Without Dogma by Henryk Sienkiewicz

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The hero of the evening worsted, the conservatives came over to me in
a body, and I might have become the hero now; but it was getting late,
I was bored, and wanted to get back to Ploszow. Gradually the others
too began to disperse. I was already in my fur coat and searching
for my eyeglasses, that had slipped between the coat and furs, when
Stawowski, who evidently had found his answer, came up to me and
said:--

"You asked why--"

I, still searching for the eyeglasses and rather put out, said
impatiently:--

"Plainly speaking, the question does not interest me very much. It is
getting late and everybody is leaving; besides I can guess what you
are going to say, therefore permit me to wish you good-night."

I fancy I have made an enemy of the man, especially by my last remark.

It was one o'clock when I arrived at Ploszow, and there a pleasant
surprise awaited me; Aniela was sitting up to make some tea for me. I
found her in the dining-room, still fully dressed, with the exception
of her hair, which was done up for the night. From the intense delight
I felt in seeing her thus unexpectedly, I perceived how deeply she had
entered into my heart. What a dear girl she is, and how pretty she
looks with the tresses coiled low down her neck. And to think that I
have only to say the word and in a month or two I might have the right
to undo those tresses and let them fall on her shoulders. I cannot
think of it quietly. It seems past all belief that happiness should be
so easy to get.

I began to scold her a little for sitting up so late, and she
replied:--

"But I was not in the least sleepy, and begged mamma and aunty to let
me sit up for you. Mamma would not allow it, said it was not proper;
but I explained to her that we were cousins, and that makes all the
difference. And do you know who took my part?--auntie."

"Dear aunt! You will take some tea with me, will you not?"

I watched her handling the cups with those deft, graceful fingers, and
felt a desire to kiss them.

She looked at me now and then, but upon meeting my eyes her eyelashes
drooped. Presently she inquired how I had spent the evening, and what
impressions I had carried away. We spoke in a low voice, though the
sleeping-rooms were far enough away to make it unnecessary. There was
such confidence and heartiness in our intercourse as among relatives
who are fond of each other.

I told her what I had seen and noticed, as one tells a friend. I spoke
about the general impression the society of the country makes upon a
man that has chiefly lived abroad. She listened quietly with wide-open
eyes, happy to be thus taken into confidence. Then she said:--

"Why do you not write about all that, Leon? That I do not think
of such things is not to be wondered at; but nobody else here has
thoughts like these."

"Why do I not write?" I replied. "There are many reasons for it. I
will explain to you some time; one of them is that I have nobody near
me who, like you, says: 'Leon, why do you not do something?'"

After this we both became silent. I had never seen Aniela's lashes
veil her eyes so closely, and I could almost hear the beating of her
heart.

And indeed she had a right to expect me to say: "Will you remain with
me always and put the same question?" But I found such a keen delight
in skirting the precipice before making the final plunge, and feeling
that heart palpitating almost in my hand that I could not do it.

"Good-night," I said, after a short time.

And that angelic creature gave not the slightest sign that she had met
with a disappointment. She rose, and with the least touch of sadness
in her voice, but no impatience, replied: "Good-night."

We shook hands and parted for the night. My hand was already on the
latch, when I turned round and saw her still standing near the table.

"Aniela! Tell me," I said, "do you not think me a fantastic kind of
man, full of whims and fancies?"

"Oh, no, not fantastic; sometimes I think you a little strange, but
then I say to myself that men like you are bound to be different from
others."

"One question more; when was it you thought me strange the first
time?"

Aniela blushed to the tips of her ears. How pretty she looked with the
pink flame spreading over her face and neck.

"No, I could not tell you."

"Then let me guess, and if I am right say yes. It is a single word."

"What word?" she asked, with increased confusion.

"Tablets. Yes, or no?"

"Yes," said Aniela, with drooping eyes.

"Then I will tell you why I wrote those words. First, because I wanted
a link connecting us together, a little secret shared by both of us,
and also--"

I pointed at the flowers the gardener had brought from the hot-house.

"You know flowers want light to bring out all their beauty, and I
wanted plenty of light for our atmosphere."

"I cannot always follow you," she said, after a momentary silence,
"but I trust you, yes, and believe in you."

We remained once more silent; I pressed her hand again, saying
good-night. We stopped near the door, and our eyes met. The waters
begin to rise and to rise. They will overstep their boundary any
moment.

23 February.

The human being, like the sea, has his ebb and flood tides. To-day my
will, my energy, the very action of life are at a very low tide. It
came upon me without warning, a mere matter of nerves. But for that
very reason my thoughts are full of bitterness. What right have I,
a man physically worn out and mentally exhausted, to marry at all?
Involuntarily the words of Hamlet come in my mind: "Get thee to a
nunnery; why wouldst thou be a breeder of sinners?" I shall not bury
myself within cloister walls. The future sinners will be like me,
all nerves, oversensitive, not fit for any practical life,--in fact,
artists without portfolios. But the deuce take it, it is not they, but
Aniela I am thinking of. Have I a right to marry her,--to link that
fresh budding life, full of simple faith in God and the world, to my
doubts, my spiritual impotence, my hopeless scepticism, my criticism
and nerves? What will be the result of it for her? I cannot regain
another spiritual youth, and even at her side cannot find my old self;
my brains cannot change, or my nerves grow more vigorous,--and what
then? Is she to wither at my side? It would be simply monstrous. I to
play the part of a polypus that sucks the life-blood of its victims in
order to renew its own life! A heavy cloud weighs on my brain. But if
such be the case why did I allow it to go so far? What have I been
doing ever since I met Aniela? Playing on her very heartstrings to
bring forth sweet music. And yet, what for me was "Quasi una fantasia"
may prove to her "Quasi un dolore." Yes, I have played on that
sensitive instrument from morning until night; and what is more,
I feel that in spite of my self-upbraidings, I shall do the same
to-morrow and the days following, for I cannot help it; she attracts
me more than any woman I ever met, I desire her above all things--I
love her!

Why delude myself any longer?--I love her!

What is to be done? Must I go away back to Rome? That means a
disappointment and sorrow for her; for who knows how deeply rooted
her feelings may be? To marry her is the same as to sacrifice her for
myself, and make her life unhappy in another way. A truly enchanted
circle! Only people of the Ploszowski species ever get into such
dilemmas. And there is devilish little comfort in the thought that
there are more such as I, or that their name is legion.

Whether the species be gradually dying out, as badly fitted for the
struggle of life, remains to be seen; for in addition to an incapacity
for life, there is ill luck as well. I might have met such an Aniela
ten years ago, when my sails were not, as now, worn to shreds and
patches.

If that honest soul, my aunt, knew how, with the best of intentions,
she brought me to this pass, she would be truly grieved. There was
tragedy enough in my life,--the consciousness of utter failure, the
dark mist in which my thoughts were straying; now there is a new,--to
be, or not to be; but no, it is far worse than that!

26 February.

Yesterday I went again to Warsaw by appointment, to meet a certain Pan
Julius Keo, on whose estates I lodged part of the capital I inherited
from my mother. Pan Julius Keo wants to pay off the mortgage, and
asked me to meet him at a fixed time; and I waited for him the whole
day. The devil take their ways of managing any business in this
country! He will make five other appointments, and not keep one. He is
very rich, wants to get rid of the mortgage, and is able to pay it off
any time; and yet--such is our way of transacting business.

From my own observations I long since came to the conclusion that in
money matters we are the most flighty and unbusinesslike people in the
world. I, who like to go to the root of matters, often pondered over
this phenomenon.

According to my ideas, this is the result of the purely agricultural
occupation of the people. Commerce was in the hands of the Jews, and
these could not teach us accuracy; the cultivator of the soil is
unreliable because the soil is unreliable, he is unpunctual because
nature has no punctuality. Working in the soil, they gradually take
some of its characteristics, which enters into their moral being, and
in the course of time becomes an inherited defect.

The knowledge of cause and effect does not restore me to an equable
temper. I had to tear myself away from Aniela for a whole day, and
what is more, shall have to go through the some process a few
days hence; but it cannot be helped. In my aunt's house I found
visiting-cards from Kromitzki,--one for me and two for the elder
ladies. I was afraid he might take it into his head to pay us a
visit at Ploszow; to avoid that, I went out to leave my card on him.
Unfortunately for me, he was at home, and I had to stay half an hour.
He began his conversation by telling me that he had promised to call
at Ploszow; to which I replied that we had gone there merely for a few
days, and would be back in town almost immediately. He asked after
Aniela's mother, and very guardedly after Aniela herself. He evidently
wanted to impress me with the fact that he inquired as a mere
acquaintance. I am so impressionable that even this gave me a twinge;
how I loathe that man! I fancy the Tartars under Batu Khan must have
played many pranks in what is to-day Austrian Silesia, when looting
the country after the battle of Liegnitz. That those black eyes, like
roasted coffee-berries, did not come from Silesian ancestors, I have
not the slightest doubt.

He was exceedingly polite to me, because I am rich. It is true, he
wants nothing from me,--I do not give him anything, and my being rich
is of no advantage to him; but as a financier he worships money. We
spoke about the difficulties in which Aniela's mother was and is still
involved. According to Kromitzki, a great deal of her fortune might
still be saved if she would part with the estate. Kromitzki looks upon
the reluctance to part with ancestral lands as a mere fad. He said he
might be able to understand it if she had the means to prevent it, but
as the case stood it was mere sentimentality.

He is very talkative, and discussed at some length our national
idiocy. Money was lying on the pavement, to be had for the picking up.
His father, like other noblemen, had left scarcely any fortune; when
all debts were cleared off there remained a paltry hundred thousand
florins, and the world knew how he, Kromitzki, stood at present.

"If that business in Turkestan comes off, I shall be able to wind up
my affairs. The Jews and Greeks have made millions in the contract
business; why should not we be able to do as well? I do not put
myself as an example; but I say, why should we not? There is room for
everybody,--why not go in for it?"

According to my opinion, Kromitzki has a certain aptness for business,
but is foolish in a general sense. That we are shiftless, everybody
knows that; and that here and there somebody makes a fortune by
contracts, I can well believe; but the greater part of the people must
work at home, and not look for millions from contracts in Turkestan.

May God save Aniela from an alliance with that man. He may have some
good qualities, but he belongs to a different moral type. If there be
a worse fate in store for her, ought I to hesitate any longer?

28 February.

The elder ladies seem uneasy that the affair is not going on as
speedily as they had fancied; my aunt, who is of an impatient temper,
must chafe inwardly not a little. But the expression of happiness on
Aniela's face soothes them, and allays their fears. I can read in her
eyes endless trust and thorough belief in me. She fills my thoughts so
that I cannot think of anything but her. I desire her more and more,
and do not want to play upon her feelings any longer,--I want her.

4 March.

This day has been to me of so much importance that I am obliged to
muster all my calmness and self-possession to put down everything in
its proper order. Nevertheless, I cannot contain myself. The die is
cast, or as good as cast. I could not have gone on quietly, had I not
put that down.

And now I can begin. Sniatynski and his wife arrived here towards
noon, for an early dinner. He had to go back, as a new play of his
is coming out at the theatre. However happy we may be in our rural
seclusion, we are always delighted to see them. Aniela is great
friends with Pani Sniatynska, and I suppose there will be an exchange
of confidences. Pani Sniatynska guessed at the state of things, and
tried to put her hand to the wheel, to make the cart go a little
faster. She had only just arrived, when she said to my aunt:--

"How lovely and peaceful everything is here! No wonder the young
people there do not pine after the dissipations of town."

We both, Aniela and I, understood perfectly well that Pani Sniatynska,
calling us the young people, was not referring only to our age.
Besides, she repeated the same thing several times during dinner: "the
young people," "the young couple," as if making a pointed difference
between us two and the elder ladies. But there was such real sympathy
for us in the friendly eyes; such a pricking up of her little ears to
hear what we were saying to each other; and the little woman looked so
charming withal that I forgive her readily her good-natured meddling.
I have arrived at such a state of infatuation that this coupling of
our names rather gladdens than irritates me. Aniela too seemed to hear
it with pleasure. In her efforts to please the Sniatynskis and the
attentions she bestowed on them during dinner, she truly looked like a
young bride, who receives dear visitors for the first time in her new
home. At the sight of this my aunt's heart seemed to swell, and she
said many kind and polite things to both Sniatynskis. I noticed a
wonderful thing, which I should not believe had I not seen it with my
own eyes. Pani Sniatynska blushes up to her ears when anybody praises
her husband! To blush with pleasure when her husband is praised after
eight years of married life! Surely, I committed an egregious mistake
writing as I did about Polish women.

The dinner passed off very pleasantly. A married couple, like these
two, are born matchmakers. The very sight of them sets people
thinking: "If married life is like that, let us go and commit
matrimony." I at least saw it for the first time in a quite different
light,--not as the prose of life, a commonplace, more or less
skilfully disguised indifference, but as a thing to be desired.

Aniela evidently read our future in the same light; I saw it in her
eyes shining with happiness.

After dinner I remained in the dining-room with Sniatynski, who liked
a quiet talk over a glass of cognac after his coffee. The elder ladies
went to the drawing-room, and Aniela took Pani Sniatynska upstairs to
show her some photographs of Volhynia. I questioned Sniatynski about
his new play, the fate of which seemed to make him a little anxious.
Our conversation drifted on to those times when we both tried our
sprouting wings. He told me how afterwards, step by step, he had
worked his way upward; how he had been full of doubts, and still
doubted his power, in spite of having acquired a certain reputation.

"Tell me," I asked, "what do you do with your fame?"

"How do you mean what I do with my fame?"

"For instance, do you wear it as a crown on your head, or as a golden
fleece round your neck? do you put it over your writing-desk, or hang
it up in your drawing-room? I only ask as a man who has no idea what
to do with it if he once obtains it?"

"Let us suppose I have won it; the man must be deuced ill-bred
mentally either to wear the so-called fame as an ornament or to put it
up for show. I confess that at first it gratifies one's vanity; but
only a spiritual parvenu would find it sufficient to fill the whole
life, or take the place of real happiness. It is quite another thing
to be conscious you are doing good work; that the public appreciates
it, and that your work calls forth an echo in other minds,--a public
man has the right to feel pleased with that. But as to feeling
gratified when somebody, looking more or less foolish, comes up and
says: 'We are indebted to you for so much pleasure;' or, when a dinner
does not agree with me, our daily press remarks: 'We communicate
to our readers the sad news that our famous XX suffers from a
stomachache,'--pshaw! what do you take me for, that such a thing could
give me satisfaction?"

"Listen," I said, "I am not inordinately vain; but I confess that,
when people speak of my extraordinary talents, and regret that I make
not a better use of them, it flatters me; and though I feel more
than ever my uselessness, it gives me pleasure; humankind is fond of
approbation."

"That is because you pity yourself, and in that you are quite right.
But you are turning away from the question. I do not say that it would
give one pleasure to be called an ass."

"But the public esteem that goes hand in hand with fame?"

Sniatynski, who is very lively and always walks about the room,
sitting down on any table or chair, now sat on the window-sill, and
replied:--

"Public esteem? You are wrong there, old fellow; there is no such
thing. Ours is a strange society, dominated by a pure republican
jealousy. I write plays, work for the stage; very good. I have gained
a certain reputation; better still. Now, these plays excite the
jealousy,--of another playwright, you think? Not at all; it is the
engineer, the bank clerk, the teacher, the physician, the railway
official,--in short, people who never wrote a play in their
lives,--that envy you. All these in their intercourse will show that
they do not think much of you, will speak slightingly of you behind
your back, and belittle you on purpose, so as to add an inch or two to
their own height. 'Sniatynski? who is he? Yes, I remember; he dresses
at the same tailor as I.' Such is fame, my dear fellow."

"But if must be worth something, since people risk their lives for
it?"

Sniatynski grew thoughtful, and replied with a certain gravity:--

"In private life it is worth something; you can make a footstool of it
for the woman you love."

"You will gain a new fame by this definition."

Sniatynski rushed at me with lively impetuosity.

"Yes, yes; put all your laurels into a cushion, go to the dear one,
and say to her: 'This for which people risk their lives; this which
they consider supreme happiness, appreciate more than wealth,--I have
got it, striven for it; and now put your dear feet on it at once.' If
you do this, you will be loved all your life. You wanted to know what
fame is good for, and there you are."

Further discussions were cut short by the entrance of Pani Sniatynska
and Aniela. They were dressed for going out to the hot-houses. What an
imp of mischief lurks in that little woman. She came up to her husband
to ask his permission to go out, which he granted, insisting only that
she should wrap herself up warm; she turned to me and said with a
roguish smile,--

"You will let Aniela go, will you not?"

That Aniela should blush furiously was only natural, but that I,
an old stager, a razor sharpened against the strops of so many
experiences, should have betrayed so much confusion, I cannot forgive
myself. But, putting on a semblance of self-possession, I went up to
Aniela, and raising her hand to my lips, said:--

"It is Aniela who gives orders at Ploszow, and I am her humble
subject."

I should have liked to take Sniatynski with me and join the excursion,
but refrained. I felt a want to speak about Aniela, my future
marriage, and I knew that sooner or later Sniatynski himself would
broach the question. I gave him an opening after the ladies had left
us by saying:--

"And do you still believe as firmly as ever in your life-dogmas?"

"More than ever, or rather, the same as ever. There is no expression
more worn to tatters than the word 'love;' one scarcely likes to use
it; but between ourselves, I tell you; love in the general meaning,
love in the individual sense does not permit of criticism. It is one
of the canons of life. My philosophy consists in not philosophizing
about it at all,--and the deuce take me if for the matter of that, I
consider myself more foolish than other people. With love, life is
worth something; without, it is not worth a bag of chaff."

"Let us see what you have to say about individual love,--or better
still, put in its place woman."

"Very well, let it be woman."

"My good friend, do you not perceive on what brittle foundation you
are building human happiness?"

"On about as brittle a foundation as life,--no more nor less!"

I did not want to drift into a discussion of life and death, and
pulled Sniatynski up.

"For mercy's sake, do not generalize about individual happiness. You
chanced to find the right woman, another might not."

He would not even listen to that. According to his view, ninety out of
a hundred were successful. Women were better, purer, and nobler than
men.

"We are rascals all, in comparison with them!" he shouted, waving his
arms and snaking his leonine mane. "Nothing but rascals! It is I who
say it,--I, who study mankind closely, if only for the reason that I
am a playwright."

He was sitting astride on his chair, attacking me, as it were, with
the chairback, and went on with his usual impetuosity:--

"There are, as Dumas says, apes from the land of Nod, who know neither
curb nor bridle; but what are eyes given for but to see that you do
not take to wife an ape from Nod? Generally speaking a woman does not
betray her husband nor deceive him, unless he himself corrupts her
heart, tramples on her feelings, or repulses and estranges her by his
meanness, his selfishness, narrowness, and his miserable, worthless
nature. You must love her! Let her feel that she is not only your
female, but the crown of your head, as precious as your child and
friend; wear her close to your heart, let her feel the warmth of it,
and you may rest in peace; year after year she will cling closer to
you, until you two are like Siamese twins. If you do not give her all
that, you pervert her, estrange her by your worthlessness,--and she
will leave you. She will leave you as soon as she sees nobler hands
stretched out for her; she is forced to do it, as this warmth, this
appreciation, are as necessary to her life as the air she breathes."

He charged me with the chairback as with a battering ram. I retreated
before him until we had come close to the window; there he jumped up.

"How blind you are! In presence of such social drought, such utter
absence of general happiness as stamps our time, not to grasp this
felicity that is within reach! Shiver on the forum, and not light a
fire at home! Idiotism can go no farther! I tell you plainly, go and
get married."

He pointed through the window at Aniela, who with his wife was coming
back from the hot-houses, and added: "There is your happiness. There
it patters in fur boots on the frozen snow. Take her by weight of
gold, by weight in carats rather! You simply have no home, not only in
a physical sense, but in a moral, intellectual meaning; you have no
basis, no point of rest, and she will give you all that. But do not
philosophize her away as you have philosophized away your abilities
and your thirty-five years of life!"

He could not have told me anything better, nobler, or what chimed in
more with my own desires. I pressed his hands and replied:--

"No, I will not philosophize her away, because I love her."

Upon this the ladies entered, and Pani Sniatynska observed:--

"We heard some disputes when we were leaving, but I see peace is
restored. May I ask what you have been discussing?"

"Woman, madame," I said.

"And what was the result?"

"As you see, a treaty of peace sealed by a grasp of the hand, and
something further may come of it in the course of time."

The sledge was already waiting at the door. The short day was drawing
to its close, and they had to go back; but as the weather was calm,
and the snow on the drive as smooth as a parquetted floor, we
resolved, Aniela and I, to accompany them as far as the high-road.

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