and shelves which are nearly as high filled with books, all in regular order and bound in black. I like the great table in the centre, lit up with bright lamps, and strewn with periodicals in every language. I like, too, those heavy, comfortable, leather-covered armchairs which stand round it. Obojanski also I like, who in this environment is a handsome man, with grey hair and eyes dark and youthful.
Formerly my professor, Obojanski has been extremely useful to me in my studies. The profit I have derived from him is, however, chiefly negative, from the critical side of his teaching. It still pleases him, in our mutual relations, to take up the attitude of a master.
Generally I come to him late in the evening, dressed in black, in the style of la dame voilée. If he is working, I sit with him, and set to reading some interesting book: but we mostly converse together, and invariably of serious things.
Obojanski is an old bachelor, and objects to women as a rule. “The idea of emancipation, possibly not quite unreasonable in principle, has been misunderstood and warped from its true meaning by the women themselves. For instance, they are not content with equality in the field of economics; they want to have the same freedom in their conduct as is enjoyed by men. A fine place the world would be, if they had! And, as concerns the admission of women to the higher studies, this is absolutely superfluous: a woman’s brain is not able to think with the logical accuracy which these require.”
“As to this last,” I reply, “a census of the sexes would not, I think, be desirable. It may well be doubted, not only whether all males, but whether all learned men, are capable of accurate logical reasoning.”
“Oh, of course, exceptions are everywhere to be found,” he answers gravely, with his own peculiar directness of mental association.
To his mind, I am among women one of those exceptions. He is never scandalized at my late visits; perhaps only for the reason that my visits are made to him. He is withal full of respect for my intellectual capacity, which he thinks due to him. For him, I am the one woman who can talk reasonably.
For my own part, I do not consider myself to be clever merely for being able to draw a logical conclusion from two premises. What I call cleverness is the faculty of understanding all things, and of wondering at none; that of setting aside all preconceived ideas and doctrines, by reason of which men have set up “categories,” and of giving up accepted forms of thinking, that seem to be, but are not, necessary to thought; the faculty of getting out of oneself, and viewing both oneself and everything else from without and objectively.
I sit down in one of the high-backed armchairs, and begin to talk about some abstruse subject or other, but making every endeavour to lead the conversation round to Roslawski.
“Do you know London?” I ask.
“Oh, yes; I was there; a long time ago, when I had just finished my University studies.”
“I think Roslawski went there for about six months.”
“Yes, and he is there still.”
My strength has just been put to the test, and I am satisfied. The news I hear neither makes my lips tremble, nor dims my dark-golden eyes with the slightest mist. But I am careful not to pretend either indifference or special good humour. Obojanski, in spite of his weak points, is no mean expert in the knowledge of human nature.
“Indeed! Why, I was informed he had returned to Warsaw already.”
“No. I am expecting him about the middle of this month. He is a nice fellow, is he not? We three got on very well together.”
“I hope you don’t mean that we two do not get on well,” I answer, smiling amiably.
He shows me a postcard that he has got from Roslawski: water, some shipping, and an ugly building ashore, with innumerable windows. I for the first time see his handwriting: sloping, not very legible; nothing much out of the ordinary. I should like to press it to my lips, which would be
