The evening "Kite" publishes untreated tales of the orders which have come to me; my income is reckoned by thousands. That in a small degree is the reason, perhaps, that next day I receive a letter from Kazia, stating that she returned the ring under the influence of anger and jealousy, but if I come and we fall at the feet of her parents, they will let themselves be implored.

I have enough of that falling at the feet and those forgivenesses. I do not answer. Let him fall at Suslovski's feet who wants to; let Kazia marry Ostrynski! I have my Eva.

But my silence casts an evident panic on the Suslovski family; for a few days later the same messenger comes with a letter from Kazia, but this time to Antek.

Antek shows me the letter. Kazia prays him to come for a moment's conversation concerning an affair on which her whole future depends; she reckons on his heart, on that sense of justice which from the first glance of the eye she divined in him. She has the hope that he will not refuse the prayer of an unhappy woman. Antek curses, mutters something under his nose about low Philistines, and about the necessity of hanging both them and their posterity at the next opportunity; but he goes.

I divine that they wish to influence me through him.

CHAPTER XVIII.

Antek, who in reality has a soft heart, is won over evidently. For a week he goes to the Suslovskis regularly; for three days he walks around me, frowns, looks at me just like a wolf.

At last one day at tea he inquires peevishly, "Well, what dost thou think of doing with that girl?"

"With what girl?"

"With that Suslovski, or what is her name?"

"I don't think of doing anything with that Suslovski, or what is her name."

A moment of silence follows, then Antek speaks again,--

"She is whining whole days, till I cannot look at her."

What an honest soul! At that moment too his voice trembles with emotion; but he snorts like a rhinoceros and adds,--

"A decent man does not act in that fashion."

"Antek, thou art beginning to remind me of Papa Suslovski."

"I would rather remind thee of Papa Suslovski than wrong his daughter."

"I beg thee to drop me."

"Very well! I can even not know thee at all."

With this, the conversation ends, and thenceforth I do not speak to Antek.

We pretend not to know each other, which is the more amusing since we live together. We drink tea together in the morning, and it never occurs to either of us to move out of the studio.

The time of my marriage is approaching. Through the intermediary of "The Kite" all Warsaw knows of that now. All look at us; all admire Eva. When we were at the exhibition, they surrounded us so that we could not push through.

My unknown friendess sends an anonymous letter in which she warns me that Eva is not the wife for a man like me.

"I do not believe what is said of the relations between Panna Adami and Pan Ostrynski [writes my friend_ess_]; but thou, O master, art in need of a wife who would devote herself altogether to thy greatness; Panna Adami is an artist herself, and will always be drawing water to her own mill."

Antek goes continually to the Suslovskis, but surely as a comforter, for the Suslovskis must know of my intentions.

I have obtained an unlimited leave of absence for Eva. She begins to wear her hair as a village maiden; she dresses very modestly and wears robes closed to the neck. This becomes her very much. The scene in the dressing-room has not been repeated. Eva does not permit it. The utmost right I have is to kiss her hands. That makes me greatly impatient; but I flatter myself that it affects her in the same way.

She loves me madly. We spend whole days together. I have begun to give her lessons in drawing. She is swallowed up in those lectures, and painting in general.

CHAPTER XIX.

Thunder hurling Zeus; at what art thou gazing from the summit of Olympus? Things are done of which philosophers have never dreamed.

On the eve of my marriage Antek comes to me, nudges me with his elbow, and, turning aside his dishevelled head, says gloomily,--

"Vladek, dost thou know I have committed a crime?"

"Well, since thou hast mentioned it," I answer, "what sort of a crime?"

Antek looks at the floor fixedly, and says, as if to himself,--

"That such a drunkard as I, such an idiot without talent, such a moral and physical bankrupt should marry such a maiden as Kazia is an out-and-out crime."

I do not believe my ears; but I throw myself on my friend's neck without regard to the fact that he pushes me away.

His marriage will be in a couple of days.

CHAPTER XX.

After a residence of some months in Rome, Eva and I receive a splendid card inviting us to the wedding of Pan Ostrynski and Panna Helena Turno, primo voto, Kolchanovski.

We cannot go, for Eva's health does not permit.

Eva paints continually, and makes immense progress. I receive a gold medal in Pest. A certain rich Croat bought my picture. I have entered into relations with Goupil.

CHAPTER XXI.

A son is born to me in Verona.