Chapter IX (1)

In a few days after the premiere of The Churls, which remained upon the bill, but attracted ever smaller audiences, Glogowski came to Janina's home.

"What is the matter with you? . . ." she exclaimed, extending her hand in friendly greeting.

"Nothing. . . . Well, I improved my play a little. Did you read the criticisms?"

"Some of them."

"I have brought all the reviews," said Glogowski. "I'll read them."

He began to read.

One of the important weeklies maintained that The Churls was a very good, original, and superbly realistic play; that with Glogowski there had, at last, appeared a real dramatist who had let a current of fresh air into the stagnant and anaemic atmosphere of our dramatic creativity, and had given us real people and real life. The only cause for regret was that the staging of the play was beneath criticism and the acting of it, with one or two exceptions, scandalous.

The reviewer of one of the most estimable dailies for two whole days rambled on in a special supplement about the history of the theater in France and about German actors, he discussed theatrical novelties and after every two paragraphs or so would remark in parenthesis: "I saw him at the Odeon," "I heard this at the Burg Theater" "I admired such acting in London," etc. Then he adduced various theatrical anecdotes, praised actors who had died half a century ago, harked back to the past of the stage, spoke in several paragraphs about the red rags of radicalism that had begun to appear on the stage, praised with paternal indulgence the actors appearing in The Churls, flattered Cabinski and wound up by saying that he would probably give his opinion of the play itself only after the author had written another one, for this one was merely to be forgiven a novice.

A third reviewer contended that the play was not at all bad and would even be excellent, if the author had chosen to honor theatrical traditions and added music and dances to it.

A fourth took a diametrically opposite viewpoint, maintaining that the play was positively worthless, that it was rubbish, but that the author possessed at least the one merit that he had avoided the cut and dried formulas by failing to introduce the usual songs and dances which always lower the value of folk plays.

In the fifth review a "specialist" on garden-theaters wrote about a hundred paragraphs somewhat to this effect: "The Churls by Mr. Glogowski hm! . . . not a bad thing . . . it would even be entirely good . . . but . . . although, considering again . . . at any rate . . . one must have the courage to tell the truth. . . . At all events . . . be that as it may . . . (with a little qualifying phrase) the author has a talent. The play is . . . hm . . . let us see, how can we define it? About two months ago I wrote something about it, so I refer those that are interested to my former article. . . . They played it excellently," and he enumerated the entire cast, placing beside the name of each actress a sugary epithet, and an ingratiating remark, a polite description, a melancholy equivocation and an empty phrase.

"What do you call all that?" inquired Janina.

"A libretto for an operetta. Entitle it Theatrical Criticisms and set it to music and you will have such a show that the whole nation will flock to it as to a church festival."

"And what answer did you give to all that?"

"I? . . . Nothing, of course! I merely turned my back on them and, since I have a splendid plan for a new play, I shall immediately start working on it. I have received a job as a dramatic coach at Radomsk and I shall go there for a half year. I am only waiting for the final notification."

"Is it absolutely necessary for you to go?"

"Yes, I must! Dramatic coaching is my only means of support. For two months I have been without any occupation and now I am penniless. I presented the play at my own expense, paid my respects to the public, had a good time at Warsaw and now it is time to quit! It is time to ring down the curtain so that I may prepare for another farce. Goodbye, Miss Janina. Before I leave, I'll drop in here or at the theater."

He shook hands with her, exclaimed, "May the deuce take me!" and hurried away.

Janina was sad. She had become so accustomed to Glogowski, to his eccentricities, paradoxes, and to that rough and ready manner which was merely a screen for his shyness and hypersensitive delicacy that regret filled her at the thought that she was now to remain alone.

She had no more money left and was living solely on what she received at the theater. Janina dared not admit it to herself, but with each new request for money she would be reminded of her home and of those times when it was unnecessary for her to think of anything, for she had all she needed. She felt deeply humiliated by this almost daily begging for a few meager copecks, but there was no way out of it, unless it was the one that she constantly read in the gray eyes of Sowinska and saw exemplified in the life of her companions.

Almost each evening Janina would stroll on Theater Place. If she was in a great hurry, she would only pass through the place, get a glimpse of the Grand Theater and return home again, but if she had plenty of time she would find a seat on the square or on a bench near the tramcar station and from there gaze at the rows of columns, at the lofty profile of the theater's facade and lose herself in dreaming. She somehow felt that those walls drew her irresistibly to them. She experienced moments of deep delight when passing under the colonnade, or when in the calm of a bright night she viewed the long gray mass of the edifice. That huge stone giant seemed to speak to her and she would listen to the whispers, the echoes, and the sounds that floated from it. Spread out before her in the dim twilight and visible to her soul alone, there would pass before her imagination the scenes that were acted there not long ago.

An additional reason for losing herself in dreams was to dull the pinch of poverty, that had become more acute, for the second half of the theatrical season, from a financial standpoint, was a great deal worse than the first. The attendance was increasingly smaller because of the continual rains and the cold evenings and, of course, the pay of the actors was proportionately smaller.

It often happened that Cabinski in the middle of a performance would take the cash box and make away with it under the pretext that he was ill, leaving only a few rubles to be divided among the company and, if he was caught before he made his escape, he would almost cry.

And if he led anyone by the arm in a friendly manner to the box office it was a prearranged sign for Gold, who was to say that there was no money to be had. If he did not lead a person in this manner, the treasurer would assume a worried look and complain: "I haven't even enough to pay the gas bills and where am I going to get the money for the rent? Why, there isn't enough to pay running expenses."

"Let him have at least something. Perhaps we can put off the payment of some bill to-day . . ." Cabinski would pretend to intercede.

He would then leave an order for the payment of the money and walk away. But it almost always so happened that Gold did not have the sum for which the order was made out. The amount paid was always short, even if it were only by a few copecks. The actors called him all sorts of names, but each took what was offered.

Gold pretended to be insulted and usually appealed to the directress, who would always sit in the box office whenever she was not taking part in the play. Cabinska would then sharply reproach the actors and loudly praise the honesty of Gold, who with the small salary that he received helped his sister, in addition to supporting himself. Gold would beam with joy at the remembrance of his sister; his eyes would flash with tenderness and at such moments he would fervently promise to pay the missing amount on the following day without fail; but he never paid.

The performances were rattled off to get through with them, for the general disorder caused by Cabinski's over-thieveries was growing ever greater and, moreover, the nearness of the departure for Warsaw, the debts in which all were swamped, the approach of winter and the worry over securing new engagements did not put anyone in a mood for playing.

And all the while Cabinski, kissed everyone and promised to pay, but never did so. He knew how to arrange matters so skillfully and acted so excellently the part of a man worried about the welfare of everyone that Janina feeling his troubles and believing him, often lacked the courage to remind him of the money he owed her. Moreover, she knew that between the director and his wife there went on a continual battle over expenses and that the nurse often bought various things for the children out of her own savings, while Cabinska would sit twice as long at the pastry shop to avoid hearing the complaints.

Slowly, but in an ever narrowing circle, poverty hemmed Janina in and clouded her face with ceaseless worry.

Janina suffered all the more in her present condition because she was unable to seclude herself from other people as she used to do at Bukowiec after every quarrel with her father. She could not rave with the gales and calm herself inwardly by sheer physical exhaustion. She tramped about the city but everywhere she met too many people. She would have gladly confided to Glogowski all that troubled her, but had not the courage to do so, for she was restrained by pride. Glogowski seemed to guess her condition, or at least her worries, and would often remind her that she ought to tell him everything . . . everything. But she did not do so.

She stayed at home as little as possible, and whenever she entered the house she tried to do it so quietly that no one might hear her. It was not the possibility that she might find herself thrown out into the street on the morrow that frightened her, but the fact that Mme. Anna or Sowinska might say to her curtly: "Pay what you owe me."

But that moment finally arrived. While eating her dinner Janina knew the inevitable had come. She caught just one glance of Mme. Anna's eyes while she was serving the soup and in them read everything.

After the meal, which to Janina had been torture, Mme. Anna followed her immediately and, in the most unconcerned manner, began to relate something about a fantastic customer. Then, suddenly, as though she had remembered something, she said: "Oh yes, I almost forgot! Perhaps you will let me have that half-month's rent, for I must pay the landlord to-day."

"I haven't the money to-day . . ." she wanted to add something else, but her voice failed her.

"What do you mean? Please give me what you owe me! I hope you don't think that I can feed anyone free of charge . . . just for fun, or for the sake of having them as an ornament in my home! A fine ornament indeed, that stays up all night and comes home only in the wee hours of the morning!"

"You needn't fear that I won't pay you!" cried Janina suddenly aroused.

"I need the money right away!"

"You will have it . . . in an hour!" answered Janina, making some sudden determination; she glanced with such scorn at Mme. Anna that the latter left without a word, slamming the door after her.

From her companions Janina had heard something about the pawnshop and she immediately went there to pawn her gold bracelet, the only one that she possessed.

On returning home she immediately paid Mme. Anna, who was surprised, but not very polite.

Having done that Janina added: "I will have my meals at the restaurant; I don't want to trouble you."

"Just as you like. If things here don't suit you, you are free to do as you please!" whispered the deeply humiliated Mme. Anna.

By that one act Janina incurred the enmity of the whole house.

"I will sell everything I possess . . . even to the last button!" she said to herself with bitter resolve.

And Janina calculated that for one half of what she had been paying Mme. Anna she could get all the food that she needed. Wolska directed her to a cheap lunch-room and she went there for her dinners; when she had not money enough for that, a roll with a sardine had to suffice her for the entire day.

But one day the theater was closed, for there were only twenty rubles in the treasury; on the following day the performance was postponed because of a heavy downpour. Janina, like everyone else, did not receive a single copeck from Cabinski and during those two days had absolutely nothing to eat.

This first hunger which she could not appease because she had nothing to appease it with had a fearful effect upon her. She felt within herself a strange and unceasing pain.

"Starvation! Starvation!" Janina whispered to herself in terror.

Hitherto she had known it by its name only. Now she wondered at that sensation of hunger within her. It seemed strange to her that she felt like eating and hadn't the money even to buy herself a roll!

"Is it possible that I have nothing to eat?" Janina asked herself.

From the kitchen there was wafted to her the smell of frying meat. She shut the door tightly for that smell nauseated her.

Janina remembered with a strange emotion that the majority of great artists in various ages also suffered poverty and hunger. The thought consoled her for a while. She felt as though she were anointed with the first pang of martyrdom for art's sake.

She smiled in the mirror with a melancholy look at her yellowish and worn face. She tried to read to rid herself, as it were, of her own personality, but she could not, for she constantly felt that growing hunger.

She gazed out of the window at the long yard surrounded on all sides by the high windows of the adjoining houses, but she saw how in a few houses people were sitting down to the table and saw the workmen in the yard also eating their dinner from small clay pots. She quickly drew back from the window for she felt hunger like a steel hand with sharp claws tearing her even more violently.

"Everybody is eating!" Janina said to herself as though this was the first time that she had taken note of that fact.

Later she lay down and slept until the evening without going either to the rehearsal or to Cabinska's home, but she felt even weaker upon awaking and had a painful dizziness in her head, while that keen and constant sapping sensation within herself tormented her so that she wept.

In the evening in the dressing-room a boisterous gayety possessed Janina; she laughed continually, joked and made fun of her companions quarreled over some trifle with Mimi and then flirted from the stage with the occupants of the front row of seats.

When the counselor appeared behind the scenes right after the first act with a box of candy, Janina greeted him joyously and pressed his hand so tightly that the old man became confused. Afterwards she sat down in some dark corner, waiting for the stage-director to cry: "Enter!" When the darkness and silence enveloped her, she broke into convulsive sobbing.

After the performance Janina received a quadruple payment on account two whole rubles. Cabinski gave them to her himself in secret so that the others might not see it.

Janina went out for supper on the veranda and became intoxicated with one glass of whiskey so that she herself requested Wladek to escort her home.

From that evening Wladek followed her like a shadow and began openly to show her his love, paying no attention to the fact that his mother was asking everybody in the theater about him and constantly tracking both him and Janina.

One day Glogowski came rushing into Janina's home and cried out already from the doorway: "Well, I have come back again to my Zulus! . . ."

He flung his hat on a trunk, sat on the bed and began to roll a cigarette.

Janina gazed at him calmly and thought how strange it was that the coming of this friend who had interested her so deeply in the past should now leave her so indifferent.

"So you do not weep with joy at seeing me again, eh? Ha! I'll have to resign myself to it. No doubt the dogs alone will weep over me! May the deuce take me! But don't you happen to know what is the matter with Kotlicki? He does not come to the theater any more and I can't find him anywhere. He must have journeyed somewhere."

"I have not seen him since the night of that supper," answered Janina slowly.

"There must be some reason for his disappearance! Probably some adventure, some love affair, some . . . But why should I bother about such a green monkey, eh? Isn't that true?"

"Indeed it is!" whispered Janina, turning her face toward the window.

"Oh! and what does that mean?" he cried, glancing sharply into her eyes. "Goodness, how you have changed! Sunken and glassy eyes, yellowish complexion, sharpened features. . . . What does it all mean?" he asked in a quieter tone.

Suddenly he struck his hand to his forehead and began to run up and down the room like a maniac.

"What an idiot I am. What a monster! Here I am parading about Warsaw, while here real, artistic poverty has quartered itself in earnest! Miss Janina," he cried, taking her hand and looking steadily into her eyes, "Miss Janina! I want you to tell me everything as at confession. May the deuce take me, but you must tell me!"

Janina was silent; but seeing his honest face and hearing that sympathetic voice whose accents had a strange way of gripping one's heart, she suddenly felt overcome by feeling, and tears stood in her eyes. She could not speak for emotion.

"Well, well, there's no use crying, for I shall depart anyway," he said jokingly to hide his own emotion. "Now, just listen to me . . . but without any protests or loud opposition, for I detest parliamentarism! I see you are in poverty and theatrical poverty in the bargain. . . . Well, I happen to know what it's like. Now, for goodness' sake, stop blushing. Poverty that is honestly acquired is not anything to be ashamed of! It's nothing but an ordinary smallpox which all people who are worth anything in this world have to pass through. Ho! ho! I have been playing blindman's buff with troubles since many a year! Well, I shall end what I am saying in a gallop. Let us do this . . ."

He turned around, took from his pocketbook thirty rubles, that is, all the money that had been sent him for his journey, placed it under Janina's pillow and returned to his former seat.

"'Now we are agreed, are we not, my cousin . . .' said Louis XI after beheading the Duke of Anjou. I will accept no appeal and if you dare to . . ."

He grasped his hat and extending his hand, said softly: "Good-bye, Miss Janina."

With a desperate motion, Janina hastily barred the door with her body.

"No, no! Do not humiliate me! I am unfortunate enough as it is," she whispered, firmly holding his hand.

"There you have a woman's philosophy! May the deuce take me, but that which I did is as natural as the fact that I will some day blow out my brains and that you will become a great actress!"

Janina began to expostulate with him, and finally to urge him to take back his money, saying that she did not need it, that she would not accept it, and showing a deep aversion to being helped.

Glogowski became gloomy and said roughly: "What! May the deuce take me, but of the two of us I certainly am not the fool! But no! I refuse to get provoked about it. I shall sit down calmly and talk it over with you seriously. I don't want you to get angry at me over such an empty thing as money. You don't want to take it, although you need it, and why? Because a false shame deters you, because you have been taught that such simple human things as helping one another lowers one's pride. Such conceptions are already becoming putrid. To the museum with them! Those are foolish and evil prejudices. May the deuce take me, but it requires a European brain and hysterical subtlety to hesitate to accept money from a human being like yourself when you are in need. Why and to what purpose do you think the human herd unites itself into some form of society? Is it mutually to devour and rob one another or mutually to help one another? I know you will tell me that it is otherwise, but I answer you that that is precisely why we have so much evil in this world. And once we recognize a thing as evil we ought to shun it. Man ought to do good. That is his duty. To do good is the wisest mathematics. But Great Scott! What's the use of my making so much ado about it!" he cried in irritation.

He continued to speak for a long while yet, scoffed, swore occasionally, shouted: "May the deuce take me," and raged fiercely, but in his voice there was so much sincere and deep friendliness, such heartfelt kindness, that Janina, although she was not at all convinced, accepted his proffered aid with a grateful handclasp only because she did not wish to offend him by refusing.

"Well, that is what I like! And now . . . good-bye!" he said, arising to go.

"Good-bye! I wish to thank you once more and I am so very grateful and obligated to you . . ." murmured Janina.

"If you only knew how much kindness people have shown me! I would like to repay only one hundredth part of it to others. I will add yet that we shall no doubt meet each other in the spring."

"Where?" asked Janina.

"Bah! I don't know! but that it will be in the theater of that I am sure, for I have determined to join the theater in the spring, if only for a half year so that I may gain a better knowledge of the stage."

"Oh, that's an excellent idea!"

"Now we are even with one another, as my father used to say after he had massaged my hide so that it shone as though freshly tanned. I leave you my address and say nothing, only remind you that you are to tell me everything by letter . . . everything! Do you give me your word?"

"I give you my word!" Janina answered gravely.

"I trust your word as though it were that of a man, although with women a word of honor is usually an empty word only, which they make use of, but never fulfill. Goodbye!"

Glogowski pressed both her hands firmly, raised them a little as though he were eager to kiss them, but quickly dropped them again, glanced into her eyes, laughed a trifle unnaturally and departed.

Janina sat thinking for a long time about him. She felt so deep a gratitude toward him and felt so cheered and strengthened by her talk with him that she regretted she did not know on what train Glogowski was leaving, for she had a desire to see him once more.

Then again, there arose in her something that protested loudly against the aid he had given her, something that saw in that kindness an insult.

"Alms!" Janina whispered bitterly and felt a burning pain of humiliation.

"Can't I live alone, can't I get along by my own unaided strength, can't I be sufficient unto myself? Must I continually lean on someone for support? Must there always be someone watching over me? The others know how to help themselves, why can't I?" she asked herself.

Janina pondered over this, but a moment later she went to the pawnshop to redeem her bracelet and on the way bought herself an inexpensive autumn hat.

Life dragged on for her slowly, sluggishly, and wearily.

Janina was sustained only by the hope, or rather by a deep faith that all this would change radically and soon, and in this longing anticipation she began to pay ever more attention to Wladek. She knew that he loved her. She listened almost daily to his confessions and proposals, smiling deep within herself and thinking that in spite of all she could not become that which her companions became. Their mode of life aroused a deep aversion in her for she felt a truly organic revulsion to all forms of filth. But these attentions of Wladek had at least this effect, that they awakened in her for the first time conscious thoughts of love.

She dreamed at moments of loving a man to whom she could give herself entirely and for all time; she dreamed of a united life full of ecstasy and love, such a love as poets presented in their plays; and then there would pass before her mind the figures of all the great lovers about whom she had read, passionate whispers, burning embraces, volcanic passions and that whole Titanic love life, the remembrance of which sent a tremor of delight through her.

Janina did not know whence these dreams came, but they would visit her ever more frequently in spite of the poverty which again began to grow more distressing, and the frequent hunger that gripped her as it were in bony embrace. Her bracelet again went to the pawnshop, for she continually had to buy some new article of wear for the stage, so that often she was forced to deny herself food only to be able to buy what she needed. New plays were continually presented to draw the public but success was as far off as ever.

Such a situation harassed and tormented Janina dreadfully, robbing her of her strength, but it also awakened a rebellion which began to seethe silently within her. She felt at first an indefinable animosity toward everybody. She regarded with a fierce envy the women whom she met on the street.

Often, she would be seized with a mad desire to stop one of those well-dressed ladies and ask her whether she knew what poverty was. She observed intently their faces, their clothes, and their smiles and came to the painful conclusion that these ladies could not know that there were other people who suffered, wept, and were hungry. But later Janina began to reason that she herself was dressed in the same way as these other women; that there may be among them others in the same plight as she, and that perhaps unknowingly they passed her on the way, hungry and desperate, hurling the same glances at other passers-by that she did. She tried to distinguish the faces of such sufferers in the multitude, but could not. All appeared to be satisfied and happy.

Then, something like the triumph of her own ascendancy over this well-dressed and well-fed multitude lit up Janina's face. She felt herself to be far superior to this world of everyday mortals.

"I have an idea, an aim!" she thought. "What do they live for? What is their object in life?" she would often ask herself. And unable to answer that question, Janina would smile pityingly at the emptiness of their existence.

"A race of butterflies that knows not whence, nor why, nor to what end their life has been given them!" she whispered, sating herself to her heart's content with that silent scorn of people that was growing to abnormal proportions in her.

Cabinska, Janina now hated with her whole soul, for although Pepa always treated her with a sugary affability, she never paid her for Yadzia's piano lessons, taking advantage of Janina's situation and abilities with a hypocritical smile of friendliness. Janina could not sever relations with her, for she felt distinctly that behind that mask of politeness that Pepa wore there was hidden a fury who would not forgive her that. Furthermore, she hated Cabinska as a woman, a mother, and an actress. She had come to know her well, and moreover, in her present period of continual strain and struggle, she had either to love or hate someone immensely. Janina did not love anyone as yet, but already she hated.

"Do you know it is hardly believable that such an incompetent judge as the directress should herself assign the roles for all our plays!" she once remarked to Wladek greatly embittered by the fact that she had been ignored in the selection of the cast for an old melodramatic caricature entitled Martin, the Foundling.

"It is too bad that you did not ask her for a role for, as you see, the director can do nothing," said Wladek.

"Quite true! That's a good idea! I'll try it to-morrow."

"Ask her for the role of 'Mary' in Doctor Robin which we are to present next week. Some amateur wishes to join our company and he is to make his debut as 'Garrick.'"

"What sort of role is that of 'Mary?'"

"A splendid display role! I think that you would act it superbly. I can bring you the play, if you wish."

"Good! we can read it together."

On the morrow Janina received a solemn promise from Cabinska that she would be given the part.

In the afternoon Wladek brought Doctor Robin. This was his first visit to Janina's home, so he took care to appear particularly handsome, elegant, polite, and somewhat absent-minded. He acted love and respect for Janina with the skill of a virtuoso; he was very quiet, as though from an excess of happiness.

"For the first time I feel shy and happy!" he said, kissing Janina's hand.

"Why shy? You are always so sure of yourself on the stage!" she answered, a bit confused.

"Yes, on the stage, where one only plays happiness, but not here . . . where I am really happy."

"Happy?" she repeated.

Wladek glanced at Janina with such passionate intensity, with such mastery of facial expression, accentuated by a rapturous smile, simulating the ecstasy and transport of love, that had he shown this on the stage he would have been warmly applauded. Janina understood him excellently and something stirred in her as though some new string in her heart had been lightly plucked.

Wladek began to read the play. With each of "Mary's" words, Janina's enthusiastic nature burst forth anew. With bated breath, and eyes fixed on Wladek, she listened, not daring to mar, either by word or gesture, the impression that his reading made on her. She feared to dispel the charm that spoke through his eloquent voice and in the velvety softness of his black eyes.

When he had finished reading, the girl cried out in rapture: "What a splendid role!"

"I am willing to wager that you will make a furore in it," remarked Wladek.

"Yes . . . I feel that I could play it fairly well. 'Garrick, that creator of souls, so mighty in Coriolanus!'" she whispered, repeating a remembered line of the play.

And Janina's face glowed with such fervor, so radiant did she become with her deep inner joy, that Wladek scarcely recognized her.

"You are an enthusiast," he said.

"Yes, because I love art! Give all for art and everything is contained in art! . . . that is my motto. Beyond art I see almost nothing," answered Janina suddenly kindling anew with ardor.

"Even love?" asked Wladek.

"But art appears to me to be a greater and completer expression of the ideal than love . . ." answered Janina.

"But it is more alien to human beings and not so necessary to life as is love. Without art the world could exist, but without love . . . never! Moreover, art causes more painful disappointments than love."

"But it also gives greater joys. Love is an individual emotion; art is a social emotion, a synthesis. One loves it with one's humanity, one suffers for it, but only through art does one sometimes become immortal!"

"Those are dreams. Thousands have given their lives to become convinced of that and thousands have cursed that unattainable mirage."

"But those thousands had their lives filled with that mirage and felt more than one can feel, who dreams about nothing."

"But since they were not happy, what is it all worth?"

"And are most people happy?"

"A thousandfold more so than we!"

Wladek emphasized that "we" significantly.

"Never!" cried Janina, "for our happiness lies in pain as it does in joy, in dejection as well as ecstasy. Even this in itself is happiness: to be able to develop one's self spiritually; to reach far out into infinity with the arms of desire; to create new worlds in our mind, larger and more beautiful than those surrounding us; to chant, even through tears and pain, hymns to beauty and immortality; to dream, but to dream so intensely as to forget about life entirely and to live in dreams alone!"

Janina felt so great a flood of happiness and inspiration flowing into her soul that she spoke, as it were, only in periods of her thought, so that she might express herself at least in part. She spoke, entirely forgetful of the fact that some one was listening to her and spun out aloud ever grander and ever more evanescent dreams.

Wladek at first listened attentively, but later grew impatient.

"A comedienne!" he thought with irony. And he was sure that Janina was unfurling before him the peacock feathers of fervor and enthusiasm merely to fascinate and conquer him. He did not answer or interrupt her, for it finally began to bore him.

"That role of 'Mary' is a trifle too sentimental . . ." added Janina after a longer silence.

"To me it seemed merely lyrical," answered Wladek.

"I should like some time to play 'Ophelia.'"

"Are you familiar with Hamlet?" asked Wladek, somewhat surprised.

"During the last two years I have read nothing but dramas and dreamed of the stage," she answered simply.

"Truly it is worth bending the knee before such enthusiasm!"

"Why? All that is necessary is to help it, to give it a field, an opportunity. . . ."

"If I only could. . . . Believe me when I say, that with my whole heart I desire to see you reach the heights of art."

"I believe you," Janina answered in a quieter tone. "And I thank you very much for Doctor Robin."

"May I copy out the role for you?"

"I will copy it myself; it will give me a certain pleasure."

"While you are learning it, I could act as a prompter for you, if you like."

"Oh, I should not want to take up any of your time . . ."

"Exclude a few hours each day for the performance and the rest of my time is yours to dispose of as you will," he said with fervor.

They gazed at each other a moment.

Janina gave Wladek her hand; he held and kissed it for a long time.

"Beginning with to-morrow I shall start to learn the part for I have a day off," said Janina.

"I also do not appear on the stage to-morrow."

Wladek went out a little angry at himself, for although he called Janina a "comedienne" she had made him feel abashed with her simplicity and enthusiasm. Moreover, he felt in her a certain intellectual and artistic superiority.

Janina feverishly applied herself to the study of Doctor Robin. In a few days she knew not only the role of "Mary," but had memorized the entire play. So intensely eager was she to play the role, that it seemed as though she were staking her whole life on this performance. Her former dreams that had been subdued a bit by poverty and the feverish life of the theater now again burst forth with a flaming intensity that dazzled and hypnotized her. The theater again took so powerful a hold on Janina that there was no room in her consciousness for anything else. In her hours of ecstasy it appeared to her like a mystic altar suspended high above the gray vale of everyday life and glowing with flames like a second burning bush of Moses; it seemed to her like a miracle that endured eternally.

Wladek came to see Janina each day in the interval between the rehearsal and the performance, although he was already beginning to be immensely bored by her endlessly repeated raptures and was growing impatient over the fact that in her mad absorption in art she did not pay much attention to him. He could not penetrate her morbid enthusiasm, as he called it, with his love, but he nevertheless continued to go to her.

He began to desire Janina's love ever more strongly. He was invited by her naivete and by the talent which he felt she possessed. Moreover, he had long since desired just such an elegant and educated mistress. He wanted by all means to possess this refined and genteel girl, who was so different from his former mistresses and who captivated him by the charm of her superiority. His triumph would be all the greater, he told himself, because of the fact that she seemed to him one of those ladies of the fashionable world upon whom he would often cast covetous glances in the Ujazdowskie Allees.

Janina had not told Wladek that she loved him, but he already saw it in her eyes and spun an ever stronger web about her made up of smiles, passionate words, sighs, and exaggerated respect.

For Janina this was the most beautiful period that she had known in her life. Poverty she treated with scorn, as though it were only a temporary thing that would soon pass away.

Sowinska, after Wladek's frequent visits, became more intimate and friendly with Janina and advised her to sell those parts of her wardrobe which she did not need, even offering to do it for her.

And so life went on for Janina who was oblivious to everything else but that performance of Doctor Robin which she awaited with the greatest impatience. She lived, as it were, in a troubled dream. Through the prism of dreams the world again appeared brighter to her, and people kind. She forgot about everything, even about Glogowski, whose recent letter she laid away only half read, for she now lived entirely in the future. She fortified herself against the present with dreams of what was to come.

Furthermore, Janina loved Wladek. She did not know how it had come about, but she now knew that she could not do without him. She felt very happy and peaceful, when, leaning on his arm, she walked along the streets and listened to his low, melodious voice. The soft velvety glances of his dark eyes made her glow with passion and a sweet helplessness . . . .

Everything about him attracted her. He appeared so beautiful upon the stage! He acted with such fervor and lyricism the parts of unhappy lovers in the melodramas! He spoke, moved about and posed with such charming simplicity. He was the favorite of the public; even the press bestowed frequent praises upon him and predicted a brilliant artistic future for him.

It pleased Janina to see him applauded on the stage. And so skillfully did he know how to exhibit the resources of his brain, that he was generally taken for an educated man, while in reality he possessed only cleverness and the brazenness of a Warsaw loafer and trickster. Moreover, for Janina he was the first and only man to whom she had ever surrendered herself. It seemed to her that this bound them for all time and indissolubly.

It happened, as it were, of itself, after one of the rehearsals of Doctor Robin in which Wladek acted as a substitute in the role of "Garrick." When they had left the theater he spoke or rather declaimed to her about love with a volcanic outburst of passion and accentuated his emotion with such pathos that he stirred her to the very depths of her soul. She felt sudden tears of tenderness welling up in her eyes; and a desire for tremendous happiness through life and death remained in her dreaming heart. Her whole soul was absorbed in the desire for love.

Janina did not even know what was happening to her, for she could not resist the fascination of his voice. That musical pleading of love, those burning kisses, and those passionate glances flooded her entire being with an overwhelming and mad desire for joy. She abandoned herself to him with the passiveness of a fascinated creature, without a word of protest or resistance, but also without a consciousness of what she was doing; in a word, she was hypnotized.

She did not even know what it was in him that she loved: the actor masterfully playing upon her emotions and enthusiasm, or the man. Janina did not think of this. She loved him because she loved him and because he personified the theater and art for her.

It seemed to Janina that through his eyes she saw farther and deeper. Her soul was growing (as the peasants describe certain stages in the development of youth), so besides her distant plans of fame in the future, she needed something for herself alone, she needed to strengthen herself and support herself on some loving heart which would at the same time serve as a stepping-stone for her own elevation. She no longer felt lonely, for she could now reveal to Wladek her most secret thoughts, dreams, and projects for the future and go over various heroic roles together with him. He was a sort of physical complement of her, and outlet for her excessive energy and dreams.

Janina did not submerge and lose herself in Wladek's being, but rather absorbed him into herself. And not for one moment did she think that she had surrendered herself to him, that he was henceforth her lover and lord and that she belonged to him! She did not even consider whether he had a soul or not. It sufficed her to know that he was handsome, popular, that he loved her and that she needed him. Even in her most intimate confidences and whispers of love there was a tone of unconscious superiority. She spoke with him continually but almost never asked him for his opinion and very seldom listened to his replies. Wladek could not understand this, but he was conscious of it and it acted as an unpleasant restraint upon him, for in spite of their intimate relation, he could not feel at ease with her in his own way. It wounded his self-love, but he had no way of remedying it. He possessed her body, but not her soul that mysterious something, that love that gives itself for life and eternity and makes of itself a footstool for the lover. This attitude of Janina's irritated him, but nevertheless attracted him so irresistibly that he doubled his pretenses of love, thinking that by a larger dose of sentimental falsehood, and a better acting of emotion he would at last captivate and conquer her completely. However, he did not succeed in doing so.

Janina, aside from this love, gradually renounced everything, yet in spite of that she felt content. She often suffered hunger, but it was enough for her to have Wladek at her side and to become absorbed in her role, to forget about the whole world.

The performance of Doctor Robin was postponed from day to day, for the amateur who was to make his debut in it became ill. In the meanwhile, other plays had to be given; so Janina was forced to content herself with waiting. She was consumed by impatience and the ambition to rise at once above the throng of her companions and was also impelled by the hope of ending her poverty by this means and finally, by the need of her own soul which had formed its own conception of the character of "Mary" and had to give it forth.

Janina did not even pay attention to what was brewing behind the scenes where every day schemes and projects for new companies were formed, only to be abandoned after a few days. Krzykiewicz had already delicately suggested to Janina on a few occasions that, if she wished, she could secure an engagement with Ciepieszewski. She declined, for she remembered Topolski's project and wished to wait for its realization, knowing that he was counting on her for sure.

Topolski was in reality organizing a company. It was meant to be a secret as yet, but everyone knew about it. It was openly said that Mimi, Wawrzecki, Piesh with his wife, and a few of the younger forces had already signed a contract and that Topolski had quietly closed a deal for the Lubelsk Theater, a new building that had just been opened. It was known for certain that Kotlicki and others had advanced him the necessary capital.

Cabinski, of course, knew all about this and loudly ridiculed these projects. He knew very well that he could win back all those who had joined Topolski by merely giving them larger advances on their salaries. He predicted that Topolski would not hold out for one season and would go to smash, for he did not believe that anyone was willing to loan him money for organizing a new company.

"There are no longer any such fools!" he said aloud with conviction. What amused him most was Topolski's proposed reform of the theater which he unceremoniously termed an idiocy. Cabinski knew the public well and knew what it wanted.

Topolski held frequent soirees at his home to which he invited all those whom he might need. But he did not yet speak openly about his company, leaving that to Wawrzecki who treated the matter enthusiastically as though it were his own and used it to taunt Cabinski with and to create more frequent rumpuses about his overdue salary.

Janina was present at a few of these evenings at Topolski's house, but was bored by them, for the men would usually play cards, while the women, if they were not gossiping or complaining, would enclose themselves within a narrow circle for secret whispering from which they barred Janina, fearing that she might betray something to Cabinski, to whose home she went daily to give piano lessons.

At the last of these evenings, while they were having tea, Majkowska quietly begged Janina to stay a little longer, promising that she and Topolski would accompany her home.

Wladek never appeared at these affairs, for he was an open and stanch supporter of Cabinski.

After all the rest had gone Topolski sat opposite Janina and began to tell her about the company he was organizing.

"It will be an exemplary theater for true art! I have a splendid ensemble of actors; I have made a contract for one of the best theaters, the library is ready to be sent away and the costumes are already half completed, hence we have almost all that is needed."

"What are you still lacking?" asked Janina, determining immediately to ask for an engagement.

"A little money . . . a mere trifle of about a thousand rubles as a working capital for the first month," answered Topolski.

"Couldn't you borrow it?"

"Yes . . . and that is precisely what I want to talk over with you in a friendly way, for we already count you as one of us. I will give you a good salary and alternating roles with Mela for I know that you are a capable actress. You have the appearance, the voice and the temperament, and, aside from intelligence, that is just what is required to make an excellent actress."

"Oh thank you, thank you sincerely!" cried Janina beaming with joy. And so elated was she that she kissed Majkowska, who, as was her habit, was almost lying on the table and gazing absently at the lamp.

"But you must help us!" said Topolski after a short pause.

"I? What can I do?" she asked in surprise.

"A great deal! If you only want to . . ." he answered.

"Well! if you say that I can, then, of course I shall be glad to help, for it is not only my duty, but also in my own interest! But I'm very curious to know what I can do."

"It's a question of that one thousand rubles. The money is already assured, only there is one little condition . . ."

"What is it?" Janina asked curiously.

Topolski drew closer to her, took hold of her hands in a friendly way and only then answered:

"Miss Janina not only our theater, but your entire artistic future depends on this, so I will tell you frankly that there is someone who is ready to give even two thousand rubles, but he said that he would give them only to you personally, otherwise not at all."

"Who is that person?" she asked uneasily.

"Kotlicki!"

Janina dropped her head and for a while a deep silence reigned in the room. Topolski gazed at her uneasily, while Majkowska had upon her face an indescribably derisive smile.

Janina almost cried out with pain, so repulsive did that name and proposal strike her and after a moment she arose from her chair and said in a determined voice: "No! I will not go to Kotlicki . . . and that which you have proposed to me is insulting and outrageous! Only in the theater can people lose so entirely their moral sense as to persuade others to base acts and purposely push them into the mire of degradation, so that they themselves may profit. You have miscalculated this time, my dear sir! I have not fallen so low as that. What hurts me is that you could think even for a moment that I would agree to go to Kotlicki, to Kotlicki, who is more repulsive to me than the basest reptile!" she cried, carried away by passion.

"Miss Janina! Let us speak it over calmly and sensibly, without getting excited."

"You dare to tell me not to get excited?"

"I must, for you are simply inexperienced; consequently that which I ask of you appears to you as something monstrous, something that will immediately sink you in the mud, dishonor you, and shame you."

"For God's sake, what is it then, if not just that!" Janina cried in amazement.

"Let us stop playing a comedy, let us drop this game of hide-and-seek and look at things as they are and we shall see that I am not proposing anything out of the ordinary to you. What am I asking of you? Merely that you go to Kotlicki for the money which is to be the foundation of our common future, the money which will create our theater for us and without which none of us can budge from Warsaw. So what is there wrong in this? What wrong can there be in that which will make almost all of us happy?"

"What? Is it possible that you do not see any wrong in the fact that I, a woman should go alone to the home of a man? And for what will he give me that one thousand or two thousand rubles?"

"When you lived with Glogowski no one regarded it as wrong. Now, when you are living with Wladek who blames you for it? After all, what is there so dreadfully dishonorable about it? We all live that way; and are we thereby committing anything base? . . . No! for that is a secondary thing, for we have something more important in our minds: art!"

"No, I will not go!" answered Janina quietly, depressed by the discovery that they all knew about her relation with Wladek.