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 v. I 
 
By the Same. 
 
 KEATA: WHAT'S IN A NAME. 
 
 NEW AND CHEAPER EDITION. 
 Complete in One Volume, Crown 8vo, price 6s. 
 
 SPECTATOR. 
 
 "It is long since we have read a story in which excellence of plot and excel- 
 lence of character-painting are so well combined. From the first page to the last 
 
 the reader is thoroughly interested in the story Such evenness of execution, 
 
 such admirable balance between the interest of the story, the interest of the 
 characters, and the mere interest of the local colouring itself, is very rare." 
 
 STANDARD. 
 "We have said that 'Reata' is a capital novel; and so it is. The plot is 
 original and excellent Bright and gay and sparkling." 
 
 LONDON GUARDIAN. 
 
 " It is pleasant to read a book that has evidently been a delight to the author, 
 full of play, as it were, showing exuberance of enjoyment of the scenes and 
 
 characters When read over again, with the key to the plot, the tale loses 
 
 nothing of its charm." 
 
 DAILY NEWS. 
 
 "The story is strikingly fresh and original." 
 
 VANITY FAIR. 
 
 " ' Reata' is one of those charming books which to read is to remember." 
 
 DAILY TELEGRAPH. 
 
 "A well-sustained dramatic interest marks it as a story ; and a fresh and easy 
 style aids the effect of this novel as a rolling panorama of scenes, which have 
 evidently been studied with keen observation." 
 
 GRAPHIC. 
 
 " It is impossible to avoid awarding it the highest praise. Whether in descrip- 
 tion of Mexican tropical scenery or German watering-place society, whether in 
 sketching the Prussian officer, or, place aux dames, the fascinating young Creole 
 heiress, the author is equally at home. The book is sure to take one of the first 
 places in the novels of the season, and we can in all sincerity congratulate the 
 author on having achieved a striking success. ' Reata' is a charming novel." 
 
 WILLIAM BLACKWOOD & SONS, Edinburgh and London. 
 
nf*&c- Ucz t^l^-^ 
 
 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUE 
 
"Die Ktinst reich zu werden, ist im Grande nichts Anderes, 
 als die Kunst sich des Eigenthums anderer Leute mit ilirem 
 guten Willen zu bemachtigen." — Wieland. 
 
BEGGAK MY NEIGHBOUR 
 
 A NOVEL 
 
 BY 
 
 E. D. GEEAKD 
 
 AUTHOR OF 'REATA: WHAT'S IN A NAME 
 
 IN THREE VOLUMES 
 VOL. I. 
 
 WILLIAM BLACKWOOD AND SONS 
 
 EDINBURGH AND LONDON 
 
 MDCCCLXXXII 
 

 CONTENTS OF THE FIRST VOLUME. 
 
 INTRODUCTORY, 
 
 PAGE 
 
 1 
 
 
 PART I. 
 
 CHAP. 
 
 I. THE CARDS ARE DEALT, 
 II. A NON-PLAYER, 
 III. ONE OF THE KNAVES, 
 IV. TWO OF THE QUEENS, 
 V. AT THE COURT OF THE SPADE 
 VI. FINESSING, 
 VII. QUEEN OF HEARTS, 
 VIII. MARCIN'S CARDS, 
 
 IX. QUEEN OF DIAMONDS, 
 X. CUTTING FOR PARTNERS, 
 XI. SHE LOST THE TRICK, 
 XII. " CARTES OUVERTES," 
 XIII. THE CARDS ARE SHUFFLED, 
 XIV. KING AND QUEEN, . 
 
 KING 
 
 13 
 39 
 
 54 
 66 
 77 
 101 
 119 
 138 
 164 
 182 
 205 
 230 
 243 
 267 
 
BEGGAB MY NEIGHBOUR 
 
 INTKODUCTOKY. 
 
 Three boys were playing at cards ; and the game they 
 played was " Beggar my Neighbour." 
 
 Not, strictly speaking, " Beggar my Neighbour," for 
 that is an English game, and these were Polish boys ; 
 but on every spot of earth, whether it be in England, 
 Poland, the tropic or the arctic regions, there is always 
 some way of beggaring one's neighbour, if only one 
 has the will and the talent for doing so. In differ- 
 ent countries the process has got different names — 
 at cards ; the result is everywhere the same. 
 
 A large and lofty room, with tall windows, curtain- 
 less ; a polished floor, carpetless ; stiff red velvet 
 chairs, which scarcely lessen the look of emptiness ; 
 an enormous mirror, hanging out of the perpendicular, 
 
 VOL. I. a 
 
2 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 which makes the room emptier, larger, more stately, 
 more dreary, and throws back a puny image of the 
 three children at their distant card-table. Far away 
 and dwarfish they look in their quaint costume, their 
 broad white collars and short green jackets. Their 
 voices wander up to the ceiling and waken echoes, — 
 three little figures swallowed up in their surroundings, 
 lost against their background. And not in the mirror 
 alone is an image of the card-players to be found. A 
 row of old portraits, dingy, and framed in dingy gold ; 
 Eoman- nosed Polish heroes, and simpering Polish 
 beauties, would make a spectator look from the canvas 
 to two at least of those boy-faces down there. 
 
 The eldest card-player — Kazimir by name — whose 
 age is eleven, has brown wavy hair, and eager, resolute 
 brown eyes, which correct the softness of his smiling 
 lips. He plays his cards with determination, but 
 scarcely with prudence ; for calmness has given way 
 at sight of the brilliant prize at stake, — an old bat- 
 tered silver watch, I think it was. 
 
 Martin, the second card-player, a year younger, is 
 like his brother — but as a blurred photograph is like 
 the original, as a face in the water is like a living face. 
 He does not play his cards at all, unless he be re- 
 minded to do it. 
 
 The youngest card-player never misses his turn, and 
 as the game reaches the climax he grows a little pale. 
 
INTRODUCTORY. 3 
 
 At the age of eight it is surely permissible to turn pale 
 because of a silver watch, even a battered watch, 
 which requires winding-up four times a-day. Lucyan 
 is not like his brothers, nor like the pictures on the 
 wall. He has coal-black hair and a sallow face. 
 
 There, on the red velvet sofa, sits a pale woman 
 with just such hair, elaborately curled; she is the 
 mother of the three boys, and she is watching their 
 game. 
 
 So earnestly is she watching that she does not hear 
 the far-off door open, nor notice the entrance of a tall 
 man in an embroidered dressing-gown, and holding a 
 long Turkish pipe, who now with rapid strides ap- 
 proaches the group. He is a man scarcely past the 
 prime of life, in face the very copy of those pictures 
 on the wall ; but there is a worn look on his hand- 
 some features. 
 
 " Cards again ! " says a high and passionate voice. 
 " Have I not forbidden them ? " but before he has 
 reached the table, little Lucyan has thrown down his 
 last king (the kings and aces always did find their 
 way into Lucyan's hand, no matter how the cards 
 were dealt), and, clutching the battered prize, has 
 retired into the background. He knows well enough 
 that the best policy lies in keeping his treasure out of 
 sight, until his father's anger is spent, as it will be 
 spent in ten minutes, perhaps in five. 
 
4 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 " Poor children ! they have had but one game," 
 pleads the mother; but the passionate man retorts — 
 
 " I will not have my children shown the highroad 
 to gambling ! " 
 
 What an exemplary father ! what a weak indulgent 
 mother ! you say. So much for appearances. 
 
 Madame Bielinska is almost as wise as she is fond, 
 and Bogumil Bielinski is the most desperate gambler 
 to be found for miles around. Here is the family 
 history in brief. 
 
 This lofty apartment is the chief room in the resi- 
 dence which stands on the Bielinskis' chief estate. 
 There are other estates belonging to this family, and 
 there have been more estates belonging to it which 
 now belong to other families, or which have been 
 swallowed up by a great insatiable monster, which 
 in Poland they call " the Jew." When " the Jew " 
 has once had a taste of any one's ancestral houses 
 and lands, it is very difficult to check his appetite. 
 
 Every one of the ancestors on the wall has helped 
 towards this end. All those haughty magnates and 
 fierce warriors have worked their part ; the beauty in 
 cream-coloured brocade has contributed her mite. It 
 takes a long time to run through a fortune which 
 draws its strength from miles of rich land, tilled by 
 vassals, over whom the master holds the old feudal 
 rights; but free living, large-hearted, short-sighted 
 
INTRODUCTORY. 5 
 
 Polish hospitality, open-handed bounty, when con- 
 tinued steadily through half-a-dozen generations, will 
 do their work at last. 
 
 It needed only one thing to accelerate the downhill 
 speed of the Bielinski fortunes, and this need had 
 been supplied by the present head of the family. 
 Other Bielinskis had gambled and had paid the 
 penalty, but it had been as a recreation in the in- 
 tervals of respite from graver business. This one 
 gambled as a business; it was his one solitary pas- 
 sion, his darling and only vice ; it filled him mind 
 and soul; it was the idol, the love of his life. 
 
 Of course he lost. It is always the losing gambler 
 who plunges again and again into the whirlpool that 
 is to engulf him. But Bogumil Bielinski lost in a 
 quiet, gentlemanlike style. He carried his bad for- 
 tunes with an easy grace; he lost his money, but 
 he did not lose his head. He himself was beyond 
 curing — his wife knew that, his friends knew that, he 
 knew that himself ; but his children might still grow 
 up wiser men than their father. This was the secret 
 of his stern prohibition of cards. He meant to bring 
 up his sons according to the high moral principles in 
 which he firmly believed, and on which he never 
 acted. The hope of making them as different as pos- 
 sible in every way from himself, gave a zest to his 
 existence ; and his system was carried out rigorously 
 
G BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 in details. While puffing the smoke luxuriously out 
 of his long Turkish pipe, he would hold forth at length 
 upon the baneful effects of tobacco; wrapped negli- 
 gently in his silk-embroidered dressing-gown, he would 
 severely reprimand the slightest slovenliness in dress. 
 The only instance in which his preaching coincided 
 with his practice was the use of a cold shower-bath in 
 the morning. Early rising was one of the virtues 
 which he most cultivated — in his sons. Therefore, 
 the three boys, having been shaken out of bed at six 
 A.M., were brought into his bedroom and sent in turn 
 behind a tall screen, to wince and pant under the icy 
 shower. In an evil day some ill-natured domestic 
 betrayed poor Marcin. Marcin hated cold water as 
 much as it was in his nature to hate anything. It 
 was much pleasanter to run round and round the 
 shower, and no one at the other side of the screen was 
 a bit the wiser. Then came the cruel sentence : no 
 screen, no possibility of escape ! The high-principled 
 father watched the execution of the sentence from the 
 depth of his feather pillows, and over the edge of his 
 satin coverlet. Then, the three victims dismissed, he 
 w$uld turn over for another doze ; and later on, when 
 the boys were hard at their books, he would come 
 down, refreshed by his own bath, to pass their studies 
 in review. 
 
 Bogumil's wife was held by most people to be a 
 
INTRODUCTORY. 7 
 
 fond, foolish, and bigoted woman ; too phlegmatic to 
 attempt any check upon her husband's reckless course. 
 But these people did not quite read her. She was a 
 woman who had so many outward signs of the weak- 
 minded : ready tears, hysterical symptoms, an affected 
 lisp, and, on occasion, fainting-fits — that few people 
 found out that she was not weak-minded. She had 
 iweak nerves, and a strong will, which she had never 
 as yet cared to use, and perhaps was a little indolent 
 about using. She had long ago discovered that her 
 husband was incurable, and she had long ago foreseen 
 what the end would be. With that end only would 
 come her time for action. When Bogumil should 
 have gambled away his last farthing, then her fortune 
 alone would stand between her children and beggary ; 
 and her fortune he should not touch. But that time 
 was some little way off yet ; many acres of land still 
 divided them from ruin. For a few more years she 
 might enjoy life in luxurious ease, as she loved to 
 enjoy it, and as she had enjoyed it ever since, as an 
 orphan girl, she had left her convent-school, in her 
 wedding-dress, hardly knowing what her future was 
 to be, and knowing little more about her past, nor 
 from whom she had got her pale Greek face, and the 
 depth of her oriental eyes. 
 
 She agreed in the main with her husband's system 
 of education ; but she did not see why the poor chil- 
 
8 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 dren should be half frozen to death on winter mornings, 
 nor why they should be forbidden to play a harmless 
 game at cards. 
 
 So, while the mother pleads, the father scolds. 
 " Cards make gamblers ; take them away ! " and very 
 quickly they are taken away — and once out of sight, 
 Bielinski's passion vanishes too. Now only his real 
 manner becomes evident ; for he is a man intellec- 
 tually refined ; when in good temper has a sweetness 
 and fascination perfectly irresistible; but is, when 
 contradicted, entirely without self-control, and there- 
 fore extravagantly passionate. 
 
 With characteristic ease he has now dismissed the 
 unpleasant side of the subject from his mind, and 
 draws his eldest son towards him. One train of 
 thought wakes another. " Be anything but gamblers 
 when you are men," he has said ; and an eccentric 
 impulse moves him to make his children choose their 
 professions, now, on the spot. He never resists an 
 impulse. 
 
 " Kazio, what will you be when you are a man ? Let 
 us see what your buttons say : tinker, tailor " 
 
 " Soldier ! " shouts Kazimir, without waiting for the 
 oracle to decide. Not much need of an oracle either, — 
 witness the tables slashed with sabre-cuts, the gaping 
 sword-wound which disfigures the canvas limbs of that 
 
INTRODUCTORY. 9 
 
 white charger on the wall, the broomsticks turned into 
 lances, — these are answers enough. 
 
 " Ha ! of course, a Polish soldier ; but we have no 
 army yet." Bogumil, as he says it, looks very like 
 that haughty warrior on the wall. " A pity, boy, — 
 a great pity ! Patience, it must come. But you must 
 learn your work from strangers ; better Austria than 
 Eussia. By the time you are a man we shall be a 
 nation again." His boys' future is in danger of being 
 submerged in dreams of Poland's future. He rouses 
 himself to turn to Marcin. 
 
 Marcin has no opinion ; and when pressed for one, 
 looks as if he would like to cry, if it were not too 
 much trouble. 
 
 " And Lucyan ? Will he be tinker, tailor, soldier, 
 sailor, rich man, poor man, apothecary, or thief ? " 
 But Bogumil is not thinking of Lucyan; he is looking 
 at Kazimir, and picturing that round boy-face under 
 a tatartka, and that strong young arm working the 
 salvation of his country. 
 
 No one hears Lucyan's answer, as he says to 
 himself — 
 
 " I am going to be a rich man." 
 
PAET 1 
 
CHAPTER I. 
 
 THE CARDS ARE DEALT. 
 
 Whence art thou ? what canst thou be ? 
 Exquisite creature, fashioned so fairly ! " 
 
 —Lord Lytton. 
 
 A soldier, a do-nothing, and a rich man. The two 
 first of these prophecies have come true ; the third 
 shows no signs as yet of coming true. 
 
 It was in the year 1858, just about fifteen years 
 after that summer or winter's evening, whichever it 
 had been, on which the three brothers had played that 
 game at cards, that Kazimir Bielinski found himself, 
 one November afternoon, travelling homewards from 
 his Tyrolese garrison, in answer to a hurried summons 
 which had reached him. 
 
 The home to which Kazimir is hurrying is not that 
 large and cheerless mansion with the drearily magni- 
 ficent state-room and the stiff and frigid furniture. 
 Some years ago that last and largest of the Bielinski 
 estates has been sold, and the family is now living on 
 
14 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 Madame Bielinska's personal estate, a country place 
 of the name of Wowasulka. 
 
 Madame Bielinska's time for action has come. Until 
 Bogumil had gambled away his last florin, she had 
 been in the background. When Bogumil for the last 
 time rose from the card-table, and this time a ruined 
 man, then she stepped forward and took the reins into 
 her hands. From that moment her husband was de- 
 pendent on her for the very bread he ate. 
 
 When Bogumil had risen from the card -table a 
 ruined man, his blood was all burning with the ex- 
 citement of the last ten minutes. He did not fly into 
 a passion — it was never at cards that he lost his 
 temper, his passions were spent on smaller matters — 
 but the chances of those last ten minutes had been so 
 strange, — good fortune had been so nearly weighing 
 down the scale on his side, only to make it fly up 
 again with such cruel irony, — that Bogumil felt every 
 single pulse throb in the moment of revulsion. He 
 was blind with excitement. He had staked his last 
 farthing against another man's estate ; he had played 
 for it and won it. 
 
 " Double or quits," said his adversary. " My two 
 remaining estates against all you hold." 
 
 " Stop ! " said his friends, holding their hands over 
 his cards. " Take luck when you get it ; you are not 
 bound to play again." 
 
THE CARDS ARE DEALT. 15 
 
 " If he asks for his revenge I shall give it," said 
 Bielinski, haughtily. "I am at your service." He 
 bent his head to his adversary with the perfection 
 of old-world courtesy. 
 
 A few seconds of breathless silence, a few pieces of 
 pasteboard thrown down on the table, and then Bogu- 
 mil Bielinski rose to his feet knowing that in the 
 whole wide world there was not a farthing he could 
 call his own. 
 
 He did a very foolish thing then. His chief sensa- 
 tion at that moment was burning heat ; his sole long- 
 ing was for cold. He must have something icy, some- 
 thing to check the mad pace at which the blood was 
 racing through his veins. His shower-bath had been 
 his firm friend for years ; he had recourse to it again. 
 But his deadliest enemy could not have done him 
 more harm than did this once faithful ally now. An 
 instant stroke of paralysis deprived him of conscious- 
 ness at the moment, and of the use of his left arm for 
 life. 
 
 From the time that he recovered he was a changed 
 man. The feverish interest which had bound him to 
 life was gone. Hitherto pleasure-seeking and sociable, 
 beloved even by those who blamed his faults, he be- 
 came all at once a hermit, a morbid recluse. He 
 could not abide the sight of a card ; he shunned with 
 horror the faces of all his old friends. No syllable of 
 
1G BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 complaint passed his lips ; hardly could he be got to 
 accept the necessaries of life which he now owed to 
 his wife alone. 
 
 Towards Wowasulka then it was that Kazirnir was 
 hurrying. The summons had not been unexpected ; 
 for he had heard of his mother's severe illness, the 
 violent attack of typhus from which she had seemed 
 to recover, only to fall into a decline, which could end 
 but one way. Therefore the letter which he received 
 from his aunt, Eobertine Bielinska, grieved him more 
 than it surprised him. It puzzled him also ; for there 
 was a haziness about the terms of the letter which 
 left him in considerable doubt as to the real facts cf 
 the case. 
 
 " My dear Nephew, — I take up my pen to prepare 
 your mind for the painful changes which await you in 
 the bosom of your family. You have, I regret to say, 
 been made acquainted with the fact of your mother's 
 illness (although I always considered it an unnecessary 
 disclosure) ; but you cannot possibly form a clear con- 
 jecture as to the real situation in its entirety. It is so 
 very distressing to have these circumstances discussed 
 outside the family circle, and committing anything to 
 paper is always such a risk. In my opinion your 
 presence here is very undesirable, as every additional 
 face, voice, and step, only tends to agitate and weaken 
 
THE CARDS ARE DEALT. 17 
 
 your mother. But she foolishly persists in wishing to 
 see you again, and, I fear, she must be humoured, 
 especially in her present deplorable state, which in 
 many ways reminds me of that of my late sister (re- 
 spectively your late aunt) Eudolfine. 
 
 " I should not refer to this fact if I had not been 
 aware that you knew it already, and as an additional 
 reason for never mentioning her name to anybody. 
 
 "You will be sure, I trust, to burn this letter as 
 soon as you have read it, and not to let any one know 
 from whom it is." 
 
 The letter was wrapped in a double fold of white 
 paper, sealed several times, registered, and marked, 
 with directions that the seals were on no account to 
 be broken by any one but the person addressed. 
 
 Kazimir's perplexity will be understood when it is 
 explained that his late aunt Eudolfine suffered not 
 only from derangement of health, but also from a 
 slight derangement of mind. Had his mother's mental 
 powers given way ? On the outside of the envelope 
 Kazimir had discovered a few lines in his youngest 
 brother's handwriting. The purport of Lucyan's mes- 
 sage was strenuous advice not to let himself be dis- 
 turbed by anything that might have been said in his 
 aunt's letter; that his coming was not urgent; and that, 
 should there be any difficulty about getting leave of 
 vol. I. b 
 
18 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 absence, he, Lucyau, would undertake to explain this 
 to the family. 
 
 Fortunately for aunt Kobertine's peace, she had 
 remained serenely unconscious of this indiscreet 
 communication, thus openly displayed to the light 
 of day. 
 
 But Kazimir had not availed himself of Lucyan's 
 offer. Not only was his alarm aroused, but his con- 
 science was pricked. It was some years now since a 
 sort of coolness had arisen between mother and son, 
 on the subject of Kazimir's profession. Madame 
 Bielinska, having at length realised that there were 
 no immediate hopes of a new Polish kingdom, dis- 
 covered that her eldest son, instead of learning to be 
 a Polish hero, was simply serving the Emperor ox 
 Austria, like any other officer. She had immediately 
 written to Kazimir, announcing that there was no 
 need for his continuing in the army; but, to her 
 absolute amazement, was answered by a flat refusal 
 to quit the service, coupled with a good deal of what 
 she put down as boyish enthusiasm regarding his 
 profession. 
 
 She had been too much hurt to refer to the subject 
 since ; and Kazimir, hearing of her danger, felt a pang 
 of remorse, and having with some difficulty obtained 
 leave of absence for the whole winter, had bidden 
 farewell to his comrades in November. 
 
THE CARDS AEE DEALT. 10 
 
 " You will have to be back before your term," they 
 said to him at parting. " We shall be on our way to 
 Italy in March." 
 
 " I shall be back whenever I am wanted," said Kazi- 
 mir ; " don't go and cut up the Italians without me." 
 
 The last part of this long journey was the most 
 wearisome ; for here the railway ceased, and Kazimir 
 was boxed up in a huge, lumbering construction, by 
 name a hired carriage, but by nature an ark on four 
 w T heels. Never had its Hebrew possessor touched it 
 with a renovating hand; cushions, doors, windows, 
 and hinges had been left to take the chances of life, 
 just as they came. 
 
 Under ordinary circumstances the drive should 
 have lasted four hours, but the circumstances which 
 attended this drive of Kazimir's were not ordinary, 
 and the drive itself was therefore much longer. 
 
 The first hour was comparatively bearable, the 
 second hour he began to find irksome. Kazimir 
 changed his position fifty times in hopes of dodging 
 the rain-drops which trickled in plentifully, for it had 
 drizzled continually since the moment he had left the 
 railway. In tugging at one of the cushions, out flew 
 a cloud of tiny moths, for the first time disturbed in 
 their mouldy seclusion. Half suffocated, Kazimir had 
 quick recourse to the window, but the handle gave way 
 at the first pull. It was no use calling to the driver, 
 
20 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 for every single part of the carriage was rattling 
 against the other, drowning even the monotonous 
 trot-trot of the gaunt long-legged screws, innocent of 
 the smallest attempt at grooming. 
 
 The third hour was wellnigh unendurable. They 
 were jolting over ruts and stones, in and out of holes 
 and puddles, with that large-minded disregard to 
 horses' legs and travellers' bones which characterises 
 the Polish coachman. The continued jingling of the 
 dirty panes was not to be borne any longer. One 
 more vigorous attack on the window, and now Kazi- 
 mir could breathe fresh air ; but the driver glanced 
 round in dismay, for the glass had flown into pieces, 
 scattered along the mud. 
 
 It was a day late in November, and the first hint of 
 dusk had begun to overshadow the bare brown fields, 
 which lay side by side in long strips, curving over the 
 swell of hillocks, and sinking down into the little 
 hollows of the undulating country. They passed by a 
 village — a double row of thickly thatched mud-huts, 
 with minute square windows. The women were at 
 work stacking dead leaves and straw along their house- 
 fronts as a shield against the coming cold. Pigs 
 wallowed in the mire at the door-steps, and troops of 
 shrieking geese, driven by children with bleached 
 yellow hair, flew before the big carriage as it splashed 
 heavily up the road. 
 
THE CARDS ARE DEALT. 21 
 
 There had been some woodcutting on a gigantic 
 scale somewhere in the neighbourhood, for they over- 
 took many peasant - carts laden with newly felled 
 trunks. 
 
 The landscape was wintry and waste, but no snow 
 had yet fallen. It must fall soon, thought Kazimir, 
 as he leant back wearily. His heart was heavy with 
 the thought of what awaited him at home. He had 
 not seen his mother for two years ; would she be 
 much changed ? And his father . . . and Lucyan 
 . . . how cold it was ! . . . Kazimir suddenly 
 opened his eyes from a sound sleep to the conscious- 
 ness that the splashing and rattling had ceased, and 
 that the carriage was standing stock-still. 
 
 At home already ? He put his head out by the 
 broken pane. How sharp the air was ! The rain had 
 ceased, but it was freezing hard, and it was almost 
 dark. 
 
 No, this was not home ; it was some distance from 
 home still. This was the foot of a steep hill, and the 
 edge of the great forest which ran as far as Wowa- 
 sulka, and over the country for many miles. 
 
 What exactly was the matter did not immediately 
 become evident ; but that something must be the 
 matter was obvious from the confusion of voices on 
 all sides. The two gaunt horses stood patiently rub- 
 bing their noses against each other, abandoned by the 
 
22 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 driver, who, as Kazimir now perceived, was exchanging 
 violent language with half-a-dozen peasants at some 
 little distance. There was a peasant-cart without 
 horses, and heavily laden with wood, hard by the 
 carriage. There was another behind and another in 
 front, and more further on; while one half-way up 
 the hill struggled slowly onwards, amidst the shouts, 
 and oaths, and wild gesticulations of the peasants ; 
 and from yet higher up, round the bend of the road, 
 more shouts came ringing down from the black forest 
 beyond. 
 
 " What is the matter ? " asked Kazimir ; but he 
 asked it of the air alone. 
 
 It was no use staying boxed up in this ark, and in 
 another minute he was out of it. 
 
 The scene was unlighted, save for a solitary yellow 
 glimmer from the hole which served as entrance to a 
 sort of earth-cellar, a low hovel cut in the bank at one 
 side. The Jew who spent his life there, serving out 
 spirits to the woodcutters and drivers who passed that 
 way, was now moving about from group to group, a 
 noiseless black figure ; quietly making the most of the 
 occasion, and eloquently persuading the not unwilling 
 listeners that an unlimited consumption of wodki was 
 the first and foremost step towards getting out of their 
 present difficulty. The present difficulty was a serious 
 one. Upon the rain of the afternoon had succeeded a 
 
THE CARDS ARE DEALT. 23 
 
 sudden frost ; the hillside was like glass. It was a 
 bad hill at the best of times, steeper than an}' in that 
 part of the country ; but now it was all they could do 
 to get their carts up one by one, dragged by four, or 
 sometimes six horses. Of course this could not be 
 done peacefully. Each man would have his cart 
 drawn first, and there were bargainings and loud- 
 voiced quarrels — and the wild-looking peasants, with 
 their matted black elf-locks framing their toil-worn 
 faces, and their long sheepskin coats hanging down to 
 their heels, talked fast and cursed fiercely ; and stand- 
 ing in the light of the Jew's hut, tossed off their 
 wodki and fell to cursing more fiercely still. 
 
 No sooner had Kazimir realised the emergency than 
 he saw that out of it there was only one way, and that 
 lay through his purse. These two long-legged horses 
 could never, unaided, drag this ponderous vehicle up 
 that hill. It was beginning to snow now, to enhance 
 the situation. The very first snow-flakes of the winter 
 were floating down through the air. Have not the 
 first snow-flakes, like the first flowers of the season, a 
 special and individual charm about them ? 
 
 But Kazimir just now was callous to this charm. 
 
 " Which of you wants a florin ? " he called out 
 loud, holding up his purse on high. 
 
 There were shouts and a general movement. Some 
 horses appeared with magical rapidity in front of the 
 
24 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 carriage, and then the quarrelling began again worse 
 than before. Those who had missed the chance swore 
 at those who had not, and drank more wddki to make 
 up for it. Then, amidst a great cracking of whips and 
 vociferous shouts, the lumbering carriage began slowly 
 to move upwards. 
 
 ''He, Hajta — he, Wisba!" shouted the wild drivers, 
 as they ran alongside ; and the little horses strained 
 every nerve, and pulled on bravely, making each yard 
 with pain. Kazimir was expending his strength be- 
 hind, supporting the carriage to the best of his power. 
 
 " He, Hajta — he " the shout broke off, and the 
 
 carriage stood still so suddenly that Kazimir was 
 nearly thrown over. 
 
 " What is the matter now ? " he asked, emerging 
 from the back. 
 
 There was an obstacle in front blocking the passage- 
 Not a trunk-laden peasant- cart, but a carriage, less 
 large and less clumsy than his own conveyance. It 
 was at a total standstill, and surrounded by a circle of 
 voluble peasants. 
 
 "Fellow -sufferers," thought Kazimir, — and he ap- 
 proached with some curiosity, ready to offer whatever 
 help might be in his power. 
 
 From the inside of the carriage there was issuing 
 the sound of what seemed to Kazimir an unlimited 
 number of female voices, far more than the size of 
 
THE CARDS ARE DEALT, 25 
 
 the vehicle could explain. There were tones of sup- 
 plication, of terror, of indignation, of querulous retort, 
 all mingled inextricably. At any rate, it was clear 
 that the occupants of the carriage, whoever and how- 
 ever numerous they might be, were sorely in need of 
 some masculine guidance. Kazimir pushed out his 
 elbows, made his way through the circle, and stood 
 beside the carriage-door. 
 
 " Can I be of any service ? " he asked, through the 
 chink of window, which was all that was opened. 
 
 The voices all ceased simultaneously, and there was 
 something like a start, and the very faint beginning of 
 a shriek, speedily suffocated. The close vicinity of an 
 educated voice speaking thus suddenly out of the 
 darkness, in sharp contrast to the unmodulated organs 
 of the other spectators, might well be startling. 
 
 The pause was for no more than an instant. Pol- 
 ish etiquette fought a quick, sharp battle, versus the 
 unprotected female instinct, and victory declared on 
 Nature's side. Perhaps, after all, it might not be posi- 
 tively incorrect to let their lives be saved by an un- 
 known gentleman. 
 
 The voices all began to talk again. The barbarians 
 refused to take them up the hill ; they had had to beg 
 for the florin from the Jew almost on their knees ; and 
 they could not have guessed about the snow ; and how 
 could they be asked to walk in thin shoes ? and the 
 
26 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 swearing was so dreadful. They paused aud began anew 
 in the next breath : would he ask them to stop their 
 dreadful language ; and they were quite sure they were 
 going to be killed in the forest, and perhaps get their 
 feet wet in the snow. 
 
 " If the ladies would be so very kind as to speak one 
 at a time," observed Kazimir, deferentially, " I think 
 I could be of more use." 
 
 Then at last one voice spoke alone. They were on 
 their way home; owing to some unfortunate chance 
 they had only two horses instead of four, and two horses 
 could not get the carriage up the hill : the peasants 
 would not lend their horses without money, and owing 
 to another unfortunate chance they had no money with 
 them. The Jew had lent them a florin under protest ; 
 and now that they were half-way up, those wretches had 
 stopped and refused to move a step without another 
 florin. They were unharnessing their horses already, 
 and the Jew would certainly not lend another florin. 
 
 " No need, either," said Kazimir, with great indig- 
 nation. This was a tolerably composed account, and 
 being in possession of the facts, he proceeded to action. 
 
 " Back there ! " he shouted, as he stepped away 
 from the carriage. " Leave your horses where they 
 are," to the fellow who was sullenly loosening the 
 coarse rope-harness. 
 
 " Blockheads every one of you ! Gatgan jeden 
 
THE CAEDS AEE DEALT. 27 
 
 % drugi " (which might be translated as indicating in 
 a general way that the persons addressed are destined 
 to the gallows). An immediate transformation took 
 place. That voice raised in indignation vibrated 
 through the dark. Instantly the men around ceased 
 their wrangling, and fell back in attitudes of the most 
 servile humility. The tone of Kazimir's voice, the 
 gesture which accompanied it, and the glimpse of 
 his face which they could catch through the darkness, 
 told them that this was one of that class before which 
 they were wont to cower like frightened dogs. By 
 the unanimous silence which fell on the circle, they 
 recognised his right to rule them. Confronted by 
 unprotected women, they had dared to be exacting 
 and merciless ; at the sight of a man, willing and 
 able to enforce his rights, they shrank back out- 
 wardly, into what they were at heart, abject serfs, 
 the slaves of their master's will. 
 
 The spirit-selling Jew, down at the bottom of the 
 hill, hearing that loud impatient voice in the wood, 
 thought it wiser to slink back into his low mud-hovel 
 in the bank. 
 
 Kazimir approached the carriage again. 
 
 " In the first place, I must ask you to let down the 
 window entirely." 
 
 There was something murmured about " cold air ; " 
 but his demand was complied with. 
 
28 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 " Now I am afraid T must ask you to get out of the 
 carriage." 
 
 " Impossible ! " 
 
 " Our shoes are too thin." 
 
 " Our dresses are too long." 
 
 " It is snowing." 
 
 It was indeed snowing. Thickly and silently the 
 flakes, like great, soft, white moths in the darkness, 
 were hovering leisurely through the air. They clung 
 to Kazimir's hair, and stuck in his eyelashes blind- 
 ingly. They had begun to fill the broad ditch by the 
 side of the road, and they had put a white cover on 
 the carriage-roof, and a white rim on the wood-logs in 
 the carts. 
 
 " It is the only chance of getting up the hill," said 
 Kaziruir, commanding his impatience. 
 
 A little more hysterical parley, and then, very 
 reluctantly, the door was allowed to be opened. There 
 was a great rustling of silks and pushing aside of 
 rugs, before some one, with satin-clad feet, stepped 
 daintily and fearfully out. 
 
 " One, two, three," Kazimir counted, and peered 
 into the carriage for more. Three females were 
 hardly enough to account for that Tower-of-Babel sort 
 of sound which had assailed his ears. It was rather 
 disappointing. 
 
 " Now, move on in front!" called out Kazimir to the 
 
THE CARDS ARE DEALT. 29 
 
 peasants, as be closed the carriage-door, " gatgan that 
 you are ! " and something followed about beating them 
 all within an inch of their lives, if they were not at 
 the top of the hill in much less than no time. It 
 acted like a charm. The grim-faced peasants relaxed 
 almost into a smile, cheered by the familiar language. 
 Vigorous abuse and violent threats are the surest and 
 safest means of earning the love and respect of Polish 
 peasantry. That amiable smooth-tongued address, 
 which your English butler expects as confidently as 
 he expects his daily beer, will here make you into an 
 object of contempt and pity. 
 
 " lie, Hajta — he, Wista ! " Whips cracked, harness 
 rattled, wheels creaked, and woodwork groaned ; but 
 they are going up fast now, cheered on by the elated 
 bystanders. 
 
 Kazimir turned back to the three figures that stood 
 shivering on the edge of the road. 
 
 One of them was short and stout, and unmistakably 
 an attendant. Two of them were tall, and as unmis- 
 takably ladies. All three were clothed in long, shape- 
 less, fur-lined cloaks ; no less disfiguring in the case of 
 the attendant than of the two ladies, — differing only 
 in the distinction that lies between silk and wool, — 
 blue fox and vulgar rabbit. All three travellers wore 
 hoods, which covered their hair and shaded their 
 faces. 
 
30 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 " Will either of the ladies take my arm ? " asked 
 Kazimir, looking from one figure to the other. But 
 even before he had completed his offer, his arm was 
 seized convulsively by a hand. That hand, encased 
 in pale kid, was narrow and delicate ; but there was 
 the strength of a sudden fright in its clutch, while 
 the flounced silk train dropped unheeded to the 
 ground. 
 
 " Oh, look ! what is that in the ditch ? " gasped a 
 voice beside him, and the other delicately gloved 
 hand pointed to a long formless object in the roadside 
 ditch. The object was only an unwise peasant, who, 
 having listened too willingly to the loving voice of the 
 vjoclki dispenser, had rolled over into this ready-made 
 resting-place, and was sleeping the sleep of the just, 
 in happy unconsciousness that his cart was at the 
 bottom of the hill, and his horses helping other peo- 
 ple's carts to the top, while his whip has been stolen 
 by a sober and sharp-witted fellow-creature. 
 
 "Only a drunken man," said Kazimir, reassuringly; 
 and he turned to the second figure with an offer of his 
 second arm, trying to make the most of himself for 
 the occasion. The second figure seemed to be in pos- 
 session of a little more self-command ; for, though 
 visibly nervous, the offer was declined with a shade of 
 stiffness, which had to do service for composure of 
 manner. The third figure, that of the dumpy attend- 
 
THE CARDS ARE DEALT. 3i 
 
 ant, marched along in silence, rustling her garments 
 ostentatiously as they began slowly to mount the hill. 
 Kazimir was between the two tall figures. That slen- 
 der hand had not changed its position on his arm. 
 The satin-clad feet were moving charily along over the 
 broken ground. 
 
 " My poor feet ! " sighed the owner, looking down 
 at them compassionately; "to have to go up this hill 
 after dancing all last night ! " 
 
 " Those details can hardly interest this gentleman," 
 said the voice at Kazimir's other side, with a little 
 asperity. 
 
 Kazimir took an instant prejudice against the owner 
 of that other voice. He did not feel at all sure that 
 those details would not have interested him very much. 
 
 " I know I shall be ill to-morrow," murmured the 
 other. 
 
 He could not see their faces ; he could only distin- 
 guish them by their voices. One was an ordinary 
 woman's voice, with just now a touch of temper in it. 
 Eespecting the other, Kazimir could not make up his 
 mind whether it tinkled through the darkness like a 
 crystal bell, or whether its sound was more to be com- 
 pared to the music of a silver flute. 
 
 The flute was silent now — chilled by a sharp repri- 
 mand ; or perhaps the steep hillside, growing steeper 
 every moment, called for all the breath she had. She 
 
32 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 began to pant a little, and now and then glanced fear- 
 fully into 'the dense shadows. 
 
 The great dead forest stretched up the hill from this 
 point and thence for many miles. Broad trunks stood 
 in shadowy array, dying off into impenetrable black- 
 ness. The carriage had got round the turn of the 
 road and there were no more carts passing just then. 
 The cries of the peasants reached them now only in 
 broken snatches. 
 
 But another sound was beginning around them. 
 The topmost branches of the trees shivered first ; then 
 the rustling sound crept downwards and shook the 
 bare boughs out of their lethargy. They groaned as 
 they yielded, and creaked as they swept upwards 
 again ; the wintry skeletons shuddered first, and then 
 they rattled their dead limbs noisily. Afar in the 
 forest-depths the trees were moaning ; and here close 
 at hand the flakes were begining to whirl wildly. 
 
 " That sound — it must be wolves ! " gasped the voice 
 by Kazimir's side. 
 
 She was struggling for breath against the quickly 
 rising wind, and with one hand she was righting to 
 keep the hood on her head. The wind would have 
 its way. The hood slipped back ; and Kazimir, look- 
 ing, could just see a pale face, and a pair of frightened 
 blue eyes gazing at him through the falling snow. 
 
 11 It is only the wind in the trees," said the other 
 
THE CARDS ARE DEALT. 33 
 
 voice, trying in vain to sound steady amidst the 
 choking gusts. " How can you be — so — fool — ish ? " 
 
 The fierce air carried away the end of the word, and 
 the speaker succumbing, abandoned her flapping train 
 and leant upon Kazimir's second arm. 
 
 On all sides the dead trees were tossing their dried 
 arms high. The white moths have gone mad ; they 
 ha've taken wing wildly, and fly hither and thither, 
 helplessly huddled in troops ; or chase each other with 
 lightning speed, round and round the black tree- 
 trunks. Everywhere the wind is undoing the snow's 
 work. From off the ground it catches the freshly 
 fallen flakes, and whirls them in powder down the 
 hill. Clouds and columns are rushing past: visible 
 for an instant, and very palpable, as they shower over 
 the travellers, to disappear next moment in the dark- 
 ness beyond. 
 
 To Kazimir's right, there was a sound of hysterical 
 sobbing; and the weight on each side grew heavier. 
 "It needs but the attendant to finish me," he thought, 
 as with an effort he succeeded in throwing open his 
 heavy fur travelling-cloak at the neck. Light-blue 
 cloth and gold hussar-cording gleamed in the uncer- 
 tain light. It produced a curious effect ; for there 
 were two distinct starts, and both the hands percep- 
 tibly relaxed their grasp. 
 
 " An Austrian officer ! " thought both ladies with 
 vol. I. c 
 
34 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 terror. An Austrian officer had dragged them up a 
 hill in the dark. Horrible thought! 
 
 But just then there was a slip and a shriek. The 
 figure to Kazimir's right staggered, and but for his arm 
 would have fallen. For an instant she stood clinging 
 to him, while the wild wind showered the snow-flakes 
 right over her. Again that vision of blue eyes, and 
 that half-seen glimpse of an oval face. 
 
 She gasped out faintly that she thought she must 
 die (like the far-off echo of an iEolian harp, Kazimir 
 found ; for the rude wind caught each word from her 
 lips and carried it off on its wings) ; but the second 
 voice faltered a scarcely more audible, though unques- 
 tionably chilling reply, and the iEolian harp spoke no 
 more. 
 
 How harsh that second voice was ! What a want 
 of pity she showed to her poor delicate sister ! thought 
 Kazimir, as with a final effort they stood at last pant- 
 ing on the hill-top beside the carriage. 
 
 He knew that he had done his duty, and that all 
 that remained was to put his charges safely in the 
 carriage. Both ladies were busied with the arrange- 
 ment of their hoods and trains ; while the maid, with 
 an apoplectic flush on her face, was pulling about the 
 furs in the carriage. 
 
 " I hope that the ladies will not have caught cold," 
 said Kazimir, earnestly. He belonged to that class of 
 
THE CARDS ARE DEALT. 35 
 
 men who believe that no women ever dress warmly 
 enough, and that they should be in a continual state 
 of changing their shoes and stockings, if they are to 
 keep in health. 
 
 "I trust not," replied the lady with the ordinary 
 voice, making him a demure curtsey. Kazimir was 
 not conscious of having expected much thanks for his 
 service, but he was conscious of feeling chilled now. 
 He turned towards the other. " You will be sure to 
 put on dry shoes," he said with greater earnestness, 
 looking down at the soaked black satin slippers, half 
 buried in the snow. What was this ? another curtsey, 
 quite as graceful as any curtsey ever executed on a 
 parquetted floor, but quite as demure as the first. 
 
 " M Me remerdments, Monsieur ! " From what a 
 height of icy pinnacles the silvery voice sounded 
 down ! 
 
 The dangers were passed, the hill was surmounted. 
 Etiquette now recovered that upper hand which Na- 
 ture for a brief space had unjustly usurped. The 
 hands which two minutes ago had clung to him so 
 convulsively, would hardly touch the tips of his fin- 
 gers in mounting the carriage-step. The door was 
 closed ; the furs were put to rights ; in another minute 
 they would be gone. An impulse of invincible curi- 
 osity seized upon Kazimir. "I hope your drive is 
 not a long one," he said, with his hand on the door. 
 
36 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 " Thank you ; it is rather long/' replied the ordinary 
 woman's voice. " Will you kindly tell the coachman 
 to drive on ? " 
 
 " May I hope to meet the ladies again ? " said Kazi- 
 mir, desperately. 
 
 No answer ; only a frigid and shadowy inclination 
 of both heads. 
 
 " You have not got rugs enough ; perhaps my 
 
 fur " making a movement towards tearing his 
 
 big cloak off. 
 
 " Oh no, thank you ! " Even in the dark the start 
 could be seen, with which the two ladies recoiled be- 
 fore this indelicate offer. 
 
 " Can I do nothing ? " said the baffled man ; but 
 already they were passing away. The horses, de- 
 lighted at having level ground under their feet, 
 plunged off into the dark. His last glimpse w r as of 
 two figures leaning back exhausted, and the last words 
 he heard were from the apoplectic maid, apparently 
 resigning her situation. " I am not accustomed to 
 this, Pani Xenia ! " reached Kazimir's ears as they 
 drove off. 
 
 He was alone in the dark and the snow ; his own 
 conveyance was half-way down the hill. Just now 
 the fury of the storm was lulled for a little. Very 
 furtively the falling flakes began their work again ; 
 whitening over each little twig, and filling each tree- 
 
THE CARDS ARE DEALT. 37 
 
 hollow with soft powder which the next gust would 
 scatter away. 
 
 Kazimir reflected upon the expediency of thrashing 
 somebody, for he felt very much inclined to play clubs 
 just now. Should he thrash the Jew at the bottom of 
 the hill, who had been so chary of the loan of his 
 dirty paper florin? But that would entail another 
 ascent of the hill. Perhaps some of those wrangling 
 peasants, whose guilt was certainly greater ? Which 
 peasant ? He would need to thrash half-a-dozen at 
 least, in order to make sure that he had thrashed the 
 right one. How infamously they had behaved to 
 those two unfortunate ladies — to that delicate, timid 
 girl ! even the elder sister had been wanting in ten- 
 derness. Xenia ! such a harsh, uncompromising 
 name, exactly suitable to an unamiable elder sister ! 
 He roused himself just in time to escape being run 
 over by his own lumbering conveyance. Here was 
 the carriage at the top of the hill, and now there was 
 no more time to thrash anybody. 
 
 It was only when the ark on four wheels had car- 
 ried him on some hundred yards that another thought 
 struck Kazimir. It was a pity, after all, that he had 
 not "one down the hill to thrash the Jew ; not so 
 much from a sense of the justice of the castigation ; 
 but because the man to be chastised might have given 
 him some clue to the identity of these sisters. 
 
38 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 Then, as an afterthought, came the reflection : the 
 man thus castigated might not be inclined to supply 
 information of any kind. 
 
 At any rate, it was too late now. The chance for 
 to-day was past: to-morrow, perhaps, might bring 
 another. 
 
39 
 
 CHAPTEE II. 
 
 A NON-PLAYER. 
 
 " . . . . Life went a-Maying 
 With nature, hope, and poesy, 
 When I was young. 
 
 When I was young ! Ah, woeful when ! 
 Ah, for the change 'twixt now and then ! " 
 
 — Coleridge. 
 
 When Kazimir readied home, it was too late to see 
 either his mother or father that night. He was put into 
 a large square room, heated to suffocation, and told to 
 take his rest in a bed covered with the finest of linen, 
 and the most costly of satin quilts. In the morning 
 he was given a minute basin of solid silver, placed 
 upon a wooden chair as washhand-stand ; he was, in 
 fact, regarded as a guest, and as such treated with 
 that profusion of luxuries and absence of necessaries 
 which is never failing in a Polish house. Kazimir 
 had to confess that a long estrangement from his 
 native soil had made him degenerate to no small ex- 
 tent. So far from being a narrow-minded man, he 
 
40 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 was accustomed to take broad, in fact exceptionally 
 broad, views of life ; but he now became speedily 
 aware that so trivial a detail as the want of a looking- 
 glass was a nuisance, and that the absence of soap 
 and towels disturbed his mind considerably. He 
 looked round in despair ; the splendid walnut ward- 
 robe seemed to smile at him ironically, and to say, 
 " Try me ! " He could see his face almost in the 
 shining surface; but having tried the wardrobe, he 
 sank down discouraged into a chair of old tapestry 
 that would have delighted the heart of an antiquary. 
 "Why don't I ring?" he said, impatiently; but the 
 answer was obvious, for there was nothing wherewith 
 to ring. He put his head out of the door, and was 
 about to indulge in a resounding call, when the 
 thought of his mother checked him. There, at the 
 far end of the passage, a small figure was visible — a 
 little barefooted girl biting a crust of bread. A stray 
 beggar devouring a charitably given morsel, she would 
 have been taken for anywhere else ; but Kazimir was 
 still familiar enough with the ways of his country to 
 know that this must be what in England we call a 
 housemaid, and that she was taking her breakfast in 
 the orthodox fashion. A pantomime of beckoning 
 resulted in the ten-year-old housemaid taking to her 
 heels in dismay. Hope being quenched on that side, 
 Kazimir had recourse to the other. He knocked at 
 
A NON-PLAYER. 41 
 
 the door which he knew to be that of his brother 
 Marcin, and he knocked loudly, for his spirit was 
 beginning to chafe. 
 
 The sound of gentle snoring broke off at Kazimir's 
 first knock, but there was no invitation to enter. He 
 knocked again, and hearing only a prolonged yawn, 
 entered uninvited. Marcin contemplated him with 
 sleepy blinking eyes from out of his pillow depths. 
 " May I ask what you have been doing to my door ? " 
 he inquired, lazily. 
 
 " I wanted to come in. I need soap, and a looking- 
 glass, and towels." 
 
 " I daresay ; but what did you make that noise for ? " 
 
 " I was knocking at your door. Why did you not 
 answer ? " 
 
 " What was I to say ? " yawned Marcin. 
 
 " Why, ' come in,' of course. Do you never knock 
 at people's doors ? " 
 
 " Never ! What a strange idea ! Life is a great 
 deal too short for that sort of thing." Marcin looked 
 languidly amused, then closed his eyes again. 
 
 " I want towels, and a looking-glass, and soap," 
 began Kazimir again hastily, for fear of his brother 
 relapsing into slumber. 
 
 " I know there was some soap in the house a week 
 ago," said Marcin, drowsily. " You can have it if you 
 like, but I think it is done. Nobody has been to 
 
42 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 Lwow lately. Aunt Kobertine had it last ; go to her 
 room." 
 
 " Where is her room ? " 
 
 " At the other side of my father's." 
 
 " How can I get to it, then ? " 
 
 " You can't get to it," said Marcin, sweetly. 
 
 n Do you mean to say that nobody else in the house 
 has got soap ? " asked Kazimir, aghast. 
 
 " Oh yes, Lucyan has got soap," murmured Marcin, 
 in a muffled voice ; " white rose soap, and new-mown 
 violet scent, and pate aux amandes du printemps. 
 Kazimir ? " 
 
 " Yes ? " Kazimir turned at the door. 
 
 u Don't make that noise at Lucyan's door ; what do 
 you call it ? Knocking the door ? " 
 
 " Am I to go in without knocking ? " 
 
 " Certainly ; when you are at Eome you must howl 
 with the Eomans." 
 
 " What on earth do you mean ? " asked Kazimir, 
 bewildered at this novel mixture of proverbs. 
 
 "Perhaps I mean the wolves," said Marcin. 
 "Kazimir?" 
 
 " What next ? Am I never to get shaved to-day ? " 
 
 u Don't go to Lucyan at all." 
 
 " Why not ? " 
 
 "He is horse in the manger, don't you know? 
 Never lends anything to anybody." 
 
A NON-PLAYER. 43 
 
 By hook or by crook Kazimir got shaved, and then 
 turned his attention to the view outside. 
 
 The world had undergone a wonderful transfor- 
 mation since yesterday, when it had lain dull and 
 brown, waiting for its winter cloak. The cloak had 
 fallen on it now, and covered its nakedness; but it 
 was a cloak of strangely uneven texture. All night 
 long the wind had fiercely lashed the innocent snow 
 with its merciless whips ; it had driven white mounds 
 up against the house ; it had piled soft dazzling 
 cushions on the window-sills, darkening the panes at 
 intervals. The trees here and there were girt with 
 deep white. The rose-bushes in the garden, which 
 were Lucyan's special pride and treasures, and which 
 he himself had wrapped in their winter garb of straw, 
 stood waist-deep in snow. Nature had been at work 
 with a lavish but an unequal hand. She had smothered 
 the garden benches in snow so deep, that their out- 
 line could but dimly be discerned, like overgrown 
 grave-mounds; and again the capricious wind had 
 laid bare the unsightly row of dead asters, in all their 
 desolation of withered leaves and bleached stalks. 
 Further off, where the ground, growing bare and 
 rocky, sloped up gradually from the garden to the 
 forest-edge, it was all a heavy and unbroken mass of 
 white. Snow and wind had suspended their work ; 
 but the dull white sky was brooding more changes. 
 
44 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 "When can I see my mother?" asked Kazimir, 
 after breakfast. 
 
 There was no one in the room but his youngest 
 brother, and at the question, Lucyan looked up from 
 a seedsman's catalogue he was studying ; for it must 
 be understood that, although Lucyan was a lawyer in 
 embryo, he was at heart a gardener. 
 
 " It is scarcely likely that aunt Kobertine will let 
 you see her to-day," he answered. " My mother is 
 very easily agitated." 
 
 Kazimir gazed out of the window and reflected. 
 The veiled hints in his aunt Kobertine' s letter, did 
 they really hide a real mystery ? His mother had al- 
 ways been remarkable for her clear judgment ; was 
 it possible that she had lost her reason with her 
 health ? 
 
 " My aunt's letter gave me a great fright," said 
 Kazimir, turning from the window. " Surely you do 
 not think that there is anything wrong with my 
 mother, — beyond her health, I mean ? " 
 
 Lucyan looked up inquiringly. 
 
 " I mean mentally," completed Kazimir, with an 
 effort. 
 
 Lucyan paused for a minute, with his eyes fixed on 
 his brother's, and the point of his pencil keeping the 
 place of Zinnia elegans in the catalogue. 
 
 " I do not exactly like to say that she is irrespon- 
 
A NON-PLAYER. 45 
 
 sible for her actions," he answered slowly ; " but there 
 certainly are some subjects on which she is very excit- 
 able — strangely excitable." 
 
 " Have you seen my mother to-day ? " asked Kazi- 
 mir, suddenly. 
 
 Lucyan looked up again from his catalogue without 
 betraying any impatience. 
 
 " Yes, of course I have seen her. I read aloud to 
 her every day." 
 
 " And why am I to be kept out of her room if you 
 are allowed in V 
 
 The question was so direct that Lucyan, before 
 answering, rose from his chair and took a turn in the 
 room. At the same time, he drew a little ivory comb 
 from his pocket, and pensively passed it through his 
 black hair, winch grew up thick and straight from his 
 low broad forehead. This was a trick of his, a mere 
 mechanical habit, into which he had fallen, no one 
 knew how. His comb was to him a talisman, what to 
 a coquettish woman is her fan, or to a bandmaster his 
 baton. Perhaps the mesmeric contact of the ivory 
 roused and assisted thought. 
 
 His face was in character the same as it had been 
 at eight years old ; but though Lucyan was only 
 twenty-four, the short coal-black beard stamped him 
 as a man, and by contrast made his skin more colour- 
 less. His eyes moved quickly, and now and then 
 
46 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 shone as brightly as though a spark had struck them. 
 Kound his lips there hovered perpetually a faint, a 
 very faint smile, which was sometimes mirrored in the 
 eyes, and which was just dimly to be read through the 
 black moustache. 
 
 The faint smile was just now a shade more distinct 
 than usual, as he paced down the length of the room, 
 passing the comb through his hair. 
 
 " Why are you to be kept out of the room if I am 
 allowed in ? Eh, cher Kazio ; the matter is simple 
 enough. She is used to see me, and she is not used 
 to see you. Anything in the shape of a — a what shall 
 I say ? — a stranger " 
 
 " A stranger ! " repeated Kazimir. 
 
 " Well, que voulez - vous ? " with a shrug, which 
 exactly matched the smile. " You are virtually a 
 stranger ; and besides " — Lucyan stopped combing 
 his hair, and threw a glance over his brother's tall 
 figure — besides, I am not sure that you would know 
 how to move in a sick-room." 
 
 " And you know how to move in a sick-room, I 
 suppose?" said Kazimir, for him almost bitterly. 
 
 Lucyan inclined his head. " Yes, I can walk like 
 a cat when I like." He laughed ; but Kazimir did 
 not join him. 
 
 " Come, Kazio," said the younger brother, pocketing 
 his comb, and laying a delicate white hand on the 
 
A NON-PLAYER. 47 
 
 elder one's shoulder. " You are not going to turn 
 sulky, are you? Just be sensible, and consider how 
 trying to an invalid your resounding martial step and 
 your cavalry movements would be." 
 
 "Why was I sent for?" asked Kazimir, not yet 
 relenting. 
 
 Another very slight shrug of Lucyan's shoulders. 
 He withdrew his hand from his brother's arm, and 
 began a minute inspection of his carefully trimmed 
 nails. 
 
 " You will remember that I did not send for you." 
 
 Kazimir, thinking of the P.S. to his aunt's letter, 
 remembered that well. 
 
 " I told you then that your presence here would 
 do no good. There were none but sentimental 
 grounds to advance for your coming ; but if it is 
 any relief to your feelings, of course you are welcome 
 to stay." 
 
 There was a slight air of concession about the 
 words ; the tone of the master of the house offering 
 the protection of his roof to a stranger. Since his 
 mother's illness, Lucy an had been virtually the master 
 of the house : Marcin was as useless as a six-year-old 
 child, and Bielinski was now a cipher. 
 
 "You look quite out of place in a dull country- 
 house like this," said Lucyan, still soothingly. " You 
 are a soldier all over, Kazimir." 
 
48 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 Lucyan's eyes rested again on his brother with a 
 glance of admiration, scarcely mixed with envy. 
 
 Nearly a head taller than his younger brother, with 
 brown hair waving off a high forehead ; brown eyes, 
 rather long in shape and fall of life ; nothing but a 
 short moustache shading his well-cut lips, — Kazimir 
 indeed looked a soldier all over. He was handsome ; 
 but his was not only the beauty of features, it was 
 also that of expression and grace. He had in his face 
 a little of each of the twelve ancestral portraits on the 
 wall. The dusky knight in armour had given him 
 that hawk-like sweep of eyelids ; the beauty in cream- 
 coloured brocade had given him that peculiar sweet- 
 ness of mouth which softened the otherwise hard 
 features ; all the men combined had given him their 
 nose — a high-bridged, clean-cut nose, with those proud 
 sensitive nostrils which belong eminently to a well- 
 born Polish nose. Kazimir's face was the sort of face 
 which has gone out of fashion ; for types of feature 
 go out of fashion as well as types of character. You 
 do not see it often nowadays, unless upon mouldering 
 canvas, framed in tarnished gold, and hung upon the 
 walls of some turreted old castle. Thus may that 
 grim-visaged old warrior on the white charger have 
 looked when first he drew the sword with which in 
 later years he cut down so many of his country's foes. 
 But though so distinct in feature, it was in expression 
 
A NON-PLAYER. 49 
 
 a face younger than its years, perhaps almost too 
 young for its years. The glow of ardent life was upon 
 it ; but as yet it was a face without a history. That 
 man, you felt instinctively, had been scathed by no 
 passion, had looked upon no dreadful sight, had suf- 
 fered no violent grief. The face was too unmarked 
 for that, the glance too serene, the smile too boyish. 
 According to people's individual views of life, this 
 would be considered either a merit or a defect. 
 
 " Never mind, Kazio," Lucyan was saying, " you 
 will see my mother now and then, no doubt, if aunt 
 Robertine can be persuaded to let you have ' a little 
 peep,' as she calls it. But I hardly know how I shall 
 be able to entertain you in this dull place. After 
 your horses and soldiers, you could never stand this 
 life for long. 
 
 Kazimir had quite relaxed by this time ; bad 
 humour was a thing too foreign to his nature to 
 endure long. He did not even notice the but half- 
 concealed sneer in his brother's words and tone, which 
 might have implied that horses and soldiers were 
 capital toys with which to keep little boys amused. 
 
 The result of this conversation was to make Kazi- 
 mir wonder why he had been in so great a hurry to 
 leave his regiment. Nobody seemed to want him. 
 Lucyan and Marcin were the only members of the 
 family he had seen as yet. Even aunt Robertine 
 
 VOL. I. D 
 
50 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 remained invisible ; and it was late in the afternoon 
 before his father sent for him. 
 
 Bogumil had become an old man since his son had 
 seen him last ; all that careless yet graceful ease, 
 which had been his charm, was gone. His eyes be- 
 trayed his utter want of interest in the world and in 
 life itself, — the weary eyes of a man who, having been 
 used to the excitement of strong stimulants, finds him- 
 self cut off from them, and droops into listless dejec- 
 tion. With his right hand he held his long Turkish 
 pipe, sole companion of his self-chosen solitude ; his 
 left arm hung powerless by his side. Thus for years 
 past Bogumil had passed his life, too proud to utter 
 a complaint, too proud to express the most trivial 
 want ; suffering rather his one consolation — his Turk- 
 ish pipe — to hang unused on the wall for days, than 
 so much as to mention that his tobacco-pouch was 
 empty. If by any chance his dinner had been for- 
 gotten some day, he would rather have starved than 
 asked for it. 
 
 " When shall you see your mother ? " repeated 
 Bogumil, in answer to his son's complaint. " It is no 
 use applying to me; I am a cipher in the house, 
 Kazimir ; understand that once for a^l." He smoked 
 on in silence for some minutes, then resumed. 
 
 " When your aunt Eobertine does give you entrance 
 to the sick-room, your mother's first word to you 
 
A NON-PLAYER. 51 
 
 will be a persuasion to leave the. army. Are you 
 prepared for this ? " 
 
 Kazimir was quite prepared. 
 
 His father paused again — a longer pause this time 
 — while the white rings of tobacco-smoke curled above 
 his head. 
 
 " I have no right to give you any advice," he began, 
 after that pause ; " for I have nothing to leave you in 
 legacy except the remembrance of my folly. If you 
 care enough for my advice to ask for it, Kazimir, you 
 can have it ; if not, I shall never refer to the subject 
 again." 
 
 " But I do ask for it, father," cried Kazimir, touched 
 by the proud reserve of the tone; although in his 
 innermost mind he registered the firm resolve only to 
 take that advice if it coincided with his own wish. 
 
 " Then listen. When I made you into a soldier, I 
 and others fully believed that Poland would in a few 
 years be a new kingdom, with a new king and a new 
 army. That dream of mine is gone — every dream of 
 mine is gone — ah ! no matter. If I could have fore- 
 seen what was coming, I should not have put you into 
 the army." 
 
 Kazimir started, but he held fast to his resolve. 
 
 " Now that you are in the army, my advice to you 
 is to stay in it, whatever " 
 
 " I will stay in it, father ! " burst in Kazimir raptur- 
 
 a OF ILL 
 
52 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 ously, taking his father's wasted hand and kissing it 
 in a transport of filial gratitude. The advice against 
 which he had been so resolutely steeling himself a 
 minute ago was now enthusiastically accepted; and 
 his mind was pervaded by a satisfactory glow of 
 virtue — a pleasant feeling of having shown himself 
 a good and dutiful son. 
 
 In Bogumil's world-weary eyes there shone for a 
 moment a light at sight of this glow of gratitude. It 
 was like a breath of hillside air — a breeze out of his 
 own youth, wafted across a long, long waste of years, 
 out of the time when the world was not the weary 
 empty place it was now. It is bad to be old : old age 
 is an evil thing devoid of sweetness ; but old age — 
 ugly, misery-burdened old age — has one poetry which 
 belongs to it by rights, and that shines out of the eyes 
 of our children. 
 
 The faces of Marcin and Lucy an had never moved 
 this thought in Bogumil's soul in the way Kazimir's 
 face did now. 
 
 " Kemember that I have not tried to persuade you, 
 Kazimir," said his father. " My vote is powerless. 
 You owe duty and gratitude to your mother ; you owe 
 nothing to me." 
 
 It was said bitterly yet sadly ; and Kazimir's burst 
 of rapture melted quickly into pity, — pity at the sight 
 
A NON-PLAYER. 53 
 
 of this change, at the recollection of his father's once 
 gay and gracious countenance — and pity also, more 
 dimly felt, that so much that was noble and great 
 should have fallen to wreck upon reefs with which 
 a more commonplace nature would not have been 
 threatened. 
 
54 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 ONE OF THE KNAVES. 
 
 Jedes Land hat die Juden die es verdient, " 
 
 — K. E. Franzos. 
 
 In the midst of the anxieties and impressions of this 
 first day, Kazimir's thoughts ran continually on his 
 adventure in the snow. At the moment, the two 
 figures had appeared distinct enough from each other ; 
 now, in recollection, he could not so well separate 
 their individualities. They had both worn pale kid 
 gloves. One had had a common voice and the other 
 an uncommon one ; one had grey eyes and the other 
 had blue eyes. When he thought of the grey eyes he 
 remained unmoved ; when he thought of the blue eyes 
 he thrilled with something more than curiosity. He 
 had questioned his brothers and father to no purpose. 
 In the eveninQ- as the three brothers sat in their 
 father's room — the one hour in the day in which 
 Bogumil allowed intrusion on his hermitage — they 
 reverted to the subject again. 
 
ONE OF THE KNAVES. 55 
 
 " We know little of any of our neighbours," said 
 Bogumil, " and I know less than nothing." 
 
 " The only pair of sisters within reasonable distance 
 are the Zuminskas," said Lucyan ; " but one of them 
 is hunchbacked and the other lame." 
 
 " That will not do," said Kazimir ; for although a 
 hunch might conveniently have been concealed under 
 the monstrous cloak, lameness was not compatible 
 with reaching the top of that hill. 
 
 " There is that girl with the box on her ear," put in 
 Marcin from the sofa. 
 
 " Box on her ear ? " repeated Kazimir, in inter- 
 rogative bewilderment, for he was scarcely used to 
 Marcin's fashion of conversation. This meeting 
 with his brothers was almost like making acquaint- 
 ance with strangers. They were, in fact, more 
 strangers to him than his playfellows had been, 
 and than his comrades were now ; for since at the 
 age of twelve he had been placed in a military 
 academy at Vienna, all his visits home had been but 
 flying ones. 
 
 " Ask Lucyan to explain ; I can't," said Marcin, 
 helplessly. 
 
 " He means Mademoiselle Walenska," explained 
 Lucyan, with ready civility. " Her mother once at a 
 ball boxed the ears of a man who had forgotten to 
 dance an engaged mazur with the daughter." 
 
56 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 " But if she has no sister she will not do : think of 
 some one else, Marcin." 
 
 Marcin closed his eyes and made the heroic effort 
 of thinking. 
 
 " The only other people I know are the three 
 Merinskas ; won't they do ? " 
 
 " Is there a pair of blue eyes between them ? " asked 
 Kazimir, hopefully. 
 
 " Yes — no ; I fancy their eyes are rather fishy." 
 Kazimir's face fell. Marcin brightened up. " But I 
 remember that they once wore yellow gloves ; and — 
 let me see, I know something else about them — they 
 have got forty thousand florins each." 
 
 " Oh no," corrected Lucyan, smiling ; " you mean 
 that the youngest is forty years old." 
 
 " Well, I knew it was something about forty," said 
 Marcin, in languid triumph ; and he sat up almost 
 straight for a moment, with a conscious and pardon- 
 able feeling of pleasure in finding his memory thus 
 unusually accurate. 
 
 " Forty years old ! " sighed Kazimir. That voice 
 that had followed him into his dreams had not been 
 twenty. Was the clue never to be supplied ? Were 
 they mere birds of passage which had crossed his path, 
 to disappear again without a trace ? Had that meet- 
 ing been but an isolated fact, or was it to be the first 
 link of other things to come ? 
 
ONE OF THE KNAVES. 57 
 
 Brooding over these thoughts, he fell into silence, 
 but presently was roused by a request to join in a new 
 and general subject of interest. 
 
 There was a discussion going on about horses. The 
 Bielinski's last carriage-horses had come to grief quite 
 lately; and as even a ruined family in Poland cannot 
 exist without one, if not two pair of horses, the Jewish 
 factor had come to report upon a pair in the neigh- 
 bourhood. 
 
 There scarcely passed a week in which this factor 
 was not to be seen at "VYowasulka ; for was he not 
 one of that nation who are at once the slaves and the 
 masters of Poland ? Drawing gain out of the indolence 
 of Polish character, the Jews have, little by little, got 
 the strings of the whole national life into their hands. 
 They have crept into the machinery of public life, and 
 have wound and wormed themselves in behind the 
 very veil of privacy. 
 
 They cannot be kept away or pushed back ; for you 
 cannot fight with their own weapons: they do not 
 push, they crawl. Like a network they spread over 
 the country : a nation of detectives, bound together by 
 the bond of their religion, and by that national esprit 
 de corps which will always make a Jew help a Jew, 
 hold a Jew's secrets inviolate, if necessary conceal a 
 Jew. They have their own secrets of success, but this 
 last is not the least. You cannot ignore them, reptiles 
 
58 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 as they are ; the best you can do is to reconcile your- 
 self to them, and that is what every Pole does. He 
 treats them as the scum of the earth, uses any amount 
 of violent language towards them, and on occasion 
 kicks them down-stairs. And next time he wishes to 
 save himself trouble he sends for his Jew, and the Jew 
 comes with the same cringing smile, obsequious and 
 oily - tongued, as though they had parted the best 
 friends. Whether you want to buy a horse, engage a 
 cook, sell a piano or a property, or get married in a 
 hurry, you cannot do without a Jew ; and above all, 
 if you want money you cannot do without him. He 
 will tell you all the horses for sale for ten miles 
 round, and what each is worth ; he can give you the 
 accurate amount of the fortunes of all the young ladies 
 of the neighbourhood ; and the ragged wretch, slip- 
 shod and out at elbows, will put at your instant dis- 
 posal thousands of florins, which he presses on you 
 with loquacious and irresistible persistence. 
 
 Every family of rank has its own particular factor, 
 just as much as it has its own coachman; and Aitzig 
 Majulik was the particular factor of the Bielinski 
 family. 
 
 Aitzig Majulik was a Jew unwashed and garlic- 
 scented. He was generally called "old Aitzig," and 
 had always been called so, even before he became old. 
 No one remembered his ever having been young. When 
 
ONE OF THE KNAVES. 59 
 
 he was forty, he had looked like fifty ; and now that 
 he was sixty, he looked like fifty still. Kazimir, who 
 had not seen him for ten years, thought that Aitzig 
 must have been standing still, instead of going on with 
 the time. His nose had the orthodox hook, and his 
 face was framed in the orthodox corkscrew curls, one 
 at each side. He had brows so protruding as to throw 
 his eyes into deep shade ; and he had hands long and 
 thin and yellow, which might have made a fanciful 
 person think of claws. 
 
 His long gown had turned greenish in hue, from 
 extreme old age ; a tattered cord was round his waist ; 
 with one yellow claw he waved about his battered hat, 
 — which, on entering he had removed, leaving visible 
 a greasy black skull-cap, — with the other he gave fur- 
 tive pulls to his corkscrew curls. He had not stopped 
 talking since he entered. His hungry shining eyes 
 wandered round the room. 
 
 " You will never have seen anything to come near 
 that pair of horses, gracious Pan ! Gott und die Welt" 
 cried Aitzig, in his nasal mixture of Polish and Ger- 
 man, " but they are grand horses ! That is what you 
 will call them when you see them. There is some- 
 thing about the limbs of those horses, I tell you, 
 noble gentlemen " 
 
 "We shall see about that," interrupted Lucyan,- 
 but what is the price ? " 
 
GO BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUE. 
 
 " No money at all ; a price hardly worth mention 
 ing ; I blush to mention it to you," gabbled Aitzig, 
 with his shoulders drawn up to his ears, and his ten 
 ringers spread out like fans. " I will whisper the price 
 into your gracious ear, for fear that strangers should 
 overhear this wonderful bargain." 
 
 " Keep where you are, you garlic-smelling hound ! " 
 cried Bogumil, with a spark of his old temper, as 
 the factor was gliding towards his chair to impart 
 the secret. 
 
 Instantly the Jew retreated, cringing in dog-like 
 humility. " I will whisper it across : seven hundred 
 florins ! No money at all ! You will drive out with 
 those horses, and you will say to your friends, ' These 
 are horses of a thousand florins/ and they will believe 
 you ; and you will remember that it was the factor 
 Aitzig Majulik who got you those horses." 
 
 "Hold your chattering tongue," broke in Kazi- 
 mir, losing patience. "What is the height of these 
 paragons ? " 
 
 " If you ask me what is their height, I will say it 
 is fifteen -one; but when you look at those horses 
 you will say that they are twice fifteen-one. Those 
 
 horses have got a leg — gracious Pan ! — a leg " and 
 
 Aitzig Majulik, whose rhetoric apparently could fur- 
 nish no epithet worthy of describing the leg which 
 those horses had, closed his eyes and smacked his 
 
ONE OF THE KNAVES. 61 
 
 withered lips with an expression of exquisite ap- 
 preciation. 
 
 " Fifteen-one is no height at all," remarked Kazimir. 
 
 " If you could see those horses lift their legs, noble 
 gentlemen, you would not say that fifteen-one is no 
 height. They lift their legs in this manner : " and 
 Aitzig, having recourse to illustration, began stepping 
 round the room, with his slippered feet drawn up 
 alternately to an impossible height. 
 
 " Where are these horses to be seen ? " 
 
 " It is only two hours to drive in a sledge," said the 
 Jew, pausing in his high-bred stepping. 
 
 " Of course no one will be mad enough to give 
 seven hundred florins for a pair of carriage-horses/' 
 said Lucyan, quietly. " If the price had been named 
 at four hundred, the matter might have been con- 
 sidered." Lucyan knew perfectly well that when the 
 Jew said seven hundred he meant six, or perhaps less ; 
 and the Jew was equally aware that Lucyan's four 
 hundred meant a hundred or so upwards. 
 
 " Four hundred !" Aitzig Majulik indulged in a sort 
 of cackling sound — a sickly attempt at a laugh. The 
 gracious gentlemen were pleased to be merry this 
 evening, they were only joking with poor old Aitzig. 
 Four hundred ! He could hardly recover from the 
 shock. Even when he had said seven hundred, it 
 had been against his conscience. 
 
62 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 Might his body be burnt in deepest hell-fires if the 
 horses were not worth one thousand florins ! One 
 thousand ! What was he saying ? One thousand 
 live hundred should be their price. Might his name 
 be no longer Aitzig Majulik if those horses were not 
 grand horses, and if they were not worth one thousand 
 five hundred florins ! — and so on, and so on ; the poor 
 wretch went on talking himself hoarse, for the sake of 
 the couple of florins he would get from either party, 
 should the bargain be concluded. 
 
 Kazimir broke in again, with questions about age 
 and race. 
 
 " If one of the gentlemen would drive out himself 
 to Pan Eogdanovics, he would see with his own 
 eyes ! " 
 
 " Eogdanovics," repeated Bielinski. " No, that will 
 not do. I cannot have any transactions with him/' 
 
 " Why, have you quarrelled with the man, father ? " 
 asked Kazimir. " Is he your enemy ? " 
 
 " He was my best friend once," said Bielinski, " and 
 that is the very reason." 
 
 Kazimir had never so realised his father's morbid 
 dislike to seeing a known face. 
 
 Aitzig was wringing his hands and swaying his 
 body at the thought of the florins escaping him. 
 " Wai, wai ! " he groaned piteously ; but with the per- 
 sistence of a bull-dog, — " they are grand horses," I say. 
 
ONE OF THE KNAVES. 63 
 
 " May Aitzig Majulik be buried in a nameless grave if 
 they are not grand horses ! Aitzig is but a poor old 
 man who desires to serve the gracious Panowie, and 
 who works for his bread with his hands; he is not 
 one of those fortunate among the children of Abra- 
 ham, who are blessed with luck, such as is Naftali 
 Taubenkiibel " 
 
 "Hold your tongue," interrupted Lucyan, sternly, 
 — for the superior luck of Naftali Taubenkiibel was a 
 perpetually sore subject with Aitzig, and one on which 
 he was apt to become overpoweringly loquacious. 
 
 " But, father," said Kazimir — not out of regard for 
 the Jew's feelings, but because the prospect of inspect- 
 ing a pair of young horses was a congenial one — " you 
 need not meet your old friend. Let me drive over and 
 look at them." 
 
 " Y.es, let him drive over and look at them," moaned 
 the Jew in the background. 
 
 "Let him drive over and look at them," echoed 
 Marcin, worn out with the effort of listening ; " any 
 thing for a quiet life, I say." 
 
 Bo£umil resisted no further. Kazimir should drive 
 over as soon as the road was passable for a sledge. It 
 might be to-morrow or the next day. Aitzig Majulik, 
 seeing things in this promising vein, glided from the 
 room ; and went off to sing the praises of a faultless 
 cook, to an old lady, five miles distant ; to buy up old 
 
G4 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 clothes from another, and to offer money at 120 per 
 cent to a young scamp of the neighbourhood. Though 
 he should get no supper to-night, he will be happy, as 
 he chews his garlic, to think that his pains of to-day 
 must bring him in a few greasy paper florins. 
 
 To-morrow, at early dawn, he will find some corner 
 in a peasant-cart on its way to Lodniki, and he will 
 assure Eogdanovics that no other factor but Aitzig 
 Majulik could have procured him such a splendid 
 price as five hundred and fifty florins for his two raw 
 under-bred horses. 
 
 " By the way, Kazimir," said Lucyan, later in the 
 evening, "why did you not think of asking old 
 Aitzig for the names of your two fair acquaintances 
 in the snow ? If they are not mere creations of your 
 fancy, he is sure to know them/' 
 
 " I did not think of it," said Kazimir, excitedly — and 
 he left the room in hopes of discovering Aitzig still 
 lingering about the premises. But Aitzig was far 
 away by that time ; having already concluded a satis- 
 factory bargain with the old lady for her old clothes, 
 and having received fifty kreutzers for his trouble 
 in procuring a cook — to say nothing of having been 
 kicked out of a third house by the indignant father 
 of the young scamp. 
 
 " He is gone," said Kazimir, coming back discour- 
 
ONE OF THE KNAVES. 65 
 
 aged. "But," as an idea struck him, "who is that 
 Eogdanovics who has the horses ? " 
 
 " Has he daughters besides horses ? you mean," 
 completed Lucyan, laughing in his own peculiar 
 manner. "Yes, I believe he has, but only one." 
 
 " Are you quite sure ? " asked Kazimir, ruefully. 
 " Have you ever seen her ? " 
 
 " Never, mon ami; but I am quite sure — only one." 
 
 VOL. I. 
 
6Q 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 TWO OF THE QUEENS. 
 
 " We were two daughters of one race, 
 She was the fairest in the face." 
 
 — Tennyson. 
 
 Two girls are talking in their room. A large apart- 
 ment littered with evidences of a very feminine 
 presence ; such things as French fashion-plates, lace 
 handkerchiefs, several pairs of shoes and stockings, 
 a fan or two, and a hat which must surely have seen 
 Paris in its day. The good days of that hat are past 
 now ; it has been tossed aside, and lies suffocated by 
 a heavy fur muff, weighing down its once crisp and 
 curling feather. Here on a chair lies a fan, with its 
 white ivory bones starting from its pink silk skin ; 
 its broken pinions, incapable of raising the faintest 
 breath of air now, droop helpless and dejected. The 
 delicate white stockings, with cunningly traced silk 
 clocks, are unimpeachable as to quality, but hardly so 
 as to conservation and colour. The shoes, which lie in 
 
TWO OF THE QUEENS. G7 
 
 a miscellaneous heap, satin and kid, amicably blended, 
 have some of them left muddy marks on the floor; 
 and though the marks are two days old, they have not 
 been thought worth removing. In one corner there 
 lies a soiled primrose glove, turned inside out, and 
 abandoned by its wearer, as well as by its fellow. 
 
 The two girls who are carrying on conversation in 
 the midst of this picturesque disorder, look perfectly 
 at home and perfectly in keeping with it. One of 
 them is sitting before the glass, the other is reclining 
 on a chaise longue, wrapped in a flowing dressing-gown. 
 
 They are very like each other ; from a little distance, 
 and at certain moments, you might mistake them for 
 each other. Yet there is a difference between them, 
 only one difference, but a might}' one ; one of them is 
 plain, and the other is beautiful. 
 
 The girl on the sofa has got chestnut-brown hair, 
 of a peculiarly bright tint. Just now it floats down 
 unbound, in ruffled waves, with here and there a 
 thread of ruddier gold, where it catches the light. Her 
 face is a narrow oval, tenderly tinted, and delicate 
 almost to transparency, blue veins wandering on the 
 white temples; a little mouth, red and fresh as a 
 flower. The blue eyes are large and full of light — 
 more luminous than deep, more beseeching than com- 
 manding. A perishable hothouse flower she looks, 
 scarcely suited to this land of ice and snows. And 
 
68 BEGGAE MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 yet she is a blossom which could have sprung out of 
 no other but that rugged stem ; she is most distinctly 
 Polish. The cast of her features proclaims it, as does 
 also the exquisite finish, if I ma}^ say so, in every 
 detail of her beauty. She lies with her hands clasped 
 under her head, and her feet in loose slippers, appear- 
 ing from under the pale-coloured dressing-gown, which 
 falls in clinging folds all down her tall slight figure. 
 This dressing-gown is of a pale lavender colour, much 
 streaked and faded, showing the original tints only 
 where the seams are sprung, which they are both on 
 shoulders and arms ; very deficient as to buttons and 
 hooks, the elaborate trimming held to its place some- 
 times by nothing more than a weak yielding pin. 
 Not a becoming dress, certainly ; but it would take 
 much to disfigure that face and form. 
 
 The girl who sits before the glass is attired in a 
 loose white dressing-jacket and petticoat; both of 
 which have lost their first, their very first freshness. 
 She, like the other, has a pale face and brown hair, 
 and a tall figure. But the paleness here strikes not as 
 flower-like, but as sallow ; the hair has the shades, but 
 it has not the bright chestnut lights of the other's ; the 
 eyes are grey, not blue. What an irony of nature 
 to make two faces so alike, and so different ! There 
 is hardly any reason why this one should not be as 
 beautiful as the other is ; and yet no one has ever 
 
TWO OF THE QUEENS. 69 
 
 called her as much as comely. A duller tint of the 
 hair, a shade less crimson in the lips, a harder line 
 about the chin, a mere suggestion of greater robust- 
 ness in the figure, have robbed the elder of that 
 bewitching ensemble which constitutes the beauty of 
 the younger. 
 
 " I do not think it is worth while dressing to-day," 
 says the fair wearer of the lilac dressing-gown, yawn- 
 ing for the third time in five minutes. " Don't you 
 think so, Vizia? My cough is still so bad." She 
 breaks off, and burying her face in a silk handker- 
 chief, coughs a low, subdued little cough, and then 
 throwing back her head on her arms again, closes 
 her eyes exhausted. 
 
 " Your cough is not nearly so bad as you make it 
 out," says Vizia, from behind the shower of hair which 
 she is busied in brushing out. 
 
 " I cannot help it," answers the other meekly. 
 
 " What is the pleasure of staying on a sofa all day?" 
 inquires the other a little impatiently. 
 
 " What is the pleasure of getting off it, I wonder ? " 
 with another yawn. " There is nothing to do. I have 
 read through all the feuilletons in the fashion papers, 
 three times each ; I can't play the piano in that cold 
 room ; I have got no letters to write, and nobody has 
 written to me. I should only bore myself to death 
 all day." 
 
70 BEGGAK MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 " There is only half the day remaining to bore your- 
 self in, at any rate. It has struck twelve. Don't you 
 want any dinner, Xenia ? " 
 
 "But I had breakfast only two hours ago," says 
 Xenia, pushing away the tray on the table beside 
 her, where cold remains of coffee and stale scraps of 
 bread still linger. " My appetite is quite gone, ever 
 since that dreadful night in the snow. I wonder who 
 that officer was who helped us up the hill! Don't 
 you, Vizia?" 
 
 Vizia continued brushing her hair in silence. 
 
 " How well he spoke Polish ! But what a pity there 
 was nobody to introduce him to us ! It would have 
 been so much less awkward, wouldn't it? I hope I 
 did not pinch his arm too much," continued Xenia, 
 kicking off her slippers, and crossing her small feet, 
 one over the other, on the edge of the sofa. " I should 
 not have done so if I had known that he was an officer; 
 but then I was so frightened ! " 
 
 " Xenia, this is ridiculous ! " broke in the elder girl, 
 turning from the glass. " You have kept harping upon 
 your hardships and your fears as if you alone had 
 been the sufferer. Was / not cold? was I not wet 
 — yes, and frightened too, as well as you ? " 
 
 Xenia's under lip came out with a decided pout ; 
 her chin sank down. 
 
 " How unkind of you, Vizia ! I cannot help it ; I 
 
TWO OF THE QUEENS. 71 
 
 am not as strong as you." The pouting red lips 
 quivered, and something glistened for a moment in 
 the corner of each blue eye. In the next instant the 
 quickly risen tears were stealing down the folds of 
 the soiled lilac flannel. 
 
 That shade of angry colour which had sprung to 
 Vizia's cheek melted quickly — that hard look on her 
 face softened on the instant. The brush was flung on 
 the table, whence it slipped unnoticed to the floor, 
 but fell on soft ground luckily, for the folds of a silk 
 mantle received it in their midst. 
 
 " Xenia, what a wretch I am ! " She was on her 
 knees beside the sofa ; with one hand pulling away 
 the lace handkerchief which Xenia had pressed to her 
 eyes, with the other stroking the shining chestnut hair 
 in pitiful tenderness. 
 
 " Forgive me, my own Xenia — my only, beautiful 
 Xenia; I cannot see you cry." 
 
 The lace handkerchief was removed by this time ; 
 the blue eyes smiled out through a soft veil of mois- 
 ture. Vizia's arms were round Xenia's neck ; the dull 
 brown hair and the bright brown hair hung together, 
 mixed for a moment. 
 
 " Do not mind what I said — forget it, Xenia," whis- 
 pered Vizia. " I have not an angel's temper like 
 yours ! " 
 
 Peace was established between smiles and tears. 
 
72 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 Xenia lay back again on her sofa, while a sob now 
 and then still quivered through her frame. Vizia rose 
 from her knees, hunted for her brush on the table, and 
 not finding it, took another and returned to her work 
 of brushing. As she met her own eyes in the glass, 
 some shade of bitterness came over her again. 
 
 Oh yes ! she too had been frightened and cold like 
 Xenia; — but she was not Xenia. She had no right 
 to the pity which would be given to the beautiful 
 Xenia. She was not, in the vulgar sense of the 
 word, jealous of that frail loveliness, which called 
 forth homage everywhere — oh no, — she worshipped 
 the delicate flower too deeply to admit of real envy. 
 Vizia had never tasted that intoxicating homage ; she 
 had stood by and seen the incense burned to another, 
 and she had been used to this from childhood. But 
 yet there would come moments when her heart rose 
 in rebellion at this injustice of nature. She would 
 look in the glass and scan her features, wondering 
 why she was not beautiful like Xenia. Had she not 
 the same features, the same figure almost, the same 
 hair ? She had missed beauty by an inch, by a line, 
 by a mere shade of colour, and for all her days she 
 was doomed to the fate of a plain woman. Yes, it 
 was hard. 
 
 " Vizia, why are you sighing ? " asked Xenia, 
 coaxingly. 
 
TWO OF THE QUEENS. 73 
 
 " I am not sighing." 
 
 Another silence. Xenia gazed down pensively at 
 the little pink toe, which peeped impertinently rosy 
 from the point of her embroidered stocking. 
 
 "Vizia?" 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 "Don't you wish that some one would come and 
 visit us ? " 
 
 " But the roads are blocked with snow." 
 
 " They are not blocked any longer. Mariska says 
 it is a beautiful sledge road. Perhaps some one will 
 come to-day. We have so few visits here." 
 
 " We had two visits last week," corrected Vizia. 
 
 " Yes, but they were both old ladies. Don't you 
 think old ladies are dull?" objected Xenia, looking 
 down again at the coquettish pink toe, which was 
 slowly but surely working its way out, to the in- 
 creasing destruction of the embroidered stocking. " I 
 should like somebody more amusing." 
 
 " But what is the good of their coming, since you 
 are too ill to leave the sofa ? " laughed Vizia, 
 
 " I like living in a town so much better," continued 
 the other, not hearing. " I used to see people there 
 every day, and here I see nobody; and oh, Vizia, 
 Pawel says that he heard a wolf howl in the forest 
 two nights ago. Only fancy, we might have been 
 eaten by wolves the other night!" 
 
74 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 " I hardly think so," said Vizia, who, having slipped 
 into her dress, stood now with her fingers on the 
 door-handle. I must go now, Xenia, and give out 
 hasza for the servants, and I have not seen papa 
 to-day." 
 
 " And I am to stay alone — all alone 1 " 
 
 " Listen ; what is that ? " interrupted Vizia, pausing. 
 There was the faint sound of a tinkle floating towards 
 them from the white landscape outside. 
 
 " It is a sledge coming this way," said Vizia, stand- 
 ing at the window, and rubbing the frozen pane with 
 her handkerchief. Xenia rose languidly to her elbow, 
 while they both listened and waited. 
 
 " Can you see it yet ? " 
 
 " No, it has not turned the corner ; yes — there it 
 comes." 
 
 " A peasant - sledge ? But the bells have such a 
 good sound." 
 
 The tinkle rang out clearly now through the winter 
 air, louder every instant. Then it lessened, then it 
 burst upon their ears close at hand ; they could hear 
 the dull tramp of the horses. 
 
 " What is it like ? " questioned Xenia. 
 
 " It is not a peasant-sledge," said Vizia, craning her 
 neck as she held back the curtain. "There is only 
 one person in it. I think I see a bonnet." 
 
 " Another old lady ! " sighed Xenia, sinking back. 
 
TWO OF THE QUEENS. 75 
 
 "Yes,— no, it is not a bonnet — it is a gentleman. 
 He is driving straight to the house." 
 
 " A visitor ! An amusing visitor ! Thank heavens ! " 
 cried Xenia, springing off the sofa electrified, all the 
 languor replaced by a childlike eagerness of tone and 
 mien. " I don't think I am too ill to dress. Where 
 are my shoes ? — where is my comb ? — where is Mariska 
 to do up my hair ? — where is my new silk dress ? " 
 
 " Shall I put on my new silk dress, too ? " asked 
 Vizia, eyeing herself doubtfully in the glass. 
 
 " Oh yes, let us both put them on ; they look bet- 
 ter together," said Xenia, eagerly, while hunting for 
 a truant garter among the miscellaneous burdens of 
 chairs and tables. 
 
 No, it did not matter what she put on, concluded 
 Vizia, turning from the glass. Silk would not make 
 her prettier to look at than wool. 
 
 But now it was Xenia who paused before the 
 mirror. 
 
 " Boze ! What a fright I look ! " she exclaimed, 
 regarding her fair image with an expression of the 
 most exquisite disgust. 
 
 She did not look a fright by any means ; only her 
 eyes were one degree less bright, and there was a 
 shade more pink upon her nose than was strictly 
 becoming. 
 
 " Vizia, how can I show myself with this cold ? " 
 
76 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 " I have a cold too." 
 
 " Yes, but " Perhaps Xenia dimly felt that 
 
 there was a difference. A plain woman with a cold 
 can only be a shade more plain, whereas a beauty 
 with a cold might just miss being a beauty ; and for 
 a beauty, who is nothing but a beauty, what darker 
 fate could there be ? 
 
 So, as Vizia, in her plain woollen dress, left the 
 room, Xenia sank back on her sofa, shedding a few 
 silent tears on her lavander dressing-gown, at the 
 thought of this self-imposed imprisonment, and half 
 wavering in her resolution, as the sound of bustling- 
 footsteps outside reached her ear. 
 
1 1 
 
 CHAPTEE V. 
 
 AT THE COURT OF THE SPADE KIXG. 
 
 There came a youth from Georgia's shore, 
 A military casque he wore, 
 With splendid feathers dress'd. 
 
 And with him many tales he brought 
 
 Of pleasure and of fear. 
 Such tales as told to any maid, 
 By such a youth in the green shade, 
 
 Were perilous to hear. " 
 
 —Wordsworth. 
 
 Two days after the interview with Aitzig Majulik, 
 Kazimir was awoke in the morning by the welcome 
 intelligence that the road to Lodniki was passable. 
 
 All the long hours of the night before last, the wind 
 had slept, while the snow had come down softly, 
 patching up deficient places, filling up holes, and 
 making the whole uneven texture even. Now the 
 peasant-sledges had cut their way through, the sanna 
 droga, the sledge -road for the winter, was moulded 
 into shape. A sledge-road with us means a welcome 
 change from the monotony of wheels, a good excuse 
 
78 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 for some gay freak, or an easy opportunity for display. 
 With the Poles it means something different, — not an 
 amusement, but almost a necessity. It means dis- 
 tances cut down to half their length — business and 
 traffic deprived of half their trouble ; an event ex- 
 pected with anxiety. 
 
 Kazimir, impatient for a change after two days' im- 
 prisonment, was soon out of the house and in motion, 
 his sledge-bells tinkling with each step of the horses. 
 It was the last time, he hoped, that he should drive 
 with hired horses, for he felt sanguine as to his mis- 
 sion to-day. He was in high spirits altogether. The 
 winter sunshine, which had broken its way at last, 
 stared down from a pale-blue cloudless sky, pouring 
 light-floods over the earth. 
 
 Kazimir's road led down the centre of the garden ; 
 then, as the garden on either side died off without 
 definite limits, the road ran up the gradual but rocky 
 slope, and plunged into the woods beyond, — the great 
 deep forest, which seemed to be everywhere, and to 
 lead everywhere. But before turning his horses' heads 
 in that direction, he had a glimpse of the open country 
 at the other side ; a white world of fields and roads 
 and hills, all spotless and untouched, stretching in 
 snowy widespread waves to the horizon ; all giving 
 back the sun's light with blinding brightness; with 
 silver sparks struck here and there, and diamond-dust 
 
AT THE COURT OF THE SPADE KING. 79 
 
 scattered everywhere. The windows of the low house 
 blazed as though they were on fire. 
 
 As Kazimir drove towards the forest, he could trace 
 footsteps of some animal, coming from between the 
 trees, crossing and recrossing over the flower-beds. 
 Hungry foxes, no doubt, driven to dig for roots. 
 
 In the forest it was lonely, and on a dull day 
 would be dark ; but to-day the silver sunshine peered 
 through the branches, and the blue sky showed be- 
 tween the tree-tops. The green leaves, which in 
 summer so jealously curtained the entrance to the 
 forest sanctuaries, were lying dead and buried under 
 the snow ; and at either side the eye could plunge into 
 a vista of retreating stems. Every branch and bush 
 was laden with snow ; every tree-hollow was filled to 
 overflowing ; every tiny twig which could hold a snow- 
 flake, had its load. The thorny arches of wild- rose 
 bushes, which in summer flowered pink, now nodded 
 under white burdens. There were more tracks of 
 animals here, passing in and out between the trees, 
 but there was no life, except when at times a soli- 
 tary bird, startled by the approach of the sledge, 
 darted from its perch, while the recoiling twig, with a 
 spring upwards, shook itself free of the clinging flakes. 
 Neither was there any sound in the wood, but an occa- 
 sional fall of snow, as some overladen branch dis- 
 charged its burden on the white carpet below. 
 
80 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 It was all a new experience to Kazimir. He had 
 been so long away from his country, that he had 
 grown almost to forget the delights of this gliding 
 magical swiftness with which they were flying along 
 close to the hard surface. The frost was keen; the 
 breath of the tramping horses curled away like smoke 
 into the sharp air. Kazimir, muffled up to his ears, 
 and buried down to his toes in fur, heartily pitied the 
 poor driver, whose ears from pink had became red, and 
 from red were fast turning purple. Leaning back in 
 luxurious enjoyment of the motion, he drank in intoxi- 
 cating draughts of the pure winter air, and feasted his 
 eyes on the sparkles which hung on every branch, 
 and which flew away in shivers from under the 
 horses' hoofs. 
 
 The thought which had underlain all other thoughts 
 during these last three days, rose now to the surface 
 of his mind, with a sanguine hope, engendered by 
 the brightness of this white winter day. Surely fate 
 had something good in store for him — surely his cards 
 were all trumps to-day — surely he would recover the 
 clue to those two rescued sisters, whom he had seen 
 so dimly and so vaguely. 
 
 Tinkle, tinkle came the sound of another sledge- 
 bell along the road. Kazimir's spirit leapt up in 
 hope. It seemed so easy to hope in the midst of this 
 glittering splendour. Why should not that sledge con- 
 
AT THE COURT OF THE SPADE KING. 81 
 
 tain the solution to the mystery ? He leant eagerly 
 out. Alas ! only a rude wooden construction, with 
 half-a-dozen peasants, men and women, huddled to- 
 gether on the top of it; while the two little rough 
 koniki tore along madly through the snow, their 
 clotted manes shaking with each step, their sides 
 rubbed bare into streaks of shining leather by the 
 friction of the hard rope-harness. 
 
 Kazimir sank back disappointed, and in the same 
 moment experienced a chill of another description; 
 for a shower of snow came flying down from a branch 
 overhead, and treated the passing traveller to a cold 
 and unwelcome embrace. There were no more false 
 hopes either raised or crushed before they emerged 
 from the forest road, and found themselves close to 
 the term of their journey. 
 
 Lodniki would have been in many respects the 
 ideal of an American settler's hut. The large low 
 building, with some smaller buildings to the rear, 
 stood in a sort of bay of the great forest ; which bay 
 had evidently been but lately cleared — witness the 
 unevenness of the ground, where tree -stumps and 
 roots stood close together, and where trunks of forest- 
 trees lay at their length in the snow. The house itself 
 was turned with its face towards a vista of sloping 
 fields. 
 
 The back buildings appeared to have been planned 
 
 VOL. I. F 
 
82 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 on a large scale; but most of them were unfinished, 
 and roughly roofed-in for the winter. There was a 
 -shadowy indication of something traced out on the 
 ground, hedged -in in a necessitous fashion, which 
 something might be destined to be in future a garden. 
 Everything bore the stamp of the new and the un- 
 finished. In an open shed some agricultural machines 
 stood covered with straw, peacefully sleeping their 
 winter sleep. Two large watch-dogs, with their hair 
 hanging in unkempt fringes all over them, received 
 the stranger noisily and savagely. 
 
 Before Kazimir could struggle out of his furs, the 
 host had appeared at the door, and, amidst smiles and 
 bows, warmly invited the visitor in. No matter that 
 he was a total stranger; to ask for hospitality in 
 Poland is to receive it. 
 
 There was so much warmth in Bogdanovics's man- 
 ner already, that there seemed scarcely room for more 
 when he learned that this stranger was hardly a 
 stranger, being the son of his old friend Bielinski, 
 with whom in old days he had gambled, and hunted, 
 and passed his time in so many other pleasant, if 
 unprofitable, ways. Was this really the little Kazimir 
 whom he remembered in a short green jacket and a 
 wide white collar, whom he had once protected against 
 Bogumil for some boyish offence, — it was running his 
 toy-sword through a picture, if he remembered right ? 
 
AT THE COURT OF THE SPADE KING. 83 
 
 Ah, well, that was long ago ; and what a pity it was 
 that Bogumil had made such a hermit of himself! 
 He, Rogdanovics, had only bought this estate, some 
 months ago ; but he had not ventured to intrude. 
 Kazimir could hardly get to the explanation of his 
 errand, so delighted and so talkative was the old 
 gentleman. 
 
 Of two or three long narrow buildings, half stables, 
 half sheds, Eogdanovics's breeding establishment con- 
 sisted. There is rarely a Polish Panic who does not 
 in a small way dabble in horse-breeding; but Rog- 
 danovics's experiments had been more extensive. His 
 mind was eminently of the sanguinely speculative 
 order. The horses, all huddled together, showed every 
 stage of youthful rawness, from long-legged foals to 
 tall unfinished colts. There was a general sound of 
 chewing, and an occasional stamp on the straw-covered 
 ground, — a peasant-groom was carrying about some- 
 thing hot and steaming in a pail. 
 
 The choking atmosphere notwithstanding, Kazimir 
 lingered long in each shed ; but his errand was not 
 destined to be accomplished to-day, for one of the 
 carriage-horses was away to be shod. The solitary 
 specimen visible was so far from coming up to Aitzig 
 Majulik's epithet of * grand," that Kazimir, doubt- 
 ful about the bargain, was glad of the excuse of 
 postponement. 
 
84 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 " That will insure me another visit," said Kog- 
 danovics, as they walked towards the house. His 
 humour was waxing more radiant every minute. He 
 grew communicative as to his life, past, present, and 
 future. 
 
 " Ah ! you must come and see me in summer, when 
 my fields will be in bloom," he said, button-holing 
 Kazimir on the door-step ; " it will be a pleasure to 
 look at them then," waving his hand towards the 
 vista of fields. "Every one of these tree-stumps is 
 going to be cleared off this year. I have heard of a 
 new machine, a brilliant speculation; extracts these 
 roots as neatly as teeth. See, there is my garden — my 
 future garden. To the left I shall grow asparagus and 
 artichokes. Artichokes have never succeeded yet in 
 this country, but I am ready to wager that mine will 
 succeed. To the right my daughter shall have her 
 flowers." 
 
 " Have you only got one daughter ? " put in Kazimir, 
 with a faint glimmer of hope. 
 
 " Only one daughter. I suppose you can't give me 
 any advice about steam-ploughs ? I am hesitating 
 between two kinds ; there are pros and cons on both 
 sides." 
 
 " I am afraid I know nothing about steam-ploughs," 
 said Kazimir, crest-fallen. 
 
 " To be sure, you are a soldier. But you shiver — 
 
AT THE COURT OF THE SPADE KING. 85 
 
 come, and I will introduce you to my daughter at 
 dinner." 
 
 The drawing-room was a larger room than at Wowa- 
 sulka, and bearing evidences of greater wealth. Tables, 
 chairs, and sofas, were rich and solid ; and though 
 there were nothing but tables, chairs, and sofas, with- 
 out any of these accessories which in an English 
 room speak of occupation and habitation, still it was 
 unmistakably the room of a rich man. On one table 
 there stood a vase with a faded bouquet. 
 
 The daughter could not have been unprepared for 
 the summons, for she quickly appeared. She had a 
 plain brown dress on and a scarlet shawl wrapped 
 round her ; she had grey eyes and smooth brown hair. 
 She inclined her head stiffly, but in the same moment 
 she glanced at the visitor furtively and curiously. 
 Kazimir, meeting that glance, wondered what it meant. 
 There was nothing either in her height or in her figure 
 which forbade the possibility of her having been one 
 of those two distressed damsels in the snow ; but yet 
 Kazimir felt himself touched by none but the very 
 faintest feeling of recognition ; and when he heard the 
 name of Vizia, his interest all but collapsed. 
 
 "You have not got a sister, mademoiselle?" he 
 inquired, nevertheless, after they were seated at table, 
 and were attacking their pink beetroot-soup, the much- 
 famed Barscz of Poland. There was a fourth plate of 
 
80 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 pink soup on the table, which must belong, Kazimir 
 thought, to some poor relative ; one of those nonde- 
 script hangers-on, old aunts, or penniless cousins, who, 
 in almost every Polish family, are allowed a corner 
 and a plate under the patriarchal roof. 
 
 Kazimir had been observing Vizia, and it had struck 
 him more forcibly that, after all, she might have been 
 one of those two damsels — the least interesting, of 
 course, if either. 
 
 " Certainly I have got no sister," answered Vizia, 
 raising her eyebrows perceptibly. 
 
 "Not a younger sister?" persisted Kazimir, dis- 
 regarding every previous assurance he had had to 
 the contrary. 
 
 " Certainly not," repeated the lady with a shade 
 more primness, perhaps because Kazimir had laid 
 such a stress on the adjective used. 
 
 " That was a fearful snowstorm the other night," 
 was Kazimir's next attempt. " I hope you were not 
 in it?" He looked at the daughter, but the father 
 broke in — 
 
 " Not I ; I have better things to do than that. 
 My time is gold, you know. I had plenty to do in 
 stowing away potatoes for the winter. I have a 
 capital in potatoes lying in that barn "—pointing with 
 his fork out of the window. " Anything will grow in 
 land like this ; every spadeful turns up gold, I say — 
 
AT THE COURT OF THE SPADE KING. 87 
 
 ha ! ha ! A spade is all a man needs to make his 
 fortune with here." Eogdanovics patted his fork as 
 approvingly as though it had been the vaunted spade, 
 and dug it vigorously into the viand before him. 
 w But the people are fools. I am going to grow rice 
 next year ; it will be a grand speculation. I suppose 
 you cannot give me any hints about systems of sow- 
 ing ? How do they do it where you are stationed, 
 down in Tyrol ? " 
 
 " I am afraid I never noticed," confessed Kazimir. 
 
 Here the talk was interrupted by the domestic 
 Pawel, who serenely announced that there was only 
 one partridge for three people. Pawel was a brisk 
 young fellow, wearing yellow livery gaiters, and a 
 green and grey jacket, which gave to the upper half 
 of his person a doubtfully sporting character. 
 
 " Ah ! our larder is getting low in this weather," 
 remarked the host, with undisturbed equanimity. 
 " We had plenty of partridges a fortnight ago. Are 
 you a sportsman ? Pity you were not here last week. 
 Got fifty head of game in two days." 
 
 " Fifty-three," corrected Pawel from the side-table. 
 
 " Well, Pawel, I suppose you know best. You were 
 our crack gun that day. You shot that five-antlered 
 stag." 
 
 " Seven - antlered," rectified Pawel, brimming over 
 with pride. 
 
88 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 " The snow has spoiled the sport, you see," said 
 Bogdanovics. 
 
 " And the foxes eat my hens," said Vizia, 
 
 " Just wait till the cold has given them confidence, 
 and I am ready to wager that we shall get rid of them 
 somehow." 
 
 Thus conversation flowed on; but it was scarcely 
 more than a monologue, carried on by Eogdanovics. 
 It was hard to show interest in the lists of agricul- 
 tural machines, and in the hundred and one specula- 
 tive schemes upon which Eogdanovics proceeded to 
 expatiate. There was a fortune to be gained by doing 
 something to the marshy stream in the meadows ; 
 there were thousands of florins lying dormant in the 
 wool of unborn lambs ; he had some splendid system 
 for feeding cows upon beetroot - refuse which would 
 instantly double the supply of milk and butter ; and 
 as for the forest ! why, there were millions staring 
 the people in the face, if they were not too blind to 
 see it. But he, Eogdanovics, would show them the 
 way. He was not going to sit with his hands tied in 
 the midst of all this untold wealth, only waiting to be 
 gathered. And then, crowning point of all, there was 
 the railway ; a railway in the clouds as yet, but it 
 would come down to the earth some day. And thus 
 on and on Eogdanovics pranced and curveted on his 
 private hobby-horse — never pausing to reflect that 
 
AT THE COURT OF THE SPADE KING. 89 
 
 the paces of that hobby-horse might interest the 
 spectators less than they did the rider. He was of a 
 genial nature ; a well-wisher towards every one of his 
 fellow-creatures — except, perhaps, towards an incon- 
 venient neighbour, who happened to possess a more 
 successful mowing-machine, or a higher breed of pigs 
 than his own, — but yet, Eogdanovics's best wishes 
 were always for himself. 
 
 It was almost a relief when, after dinner, the talka- 
 tive host, having caught sight of some irregular pro- 
 ceeding in the courtyard, left the room precipitately. 
 
 Kazimir drew a long breath; it was a pleasant 
 change to be able to talk ; and for the last twenty 
 minutes he had heard his own voice only in solitary 
 and far isolated monosyllables. 
 
 " Do you take one or two lumps of sugar in your 
 coffee ? " said a voice from the table over there. Vizia 
 was pouring out the coffee. Kazimir left the window. 
 
 " Two, if you please." 
 
 The hand which held out the coffee-cup was a well- 
 shaped white hand, — Kazimir's eyes travelled up 
 further. She was not so very bad-looking after all. 
 If her complexion wanted freshness, it was at least 
 pure ; the grey eyes were well set ; the colour of her 
 plain brown hair harmonised with her plain brown 
 dress. She was neither pretty in face nor particularly 
 attractive in manner. It would require positive at- 
 
90 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 tractions of mind to redeem her from the imputation 
 of being a commonplace woman ; but Kazimir did not 
 belong to that class of men who, on first beholding a 
 woman, set to work instantly to analyse and classify 
 her charms and her defects. Every face has, we 
 are told, its caricature and its ideal ; and it lay in 
 Kazimir's nature unconsciously to look for the ideal 
 rather than for the caricature. 
 
 " Your father seems to be heart and soul in his 
 farming," said Kazimir, as he sipped his coffee. 
 
 " He is always heart and soul in whatever he does," 
 said Vizi a, almost with apology." He cannot help it." 
 
 •• Why should he help it? what can be better than 
 energy ? " 
 
 u But it does not do to see all couleur de rose." 
 
 " Better than seeing everything black," said Kazimir, 
 smiling. He himself very much preferred the rose- 
 colour to the black. 
 
 Yizia smiled too. The first crust of etiquette was 
 beginning to yield. The want of the sweet and smil- 
 ing element in her nature had made her stiffer and 
 primmer at first than even Polish etiquette demand- 
 ed, but it was difficult to keep stiff with Kazimir 
 Bielinski. 
 
 " But there are a great many shades between rose- 
 coloured and black ; now papa's fields, and horses, and 
 lambs are always pure rose-coloured in perspective." 
 
AT THE COURT OF THE SPADE KING. 91 
 
 " I have got no fields and lambs, but my horses are 
 always rose-coloured too." 
 
 " Even when they are black ? " 
 
 " Even when they are black," said Kazimir, and he 
 laughed. His laugh was so infectious that another 
 shade of stiffness melted from Vizia's manner. First 
 she smiled, then she laughed ; and after that they felt 
 that their friendship had made a stride. There is 
 nothing which brings people so quickly together as a 
 little nonsense. Half an hour's sedate conversation 
 will not do as much as one harmless though possibly 
 meaningless joke. 
 
 " I hope you do not much dislike hearing about spades 
 and ploughs," said Vizia, putting down her coffee-cup. 
 
 " No ; although they are not the things that I 
 earnestly dote upon. I hope it is not rude and 
 selfish to say so. Are you going to tell me more 
 about them ? " This a little anxiously ; for this con- 
 versation was so pleasant, that somehow he dreaded a 
 revival of the plough and cattle subject. 
 
 " You had too much of them at dinner," said Vizia, 
 not as a question, but as an assertion. She was look- 
 ing at him straight, and Kazimir thought that he had 
 never seen so straight and unwavering a gaze, with 
 something of defiance, too, in its very candour. It 
 would be hard to dissemble under that full gaze, but 
 Kazimir did not think of dissembling. 
 
92 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 " I had rather more than I was prepared for, if I 
 may say so. I have a deep reverence for agricultural 
 instruments, but I do not think that I know a sickle 
 from a spade. The sword is the only blade for me." 
 
 " A Pole should wear none but a Polish sword," 
 said Vizia. 
 
 " Mademoiselle Yizia, we shall quarrel about this 
 if we go on. If you say one word against my pro- 
 fession, we can never be friends." 
 
 " You are enthusiastic," she said, looking up at him. 
 "You could be as enthusiastic about your sword as 
 papa about his ploughs." 
 
 " Yes, and I could talk about it by the hour." 
 
 " Then why don't you ? " 
 
 " Take care ! you don't know what you are bring- 
 ing down upon your own head. You have no notion 
 what I am when I get on that subject. Lucyan never 
 listens, and Marcin always goes to sleep. It would 
 weary you most awfully." 
 
 " I shall tell you when you begin to weary me." 
 
 " Thank you ; that is so kind," said Kazimir, grate- 
 fully. Her tone had been quite matter-of-fact ; but 
 Kazimir's heart warmed instantly at the half-implied 
 invitation. He did not wait for a second. He talked, 
 and she listened and questioned ; and after ten min- 
 utes of discussion and description did not look weary 
 yet. 
 
AT THE COURT OF THE SPADE KING. 93 
 
 "And you see that we can be friends in spite of 
 my hussar-cording \ " asked Kazimir, at the end of 
 those ten minutes. He wanted to be friends with her, 
 as he wanted to be friends with everybody. 
 
 " Yes ; we need not be enemies on that account," 
 said Vizia, with a warm flush on her cheek. He 
 really did not look as if he wanted to be her enemy. 
 " We need not even quarrel any more." 
 
 " Have we been quarrelling ? " 
 
 " Well, I think we were nearly quarrelling about 
 spades and sickles." 
 
 " Yes, because I said I had no opinion of them." 
 
 " But you are wrong to despise them, even from a 
 soldier's point of view. In almost every national war 
 they have played a part." 
 
 " By national wars you mean revolutions ? " 
 
 " Yes ; and in revolutions the sickle has many times 
 done the work of the sword. I hope it may do so 
 for us still." 
 
 " I hope not," said Kazimir, excitedly, for the sub- 
 ject was near to his heart ; " that would be folly, 
 pure folly." 
 
 " You talk as if you were not a Pole ! " 
 
 "lama Pole, but an enlightened one." 
 
 " That means a cold one." 
 
 " That does not mean a cold one," said Kazimir, 
 springing from his chair and pacing the room. " Made- 
 
94 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 moiselle Vizia, it seems we are going to quarrel again, 
 after all." 
 
 " Then, will you fight with us when we rise, as 
 surely we shall rise some day ? " asked Vizia, with 
 a quick turn of her head, for the subject lay near 
 her heart too. She looked at him as if she almost 
 thought that if he did fight with them, their cause 
 might have a chance of being crowned. 
 
 " I cannot, for I am an Austrian soldier." 
 
 " And yet you are a Polish patriot." 
 
 " That is just what they all said to me at the time. 
 and a hard time it was to me," said Kazimir, stopping 
 beside the table. 
 
 " What time ? " said Vizia, anxious to hear more. 
 
 " I will tell you, if you like. In '48, my regiment 
 was in Dukla ; and the second division was stationed 
 some miles off. You know, I daresay, that the moment 
 the revolution began, the Hungarian ministry called 
 in all Hungarian regiments. They sent the order to 
 us too ; to the colonel first, but he did not publish it ; 
 then to the major commanding the second division. 
 He published it, and the second division went mad 
 on the spot." 
 
 " And you went mad with them ? " 
 
 " Xo, I did not — perhaps because I was not a Hun- 
 garian; although there were Poles and Bohemians 
 among them who went quite as mad as any Hun- 
 
AT THE COURT OF THE SPADE KING. 95 
 
 garian. Our turn would come, they said; this was 
 the beginuing of universal liberty ; help them and they 
 would help us, &c. Some of them had doubts, but 
 they managed to argue and drink themselves up to 
 the point, except one unfortunate man with a con- 
 science, who shot himself, because he could not make 
 up his mind whether he would be behaving like a 
 great hero, or like a great blackguard, if he went. For 
 my part I never could see where the difficulty lay, nor 
 what there was to argue about. ' Either they meant 
 to break their oath of allegiance or they did not. I 
 did not mean to break mine, so I stayed. It never 
 puzzled me for a moment, but it hurt me for many 
 days." 
 
 " And how many stayed altogether ? " 
 
 " How many 1 Oh, nobody else stayed of my 
 division. I stood behind a tree and watched them 
 ride off one splendid autumn morning ; they were all 
 singing and shouting : and when I had seen the last 
 sword glitter, and heard the last hoof-fall die away, I 
 turned back, and, Mademoiselle Vizia — I " 
 
 "Well?" 
 
 " I cried," he finished with half-comical pathos. " 1 
 was very young, remember — scarcely seventeen; the 
 youngest lieutenant in the regiment. Please don't 
 laugh at me." 
 
 Vizia was not laughing; she was not quite sure 
 
96 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 whether she was so very far from crying herself. He 
 had told the story with such perfect simplicity, with 
 such an utter want of self-consciousness, that it was 
 impossible to suspect him of attempting to attitudinise 
 as a hero. It was, in fact, the first time he had ever 
 told the story at all. 
 
 "But I was right to stay, was I not?" asked 
 Kazimir. 
 
 Vizia' s nationality was struggling with some other 
 feeling in her breast. She did not say whether he had 
 been right or whether he had been wrong, but entirely 
 on impulse she put out her hand to him, and Kazimir 
 took it. 
 
 " And if it had been a Polish regiment ? " she asked 
 with a not quite steady smile, and in a voice which 
 might have been made hoarse either by emotion or 
 by her cold ; " and a Polish revolution, which you 
 were called upon to help?" 
 
 " Then perhaps I should have cried a little harder," 
 said Kazimir, half laughing and half moved ; and quite 
 as impulsively as Vizia had held out her hand, Kazimir 
 raised it and kissed it. 
 
 At this very moment the door opened, and Eog- 
 danovics put in his head. 
 
 " I am a shameful host, Bielinski ; but they are all 
 tearing me to pieces outside. I hope Vizia is doing 
 her part better. Aha! yes, I think she is, — better 
 
AT THE COURT OF THE SPADE KING. 97 
 
 than I could have hoped," with a chuckle of delight. 
 " You will excuse me for another five minutes ; the 
 new guano has just arrived." 
 
 He was gone again, before any answer could be made. 
 
 Vizia had hastily withdrawn her hand, and moved 
 her head distinctly upwards. The twinkle in her 
 father's eye had alarmed her pride. Why should she 
 allow herself to treat this man as an old friend, when, 
 after all, he was but a stranger ? This tete-a-tete was 
 altogether irregular ; an infringement of Polish eti- 
 quette. It was very disagreeable ; or at least it ought 
 to be very disagreeable. Vizia bit her lip with vexa- 
 tion, and, as a sort of tacit protest against further 
 intimacy, put her hand into her pocket and drew out 
 a pair of pale kid gloves. Kid gloves, even though 
 slightly soiled, were the best protection against a 
 stranger. 
 
 " Please do not be angry with me," said Kazimir, as 
 he watched her proceedings with a puzzled air ; " but 
 you remind me a little of a lady whom I met the other 
 day." 
 
 " Eeally ? " said Vizia, with forced coldness ; care- 
 fully drawing on her gloves. She was conscientiously 
 trying to freeze back into the icicle she had been at 
 first. 
 
 " Yes really ; a lady who wore gloves like these, — 
 only I think her hair was lighter than yours." 
 
 VOL. I. G 
 
98 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 " Oh, I daresay ! " How hard and unamiable her 
 voice sounded now ! 
 
 " But you have no sister." He said it with a sort 
 of vague hope that there might be a sister concealed 
 somewhere. 
 
 Vizia hesitated for one moment. She had slowly 
 but surely come to the conclusion that this was the 
 same man whom they had met in the snowstorm ; she 
 was quite sure of it now. She saw that he was 
 puzzled, and she knew that one word of hers could 
 explain the mystery. That word — she did not feel 
 inclined to speak it. Some instinct, much too subtle 
 to bear analysis, told her to be silent. Had the beau- 
 tiful Xenia been well enough to appear, then the 
 mystery would have become clear long ago ; for who, 
 having once seen her, could fail to recognise her ? But 
 then, would they two, would she and Kazimir, have 
 got on so well together ? That tete-a-tete which she 
 was endeavouring to condemn, Vizia suddenly became 
 aware that she had not succeeded in condemning at 
 all. It was not disagreeable ; it was new, and it was 
 pleasant. 
 
 " No, of course I have no sister/' she said quickly. 
 It was the perfect truth, and yet it was deception ; and 
 indirect though it was, to her particular nature it was 
 unbearable. She lost for a moment the self-possession 
 which so rarely forsook her. Looking round for any- 
 
AT THE COURT OF THE SPADE KING. 99 
 
 thing to change the subject, and leave this perilous 
 ground, her eye was caught by the faded bouquet on 
 the table. 
 
 " Do you care for flowers ? " she asked, with a sort 
 of gasp. 
 
 Kazimir did not care for flowers, and he said so 
 honestly. It was the first entirely conventional ques- 
 tion she had put that day, and the abruptness of tran- 
 sition surprised him much. 
 
 Did she care for flowers ? Yes, rather, — that is to 
 say, some flowers — camellias, for instance. 
 
 The few dead camellias in the middle of the bouquet 
 had probably suggested the idea. If there had been 
 turnips or cauliflowers there instead, Vizia would 
 certainly have seized upon them equally as a subject 
 of conversation. 
 
 Kazimir displayed a deplorable masculine ignorance 
 on the subject of camellias; and perhaps it was in 
 return for the instruction he received that he said at 
 parting — 
 
 " I shall try and bring you some of these flowers 
 you are so fond of." He was always chivalrously 
 inclined to further any wish, however slight, of any 
 lady ; but how could Vizia know this ? " I hope I 
 shall not have forgotten the name when I come back 
 again on Saturday." 
 
 "When he comes back again on Saturday," thought 
 
100 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 Vizia, after lie was gone. Somehow, for no reason 
 that she knew, her interest in camellias had suddenly 
 become real. She was really anxious to get that 
 flower on Saturday. Perhaps if she had been pro- 
 mised a cauliflower, she would have looked forward 
 to it with an equal longing. 
 
 " After all, a pretty face is not everything," she 
 said, standing before the mirror. " Some men look 
 deeper than that ; " and even as she said it, it 
 struck her that her own face had never before looked, 
 not so pretty, but so little plain. That smile which 
 sat upon it so well, replacing the frown which sat 
 upon it so ill, why was it so seldom there ? and what 
 meant the wave of warm colour in her cheek? and 
 what was this dim and dawning feeling of a delight, 
 scarcely real yet, still trembling on its insecure foun- 
 dations, and never before known to her ? 
 
 The primrose gloves were on her hands still; she 
 drew them off now slowly. For these last ten minutes 
 they had been nothing but a hollow mockery. 
 
 The ice cannot choose but melt when the sun shines 
 upon it. 
 
101 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 FINESSING. 
 
 " La parole a ete clonnee a l'horame pour d^guiser sa pensee." 
 
 —Voltaire. 
 
 Kazimir had been three full days at home, and he had 
 not yet seen his mother. Even his aunt Bobertine he 
 had seen only distantly, disappearing down passages 
 and into doorways. On the fourth day, however, she 
 entered the room where he was sitting. 
 
 A sort of black walking pillar (such was Kazimir's 
 impression) glided in. This must be a woman, to 
 judge from the sweeping garments more than from 
 the face ; for a black woollen shawl covered her head, 
 and deeply shaded her features, ostensibly a protec- 
 tion from the cold draughts of the passages ; but in 
 some vague manner the spectator wondered what 
 mystery it hid. Was there some dark secret envelop- 
 ing her past ? — was there some black cloud which 
 hung over her present? — had she a beard, or had she 
 no nose ? — people asked themselves aghast. Even her 
 
102 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 relatives, well as they knew her, could never quite 
 suppress a half-unconscious feeling of surprise when- 
 ever, on throwing back her shawl, she showed herself 
 to be an ordinary woman. She had a nose, and with 
 a vengeance too. Every one of the canvas noses on 
 the wall might have shrunk away humiliated before 
 this one. The hereditary bridge, in this instance, 
 should have been enough to endow a whole genera- 
 tion. The hereditary height, the hereditary shape of 
 eyelids, and the hereditary largeness of muscles, had 
 found their full expression here. She was a Bielinska 
 all over, as she proudly proclaimed. 
 
 Mademoiselle Eobertine had found hersel£ forced 
 to be instrumental in summoning Kazimir to his 
 mother's side ; but to make up for it now, she did her 
 best to keep him away. She had fenced and parried 
 as long as she could ; but on the fourth day of Kazi- 
 mir's stay she was compelled to begin lifting the veil, 
 inch by inch, and evidently under protest. It was 
 absolute pain to her to lift it at all. 
 
 There are some natures that revel in darkness, and 
 Mademoiselle Eobertine's was one of them. Innocent 
 mystery, harmless obscurity, was the air she breathed, 
 the food she lived on. 
 
 Madame Bielinska was not much worse than usual, 
 she admitted to Kazimir ; and, his aunt regretted it 
 much, but his mother desired to see him. He was, 
 
FINESSING. 103 
 
 in fact, to have his first little peep. After many 
 whispered instructions outside the door, and injunc- 
 tions to avoid talking, and walking, and breathing 
 if possible, Kazimir was beckoned noiselessly into 
 the room; and even then, though he advanced on 
 tiptoe, his aunt looked daggers at him, as his spurs 
 jingled faintly against the polished floor. Kazimir 
 was not used to sick-rooms ; the warm scented air 
 choked him ; the light, stealing in sparingly through 
 heavy green curtains, was darkness to him. He came 
 in contact with something which he supposed a screen, 
 and was terrified by a low groan in his ear. He fully 
 expected to hear his mother shriek next, but she did 
 not ; only in the big arm-chair at the far end of the 
 room there was a movement of some living thing. 
 
 Then Kazimir felt his arm caught by some one, 
 whom in the dark he barely recognised as Lucyan. 
 There was a whisper in his ear : " Eemember on no 
 account to allude to money matters ; it is that which 
 agitates her." His arm was relaxed, and Lucyan 
 glided out, moving as easily in the dark as if all had 
 been light and clear. 
 
 Kazimir's nerves were strong by nature, but this 
 mysterious ushering into the sick-chamber, combined 
 with all these warnings, and the vagueness attending 
 them, were beginning to chafe his nervous system. 
 
 " Kazio, is this you ? Why have you not come to 
 
104 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 me before ? " It was his mother's voice, but, ah, how 
 changed ! The remainder of the dark space was tra- 
 versed in two strides, which quite upset Mademoi- 
 selle Eobertine's calmness, and Kazimir knelt by 
 his mother's side, pressing both her wasted hands to 
 his lips. 
 
 Somehow that slight shade of coolness which had 
 existed between mother and son melted at once when 
 they were face to face. There was much more hope 
 in Madame Bielinska's talk than Kazimir had dared 
 to expect. " Yes, I may be among you in a day or 
 two," she said, answering her son. 
 
 There was a great clatter over there among the 
 empty bottles. Kazimir looked round inquiringly ; it 
 was only an effort of aunt Eobertine's to drown this 
 indiscreet admission. 
 
 " Please, dear Eobertine, do not take any more 
 trouble with those bottles," said the invalid; "you are 
 fatiguing yourself, and Kazimir and I have so much to 
 talk about." 
 
 In order to humour the patient, without taking the 
 int implied, Eobertine left the medicine-bottles and 
 began dusting the prayer-books on the prie-dieu. There 
 were about fifteen prayer-books there of different sizes, 
 so the prospect was dreary — Kazimir's patience gave 
 way at the third. 
 
 " Would you mind dusting the prayer-books a little 
 
FINESSING. 105 
 
 later, aunt Robertine ? I think my mother wants to 
 speak to me alone." 
 
 It was difficult to believe the testimony of her own 
 ears — well-tried organs of hearing though they were — 
 she was positively being asked by the son to leave him 
 alone with his mother. 
 
 " Yes, dear Robertine ; Kazio will take care of me 
 for ten minutes." 
 
 It is the last straw which breaks the camel's back. 
 Here was the mother asking to be left alone with the 
 son. Robertine was so staggered by the unexampled 
 audacity, that she actually laid down the red and 
 yellow feather brush, and only venting her feelings in 
 a long low groan of anguish, slowly dragged her steps 
 from the room. Where, oh, where could Kazimir have 
 picked up this intolerable habit of plain speaking, this 
 odious fashion of saying the thing he meant to say 
 in so many cut-and-dry words ? Yes, assuredly, the 
 military profession was the perversion of youth. She 
 felt powerless against a soldier's bluntness — she would 
 go and seek in an ally consolation, perhaps help. 
 
 "We shall not be left long alone," said Madame 
 Bielinska, with a faint smile ; " I must try and explain 
 to you all that I wish, before we are interrupted 
 again." 
 
 " What is it about, mother ? " 
 
 " It is about money ! " 
 
106 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 With Lucy aii's warning still fresh in his mind, 
 Kazimir was painfully anxious to avoid the subject of 
 money, but his mother eagerly clung to it. It cer- 
 tainly was true that towards that point her thoughts 
 seemed to be striving incessantly. 
 
 u There is great need to talk of it," she persisted, 
 when he demurred ; " you must understand your posi- 
 tion clearly, as well as that of your brothers ; and you 
 must make your choice with your eyes open, as to the 
 way you will follow. No, don't interrupt me ; for the 
 present you have made your choice. Ah, Kazimir, 
 you were too strong for me there ; but later, when I 
 am later, you may change your mind." 
 
 Kazimir did not say " Never," much as he should 
 have liked to do so. 
 
 " You have never paid much attention to money 
 matters, Kazio, but you must know that we have 
 not one quarter of what we used to have." 
 
 It was quite true that Kazimir knew very little 
 about the state of their fortunes. All he knew was, 
 that they had been great people in the days when 
 he had been a child, and that they were small people 
 now. He knew that the rooms had been large and 
 stately then, and the furniture of velvet ; and that 
 now the drawing-room had but three windows, and 
 the chairs were covered with green rep : that the 
 portraits of his ancestors had once hung upon high 
 
FINESSING. 107 
 
 walls, and that now they hung upon low ones. He 
 had not learnt to set much store by money, and he 
 could not have dreamt of making an estimate of their 
 probable income, even had the idea occurred to him. 
 Corn, brandy, and cattle, and all other chief features 
 of a Polish property, were meaningless to himself. He 
 could not have hazarded the wildest guess as to the 
 value of land ; a field of grain, where an expert would 
 have seen golden ducats waving from every full ear, 
 was to him a field of grain, " and it was nothing more ; " 
 or, if anything more, it was a place which might be 
 good for a canter after harvest time. 
 
 " No, mother ; I have never cared about money 
 matters," said Kazimir, trying to speak with resigna- 
 tion, for he saw long explanations impending. 
 
 " Then attend to me," said the invalid, sitting up. 
 " The management of Wowasulka is a troublesome 
 thing, as you will find when you have to take it into 
 your own hands." 
 
 He would rather be without it, thought Kazimir, 
 as unwillingly he listened to his mother's exposition. 
 What struck him most was, that though she evidently 
 had her subject much at heart, and went into it deeply 
 and earnestly, she did not show any signs of that 
 baneful agitation, against which Lucyan had so warned 
 him. She was as clear and calm as Kazimir had 
 ever remembered her ; w T ith her sad slow voice and 
 
108 BEGGAJt MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 her half-affected lisp, her scent-bottle and her elabor- 
 ately curled hair, her little weaknesses and her great 
 strength. 
 
 At the end of five minutes he had gathered a general 
 impression of valuable soil, not fortunately situated ; 
 of certain advantages, of which he understood nothing, 
 neutralised by certain disadvantages, of which he 
 understood, if possible, less. As yet he had received 
 no general impression, he had not grasped the out- 
 line of their situation. 
 
 " So the wood is valuable ? " ventured Kazimir, 
 rather vaguely, wishing to show some interest. 
 
 " Yes, but it is 'not there that our chief strength lies. 
 You know the line of little spirit-shops that lie along 
 the highroad ? " 
 " Yes, hideous little huts," said Kazimir. 
 "Well, those hideous little huts are the very life 
 of Wowasulka ; by far the most valuable part of the 
 estate. The lease has been held by faithful old Naf- 
 tali Taubenkiibel for years, though we have constant 
 applications for it. I believe it is Aitzig Majulik's 
 ideal of happiness to get the Propinacya into his hands. 
 If you give me the account-book over there, you will 
 understand it better by looking at the totals of sums 
 taken for wddki last year. There, that little green 
 book under the big missal." 
 
 Kazimir groped his way towards the missal. 
 
FINESSING. 109 
 
 " Of course the value of the land is fluctuating 
 always ; but should it ever be advisable to sell Wowa- 
 sulka, I do not think that each of your portions should 
 realise less than " 
 
 "Lucyan, is that you?" said Kazimir, startled, as a 
 hand was laid on his sleeve. " How did you come in 
 here ? " 
 
 " By the door, of course." 
 
 " But what have you got on your feet ? I never 
 heard your boots creak." 
 
 " I never wear creaking boots ; they don't do for 
 sick-rooms." 
 
 Madame Bielinska sank back with an impatient 
 sigh. Lucyan's eyes followed the movement. " I knew 
 it, Kazio ; you have tired her with talking." He bent 
 over his mother and kissed her hand. 
 
 "Are you going to take him away?" she asked 
 fretfully. 
 
 "I must, for aunt Bobertine is languishing out- 
 side with your cup of bouillon. We must both go. 
 Come, Kazio ; never mind that little green book. I have 
 something I want particularly to show you up- stairs." 
 
 Lucyan's private sanctuary, rarely entered by any 
 one but himself, lay at the top of the house. It was 
 a small square room with a good view from its one 
 window. By reason of its small size, or else by rea- 
 son of its occupant's character, it had a look of greater 
 
110 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 comfort about it than aiiy other room in the house. 
 It had curtains to the windows, and a blind which 
 could really pull up and down ; a piece of carpet on 
 the ground ; a genuine washing-table, on which stood 
 several mysterious flagons, together with the piece of 
 perfumed soap, of which Kazimir had heard before. 
 There were also an unbroken looking-glass, a deep- 
 seated, though shabby arm-chair, and a book-shelf, 
 where both gay and grave elements were represented ; 
 for beside such titles as, "The Laws of Wills and 
 Executors," together with more intimidating Latin 
 names, frowning down from dingy leather, there 
 were yellow paper covers, the widely known uniform 
 of the lightest if not most unexceptionable French 
 literature. The third element in the book-shelves, 
 perhaps the third interest in the owner's life, found 
 expression in some elaborately bound volumes on 
 horticulture, and various small pamphlets, with such 
 titles as, " The Florist's Guide," " Hints to the Rose- 
 Lover," &c. In the window there was a long green 
 box with some very young and sickly plants in a row ; 
 also some half-dozen more or less promising flower- 
 pots. The whole of the small space bore the impress of 
 having been made as habitable as circumstances would 
 permit : a well-feathered nest, made cosy with every 
 stray shred which forethought and care could collect. 
 "What is it that you want to show me so parti- 
 
FINESSING. Ill 
 
 cularly ? " demanded Kazirnir, looking round him. 
 He was put out by the abrupt termination of his in- 
 terview down-stairs ; not that he wanted to hear any- 
 thing more about the money subject, but he resented 
 his brother's interference. 
 
 " Come here ; I want to show you my flowers : you 
 have not seen my window-garden yet." 
 
 " Your window-garden ! Nonsense, Lucyan ! You 
 know that I have no patience for flowers ! " exclaimed 
 Kazimir, in extreme disgust. "Is that what you 
 brought me here for?" 
 
 " Well, not exactly, mon cher" said Lucyan, as with 
 deft fingers he began tenderly picking the dead leaves 
 off a fine azalea plant. " But, you see, I warned you 
 against conversations of that sort ; and when I found 
 you engaged in one, you had to be got out of the room." 
 
 " And you held out that green box full of weeds as 
 a bribe ? " said Kazimir, still incensed. 
 
 Lucyan gave no answer, except with his shoulders, 
 which he slightly raised. He had no particular ob- 
 jection to Kazimir calling his flowers weeds, and his 
 window-garden a green box! He was not going to dis- 
 pute with him about mere names. 
 
 " I wish you would speak, instead of pulling about 
 that detestable bush." 
 
 "I shall be delighted, when you have done. I 
 thought you had more to say." 
 
112 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 " Oh, nothing ; except that I don't see the use of my 
 being here." 
 
 Lucyan took up a miniature watering-can, and began 
 watering the window-garden. 
 
 " Come, Kazio," he said, with his imperturbable 
 good temper, "you know so very little about in- 
 valids that you really must rely upon other judg- 
 ments. Que voulez vous ? Aunt Eobertine and I are 
 agreed — what is that you said?" for Kazimir was 
 heard to mutter something not very complimentary 
 to aunt Eobertine. 
 
 " Never mind, go on. Aunt Eobertine and you are 
 agreed about something." 
 
 " We are agreed that peace and quiet are the most 
 imperative conditions of my mother's improvement. 
 I warned you expressly not to touch on agitating 
 subjects." 
 
 " She was not in the least agitated." 
 
 " Perhaps not at the moment ; the reaction is 
 later." 
 
 " I did not begin about it," said Kazimir, doggedly. 
 
 " Oh, you did not ? " with a point of interrogation. 
 He went on watering his plants, while Kazimir stared 
 at the prints on the wall. 
 
 " What an idea you have of making yourself com- 
 fortable ! " remarked Kazimir, after a silence. " And 
 what a lot of pretty women you have got on your 
 
FINESSING. 113 
 
 wall ! Why, you have nothing but women, I declare, 
 and they are all pretty." 
 
 " Well, I flatter myself that I am rather a con- 
 noisseur," said Lucyan, quietly. 
 
 " That girl there is almost as pretty as my heroine 
 in the snow," and Kazimir pointed to the French 
 print of an impossibly perfect fruit - seller. " That 
 print would be my favourite." 
 
 " It is my favourite," said Lucyan, looking over his 
 brother's shoulder, " among the blondes at least ; but I 
 prefer brunettes on the whole," with a laugh much too 
 cynical for his twenty -four years. 
 
 He resumed the watering of his plants, and pres- 
 ently observed, suggestively — 
 
 " I suppose she spoke about the rents, and the 
 brandy-making, and the cattle ? " 
 
 " Who ? my mother ? Yes, she did." 
 
 " And about the corn and the labourers ? " 
 
 " And about the woods and the potato-fields, till I 
 felt quite giddy." 
 
 " Ah ! no doubt. Poor Kazio ! that is not much in 
 your line. I thought that sort of conversation could 
 not interest you much." 
 
 " No, especially as half of it was Greek to me." 
 
 " Of course ; but yet you must have gained a good 
 deal of knowledge to-day ? " 
 
 " Not I. I am as wise as I was before. She was 
 
 VOL. I. H 
 
114 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 going to have shown me something in a green book, 
 but you came in just then." 
 
 " That is well," said Lucyan, putting down the 
 empty watering-can with a sigh of relief. 
 
 " What is well ? " 
 
 " This azalea, my pet azalea. Come and look at it. 
 There are two new flowers opened this morning." 
 
 " I wish you would not try and cram your flowers 
 down my throat, Lucyan; but oh, to be sure, I did 
 promise to bring some sort of a flower to Made- 
 moiselle Eo^danovics." 
 
 " You did, really ? What does she want it for ? " 
 
 " I don't quite know, and I have forgotten the 
 name. I daresay it was one of these — what do you 
 call them?" 
 
 " Azaleas." 
 
 " That sounds rather like it. I know it was a soft 
 sort of a name that melted in your mouth like a 
 lump of sugar. You may as well give me one of those." 
 
 " Not that one ! " cried Lucyan, springing forward 
 to protect his favourite pot, towards which Kazimir 
 had put out his hand. " I will give you one when 
 you go there on Saturday." 
 
 " Won't you come with me on Saturday ? " 
 
 " I don't feel particularly tempted." 
 
 " Are not three stables full of young horses a 
 temptation ? " • 
 
FINESSING. 115 
 
 " Three stables ! I did not know he had anything 
 of a stud." 
 
 " Oh, hasn't he ! ever so much quantity if not 
 quality." 
 
 " And how does it pay him ? " 
 
 " I can't say. He seems to have plenty of money 
 to spend." 
 
 " I did not know that," said Lucyan, meditatively. 
 " He has come here so lately, that I know very little 
 about him." 
 
 " He is a genial old chatterbox." 
 
 " Oh, T don't mean that ; but what is the house 
 like ? Does he seem to be farming on a large 
 scale?" 
 
 " On an enormous scale, I think. You had really 
 better go with me on Saturday. You can talk to old 
 Eogdanovics about reaping - machines and steam- 
 ploughs " 
 
 " While you are talking to Mademoiselle Vizia 
 about azaleas ? No, thank you ; I think not. What 
 is she like, by the by ? " 
 
 " Not pretty at all, but with plenty of — what shall 
 I call it? — character, I think I mean. She really 
 has got something in her head besides ribbons and 
 laces." 
 
 " That is as clear as Marcin could have made it." 
 
 " At all events, I like her very much." 
 
116 BEGGAll MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 " Oh yes — that could not be clearer, at any rate." 
 " Talking of Marcin," began Kazimir, after a minute, 
 " do you know, Lucyan, I do not understand him at 
 all. Why does he go mooning about the house in that 
 manner ? " 
 
 " That is only his way," said Lucyan. " Marcin is 
 always vague." 
 
 " Perhaps," said Kazimir, doubtfully ; " but he 
 seems to me to be several degrees vaguer than usual. 
 Have you noticed the way in which he wanders about 
 the house with his hat on, smiling at things by the 
 hour ? " 
 
 "What sort of things does he smile at?" 
 
 " Very strange things. Yesterday I found him 
 standing in the passage with a smile of ecstatic 
 admiration on his face, and there was nothing to 
 admire anywhere within sight, except a broken pot 
 with a label marked ' Leeches, with care — not to be 
 shaken.' There was nothing marvellous in that, was 
 there?" 
 
 " No, nothing." 
 
 " And this morning, when I came into the drawing- 
 room, he was tenderly stroking a pill-box. He does 
 not do that sort of thing always, does he ? " 
 
 " No, not always," smiled Lucyan, looking out of 
 the window. 
 
 - What is it you are studying ? " 
 
FINESSING. 117 
 
 " The snow. I am afraid it is going to be an ex- 
 ceptionally hard winter." 
 
 " For the poor peasants, yes." 
 
 " I don't mean the poor peasants ; I mean my poor 
 plants. Do you see those tracks in the snow ? They 
 are foxes. No other beast walks in that straight line, 
 one foot before the other. When they get a little 
 bolder, they will grub up my flower-roots." 
 
 " Oh, is that all ? The country seems overrun with 
 foxes. Mademoiselle Vizia was complaining that they 
 ate her hens." 
 
 " If you were a sportsman, Kazio, you might have 
 rid us of some of them." 
 
 " Poor beasts ! why should they not live ? I should 
 certainly eat hens if I were a hungry fox." 
 
 Lucyan shook his head. 
 
 " Oh, you will never do for a farmer, Kazio, if you 
 do not take the part of the hens against the fox." 
 
 Long after Kazimir had left him, Lucyan went on 
 working at his window-garden — weeding, and watering, 
 and pruning, and carefully tending each plant, down 
 to the tiniest and sickliest of the green sprouts. The 
 faint smile still on his face, showed that he was fol- 
 lowing up some train of thought ; but not one inch of 
 the window-garden was neglected for that — not one 
 dead leaf did he omit to clip off. 
 
 Lucyan possessed that quality of great men : the 
 
118 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 power of applying his mind, in all its force and en- 
 tirety, npon whatever object he had in hand, whether 
 great or small. It is a valuable quality, and one 
 which is sure to serve the owner well in all phases 
 of life. 
 
119 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 QUEEN OF HEARTS. 
 
 . . . . Klar auf einmal fuhlt ich's in mir werden 
 Die ist es, Oder Keine sonst auf Erden." 
 
 — Schillee. 
 
 Saturday was not nearly such a fine day as its 
 immediate predecessors ; neither was Kazimir in such 
 good spirits. The prospect of seeing the fellow to 
 a rather clumsy -looking bay was not positively ex- 
 hilarating ; the prospect of another conversation with 
 Vizia alone seemed to promise some enjoyment. 
 
 We are such deplorably sensitive creatures after all, 
 so easily cheered or distressed by the mere fact of the 
 sun shining or not. Life seems easy one day because 
 the sky is blue, and difficult the next, because it is 
 grey; and yet the grey day may bring us better 
 things than the blue one, and the gift will be the 
 more precious from being the less anticipated. 
 
 At first it seemed as though this second visit was 
 going to be but a repetition of the first. Vizia sat on 
 
120 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 the same sofa and listened, while he sat on the same 
 chair and talked. It is true that Yizia wore a silk 
 dress to-day, and it is true also that they met almost 
 like old friends, and that Kazimir said as much, and 
 was not rebuked for it. He began to wonder how he 
 could have found her manner unattractive at first ; 
 every trace of ungracious coldness was gone. The 
 other day he had taken interest in her, only on ac- 
 count of the vague memory which connected her 
 somehow with that figure in the snow; to-day he 
 began to like her for herself. His liking increased 
 in proportion as those memories weakened. 
 
 When Kazimir made the remark about meeting as 
 old friends, Vizia did not answer, but looked past him 
 through the window. He was always confident that 
 his friendship would be accepted with the same warm 
 frankness with which he was used to proffer it. How 
 could he be conscious of the thrill which went through 
 Vizia's heart ? How could he guess that his manner 
 and tone said so much more than there was to say ? 
 
 " You must be rather in want of friends in this 
 lonely place," suggested Kazimir. 
 
 "Kather — not much," faltered Vizia, with hot 
 cheeks, for she was practising a deception which she 
 detested, but to which she yet clung. What madness 
 had moved her to pass over Xenia's existence in 
 silence? Xenia could not be concealed for ever. 
 
QUEEN OF HEARTS. 121 
 
 Vizia had left her before the glass, trying to decide 
 between the merits of mauve and blue. Any mo- 
 ment might bring a step down the passage. Things 
 must take their chance, thought Vizia desperately; 
 what would have been easy to explain at first 
 would be difficult to explain now. A few more 
 minutes of this strange enjoyment, and then — and 
 then what ? Things need not change ; oh, surely they 
 would not change ! 
 
 " It is beautiful here in summer," she said, talking 
 fast ; " when you come to see us then " 
 
 " In summer I shall be gone." 
 
 " Gone ! Of course; I forgot that you are a soldier." 
 Vizia laughed at her own tone of consternation. 
 
 " And I may have to do a soldier's work soon. I 
 think we shall fight the Italians in spring." 
 
 " Who talks of fighting ? " inquired Eogdanovics 
 from a distant table, where he was employed in draw- 
 ing some plans. " Never talk of fighting. It is 
 against my principles to expect any but the best 
 things from fate. I am ready to wager that there will 
 be no such thing as war." 
 
 " That would be a great disappointment to me," said 
 Kazimir. 
 
 " Oh, that is the way your wishes lie ? Well, then, 
 I am ready to wager you will come back covered with 
 glory and decorations," and Eogdanovics reapplied 
 
122 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 himself to the finishing touches of his plan, which 
 marked a row of future glass-houses, wherein pine- 
 apples and muscatel grapes were destined to grow and 
 thrive in a degree hitherto undreamed of, except in 
 Eogdanovics's sanguine brain. 
 
 " That will do, I think," he said, laying down his 
 pencil. " The melon-beds in front, and the vineries 
 behind. I had thought of building an extensive 
 conservatory too ; the flowers would have realised a 
 round sum at the Lwow market. But I am afraid I 
 must wait ; there does not seem to be much chance of 
 the railway passing through here just at present." 
 
 " Nor for another century either," said Vizia. 
 
 " That reminds me," said Kazimir, rising, " I have 
 brought that flower for you, Mademoiselle Vizia ; I 
 must have left it in the sledge." 
 
 Only just this moment had Kazimir remembered 
 the unfortunate azalea which Lucyan had so carefully 
 wrapped in silver paper. What was an azalea to him ? 
 He could not know that Vizia, looking for the promised 
 flower when he entered, had sighed with disappoint- 
 ment at seeing him empty-handed ; and he as little 
 noticed the light of pleasure which came to her face 
 now. 
 
 " Don't trouble yourself to go out," she said. 
 
 " What ! Go out 1 Who wants to go out ? " echoed 
 Kosdanovics from his distant table. 
 
QUEEN OF HEARTS. 123 
 
 " Only to fetch a parcel," said Kazimir. 
 
 " It is so likely I should let you fetch it for your- 
 self," retorted the host, striding towards the door. 
 " What is your parcel like ? Round ? Square ? Ob- 
 long? Short?" 
 
 " Please do not move," said Kazimir, as he reached 
 the door before his host. " I hear some one in the 
 passage ; perhaps it is a servant. Ah ! " 
 
 As he opened the door the handle was at the same 
 moment turned at the other side. Kazimir heard a 
 rustle of silk, and found himself closely confronted by 
 a lady — a young lady — a beautiful young lady ! He 
 reached this conclusion with a bound. 
 
 It had taken all this time to array Xenia in that 
 long-trained, close-fitting silk, swelling in balloon-like 
 fashion all around her — for this was the time of crino- 
 lines — and to encase that chestnut hair in a mauve 
 chenille net, which did its best to conceal what it was 
 supposed to be adorning ; but through the lattice-work 
 the glossy waves shone, like sunbeams escaping from 
 prison bars. Such, at least, was Kazimir' s impression, 
 in this first bewildered moment, although the simile 
 would scarcely have stood investigation. Eibbons to 
 match the net, and fringed out in some incomprehen- 
 sibly feminine fashion, fluttered at her waistbands and 
 wrists. There was an artificial rosebud nestling at her 
 throat. Her silk was a slighter and a shabbier one than 
 
124 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 Vizia's, and the mixture of colours was not strictly in 
 accordance with a severe taste ; nevertheless, both the 
 silk and the ribbons, and even the artificial rosebud, 
 seemed imbued with a certain subtle grace which 
 came from the wearer alone. For the matter of that, 
 she might have worn a tartan shawl and a poke 
 bonnet without looking vu]gar. 
 
 "I have found her!" was Kazimir's inward cry. 
 Not for a moment did he doubt her identity. What 
 had been a mere passing recollection in the other, was 
 certitude here. Here were the very same eyes that 
 had looked into his through the falling snow ; that was 
 the shining hair which had been blown rough by the 
 unmannerly wind. The interest which, although keen 
 at first, had been gradually weakening with the lapse 
 of days, leapt back into full life all at once. He need 
 no longer grope after uncertain clues, for he had found 
 herself. 
 
 It all shot through his mind while he inclined him- 
 self profoundly, and while Xenia went through a 
 curtsey, quite as graceful but quite as ceremonious as 
 the one she had executed in the snow at the hill-top. 
 
 " Mademoiselle Xenia Rogdanovics ! " 
 
 Kazimir's first impulse was to look reproachfully 
 towards Vizia. " You told me you had no sister ! " 
 
 Vizia was leaning forward, with her hands clasped, 
 as she watched the scene by the doorway. " I have no 
 
QUEEN OF HEARTS. 125 
 
 sister; Xenia is my cousin." Her voice had stiffened 
 back into her first tone of rigid ceremony, but Kazimir 
 scarcely noticed it. 
 
 Her cousin Xenia ! So this was Xenia ; that was 
 how he had made the mistake. How could he have 
 been so stupid ? Why had he taken for granted that 
 they must be sisters ? 
 
 There was now a scene of general recognition and 
 hand - shaking, Kazimir being acknowledged as the 
 saviour in the snowstorm. 
 
 " What a fearful storm it was ! " said Kazimir to 
 Xenia, who had sat down demurely beside her cousin, 
 and who had not uttered a word as yet. 
 
 " Yes, it was a little windy," she replied, with an air 
 of great gravity. The silvery voice was clouded, not 
 with an unbecoming grating hoarseness, but as though 
 wrapped in a soft veil. 
 
 " Very windy," echoed Vizia ; and Kazimir wondered 
 why he had not found out before that she talked as if 
 she had just swallowed a woollen comforter. This is 
 another point on which nature indulges in unjust 
 caprices. A cold may be becoming or unbecoming, 
 according to its symptoms ; and Kazimir now for the 
 first time became aware that the symptoms of Vizia's 
 cold were not becoming. The same cause which had 
 afflicted her with watery eyes and a heightened colour 
 of nose, had given Xenia an interesting little cough, 
 
126 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 and but delicately touched the small fine-cut nostrils 
 into the semblance of a pink-tipped flower. Moreover, 
 Vizia's cold had been gradually getting worse, while 
 Xenia's had been getting better. 
 
 " I am afraid you must have suffered a great deal 
 from the snow ? " 
 
 " Thank you ; it was not very pleasant, was it, 
 Yizia ? " and Xenia looked appealingly at her cousin. 
 
 " It must have been a dreadful fatigue to you to get 
 up that hill ? " 
 
 " I don't think the walking was very good." 
 
 " jSTo, hardly," thought Kazimir, as he remembered 
 the style of his progress uphill, weighed down on each 
 side by clinging hands. 
 
 It was not that Xenia was forgetful of these facts, 
 or ungrateful to her preserver. This little prim fencing 
 was but the tribute paid to that tyrant Etiquette. 
 She w 7 as still at the pale kid-glove stage of acquaint- 
 anceship with him ; Yizia had had the start of her in 
 that respect. Affectation and primeval simplicity are 
 nowhere more successfully blended than in this country. 
 
 " I hope you changed your wet shoes," said Kazimir, 
 earnestly. 
 
 It was Xenia's duty to look surprised, and she ful- 
 filled it ; but, though the pink-tipped flower was raised 
 perceptibly, Kazimir could not fail to see that the eyes 
 were not displeased. 
 
QUEEN OF HEAKTS. 127 
 
 " I suppose you have not attempted to go out since?" 
 
 " Oh no, I never go out in winter, except when I 
 must. Do I, Yizia ? " 
 
 " Then it was necessity which brought you to the 
 foot of that hill ? " 
 
 " Yes ; it was a ball we had been to." 
 
 " You are fond of dancing ? " 
 
 " Oh, very ! " She did not need to look at her 
 cousin for assistance here. The crimson lips opened 
 in a smile, the first smile which she had yet allowed 
 herself. Her whole face lighted up with pleasure, for 
 Xenia was only seventeen, and at seventeen dancing is 
 a word with magic in it. 
 
 " You surely cannot get much of it here ? " 
 
 " Not here ; but I danced at Krakow last year. I 
 went to — Yizia, was it three or four balls ? " 
 
 " Three," said Yizia, drily. 
 
 "Happy Krakow!" thought Kazimir, as he watched 
 her pretty air of childish triumph. " How dull Lod- 
 niki must seem to you ! " 
 
 " Yes, I think it does ; and I have never lived in 
 the country before. The days are so long here." 
 
 " How do you spend them?" asked Kazimir, moving 
 his chair a quarter of an inch nearer. 
 
 Xenia looked at her cousin, as if she would prefer 
 Yizia to answer for her, but Yizia held her tongue. 
 
 " I play the piano, and then I read." 
 
128 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 Music and literature ! The very pursuits he would 
 have chosen for her ; innocent, refined, and intellectual. 
 
 " Is it poetry or prose that you prefer ? " 
 
 "Oh, I think I— I read both!" 
 
 The field was widening. Could he not read poetry 
 in the blue light of her eyes ? 
 
 " Which are your favourite authors ? " 
 
 Xenia looked staggered. " Oh, I don't know, I am 
 not sure." 
 
 " I understand. You have so many favourites that 
 it is difficult to choose. Do you care for Mickiervicz's 
 poems?" 
 
 " I think rather ; but I read French usually. The 
 last thing I read was by Seraphine de la Kosiere." 
 
 Seraphine de la Kosiere had no place in Kazimir's 
 memory. 
 
 " What was the story called ? Perhaps I may 
 remember it." 
 
 " It was called ' Les deux bagues mysterieuses, ou les 
 Fiancailles de Palmerie.' " 
 
 " I am afraid I have not heard of it," said Kazimir, 
 blankly. 
 
 " Of course not," suddenly put in Vizia. ' You are 
 not likely to read the ' Journal des Demoiselles.' " 
 
 " But the story is very interesting," said Xenia, 
 eagerly. 
 
 " It is not finished yet. I am so anxious for the 
 
QUEEN OF HEARTS. 129 
 
 end to come. It just broke off when Palmerie dis- 
 covers the will of her great-grandfather hidden inside 
 the sapphire ring which she has worn all her life ; so, 
 of course, now she has got an immense fortune, and I 
 want to know whether she marries Alphonse or Raoul." 
 
 " And what is there inside the second ring V 
 
 "I don't know; because you see that dreadful 
 Barbarin, who is really Palnierie's half-brother (al- 
 though she has not found that out yet), and who 
 has murdered all the rest of the family, has buried 
 the ring in a deep cave strewn with bones." 
 
 " The bones of the murdered family, perhaps ? " 
 suggested Kazimir ; but he was all wrong, it seemed. 
 
 "Oh no — for the cave was in a quite different 
 place ; somewhere in the Alps, or — Vizia, was it the 
 Pyrenees ? " 
 
 " The Pyrenees, probably, since it is in Spain," 
 said Vizia, curtly. 
 
 " But surely either Alphonse or Raoul will find this 
 out ?" 
 
 " I hope so ; but I am afraid they are going to 
 have another duel with pistols : they have had two 
 duels already." 
 
 " I see ; and all about Palmerie ?" 
 
 " Yes, all about Palmerie." 
 
 " It must be an engrossing story ; I hope you will 
 let me know the end." 
 
 vol. i. I 
 
130 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 " Oh yes, if you like." The demure reticence of 
 Xenia's manner was fast giving way to childish con- 
 fidence. Alphonse, Baoul, Palmerie, and her iniquit- 
 ous brother Barbarin, had all helped towards this end. 
 No wonder that Kazimir felt disposed in their favour. 
 This was enough on the subject of literature ; Kazimir 
 turned to the second branch of Xenia's pursuits. 
 
 " You said you were fond of music ; do you swear 
 by Mendelssohn or Beethoven ?" 
 
 " Was it they who wrote the sonata about sunshine 
 —or moonshine ? " asked Xenia, grasping at the most 
 distinct idea which Kazimir's question awoke in her 
 mind. 
 
 " Yes ; that is to say, one of them did — I am not 
 quite sure which," said Kazimir, frankly. " But per- 
 haps you are too true a Pole to play anything but 
 Chopin?" 
 
 "What is Chopin like?" 
 
 " Well, he looks very black upon paper, but he is 
 very delightful to listen to ; that is all I know." 
 
 " I think I like Strauss best ; does Chopin write 
 waltzes?" 
 
 " Yes, I fancy he does ; he is a great favourite. 
 Every one admires him, and Poles adore him ; I am 
 sure Mademoiselle Vizia adores him." 
 
 Vizia appeared not to have heard ; she was twirling 
 a ring round her finger. 
 
QUEEN OF HEARTS. 131 
 
 "Perhaps you are not as ultra- national as your 
 cousin. Mademoiselle Yizia has confessed to having 
 felt a great prejudice against my uniform at first ! " 
 
 " Vizia, where are you going ? " asked Xenia, dis- 
 tressed, for her cousin had risen and was moving away. 
 " Please stay near me ! " said the pleading blue eyes ; 
 but their pleading was not answered. 
 
 " I am going to fold up papa's plans over there ; " 
 and she walked to the end of the room. 
 
 " I am afraid you must have felt the same prejudice 
 against my gold cords," Kazimir was saying. 
 
 "I don't know; why?" asked Xenia. The very 
 first sight of the hussar cording in the snowstorm 
 had certainly acted chillingly upon her. She was 
 taught to believe that it must act chillingly upon her ; 
 but she had never attempted to analyse the causes 
 which produced the effect. 
 
 " Well, but you are a real Pole, and have lived all 
 your life in Poland," persisted Kazimir, who thought 
 that a little political discussion, such as he had had 
 the other day with Vizia, might be very pleasant ; " and 
 I have found since my return home that my uniform 
 finds favour nowhere." 
 
 " Pteally ? " Xenia leant back on the sofa and 
 looked a little bored. 
 
 " Then you do not share the universal prejudice ? " 
 went on Kazimir, pressing the point. 
 
132 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 " No, I don't think so ; I find the gold cords very 
 pretty." 
 
 "Do you? but " 
 
 "The hussar uniform looks very well in a ball- 
 room," broke in Xenia, with a return of animation. 
 
 " Perhaps," said Kazimir ; and then he felt silenced 
 for a moment, but only for a moment. " Your cousin 
 was quite hard upon me the other day for not up- 
 holding revolutions. Are you too a supporter of the 
 revolution ? " 
 
 Xenia leant back again with a pretty shrug of her 
 shoulder, and pulling a truant curl through her fin- 
 gers, " Oh, the revolution ? yes, I know. That was 
 the time when mamma's diamonds were stolen ; and 
 we never got them back ; was that not dreadful ? " 
 Her eyes looked so earnest and innocent, that Kazimir 
 felt it indeed to be dreadful. It was a shame to have 
 robbed her of the chance of wearing diamonds. 
 
 No, politics would not do : how should this youth- 
 ful flower-like creature know anything about fierce 
 strife and cruel bloodshed? He made an abrupt 
 transition from this ground back to the often dis- 
 cussed loneliness of Lodniki, which seemed to him 
 more cruelly lonely now that he knew it to be her 
 abode. The transition was successful ; to confide her 
 fears to a ready listener was just what suited Xenia 
 best. 
 
QUEEN OF HEARTS. 133 
 
 " Oh, you do not know how frightened I was when 
 I came here first, a few months ago ! It felt so strange 
 after Krakow, that I could not sleep when the wind 
 blew among the trees ; and only two days ago I got 
 such a fright ! * 
 
 "A robber?" said Kazimir, jumping to all sorts of 
 horrible conclusions. 
 
 " No, but a fox ! It had come quite up to the house, 
 and looked in at me through the window. I never 
 saw such a big fox in my life before ; it had such a 
 white chest. I don't know, in fact, if I ever saw any 
 fox before. I think I must have turned quite pale ;" 
 and at the remembrance of how pale she had turned, 
 Xenia almost turned pale again. 
 
 " Frightful ! " ejaculated Kazimir, following her 
 changes of expression with delight. 
 
 "Don't you think it was a great chance that we 
 were not eaten by wolves on the day of our unlucky 
 drive in the snow ? " 
 
 " Unlucky ? do not call it unlucky ! " pleaded Kaz- 
 imir ; " it was a lucky drive for me." 
 
 Xenia dropped her eyes towards the hem of her 
 dress, but she failed so entirely to make her expres- 
 sion forbidding, that Kazimir ventured to add that 
 he should have liked the hill to be six times as high, 
 and the storm a hundred times as violent, in order to 
 prolong the pleasure of assisting and protecting her. 
 
134: BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 Xenia looked up half alarmed — for she was so very 
 young, and so entirely inexperienced, that she had 
 scarcely yet got accustomed to receiving compliments ; 
 and this one, somehow, sounded more real than any 
 of the few which she had chanced to hear. She looked 
 uneasily towards her cousin for guidance, but she was 
 spared the necessity of doing anything decided, for 
 just now Pawel had entered and placed a little parcel 
 on the table. Kazimir pulled the silver paper open. 
 
 " Ah, a flower, a pink azalea ; how pretty ! but you 
 have not treated it well ; look ! " as two or three pink 
 blossoms dropped on the table. 
 
 " Do you think it pretty ? " 
 
 Of course Xenia thought it pretty, lovely, adorable. 
 She doted upon flowers — upon azaleas in general, and 
 upon pink azaleas in particular ; and of course in an- 
 other moment this particular pink azalea was nestling 
 in her waist-band. 
 
 Shortly after this Kazimir's sledge came round to 
 the door. The talk with Xenia had been followed 
 by some general conversation. Kazimir had learnt 
 the difference between camellias and azaleas. He had 
 also remembered with a start, that the flower he had 
 brought with him in silver paper, had been destined 
 for Vizia and not for Xenia. This he had remem- 
 bered at the moment of parting, when he saw Vizia's 
 face, and he had immediately apologised for his for- 
 
QUEEX OF HEARTS. 135 
 
 getfulness. " It does not matter after all, because, 
 you see, it was not the right flower," he had said. 
 
 " Of course not," she had answered, rather scorn- 
 fully, as it had struck him. He did not know that 
 whether it were called azalea or camellia, it would have 
 been the right flower for her. 
 
 Now he was gone, and the girls stood alone in the 
 room. 
 
 " How do you like him, Yizia ? " asked Xenia. 
 
 " I — I don't know ; not at all ! " She was standing 
 at the window, with her forehead pressed hard against 
 the glass, watching the sledge through the frozen 
 pane. 
 
 " I thought he was very nice," Xenia ventured ; 
 then looked down and smiled, while she played with 
 the flower in her belt. " He did talk some nonsense, 
 of course. Did you hear all he said about wishing 
 that the hill had been higher and the storm stronger 
 the other night ? " 
 
 No answer ; only a sort of gasp from the window 
 embrasure. 
 
 " But you must have heard it," said Xenia, again. 
 
 " Why should 1 care what he said to you ? " 
 
 « But, Vizia " 
 
 " I wish you would stop chattering," cried Vizia, 
 turning almost violently from the window. At sight 
 of her face the timid Xenia shrank to one side. 
 
136 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 " Vizia, what have I done % " she implored ; and 
 how sweet her voice sounded after the other's un- 
 gracious tone ! " You are angry about something ; is 
 it the azalea ? " with a bright inspiration. " It was 
 meant for you ; won't you have it ? " and she plucked 
 it from her belt and held it out to her cousin. 
 " Won't you have it, Vizia ? " 
 
 It was done graciously and lovingly, for Xenia 
 loved her cousin ; but it would seem that this proffer 
 of the olive-branch had been the last thing wanting 
 to upset Vizia's equanimity. She took the azalea 
 indeed which Xenia pressed into her hand, but it 
 was only to throw it to the ground and stamp it 
 under foot, crushing the life out of the two frail 
 blossoms which had survived their brethren. 
 
 There let them lie and die, since her dream was 
 dead — short-lived dream that it had been ! 
 
 Meanwhile Kazimir was driving home through the 
 forest. It was a much colder drive than his former 
 one ; but to Kazimir's eyes, nevertheless, the world 
 was a more brilliant place than it had ever before 
 been. 
 
 Xenia ! what a sweet, soft-sounding name ! How 
 exactly it suited her delicate beauty, her childish 
 openness of character ! And all the way home the 
 
QUEEN OF HEARTS. 137 
 
 name rang in his ears ; and the russet twigs of the 
 bushes made him think of chestnut-brown hair ; and 
 the patches of blue sky overhead — much less blue 
 than last time, but to him brighter — shone down on 
 him like innocent blue eyes. 
 
138 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 " I do remember an apothecary,— 
 And hereabouts he dwells." .... 
 
 — Romeo and Juliet. 
 
 " Tiif.y must be either poisoned, trapped, or shot — 
 that is clear," was the phrase which met Kazimir's ear 
 as he reached home. 
 
 " Poisoned, trapped, or shot ! In heaven's name, 
 Lucyan, who ? " 
 
 Lucyan was standing at the foot of the door-steps, 
 very carefully wrapped up ; and the expression of 
 fierce vindictiveness on his face made Kazimir start 
 almost more than the words he had said. It was a 
 very wide leap which his own thoughts had to take, 
 from the dreamy direction they had been following, 
 to this abrupt talk of poisoning and shooting. 
 
 " What is the matter, Lucyan ? " 
 
 Lucyan unmuffled one arm, and pointed silently 
 in the direction of the flower-beds; and Kazimir, 
 
marcin's cards. 139 
 
 straining his eyes through the dusk, could see no- 
 thing but a little scattered straw. 
 
 " My best Niphetos rose; or is it the Paul Verdier?" 
 went on Lucyan, peering anxiously towards the scat- 
 tered straw. " I would give — yes, I would give fifty 
 kreutzers to know." Lucyan always was moderate in 
 his expenditure, even in imagination. 
 
 " Why don't you go and look then ? " asked 
 Kazimir. 
 
 " And wade up to my knees in snow ! No, thank 
 you. I respect my boots too much for that. Perhaps 
 traps would be better than poison." 
 
 " But what are they, in the name of wonder ? " 
 
 " Foxes, of course ! " Lucyan pronounced the word 
 with an accent of concentrated hatred. 
 
 " Foxes ! Oh, is it foxes again ? " Kazimir began 
 to show a sudden interest. " They have been frighten- 
 ing her by looking in at the window. Yes, they must 
 be shot or trapped by all means. I will help you." 
 
 It was Lucyan's turn to stare. He looked at his 
 brother very keenly as he asked, " And who may she 
 be?" 
 
 " She ! Oh, Lucyan ! have I not told you ? It is 
 she herself. I have found her! I will tell you all 
 about it." 
 
 Lucyan had no objection to being told all about it, 
 but he had an objection to being told all about it in 
 
UO BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 the cold. They went in ; and Kazimir talked, while 
 Luc) T an listened. Kazimir's nature was not one to 
 attempt any concealment, nor was he as yet aware 
 that there was anything to conceal. Presently some 
 word of his seemed to have touched Lucyan's interest. 
 
 " Would you mind repeating that again, Kazimir ? " 
 asked Lucy an, raising his head. " I did not quite 
 catch that," 
 
 " About the colour of her hair ? Just a shade 
 lighter than " 
 
 " Not about the colour of her hair," and Lucyan put 
 out his hand with a deprecating gesture ; " but about 
 the value of the wood cut down on the estate." 
 
 " Twelve hundred," said Kazimir, " or it may have 
 been fifteen hundred ; I really can't remember." 
 
 " I don't see how there could be so much wood to 
 cut down on the Lodniki estate ; it is a small place." 
 
 " Oh, but Eogdanovics has rented another estate 
 besides the one he has bought. He has got Szybalin 
 also ; she mentioned having driven there once." 
 
 Lucyan took his ivory comb from his pocket, and 
 commenced slowly and gently drawing it through his 
 hair. 
 
 " You did not tell me that before ? " 
 
 " Didn't I ? What does it signify ? " 
 
 " It would need to be a rich man who rented 
 Szybalin." 
 
marcin's cards. 141 
 
 " Well, I have no doubt he is rich ; he looks like it, 
 and he told me so, in fact." 
 "Ah!" 
 '•And if all his plans succeed, he will be richer 
 
 yet." 
 
 " So he has let his own estate, and he has bought 
 Lodniki and rented Szybalin," summed up Lucyan, 
 compressing the matter into a nutshell, for his own 
 satisfaction. " And he has only got one daughter ; 
 but what is the niece there for ? " 
 
 " She told me she had no other home ; she is an 
 orphan." 
 
 " A poor relation," said Lucyan, mentally, but he 
 did not say it aloud. 
 
 Next day the horses were brought over to Wowa- 
 sulka, and the bargain was finally concluded ; for it was 
 a strange fact that, from the moment of his second 
 visit to Lodniki, Kazimir had been quite unable to see 
 any defects either in the build or the paces of those 
 horses. To his eyes there was a halo hovering round 
 them, which had never hovered round any other horses. 
 It was only natural that he should be anxious to" 
 report upon their progress to Eogdanovics, for Eogdan- 
 ovics had particularly asked to be told how they got 
 on. He was told ; once, twice, oftener still — oftener, 
 perhaps, than was absolutely necessary. He must 
 have been fully satisfied on their account, for during 
 
142 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 the whole of December the Wowasulka sledge might 
 frequently have been seen wending its way towards 
 Lodniki. " I promised him to come, you know," 
 Kazimir explained to Lucy an, who had not asked for 
 any explanation; and Lucyan smiled, and examined 
 his faultless almond-shaped nails, while he listened to 
 the narrative of his brother's visits, dropping a ques- 
 tion now and then, and quietly reading Kazimir's 
 hand over the edge of his cards. Kazimir talked 
 much at random, touching upon many subjects which 
 sounded trivial. He talked about dance-music and 
 the ' Journal des Demoiselles ' ; he talked also a great 
 deal about foxes — about one giant fox in particular, 
 which was wont to prowl round the house at Lodniki. 
 Kazimir was accustomed to talk as if he thirsted for 
 the blood of that giant fox. " The very same, I am 
 certain, that looked in through the window and fright- 
 ened Mademoiselle Xenia." 
 
 "And the same, most likely, that steals Mademoiselle 
 Vizia's chickens," said Lucyan. 
 
 " Perhaps ; I don't know." The other crime was by 
 far the blackest ; to have looked in through a window 
 was deeper guilt than to have carried off a chicken. 
 
 During this month Madame Bielinska's health 
 showed some slight improvement, and when Christmas 
 was past and the new year turned, she was once or 
 twice moved from her room to the general sitting- 
 
marcin's CARDS. H3 
 
 room. Her sons could not help feeling more hopeful 
 when they saw her once again among them. The 
 doctor cautiously admitted that this unexpected re- 
 vival might or might not be the first step towards 
 ultimate recovery. He proposed two plans which 
 might further the recovery ; one was a sea journey to 
 Australia, the other was a farinaceous food with a 
 wonderful name. Madame Bielinska, whose nerves 
 were weak though her judgment was so strong, greatly 
 preferred the farinaceous food to the sea voyage. The 
 farinaceous food carried the day. 
 
 " The apothecary at Tarajow is sure to have it," the 
 doctor had said. 
 
 Tarajow was the nearest country place ; it lay about 
 five miles to the north, not through the forest, but 
 across the open country. 
 
 " We must send for it this afternoon," said Kazimir, 
 that same day. 
 
 They were sitting together in the drawing-room 
 around the invalid, who was propped up on her 
 pillows. 
 
 " Sending for it won't be enough," said Lucyan, 
 somewhat incomprehensibly. 
 
 " It is sure to put you all right, mother," proceeded 
 Kazimir ; " you are looking quite well already." 
 
 " She is looking too well," observed Eobertine, 
 darkly. This resurrection into life was altogether a 
 
U4 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 sore trial to Eobertine ; there was too much openness 
 and publicity about it. If she could have had her 
 will, even the simplest of household transactions 
 should have been enveloped in impenetrable mystery. 
 She would have loved to throw an enshrouding veil 
 over the very food they lived on, the servants who 
 waited on them, and the tradesmen who supplied them. 
 In how far higher a degree, therefore, should mystery 
 reign in a sick-chamber ! The sick-chamber had been 
 Eobertine s field almost since she had come to the age 
 of reason; and from the moment when she had resigned 
 all matrimonial hopes, which, owing to her more than 
 ample share of the Bielinski nose, had never been very 
 great, it had been more than this, it had been her 
 kingdom. She recognised it as her vocation in life, 
 and she nursed her patients unremittingly, energeti- 
 cally, and uncompromisingly. The darkened space, 
 the scented atmosphere, the hushed steps and whis- 
 pering voices of the sick-room, suited her mystery- 
 loving nature, as subterraneous labyrinths suit the 
 darkness-loving mole. They satisfied her peculiarities, 
 and they fed them, until her special phase of eccentri- 
 city had grown into a distinct mania. She defended 
 Madame Bielinska against her sons, as if the sick 
 woman's life depended on isolation. Of the three, she 
 dreaded Kazimir most, and feared Lucyan the least ; 
 for although Lucyan did find his way to the sick-room 
 
MARCHES CARDS. 145 
 
 oftener than either of the others, he did so in a manner 
 which won her heart and soothed her alarm. Tacitly 
 he had proved a sort of ally, for he helped to keep ont 
 other people. 
 
 These being Kobertine's sentiments, it will be easy 
 to guess, bnt difficult to describe, what she suffered 
 on seeing her carefully guarded patient exposed thus 
 openly to the light of the day. In fact the sight 
 was so painful to her that she usually preferred to 
 absent herself from the circle. 
 
 " Sending for it will not be enough," repeated Lucyan. 
 
 " Why should sending not be enough ? " asked 
 Kazimir of his brother. 
 
 " Because the apothecary at Tarajow is an ass." 
 
 " How do you know he is an ass ? " asked Marcin, 
 unexpectedly. 
 
 " How do you know he is not ? Marcin ! you set- 
 ting up for giving an opinion ! " 
 
 " Well," said Kazimir, " most asses are at least able 
 to read a name if it is written large enough." 
 
 " Not such a name as Neuroyoeticon. You don't 
 know the man ; when you write for a cooling drink 
 he is sure to send you a remedy for hydrophobia. I 
 believe we have got three of those remedies in the 
 house at this moment. No ; somebody would need 
 to drive over and speak to him about it." 
 
 " Very well," said Kazimir, " which of us shall go ? " 
 VOL. I. K 
 
146 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 " I will go ! " 
 
 Everybody in the room, the invalid included, turned 
 and stared at Marcin aghast. It was he who had 
 spoken. He was offering to drive over to Tarajow 
 and see about the medicine. Such a thing had not 
 occurred within anybody's memory. In the abstract, 
 certainly, there is nothing particularly startling in the 
 idea of a full-grown man of twenty-five driving five 
 miles in a sledge to fetch a bottle of medicine. 
 Marcin was a full-grown man of twenty-five ; he had 
 long ago reached and passed the age of reason, in 
 the ordinary acceptation of the word ; neither was 
 he exactly a fool, but for the practical sides of life 
 he was as helpless as if his age had been five, instead 
 of five-and-twenty. He had never been known to 
 receive a letter in his life ; and on the solitary occa- 
 sion when he had been known to send one off, it had 
 been despatched open, unstamped and unaddressed. 
 Marcin would have much rather gone without a coat 
 than have taken the trouble to order it for himself ; 
 he would not have known how to enter a shop, or 
 address the shopman, or explain what he wanted. 
 He could not have attempted to ask for the change 
 of a florin ; probably he would not know what the 
 change ought to be. Putting the case that he could 
 have gained a million by travelling to Vienna, he 
 would most certainly have remained quietly at Wowa- 
 
marcin's cards. 147 
 
 sulka. The bare idea of having to take his ticket 
 and register his luggage, would have been quite 
 enough to deter him from the enterprise. 
 
 After the first universal exclamation, there was a 
 moment of stupefied silence. Then — 
 
 " You will never reach Tarajow ! " 
 
 " You will be lost on the way ! " 
 
 " I don't believe we shall ever see you back ! " 
 
 Madame Bielinska was so touched by the unlooked- 
 for mark of filial affection, that, in her weak state, the 
 emotion came near to overpowering her. There were 
 symptoms of tears in her voice. 
 
 Marcin sat passive through it all, without once 
 changing his position. 
 
 " Come, Marcin, this is too delightful ! " said Lucyan, 
 bursting into one of his long but noiseless laughs. 
 " I do believe you will be offering to keep my accounts 
 for me next. Why, we should have to hunt for you 
 all over the country this evening." 
 
 Marcin's temper was faultless, as a rule ; but some- 
 thing must have ruffled it now. 
 
 " Why are you all trying to take the spokes out of 
 my wheels ? " he inquired rather loftily. 
 
 " I do wish you would steer clear of proverbs, 
 metaphors, and all figures of speech," remarked Lu- 
 cyan, with a smile ; " it would be an advantage to 
 yourself and to others." 
 
148 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 "They are the only sort of thing I have got a 
 memory for," answered the other, still on his dignity. 
 " They save so much trouble, and they make things 
 clearer." 
 
 " And you really want to go ? We might try it as 
 an experiment ; don't you think so, Kazimir 1 " 
 
 The novelty of the idea gave to it a flavour of ori- 
 ginality. It was decided that Marcin should go ; and 
 that he should bring back the farinaceous food for his 
 mother as well as the traps for the foxes. 
 
 At one side of the three-cornered Place at Tarajow, 
 with a Katusz (town -hall) to the left and a burnt- 
 down house to the right, stood the apothecary's resi- 
 dence. The Eatusz was dirtier, both inside and out- 
 side, than most English cowsheds ; the burnt-down 
 house had been reduced to ashes eight months ago, 
 and had very little chance of ever rising from them. 
 Three worn stone steps led up to the apothecary's 
 shop ; and up to the lowest of these steps the stone 
 pavement swelled in undulating billows. 
 
 Over the scene were scattered the usual groups of 
 peasants in their brown sieralcs, and Jews in slim black 
 kaftans. In front of the apothecary's shop there 
 stood a sledge, and a bell tinkled now and then, as 
 one horse and now the other tossed his head. 
 
 Marcin having traversed the open country, passed 
 the wooden church on the outskirts, and bumped over 
 
MARCIN S CARDS. HO 
 
 the billowy pavement of the place, reached his desti- 
 nation safely; the slip of paper which Lucyan had 
 given him was securely buttoned up in his pocket. 
 He walked up the three steps and into the shop. So 
 far everything was progressing splendidly. 
 
 The apothecary was mixing something in a mortar, 
 while a peasant, with his fur cap in his hand, stood 
 at a respectful distance watching the proceeding, and 
 breathing very hard as he did so. The apothecary 
 was a sort of magician to him, and those bottles and 
 shelves, and labelled drawers and ticketed cases, were 
 the secrets of his magic. The perfume which the 
 sheepskin coat added to the already laden atmosphere 
 was the reverse of refreshing, and Marcin thought 
 so as he entered. At the view of this new and 
 distinguished customer, the magician abandoned his 
 magic mixture and commenced a series of inquir- 
 ing bows across the counter. To these Marcin paid 
 no attention, but sank exhausted on the nearest 
 chair. 
 
 " Can I offer you anything ? " asked the apothecary, 
 who was a small, dismal, and rather dishevelled-look- 
 ing man, but who moved more briskly than dismal men 
 usually do. He waved his arm suggestively towards 
 his shelves, where jars, with such enticing labels as 
 "rhubarb," "sulphur/' and "camomile" were ranged. 
 Martin's eyes roamed over them, and settled down 
 
150 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 upon a little row of soda-water syphons. "You can 
 give me some of that," he said. 
 
 " Some of the senna-tea ? In a moment/' and he 
 moved with gloomy alacrity towards it. 
 
 " No, not that stuff," said Marcin ; he had some 
 faint reminiscences connected with senna-tea, which 
 dated from his childhood and were not pleasant. " I 
 mean that soda over there: soda and water." 
 
 " Soda-water ? In a moment ! " 
 
 Jan Wronski, the apothecary, was by no means 
 quick of thought ; he was in fact remarkably slow 
 — perhaps because all his available faculties were 
 wrapped, and had for years been wrapped, round one 
 especial object. Some people go through life with an 
 ideal, a dream, a something for which their ambition 
 strives, but never reaches, and some people go through 
 life without this : Jan Wronski went through life 
 with a dream ; and his dream was hydrophobia — or 
 rather, I should say, the specific against it. From the 
 moment that his young wife had died from the bite of 
 a mad dog, mad dogs had literally become the betes 
 noires of his life. On this one point he was a little 
 crazy, although perfectly sane, stupidly sane on every 
 other. He bought all the works which had ever been 
 written on hydrophobia; he started correspondences 
 (which nobody carried on) in newspapers about hy- 
 drophobia ; he kept a register of all dogs which had 
 
maecin's cards. 151 
 
 died of hydrophobia within ten miles round ; he made 
 journeys to inspect interesting cases ; he concocted 
 mixtures and ointments, some of which he called 
 preventives, and others remedies. For nearly twenty 
 years past he had, at intervals of three or four years, 
 solemnly announced that the grand specific, which 
 was to make hydrophobia for ever harmless, was dis- 
 covered ; but as yet there was only one case on record 
 of a bitten child being cured, and even then it was 
 more than doubtful whether the dog had ever been 
 mad. He was not particularly hopeful about his own 
 project, but having once got into the idea, he was not 
 able to get out of it. There was something very ludi- 
 crous and also something rather pathetic in the blind 
 obstinacy with which this stupid, dismal, long-haired 
 old apothecary groped after his Will-o'-the-wisp. 
 
 He was, as I have said, remarkably slow of thought ; 
 but, nevertheless, at this moment there did dawn upon 
 his understanding some conception of incongruity. 
 It struck even him as peculiar that a gentleman 
 should drive over in a sledge to ask for a glass of 
 soda-water, on a day when the icicles were hanging in 
 a hard clear fringe from his roof. In summer he was 
 used to do a brisk business with his syphons. To 
 come in here and drink a glass of soda-water towards 
 sunset was considered fashionable and correct ; and 
 the importance of deciding between raspberry and 
 
152 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 lemon juice, as accompanying flavours, was quite 
 enough excitement for the unsophisticated beauties 
 of Tarajow. The trade naturally slackened with the 
 heat, and now had died off into a winter sleep, only 
 disturbed when now and then a case of high fever 
 came within Jan Wronski's limited jurisdiction. 
 
 When Marcin had drunk his first glass, which he 
 did very slowly, he asked for a second. He drank it 
 with his eyes roaming round the shelves and towards 
 the door w T hich led to the apothecary's back shop. 
 Then he asked for a third glass. The apothecary 
 looked alarmed. Was not this a case of high fever ? 
 or, no — rather was not this — 
 
 " Pan Bielinski did not happen to meet any dogs on 
 the way?" inquired the apothecary rather suddenly, 
 but very respectfully. The uninitiated might suppose 
 that this abnormal thirst shut out all idea of hydro- 
 phobia ; but Jan Wronski knew better. The very 
 newest theories inclined to the belief that excessive 
 water-drinkiug was one of the surest symptoms of the 
 malady. 
 
 " I never meet dogs," said Marcin, with unusual 
 decision, and he drained his third glass very slowly. 
 While he was draining it the back door opened, and 
 there came in Janina Wronska, the apothecary's only 
 daughter. She was carrying a tray, on which some 
 dried herbs were lying in heaps. 
 
MARCINS CARDS. 153 
 
 " Do you wish for a fourth glass ? " asked the 
 apothecary, in perfect good faith. 
 
 " No, thank you. What are those brown things on 
 the tray ? " 
 
 " They are dried flowers, from which we make tea. 
 Do you wish to taste any of our tea ? " 
 
 " Does Panna Janina make the tea ? " 
 
 It did not strike the apothecary as strange that this 
 gentleman should know his daughter's name. Such 
 circumstances never struck him at all. He was not 
 an unkind father ; but yet his daughter only had 
 interest for him inasmuch as she might or might not 
 be bitten by a mad dog, and that, in the former case, 
 he might or might not be able to cure her. She was a 
 little creature, not broader than became her stature, 
 with coal-black hair, dishevelled like her father's, 
 gleaming black eyes, and a full baby-mouth, with a 
 perpetual pout upon it. That she was young could 
 be seen by the way in which she reddened on seeing 
 a gentleman in the shop ; and how full of life she was 
 became evident by the way in which she set down the 
 tray of herbs on the counter, sending the dried stalks 
 flying away on all sides. 
 
 " Of course I make the tea," said Janina, tossing 
 her black head, and sweeping the herbs together again 
 with one little plump brown hand. " I should like 
 to know who would do it if I did not ! " 
 
154 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 " Ah, who indeed ! " Marcin seemed to have be- 
 come infected with the desire of proving himself help- 
 ful, for his hand was on the edge of the tray too. 
 The thin white fingers came against the plump brown 
 ones and lingered there. Jan Wronski was mean- 
 while weighing out alum and borax for another 
 customer. 
 
 " Are you going away ? " asked Marcin, as Janina 
 seized upon two stone jars and made for the door. 
 
 " Yes ; I have no time for idling. I am going to 
 the back-shop." 
 
 " I have no time for idling either," said Marcin. 
 Janina's hands were too full to open the door ; Mar- 
 cin opened it for her, and shut it for her too, and 
 then found to his surprise that he was on the same 
 side of the door as she. He had made his audacious 
 movement so unconsciously and so coolly, that Jan 
 Wronski never noticed his disappearance. 
 
 " How strange ! " said Marcin, looking round him. 
 
 " What have you come here for ? " demanded Jan- 
 ina, depositing her jars, and turning round upon him 
 with a great show of indignation. 
 
 " I cannot in the least imagine." 
 
 " Hadn't you better try and find out ? " The little 
 snub n»se was considerably elevated. 
 
 " I like back shops." 
 
 " I don't believe you have ever been in one." 
 
MARCINS CARDS. 155 
 
 "No, never." 
 
 " Then hadn't you better go out again ? " 
 
 " I like this back shop." 
 
 " But I never invited you into it." 
 
 " I think it was because it was so hot in there." 
 
 " Cold, I suppose you mean. It is much warmer in 
 here." 
 
 " Much. How truly you speak ! " 
 
 " Will you go back to the front shop ? " stormed the 
 little vixen, stamping her foot on the ground, in order 
 to call his attention to the fact that she had black 
 velvet boots on. 
 
 " I don't think so," said Marcin, gazing down at the 
 black velvet feet. It was a delightfully new sensa- 
 tion for him to be stamped at. He sat down on the 
 only arm-chair in the room, and prepared to make 
 himself at home. His immovable limpness often 
 gained points which another man's energy would 
 have lost. 
 
 Janina turned her back upon him, and began mak- 
 ing a great noise and bustle with jars, bottles, medicine- 
 spoons, and everything within reach. It was always 
 her way to make a noise with whatever she touched, 
 and it was remarkable what a variety of clattering 
 and rattling sounds she managed to get out of glass 
 and china; even harmless-looking pasteboard boxes 
 seemed to become noisy under her hands. She began 
 
156 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 dividing off some powders, and folding them in papers. 
 Marcin looked on admiringly. It made him feel 
 rather giddy to see any one move about so quickly 
 as she did. It seemed to him, in a sort of indefinite 
 way, that she was a mixture of lightning, quicksilver, 
 gunpowder, express trains, and everything else in 
 the world which conveys an idea of rapidity and 
 explosiveness. 
 
 Of course she was delighted that he should be there, 
 and, of course, she was quite resolved that he should 
 not get back into the front shop just yet ; but a little 
 show of resistance was more dignified, as well as more 
 exciting. She went on with her work as if resolved 
 to ignore his presence and existence. The room they 
 were in looked out on a narrow courtyard, where stood 
 a snow-covered summer-house, and where also hens 
 and geese stalked about on the frozen ground. 
 
 When Marcin had sat admiring for nearly two 
 minutes, he said, " Why were you not in church last 
 Sunday ? " 
 
 " Oh, you are here still, are you ? " remarked Janina, 
 over her shoulder. 
 
 " Why were you not in church ? " 
 
 " I don't go to church to see you." 
 
 " But I go to see you." 
 
 Without turning round, she shrugged her shoulders, 
 and burst out singing — 
 
marcin's cards. 157 
 
 11 Ne toho jdu cerkowci Bohuse molyty, 
 Lys toho jdu do cerkowci, na lubka dzwyty, 
 Oj pzdu ja do cerkowci stanu pid obrazy, 
 Podzwlin se raz na popu, na lubku tzy razy. " 
 (I go not in the church to pray ; I go to look at my love. I stand 
 before the holy pictures, and look once at the priest, and three times 
 at my love.) 
 
 " How nice ! " said Marcin. " Songs save so many 
 explanations. Won't you teach me to sing ? " 
 
 Janina looked round, and the perpetual pout be- 
 came a decided one. 
 
 " What a question to put to a stranger ! You hardly 
 know me a bit." 
 
 " I have known you all my life." 
 
 " Ha, ha, ha ! " she laughed, with the abruptness of 
 a bomb. It was a very hearty childish laugh; but 
 still it was shrill, and it pierced Marcin's sensitive 
 ears. " Just listen to that ! You have seen me twice 
 exactly, I believe." 
 
 " Perhaps : you are always right." 
 
 " And perhaps you will never see me again." 
 
 "Perhaps." All this time he was staring at her 
 steadfastly and without intermission ; and all this 
 time, in the midst of her pouts and her head-tossings, 
 she never for a moment paused in the business of her 
 powder-making. Now she dropped him a curtsey 
 quite as unexpected as her laugh, and said, with 
 mock gratitude — 
 
158 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 " Thank you, Pan Bielinski ! " 
 
 " How nice ! But don't call me Pan Bielinski. I 
 am tired of that." 
 
 " What am I to call you ? " 
 
 " I don't know." 
 
 " What do they call you at home ? " 
 
 " Marcin." 
 
 " Then I will call you Marcin." 
 
 " How nice ! " 
 
 Janina held her tongue for a minute after this. She 
 had done her part, and it was clearly his turn to say 
 something now. But instinct told her quickly that 
 with this sort of man one must take the initiative ; so, 
 after a moment, and with a shy glance from under her 
 eyelashes, she asked, "And what are you going to call 
 me ? " 
 
 " I don't know. I can't call you Marcin also, 
 can I ? " 
 
 " But you might call me Janina." 
 
 " Thank you, Marcin, I mean Janina ! " 
 
 Another flash of black lightning scathed the willing 
 victim. 
 
 " Why don't you help me with these papers ? Don't 
 you see how busy I am ? " 
 
 " Help ! " repeated Marcin, with a faint smile. 
 
 " Yes, help ! Do you never help people ? " 
 
 " No, never. Life is too short for that." No one, 
 
margin's cards. 159 
 
 since the commencement of his existence, had ever 
 asked Marcin to do as much as pick up a pin, and 
 now this audacious little creature was actually ask- 
 ing him to help her with papers and powders. 
 The experience was so new that it tickled his fancy. 
 He drew his chair to the table and received his 
 instructions. 
 
 "You are to put these powders into blue paper, and 
 these into white. Do you understand ? " 
 
 " Not at all ! " 
 
 " Of course you cannot understand, if you look at 
 me instead of at the powders. There is my father 
 coming." 
 
 Jan Wronski, having disposed of the commoner cus- 
 tomers, had suddenly awoke to the fact that his dis- 
 tinguished customer had disappeared in some myste- 
 rious and inexplicable fashion. He had certainly not 
 gone out by the front door, for the sledge with the 
 shivering horses still stood before the house. He 
 would consult Janina ; but entering the back shop for 
 this purpose, he found not only Janina but also the 
 distinguished visitor filling powders into paper. 
 
 " Pan Bielinski came in here because he was so 
 cold," explained Janina, sitting ostentatiously demure, 
 with her eyes on the powders. She looked such a 
 good, dutiful, and well-behaved little girl as she 
 said it. 
 
160 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 Pan Bielinski's alterations from heat to cold must 
 have been rapid, to judge from the three glasses of soda- 
 water a little time ago. For a moment Jan Wronski's 
 suspicions concerning a possible mad dog glimmered 
 into life again, but died away at the sight of the dis- 
 tinguished customer's perfect composure of face. Pan 
 Bielinski was cold? Would he not sit nearer the 
 stove ? Would he not like a rucf over his feet, or a 
 cloak over his shoulders ? No ; he preferred to sit 
 where he was. But at least there must be some more 
 wood put on. 
 
 " He is qualifying himself for a medical student," 
 put in Janina, unflinchingly, in order to check the flow 
 of her father's suggestions, " and he is very anxious to 
 learn how to make powders." 
 
 " So I see — so I see ; and you can teach that better 
 than I," said the dismal apothecary, passing his hand 
 over his long hair; "so I shall just go back to a very in- 
 teresting treatise I was reading, which throws some quite 
 new lights upon the treatment of hydrophobia ; " and 
 Jan Wronski withdrew, having gathered the impres- 
 sion that young Pan Bielinski was a doctor in embryo, 
 very earnest about his profession, and in particular 
 very keen about powders. 
 
 There followed a quarter of an hour, during which 
 Marcin certainly did not learn the system of wrapping 
 
161 
 
 up powders, although he possibly may have learnt 
 many other things. 
 
 " You are not cold now, are you, Marcin ? " Janina 
 asked, with her black-poodle head on one side. She 
 had talked, and worked, and teased, and laughed the 
 whole time. Now, for the first time, she took a mo- 
 ment's rest; and rest consisted in leaning forward with 
 both her arms on the table. The table was not a very 
 broad one. Her bold black eyes were gleaming brimful 
 of life as she looked into his face. If she had not been 
 so young and so fresh, even Marcin might have dis- 
 covered that she was vulgar ; as it was, no such sug- 
 gestion threw its shadow over this new sort of enjoy- 
 ment he was experiencing. 
 
 " I am not cold now," he said, and as he said it, it 
 occurred to him that he had never felt so warm in his 
 life before. He dropped the powders on the table, and 
 took hold, instead, of those two little busy brown 
 hands which lay close by. They fluttered for a mo- 
 ment in his grasp, and made a pretence of escaping, 
 and yet the plump fingers were much tighter in their 
 grasp than the limp white hands. There was fire in 
 her black eyes — Marcin felt it blazing on him; and 
 then — and then, he did not at all know how it hap- 
 pened, — perhaps he only did it by mistake, or per- 
 haps it was only because the table was so narrow, 
 
 VOL. I. L 
 
162 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 — but certainly he had leant across the table and 
 kissed her. 
 
 The next thing was startling ; for the door burst 
 open, and there entered Jan Wronski in a state of 
 high excitement. 
 
 " The horses are perishing with cold, Pan Bielinski, 
 — just perishing ! " 
 
 " What horses ? " stammered Marcin, not yet re- 
 covered from surprise at his own conduct, and not at 
 all certain whether Jan had not been witness of it. 
 
 " Your horses ; they have been standing for three 
 quarters of an hour. The coachman says they will 
 catch their death of cold." 
 
 " More haste, less speed ! " said Marcin, rather wide 
 of the mark. " It never does to be in a hurry." 
 
 " Quite so, Pan Bielinski, especially with powders.' 5 
 
 " I have learnt a great deal," looking at the back of 
 Janina's head, which was turned towards them. Per- 
 haps she was angry ; she had not spoken since. 
 
 " Good-bye, Panna Janina ! " 
 
 " Good-bye, Pan Bielinski ! " 
 
 No, she was not angry ; this much he had ascer- 
 tained. 
 
 Before he had got through the front shop, Janina 
 was throwing up her hands in despair over the dis- 
 covery that all the powders that should have been in 
 
MARCINS CARDS. 163 
 
 blue paper were in white, and all those that should 
 have been in white were in blue. 
 
 " Is there anything else that I can serve you with? " 
 asked the apothecary, at the door. 
 
 Marcin looked round him for the last time. 
 
 " Nothing ; yes — perhaps one more glass of soda- 
 water." 
 
164 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 QUEEN OF DIAMONDS. 
 
 " The Sabbath is a bride and a queen, and in itself more than all the command- 
 ments of the Lord : therefore shall the Jew fitly honour the Sabbath, from 
 the Friday evening until the evening when the Sabbath is closed." — Talmvd 
 Teaching. 
 
 The slip of paper was still safely buttoned up in 
 Marcin's pocket when he reached home. 
 
 " Well, Marcin, how did you get on ? " 
 
 "Famously ; much better than I hoped." 
 
 " And where are your purchases ? " 
 
 " Purchases ? Do you mean the soda-water ? I 
 didn't bring any back with me." 
 
 " But, Marcin ! the slip of paper I gave you ; you 
 have lost it, I suppose ? " 
 
 " Oh, you mean the trap for my mother ? I found 
 it was getting rather late, so I " 
 
 "Well?" 
 
 " So I did not " 
 
 " Did not what ? " 
 
QUEEN OF DIAMONDS. 165 
 
 " You see, the horses had been standing a long time," 
 explained Marcin, apologetically. 
 
 " Standing where ? " broke in Kazimir, with some 
 indignation ; but Lucyan remarked calmly : " So you 
 did not go near the apothecary's after all?" 
 
 " Oh yes, very near ! " 
 
 Lucyan gave a philosophical shrug to his shoulders, 
 and held his tongue. The long and the short of it was, 
 that Marcin had been to Tarajow and back, and had 
 brought neither Neurojpoeticon nor traps for the foxes. 
 
 Some days after this Kazimir announced : " I am 
 going to drive over to-morrow." 
 
 " Where to ? Tarajow ? " 
 
 " No, Lodniki. Won't you come with me Lucyan ? " 
 
 He had put this question so frequently and so reg- 
 ularly that it surprised him when this time Lucyan 
 answered, " Very well, I will go with you to-morrow." 
 Accordingly Lucyan went, and made acquaintance with 
 the Eogdanovics household. 
 
 There has been very little said as to the prece- 
 dents and position of this family, and it now becomes 
 necessary to say more. The chief particulars, some of 
 which Kazimir had gathered from Eogdanovics, and 
 Lucyan in turn elicited from his brother, were briefly 
 as follows. 
 
 At the time when Eogdanovics had been Bogumil 
 Bielinski's friend — that is, twenty years ago — he had 
 
160 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 been comparatively a poor man, but eminently a 
 wandering man ; leading a sort of gentlemanly vaga- 
 bond life ; shifting about from one part of the country 
 to another ; buying small estates and selling them 
 again ; renting others and throwing up his lease ; or 
 effecting speculative exchanges and compromises. 
 This nomadic existence, he explained to his friends, 
 was but a preparation for the time when a certain 
 large and valuable estate in Eussian Poland should 
 fall to his share by inheritance. This had come to 
 pass only two years ago ; and now at last he would 
 be able to air the ambitious schemes with which his 
 brain was teeming. After passing a year and a half 
 on this estate, Rogdanovics explained to his friends 
 that the ground did not lend itself to his plans. No 
 doubt the control of Russian authorities, which makes 
 itself felt even in private life and private undertak- 
 ings, had unduly oppressed Rogdanovics's free spirit. 
 Letting the place rather suddenly, he appeared in 
 East Galicia, where he bought Lodniki, and rented 
 the neighbouring large farm, Szybalin, threw the Jbwo 
 together, and began expending his energies upon this 
 double farm. The large speculative plans in which he 
 had embarked since his appearance, six months ago, 
 were beginning to startle the conservative minds of 
 the small proprietors around. Rumours of a colossal 
 estate in Russian Poland were fully confirmed by the 
 
QUEEN OF DIAMONDS. 167 
 
 grand footing on which, from the first, he had placed 
 his establishment. Beyond that, they knew very little 
 about him; or if any one did know anything about 
 him, it was the Jews ; and the Jews do not give in- 
 formation gratis. 
 
 Foremost among the speculative ideas which had 
 induced Eogdanovics to settle on this particular spot, 
 had been the hope of a future railway. On the 
 strength of this hope he had cheerfully paid a higher 
 price for Lodniki, and a higher rent for Szybalin, than 
 would under ordinary circumstances have been asked. 
 
 Such a railway really was projected ; but most of 
 the proprietors around shook their heads at Eog- 
 danovics's folly, and declared that he might consider 
 himself lucky if he saw as much as half-a-dozen yards 
 of rails within the next ten years. In face of all de- 
 pressing arguments, Eogdanovics persisted in being- 
 cheerful about his railway. The more his neighbours 
 shook their heads the more he rubbed his hands, 
 and the more fabulous grew the sums which he was 
 ready to wager, that the railway would be there, en- 
 gines, station-masters, tunnels and all, in less than no 
 time. So confident was he in himself and his pro- 
 jects, and so firmly convinced that he had hit upon 
 the right thing at last, that he forswore his nomadic 
 existence, and sent for his daughter to join him. Vizia 
 had lived but little with her father ; who, regarding 
 
168 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 her rather in the light of an encumbrance, had been 
 thankful to leave her at Krakow, under the wing of 
 Madame Torska, a widowed sister of his own. This 
 widowed sister had a second niece in charge ; for 
 Xenia, the daughter of a younger Eogdanovics brother, 
 had lost her home and her parents in early childhood. 
 The two girls had grown up together, the younger 
 clinging to the elder with childlike reliance ; the 
 elder passionately attached to the cousin, whom she 
 regarded more as a sister than as a cousin, and yet 
 more as a child than as a sister. 
 
 When, therefore, Vizia was called upon to join her 
 father, the cousins could not be parted; and Xenia, 
 half dreading the lonely country life, and half anxious 
 for a change, accompanied Vizia to Lodniki, where for 
 the present she remained. 
 
 This is about the sum total of all that was known 
 concerning the Eogdanovics household ; and as yet it 
 had been no one's interest to inquire further. Now, 
 however, there had come a day on which some one 
 was moved to ask for more information. It was not 
 Kazimir — he did not care to look further than blue 
 eyes and chestnut hair — but, strangely enough, it was 
 Lucyan. 
 
 That visit he paid to Lodniki with his brother was 
 a long visit ; it was very near dusk when the sledge 
 turned from the door. 
 
QUEEN OF DIAMONDS. 169 
 
 " Well, what do you think of her ? " asked Kazimir 
 eagerly, almost before they were out of earshot. 
 
 "What do I think of which of them?" retorted 
 Lucyan, as he pulled his fur collar up to his ears. 
 
 "Oh, of both, of course, I mean," said the other 
 with a start, and a desperate attempt at manoeuvring ; 
 and then, by way of being particularly deep, he added, 
 " Mademoiselle Vizia is very agreeable, is she not ? " 
 
 " Yes, very." 
 
 "And don't you think," began Kazimir, but his 
 voice was drowned in a jingle of bells, as a heavily 
 laden sledge came tearing towards and past them. 
 
 " There is the man I want," said Lucyan quickly, 
 half rising, and putting a hand on the reins which his 
 brother held. Among that closely packed mass of 
 black figures, nine or ten in all, he had recognised one, 
 and the recognition was at that moment particularly 
 agreeable to him. 
 
 " Make the horses stand a couple of minutes, Kazi- 
 mir," said Lucyan; " I have something to say to Aitzig 
 Majulik — something about flower -seeds," he added, 
 as he stepped out of the sledge. " He is going off to 
 buy horses in the Bukowina, and may be away some 
 weeks." 
 
 The Jew-laden sledge had shot on some fifty yards, 
 before, in answer to Lu cyan's signal, it was able to 
 draw up. Lucyan, therefore, had to walk back towards 
 
170 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 it, and in so doing, he came again within sight of the 
 Lodniki house. He was near enough to have counted 
 the window-panes, if he had been so minded, and to 
 distinguish quite clearly the figures of the two shaggy 
 watch-dogs at their post ; but the falling dusk drew a 
 delicate veil over the outlines of everything. Lucyan 
 must have had his flower-seeds very much more at 
 heart than he had his boots, if it was for the sake of 
 the former that he tramped thus through the snow. 
 But he did not tramp back all the way. As soon 
 as he had got partially out of sight of the sledge, he 
 stopped and beckoned to Aitzig Majulik. 
 
 The factor had already glided from his seat, and was 
 plunging onwards through the deep snow — his kaftan 
 flapping wildly, his skeleton legs making desperate 
 strides, his corkscrew curls streaming in the wind like 
 two demented snakes. When he got to the spot where 
 Lucyan waited, he could only stand and gasp, with the 
 drops running down his face, and his dirty fur cap 
 sitting all awry upon his head. 
 
 Lucyan waited calmly till he should have recovered 
 breath, and as soon as he had recovered breath, Aitzig 
 began panting out something about Szabas and the 
 sunset hour, and that he would most assuredly be 
 caught on the road by the first stroke of the holy day, 
 and therefore, still more assuredly, be damned for all 
 eternity. For this was Friday evening, close upon the 
 
QUEEN OF DIAMONDS. 171 
 
 verge of the twenty -four hours during which all 
 worldly transactions are rigorously forbidden to the 
 children of Abraham. The nine other children of 
 Abraham, dangling their long legs on the sledge, were 
 beginning to beat their breasts at the thought of this 
 delay. With nine souls on his conscience, no wonder 
 that Aitzig trembled for his own. 
 
 " You will reach the town in time," said Lucyan, 
 " if you give this to the driver to help him on fast- 
 er;" and at sight of a paper florin, Aitzig's susceptible 
 conscience experienced a momentary relief, the nine 
 souls of his brethren became perceptibly lighter in 
 weight. 
 
 " What is it the gracious Pan desires ? " he gasped, 
 still a little short of breath. 
 
 Lucyan, perceiving that time pressed, and knowing 
 that even a paper florin cannot keep a conscience at 
 bay for ever, quickly fitted himself to circumstances. 
 
 " You know that family, of course," he said, making 
 a slight movement with his head towards the house. 
 
 " I know that family," assented Aitzig, on his guard 
 at once, and from under his deep eyebrows watching 
 his questioner with that mixture of suspicion and 
 cunning which is never absent from a Jew, even a 
 Jew trembling for the salvation of his soul. 
 
 " And all about them ? " 
 
 " Some things about them, noble Pan," said Aitzig, 
 
172 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 in an abject tone, giving one pull to each of his curls ; 
 " some little things does poor old Aitzig know about 
 them. If you said to me, What is the amount of 
 silver forks that they keep in that house ? I can give 
 you the exact number written on paper ; and if you 
 ask me, Of what sort are the servants that they 
 have in that family ? I will answer you that among 
 the servants is a cook who is always drunk ; and if 
 you " 
 
 " Silence ! " said Lucyan ; and though he did not 
 raise his voice to say it, the tone was enough to silence 
 the Jew on the spot. " I do not want to hear about 
 the cook." 
 
 Aitzig knew perfectly that he did not want to hear 
 about the cook, but somehow at this moment his 
 conscience grew tender again : " God of Moses ! " he 
 moaned, just loud enough for Lucyan to hear it, and 
 he softly wrung his hands, — " if the Kojchoiv-huarvis 
 (the first star of the evening) shall shine out while I 
 stand talking here, then will Aitzig Majulik's soul be 
 damned for ever." 
 
 The strength of the one paper florin was clearly 
 spent, and reluctantly Lucyan drew out a second. He 
 was not precisely a miser, and he was too clever ever 
 to become a miser, and yet he had some qualities of 
 the miser in him ; he could not let as much as a silver 
 Zwanziger leave his hands without a distinct pang of 
 
QUEEN OF DIAMONDS. 173 
 
 pain, as acute as though he were parting with a bit of 
 himself. 
 
 " Quick," said Lucy an, " since there is no time to 
 lose. What I want to know is this, Are these specu- 
 lations safe ? Are these grand schemes sound or are 
 they not ? Is the fortune to be built upon ? " 
 
 Aitzig drew up his shoulders in his favourite man- 
 ner, till they brushed the corkscrew curls, and put on 
 to his face an expression which might mean anything. 
 
 That is a great question which you put to poor old 
 Aitzig Majulik," he cried. " Who is Aitzig, that he 
 should answer such a question ? Has he the wisdom 
 of Solomon to guide him ? How should he like to say 
 that these grand speculations mean very much, and 
 how should he like to say that they mean little ? " 
 
 This was much too valuable a fund of information 
 to be imparted thus in a hurried talk, and for the 
 niggardly consideration of two paper florins. 
 
 It was clear that he was not to be got at this way. 
 Lucyan tried another. Looking at the house, he had 
 seen a figure step out by the door and stand on the 
 pillared verandah outside. He recognised Vizia's red 
 shawl at once, and with its help he was able to assure 
 himself that this was the plain, and not the beautiful 
 cousin. 
 
 " Look," he said, with a bold move, laying his hand 
 on the Jew's arm, " it is about that young lady that 
 
174 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 I want to know. You recognise her?" Aitzig had 
 turned towards the house, and stood shading his eyes 
 with his hand. 
 
 " About that young lady — yes," he repeated, slowly. 
 " What does the gracious Pan desire to know of me ? " 
 
 " The sum of her fortune ; quick now, on the 
 spot ! " 
 
 " God of my forefathers ! " groaned Aitzig, dropping 
 his hand suddenly, " let me go, noble gentleman ; you 
 would not have poor old Aitzig burn for ever — wai, 
 wai ! Do I not see the bright lights beginning to 
 shine out of the windows of the children of Israel ; 
 and are they not asking of each other, ' Where is 
 Aitzig Majulik, the ever faithful ? ' Gott und die 
 Welt ! is it not my brethren who are preparing to 
 leave me ? They will drive home, and they will be 
 saved, and poor old " 
 
 " Tell me the sum of her fortune instantly," repeated 
 Lucyan, not moving a muscle of his face. His hand 
 was upon Aitzig's arm, and through his threadbare 
 kaftan the Jew could feel that the grasp of that 
 delicate white hand was as firm, ay, and as cold too, 
 as the grasp of a hand of steel. In the background 
 the waiting Jews were chattering loudly, and swaying 
 their lean bodies from side to side, as they beckoned 
 wildly to their comrade. 
 
 " Quick," said Lucyan, again. 
 
QUEEN OF DIAMONDS. 175 
 
 " Seventy — thousand — florins," whined Aitzig, trail- 
 ing out each word, as though it were being drawn 
 from his lips with iron pincers, writhing in mental 
 agony between the thought of his salvation and the 
 thought of the excellent bargain that might have been 
 made of this had time only permitted. 
 
 Lucyan's eyes lit up for a moment in their own 
 peculiar fashion. He threw another glance towards 
 the figure on the verandah, and it struck him that 
 Vizia looked a great deal handsomer in the light of 
 these seventy thousand florins, even though he was 
 scarcely near enough to distinguish her features. But 
 quickly he returned to caution ; even seventy thou- 
 sand florins might easily be swallowed up in one of 
 Eogdanovics's grand schemes. 
 
 " Does that mean seventy thousand florins of her 
 own, or of her father's ? " 
 
 "Of her own — of her own ! " breathed Aitzig, wrig- 
 gling vainly under Lucyan's hand. "Her mother's 
 money ; entirely her own. God of Abraham ! " 
 
 " And the investment ? " 
 
 " Safe as the ark of the covenant ! " 
 
 " You are not deceiving me, dog ? " and Lucyan 
 gave a quick sharp shake to the arm he held. " If 
 one word is false you shall rue it." 
 
 " As true as the Pentateuch," said the trembling 
 Jew, stuttering in his eagerness to be gone ; for the 
 
176 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 Szdbas dusk was falling fast, very fast now, and the 
 swaying Jews in the background were moving slowly 
 off. " Let my beard be shrivelled to cinders if I speak 
 not the truth ; they will be saved — Gott und die Welt, 
 they will be saved ! " 
 
 " Save yourself, then, Moschku ! " x and in the 
 moment that those white fingers unclasped, Aitzig 
 went off through the snow like an arrow from the 
 string, racing as though he were pursuing his truant 
 soul, reached the sledge, already in motion, threw 
 himself on it with the energy of despair, was dragged 
 up by the forgiving brethren, whose salvation he had 
 just been so gravely imperilling, while in a cloud of 
 flying snow the sledge rushed off at a tearing pace, 
 and disappeared like lightning through the falling 
 dusk. 
 
 Lucyan found his brother in a state of ill-suppressed 
 impatience. 
 
 " Eeally, Lucyan, you might have considered the 
 horses, instead of standing there conversing about 
 flower-seeds." 
 
 " It was very urgent," said Lucyan, taking his place 
 again. 
 
 " Well, and is it all right now about those wretched 
 seeds ? " 
 
 " Yes, I think my flower-seeds will do very well ! " 
 
 1 Contemptuous nickname applied to the Jews. 
 
QUEEN OF DIAMONDS. 177 
 
 They drove on some moments in silence ; but Kaz- 
 imir was too impatiently eager to hear his brother's 
 opinion of Xenia to hold his tongue for long. 
 
 " So you say that you find Mademoiselle Vizia 
 agreeable?" he resumed, tentatively. 
 
 Lucyan had not been saying anything of the sort ; 
 but, after a momentary pause, he answered readily — 
 
 " She could be very agreeable, I think, but I cannot 
 say that she w T as particularly gracious to me." 
 
 "What did you talk about at your end of the 
 room ? " 
 
 " Well, I tried her with flowers, as you said she 
 was fond of them ; but somehow she did not seem to 
 be so very fond of them after all. What used you to 
 talk about with her \ " 
 
 " Oh, I don't know ; all sorts of things. She was 
 agreeable on all subjects, I fancy." 
 
 " H — m," said Lucyan. " You have more luck 
 than I." 
 
 " And what do you think of Mademoiselle Xenia ? " 
 Kazimir ventured now. 
 
 Lucyan did not answer at once. The fur collar hid 
 the lower part of his face, and, besides, it was fast 
 growing dark. 
 
 " Lucyan, don't you hear me ? What do you think 
 of her ? " 
 
 " I think she is prettier than her cousin." 
 
 VOL. I. M 
 
178 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 " Prettier than her cousin ! " repeated Kazimir, 
 with some scorn. He had been looking for expres- 
 sions of rapturous — no, not rapturous, for Lucyan 
 never could be rapturous, but at least undisguised 
 (Kazimir did not know that his brother could never 
 be undisguised) — admiration. He regarded Xenia 
 to a certain extent as his own discovery and inven- 
 tion ; he wanted every one to know her and admire 
 her; he had really been anxious that his brother 
 should admire her ; and, instead of this, he was 
 chilled by being told that she was prettier than 
 her cousin. 
 
 " Is that all the difference you find between them ? 
 you who pretend to call yourself a connoisseur ! " 
 
 " Oh, I find other differences," said Lucyan, quite 
 calmly. 
 
 " What sort ? " 
 
 " Intellectual differences." 
 
 Kazimir felt inclined to fire up, he did not exactly 
 know why. 
 
 " I do not in the least understand what you meau," 
 he began, impulsively. 
 
 " That is because you misunderstand. I am not 
 such a fool as to expect brains in a woman ; they are 
 rather a disadvantage than otherwise — the few who 
 have got brains don't know how to use them. They 
 are very well as they are, I assure you." 
 
QUEEN OF DIAMONDS. 179 
 
 " That is not my way of looking at women," said 
 Kazimir, with some heat. 
 
 "But it is mine," replied Lucyan, imperturbed; 
 " and I daresay it will be yours when you are a few 
 years older." It did not strike either of them as the 
 least strange that it should be the younger brother 
 who said this to the elder. Kazimir at twenty-six 
 was a great deal younger than Lucyan at twenty-four. 
 
 " Depend upon it, Kazio, whoever asks for brains 
 or character in a woman must be very short of the 
 first ingredient himself. Mademoiselle Vizia has got 
 brains, I am afraid ; and it is saying a good deal that, 
 in spite of them, I should like her." Of course Kazi- 
 mir could not know that there were seventy thousand 
 florins in the scale, which went far towards weighing 
 down the portion of Vizia's brains, however large it 
 might be. 
 
 " And as for her cousin, I agree with you ; she has 
 got the best part of a woman — beauty." 
 
 The tone was quite careless, studiously careless, and 
 perhaps on that account it grated on Kazimir. If it 
 had not been too dark to see, the smile which accom- 
 panied the words might have grated on him yet more ; 
 at any rate, it would have shown him that his younger 
 brother's j udgment as connoisseur was in no danger of 
 deteriorating. 
 
 After this the drive became rather silent. Lucyan 
 
180 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 reflected upon his talk with the factor, and examined 
 the new card in his hand ; and Kazimir asked himself 
 repeatedly how any one could talk so coolly about 
 Xenia's beauty. He had experienced a slight and in- 
 describable chill, not the first which had touched him 
 since the beginning of his renewed intercourse with 
 Lucyan. It puzzled and displeased him, for was not 
 Lucyan his brother ? and is it not a universal law that 
 brothers love each other % Kazimir believed so at 
 least, and told himself that of course he liked his 
 brother, and that these momentary touches, which set 
 some chord within him jarring, could be caused only 
 by the long separation. Time would mend that, no 
 doubt. He did not speak again till they were far on 
 their way, and then he said suddenly : " Mademoiselle 
 Yizia asked me to come to their fox-hunt ; I suppose 
 she asked you too ? " 
 
 " She did not condescend so far to me, but her 
 father did, which is the same." 
 
 " Then you will be there ? " 
 
 " Yes, I think I shall. The foxes are my enemies, 
 a iid the traps have failed ; nothing but a lot of starved 
 sparrows fell in." 
 
 "Poor little wretches !" said Kazimir. 
 
 " Horrid little wretches ! * laughed Lucyan. " Are 
 you not rather soft-hearted for a soldier? They 
 were very funny to look at, I assure you. As stiff 
 
QUEEN OF DIAMONDS. 181 
 
 as a dozen door-nails. You don't admire the picture ? 
 Well, to return to the point, I shall go to the fox- 
 hunt ; you have given me a taste for society, Kazio." 
 
 As he spoke the very first star shone out overhead, 
 — that terrible star, which coming a little while ago 
 would have condemned Aitzig Majulik's soul to ever- 
 lasting torments ; and whose fatal beam he had barely 
 escaped by traversing the four miles' distance at a rate 
 which landed his nine faithful brethren with rescued 
 souls indeed, but, alas ! with sorely bruised bodies. 
 
182 
 
 CHAPTEK X. 
 
 CUTTING FOR PARTNERS. 
 
 " Du blickst mild und klar und gut, 
 Und bist's auch wohl ; doch htite dich, hiite dich ! 
 
 Dort weiter draussen braust das Meer." 
 
 — Grillparzer. 
 " If she be made of white and red, 
 Her faults will ne'er be known." 
 
 — Love's Labour's Lost. 
 
 In spite of the cold, or rather because of the cold, the 
 foxes had been having a fine time of it lately. The 
 frost's icy spur had made heroes of them, one and all. 
 Falling a prey to a certain uneasy oppression in the 
 depths of their wintry forest haunts, their noble breasts 
 sighed for the freedom of airy fields, and the palates of 
 their noble mouths watered for the flavour of the part- 
 ridges that peopled those fields. Partridges by day and 
 fowls by night ; what an ideal of fox-existence ! They 
 stormed the poultry-yards, they ransacked the duck- 
 ponds, and many was the plump and tender pullet 
 which they carried home in triumph to be devoured in 
 
CUTTING FOR PARTNERS. 183 
 
 the bosom of their red-coated families. Bolder and 
 bolder they grew as the cold increased ; intoxicated 
 with the blood of fat geese, the clearness of their 
 judgment began to grow clouded. Looked at through 
 a halo of feathers, the world seemed but one vast 
 poultry -yard, and men but the dull-headed slaves 
 who fattened hens and ducks for their majesties the 
 foxes. Their majesties snapped their fingers, meta- 
 phorically speaking, at mankind. What fools men 
 were ! What fools were all other creatures but foxes ! 
 The rash and foolish wolf, for instance, who allows 
 himself to be lured to destruction by the squeal of a 
 struggling sucking-pig. But Master Eeynard knows 
 better than that; he is not to be tempted by such 
 clumsy devices ; he knows to distinguish between one 
 of those murderer-laden sledges bristling with guns, 
 and a harmless travelling-sledge — such, for instance, 
 as this one which comes spinning across the snowy 
 landscape towards him. Master Eeynard was at that 
 moment stalking an uncommonly plump partridge; and 
 what between gourmanclise and arrogance, he did not 
 consider it worth while to move out of the way for this 
 travelling party, — this gentleman and his good lady, 
 starting perhaps on their wedding-trip. The fox had 
 a good lady himself at home, and he had been young 
 in his day too, and he had even had a wedding-trip 
 into a high-class poultry-yard. He remembered still 
 
184 BEGGAK MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 with emotion the first succulent guinea-fowl (ah, how 
 succulent it had been !) which he and she had strangled 
 between them. To this day he could never see a 
 guinea-fowl without feeling soft. Altogether the sight 
 of this young couple put him into a state of good- 
 humoured patronage; and if he had not been afraid 
 of leaving that partridge out of his ken, he would 
 have liked to turn round, wave his red tail instead of a 
 handkerchief, and call out bon voyage to the travellers. 
 Just as he had reached this pitch of sentiment, it 
 struck Master Eeynard that the young travellers on 
 their side were evincing at least an equal sympathy 
 for him. Straight towards him the sledge came, spin- 
 ning nearer and nearer over the snow. The male 
 occupant half rose for a moment, and bent towards 
 the driver. With one eye Master Eeynard saw this, 
 keeping the other eye on the partridge, and at the 
 same moment it seemed to him that the travelling rug 
 at the bottom of the sledge moved as if it were alive ; 
 and from under the edge what was that that peeped ? 
 A snout 1 a canine snout ? a sharp greyhound snout ? 
 Panic seized on Eeynard's heart ; horrid recollections 
 darted through his brain ; long-forgotten legends which 
 he had heard from his grandfather's lips, of masked 
 sledges, of disguises, of greyhounds concealed, of pur- 
 suit, destruction, death. Were men such fools, after all? 
 He saw no more partridge, he sighed no longer over his 
 
CUTTING FOR PARTNERS. 185 
 
 wedding - trip ; he cast one glance across his ruddy 
 shoulder, and beheld the rug torn off and two sharp- 
 nosed monsters leaping to the ground. On one side 
 the open country, not a bush to hide him for miles 
 and miles ; on the other the forest, but, alas ! nearly a 
 mile away ; his last chance — for had he not a good 
 start of those sharp-nosed, slender-bodied monsters ? 
 He turned and fled towards the forest like wind. 
 
 " Too soon, Panie — nearly a minute too soon," said 
 the driver, turning to the gentleman in the sledge ; 
 " you should not have uncovered the dogs for another 
 minute." 
 
 " We shall have him yet ! " cried Kazimir, flushed 
 with the excitement of the sport ; and standing up he 
 tore the reins from the man's hands, seized the whip, 
 and lashed the horses into a furious pace. Over the 
 fields they flew, scattering the snow on all sides, tear- 
 ing it up under the horses' feet ; and before them the 
 dogs stretched, and further ahead, that red spot fled 
 over the white ground, drawing nearer and nearer to 
 the forest. The dogs held on bravely, though the 
 snow was deep; and the horses, taking the bit between 
 their teeth, raced as though they were racing for their 
 lives. Kazimir cracked the whip, and shouted encour- 
 agement to both dogs and horses. Once in the forest 
 the game would be lost, but they were still a good 
 quarter of a mile off. 
 
186 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 " Kozak — that's right — he is gaining — cheer on — 
 another stretch — harder — harder ! " shouted Kazimir, 
 upright in the flying sledge. " We shall have him 
 yet ! They are all but ahead ; ha ! what's come to 
 Wanda ? She's lagging — by heavens she'll fail us ! " 
 
 " It is the snow, Panie — the snow ! it's too deep," 
 cried the driver, clutching desperately to his seat ; 
 " too deep by half a yard. See there, it's all over ! " for 
 the second greyhound, dropping back suddenly, sank 
 up to her shoulders in the snow. 
 
 " There's Kozak still," said Kazimir, with one more 
 fierce cut to the horses ; but even while he was saying 
 it, Kozak began to flag — his hind-legs stuck, he strug- 
 gled free again, raced on a few paces, sank again, and 
 floundered along helplessly. Master Keynard could 
 have laughed in his red sleeve now, but the panic 
 had not left him, and did not leave him until he 
 was safe in his forest haunts ; and once there, the 
 first use to which he put his recovered breath, was 
 to vow that taste of partridge should never cross 
 his lips again. 
 
 " We have lost him ! " and Kazimir sank back on 
 his seat. 
 
 " What a pity ! " said Xenia, clinging still appre- 
 hensively to the side of the sledge. She was used to 
 hard driving, but she had never been driven quite so 
 hard as this before. The last ten minutes had been 
 
CUTTING FOR PARTNERS. 187 
 
 almost as nervous work to her as to the fox. Kazimir 
 felt remorseful, begged her pardon, hoped he had not 
 frightened her, for if that were the case, he could not 
 reasonably be expected to forgive himself, no, not if he 
 lived to be a hundred. He was ready to swear never 
 so much as to look at a fox again, with the same 
 fervour wherewith the fox had sworn never to look 
 at a partridge. 
 
 And so the poor disconcerted dogs were lugged up 
 into their places, and the party looked about, a little 
 crestfallen, considering what they should do next. 
 
 " I wonder where the others are ? " said Xenia. 
 
 " There is one of the sledges over there, after a fox 
 of their own ; we must not spoil their sport. Who is 
 it ? Lucyan, I declare ! " 
 
 " And Vizia ! " said Xenia, staring in the direction. 
 
 " Your cousin and my brother ! " said Kazimir, and 
 he smiled. " They seem to be very good friends, don't 
 they ? Lucyan was half inclined to shirk the sledging 
 this morning." 
 
 Kazimir fell into a momentary meditation ; and the 
 subjects of his meditation were Lucyan and Vizia. 
 Certainly there was no accounting for some tastes. 
 He had not seen his brother start, for his sledge had 
 been the first to leave the house. The start had been 
 a complicated business altogether, and somewhat 
 stormy too. There had been five sledges in all, drawn 
 
188 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 up before the door of Lodniki, and the first rule of the 
 sport was that each sledge should start independently 
 of the others, so as to give to the couple in each the 
 appearance of a harmless travelling party. But then 
 the difficulty of telling off these couples ! And how 
 Kazimir had trembled when he saw himself all but 
 allotted to an excellent young lady of forty summers, 
 with soot - coloured hair, and a dust - coloured com- 
 plexion. What between arguments and manoeuvres 
 and counter-manoeuvres, and an amiable young giant 
 who had tried very hard to carry off Xenia, and 
 the aforenamed dust-coloured lady who had tried 
 equally hard to carry off the young giant, and a 
 choleric old gentleman who insisted that the arrange- 
 ments were all new-fangled, and that the greyhounds 
 of the present day were not worthy to hold a candle 
 to the greyhounds of his day, and Pawel the sporting 
 servant's undisguised indignation at being kept out of 
 the fun, and Eogdanovics's hospitable efforts to please 
 everybody with the least trouble to himself, — what 
 with all this, it had taken fully an hour before the 
 party had got properly under way. " Rather cold 
 work," Lucyan had said aside to his brother ; " I 
 think I shall stay with the old people," and just at 
 that moment Kazimir had perceived that the amiable 
 young giant was making preparations to enter Xenia's 
 sledge. " I beg your pardon, that is my place," 
 
CUTTING FOR PARTNERS. 189 
 
 Kazimir had said, looking the amiable young giant 
 steadily in the eyes ; and the poor giant had shrunk to 
 half his size, withdrawn the leg which was already in 
 the sledge, and, with a helpless smile, resigned himself 
 to his dust-coloured nymph. 
 
 " Thank heavens ! " Kazimir had breathed, when 
 they were off. For weeks he had looked forward to 
 this moment ; was it likely that he should let himself 
 be frustrated, even by a giant ? This was one of the 
 rare occasions on which it is understood that Polish 
 chaperonage relaxes her sway ; and as Kazimir drove 
 away, he was struck by the same thought which had 
 struck Master Eeynard a little time ago — the thought 
 of the wedding-trip. It was a thought which set his 
 blood on fire, a thought which sent delicious thrills to 
 his heart. 
 
 Up to this winter Kazimir had known no higher 
 interest than that of his profession. To his profession 
 he clung w T ith an undivided attachment, which has 
 gone quite as much out of fashion as the type of his 
 features. His profession had, to a certain extent, 
 formed his character. Discipline had given him much 
 control over a temper naturally as high and intolerant 
 as his father's had been ; isolation from family ties 
 had made him singularly independent in thought and 
 decision. The interests of military life had been out- 
 lets to his naturally ardent temperament. As yet 
 
190 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 these interests had sufficed, and Kazimir had no idea 
 that they might one day fall short of sufficing. Not 
 that he had ever shunned society ; he had taken 
 pleasures as they came, and enjoyed them keenly at 
 the moment ; and society had received him with open 
 arms, and would gladly have made a pet of the hand- 
 some, vivacious young Pole, with his youthful old- 
 fashioned face, who moved and talked so easily, who 
 never looked bored and never affected to be blase, and 
 who carried about him a flavour of old-world chivalry, 
 quite distinct from the ordinary drawing-room varnish, 
 which is the only substitute to be had nowadays. But 
 in the midst of it all, Kazimir never looked upon 
 society as more than a temporary relaxation ; his pro- 
 fession was the business, and society the recreation, of 
 his life. Once or twice, as with his temperament and 
 at his age was inevitable, the recreation had threat- 
 ened to become serious. He had knelt at various 
 shrines, but slightly, on one knee only, as it were ; he 
 had been bound by chains, but nothing more than 
 rose-chaplets, easily cast off. His captivities had been 
 but short-lived ; the main interest had never failed to 
 assert its sv/ay over the interest of the moment. Thus 
 he had escaped unscathed, going on his way and re- 
 taining no impression, though possibly leaving some 
 behind ; passing unhurt through perils in which 
 colder men than he had fallen. Now, for the first 
 
CUTTING FOR PARTNERS. 191 
 
 time since he had reached the age of manhood, he 
 found himself cut off suddenly from his military 
 sphere, and plunged into the monotony of a secluded 
 country place. His thoughts, finding themselves vio- 
 lently taken off from their usual interests, sought 
 eagerly for some other stimulus. Had he met Xenia 
 in his Tyrolese garrison, he might have bent no more 
 than one knee to her, as to the others ; but meeting 
 her at this place and at this period, he had gone 
 down on both his knees at once, and unhesitatingly — 
 and doubted not that on his knees he should remain 
 to the end of time. 
 
 Now, as, having lost their fox, the little party drove 
 slowly towards the forest, the wild delicious thrill of 
 joy which touched Kazimir was by no means the first, 
 but it was by far the most wild and the most delicious 
 which had touched him during these last two months. 
 They were alone (for a Polish driver does not rank as 
 a man), alone in this vast frozen forest. Hopes of 
 solid ice were twisted round every branch ; heavy 
 icicles hung overhead ; every dead leaf on the dead 
 trees was coated with frost. It was a dull, sullen, 
 and bitterly cold day — one of many days just alike. 
 For weeks past no snow had fallen, no wind had 
 blown, no sun had shone. Every morning the win- 
 dow-panes had been fantastically frozen ; the trees 
 had stood rigid with ice, stiff with hardened snow. 
 
192 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 But Kazimir did not miss the sunshine. He saw only 
 that the wintry trees were of a bridal-like whiteness, 
 and that the frosty branches seemed to wreathe them- 
 selves naturally into dazzling diadems ; the weak 
 chirp of a half- frozen linnet hopping across their 
 path, seemed to him sweeter than the song of any 
 nightingale ; for no nightingale he had ever heard 
 had sung a song which he could understand : while 
 this poor lean bird was, quite distinctly and audi- 
 bly, celebrating the delight, the happiness, the sweet 
 intoxication of a fresh first love. It was not Kazi- 
 mir's way to notice small things ; but what that linnet 
 chirped coincided so exactly with his own opinion, 
 that he put his hand to his pocket in the hopes of 
 a crumb. 
 
 They had made no effort to regain the open plain ; 
 once in the forest, they continued their way through it 
 mechanically, feeling singularly cool about the foxes. 
 
 "Does this not remind you," asked Kazimir, sud- 
 denly, " of that ride over the Pyrenees of Palmerie 
 and Barbarin, about which you told me ? The wood 
 in which he fell on his knees before her, must have 
 been just like this one, I fancy." 
 
 " Pan Bielinski ! " the blue eyes looked at him in 
 undisguised reproach. " How could Palmerie ride with 
 Barbarin ? Don't you remember that he has made up 
 his mind to strangle her the very first time that they 
 
CUTTING FOR PARTNERS. 193 
 
 are alone together? And besides, he is her half- 
 brother, you know." 
 
 " Oh, I beg your pardon, to be sure ; of course it 
 would be no fun riding with her brother, particularly 
 if she is to be strangled. It was the other fellow I 
 meant. By the by, how did the last duel go off be- 
 tween Albert and — and — what's his name 1 Rudolph S " 
 
 " Adolph and Eaoul," corrected Xenia, carefully. 
 " It was not quite as bad as I feared ; Adolph only 
 lost one ear, and Raoul got two ribs broken, or I think 
 it was three. Vizia would know, if she was here," and 
 Xenia gave a look around, as if in hopes that her 
 cousin might possibly appear from out of the frozen 
 forest. " I think that in the next number of the 
 1 Journal des Demoiselles ' the secret will be explained, 
 for the last words are : ' Alors l'inconnu, avec un rire 
 demoniaque, arracha son masque, et a la vue de ce 
 visage, Palmerie tomba en arriere, evanouie.' There 
 are three stars before ' evanouie/ It was at a masked 
 ball, you know." 
 
 " Have you ever been to a masked ball ? " inquired 
 Kazimir, regardless of Palmerie's sufferings. 
 
 " Never ; there was one last year at Krakow, but — 
 but " 
 
 " You were not at it ? " 
 
 " No ; because my aunt said that the costume would 
 be too expensive." 
 
 VOL. I. N 
 
194 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 Kazimir wished he had not touched upon so deli- 
 cate a subject, but Xenia, though blushing, was not 
 precisely embarrassed. She went on with her naive 
 confidences. 
 
 " You see, my aunt will give me very little money to 
 spend. I had to wear the same ball-room dress twice 
 over ; and I could not have gone to the third ball at all, 
 if Vizia had not given me a dress." 
 
 " You are very fond of your cousin, are you not ? " 
 asked Kazimir, thirsting for every word from her lips, 
 not caring much what she said, as long as she spoke. 
 
 " Of Vizia ? Oh, I like her more than any one else 
 in the world; you don't know how good she is 
 to me." 
 
 " More than any one else in the world," repeated 
 Kazimir, aloud, and a pang of jealousy stabbed his 
 heart. " Yes, and your aunt at Krakow ? go on, please, 
 tell me more." 
 
 " I like her too j only she is cross sometimes, and 
 she lets me have so little to spend ; she says I shan't 
 need money till I marry, and then I shall have 
 plenty." 
 
 " A rich marriage," said Kazimir between his teeth, 
 " and I am a poor man. No matter, I shall win her." 
 His blood was mounting rapidly with every moment 
 that they sped thus along; the frosty air made him 
 drunk. What was that the linnet chirped just now? 
 
CUTTING FOR PARTNERS. 195 
 
 " Away, away, through the forest ! never turn back. 
 Carry her boldly off, and she is yours." He could 
 scarcely take his eyes off Xenia's face; off the rounded 
 chin, where childish dimples were for ever peeping, 
 the ruffled curls pressed by the soft fur cap. She 
 wore a velvet kazaba'ika, and though the dark-green 
 colour was somewhat faded, and the velvet no longer 
 new, the jacket, with its border of silver-grey fur, set 
 off her beauty to perfection. That touch of crimson 
 on her cheek, of blue in her eyes, of bright chestnut- 
 brown on her hair, made a contrast and a harmony of 
 tints which was fast bewitching his senses ; and then, 
 the open, timid, yet fearless gaze of those blue eyes ! 
 It was enough to make the brain of a stronger and 
 an older man reel. The irresistible charm of her 
 manner was not to be defined by any single word : it 
 w T as not affected, and yet not free from affectation ; 
 it was not pure nature, and yet it was not pure art ; if 
 there was vanity in it, it was the vanity of an inno- 
 cent child; and if there was coquetry there, it was 
 coquetry so unconscious and so young — coquetry 
 scarcely peeping from the bud, with the bloom still so 
 fresh upon it — that not for worlds would you have had 
 her without it. Even those little tricks of gesture, 
 that shrug and half-shy toying with a curl which was 
 her habit, were, in their way, not inoffensive only, but 
 enchanting. Her charm was not that of the wild 
 
196 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 brier, which flings its careless branches on the air ; it 
 was rather that of a well-trained garden rose, putting 
 out its buds in regular succession, where not a twig 
 is allowed to grow out of the straight way, and not a 
 tendril is suffered to escape. As there are different 
 tastes in the world, it is as well that there should be 
 both wild briers and garden roses growing there. 
 
 " And she would not let me dance often," went on 
 Xenia, continuing her complaints — " she won't let me 
 go to the public balls ; but, do you know, I think we 
 shall dance a little this evening. I have had no car- 
 nival at all." 
 
 " I hope you will dance with me," said Kazimir, 
 losing his head more and more. 
 
 " The Mazur ? " 
 
 " Yes, the Mazur and the quadrille, waltzes and 
 polkas, anything, everything." 
 
 Xenia drew back and gave him a glance, shrinking, 
 inquiring, and coy, and then quickly she turned her 
 face away. 
 
 " Perhaps I shall go to Krakow after all," she said, 
 nervously ; " my aunt wants me to come for the last 
 week of carnival." 
 
 " Don't go," said Kazimir, impulsively. 
 
 " To Krakow ? Why not ? " 
 
 " Because I could not bear it ! " began Kazimir, and 
 then checked himself with a violent effort of will. He 
 
CUTTING FOR PARTNERS. 197 
 
 was quite clear by this time, that this woman beside 
 him was the only woman he should care to have for 
 his wife, but he must not frighten her, perhaps spoil 
 his chance, by a rash confession. No ; these hungry 
 birds hopping along the bushes, with their tempting, 
 insinuating chirp, might mean it for the best, but, 
 alas! they were not acquainted with the usages of the 
 world. It might be all very well for a linnet to fly 
 off straight with the bird of his choice, and thus to 
 cheat all watchful relations, all ambitious old aunts ; 
 but it would scarcely do for human beings. 
 
 What would be safe to say next 1 Change the sub- 
 ject? But the subject was at that moment changed 
 in a quite unexpected manner. 
 
 The two greyhounds, crouching under the cover 
 neglected and forgotten, had up to this point lain 
 motionless ; but just as Kazimir was wondering what 
 next to say, there was a movement at their feet ; the 
 fur rug shivered violently, and one of the dogs jerked 
 his head up into sight. 
 
 "What is it, Kozak? — a fox?" asked Kazimir, 
 remembering with a start that they were supposed to 
 be out on a fox-hunt. 
 
 Kozak was sitting upright, his neck stretched, his 
 eye fixed ; and as Kazimir spoke, he began to whine 
 and tremble. 
 
 "Out at him, Kozak! where is he?" said Kazimir, 
 
198 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 with an encouraging pat ; and he drew the covering off 
 the second dog. But neither Kozak nor Wanda showed 
 any inclination to leap off the sledge : Kazimir gave 
 the signal and they did not offer to obey it, did not 
 even seem to see it, but sat pressed against each other, 
 shivering and whining. 
 
 " The dogs are gone mad," said Kazimir, and he rose 
 in the sledge to look on ahead. There was a frozen 
 stream crossing the road, about a dozen yards in front 
 of them ; a bridge of rough planks led over this stream ; 
 and right in the centre of the bridge, sitting immov- 
 able on its haunches, was a large and shaggy grey 
 beast. Kazimir's first impression was that this must 
 be a dog belonging to one of the other sledges ; but 
 then it was certainly not a greyhound : it had neither 
 the figure nor the colour of a greyhound ; its hair 
 was coarse and stiff; there was a suggestion of iron 
 strength in the curve of the haunches, and in the bend 
 of the rigid neck, as with lowered head and dull eyes 
 it stared full and stupidly at the approaching sledge. 
 
 " The strangest dog I have ever seen," said Kazimir, 
 still standing. " Do you see him, Pani Xenia ? " 
 
 " Yes, I see him — but it is not a dog ; it is a fox — I 
 think the same fox that looked at me through the 
 window ; I know him by his broad white chest." 
 
 "You must be right; Kozak, Wanda, out at him, 
 cowards ! why don't they move ? Touch up the 
 
CUTTING FOR PARTNERS. 199 
 
 horses — we shall be close to him in a minute ;" but 
 before he could finish his phrase, both horses, as they 
 reached the first plank of the bridge, swerved violently 
 to one side, reared half up, and refused to advance. 
 
 Kazimir, thrown forwards, just saved himself from 
 falling. The driver seemed all at once to have taken 
 leave of his senses. 
 
 " Wilk ! wilk I " he shouted, in tones of terror, lash- 
 ing the rearing horses frantically. "The wilk! we 
 must fly from the wilk I " 
 
 " A wolf ? " repeated Kazimir, incredulously. 
 "A wolf!" Xenia turned deadly pale, and clung 
 shuddering to his arm. " Oh, save me ! Let us get on ; 
 it will tear us to pieces ! " 
 
 " The beast shall not touch you," said Kazimir, ex- 
 citedly ; " see, I am between the wolf and you. Don't 
 be frightened, — don't cry, I implore of you ; one wolf 
 could not hurt us, if it tried." 
 
 They were close alongside of the brute by this time ; 
 but the wolf never stirred; there it sat still, in its 
 gorged and heavy attitude, stupidly staring with sunk 
 head and glaring yellow eyes. The terrified horses, 
 lashed on by the terrified coachman, plunged without 
 being able to retreat, and without daring to advance. 
 
 " Let me out ! let me out ! " cried Kazimir ; " let me 
 get at the wolf ! " but his left arm was prisoner, and he 
 could not move. 
 
200 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 " Shoot, Panie ! " screamed the driver. 
 
 "No, no, don't shoot — please don't shoot," sobbed 
 Xenia, with her face buried on his sleeve. 
 
 " I have nothing to shoot with, — but let me out ! " 
 
 " Don't, Pannie, don't ! " cried the man. 
 
 " No, no, stay near me ! don't get out — don't go near 
 the wolf ! " Xenia implored ; " you will be hurt — you 
 will be killed!" 
 
 " I shall not be killed ; you do not know how strong 
 I am," said Kazimir, between his reluctance to shake 
 off that clinging hold, and his desire to do something 
 which might turn him into a sort of hero before her 
 eyes. "I will kill him, I promise you, — strangle him, 
 — strike him dead somehow; let me have a stick, 
 anything. Ah ! the whip ! " He snatched the whip 
 with his one free hand, and leaning from the sledge 
 as far as he could, struck out with the butt-end, but 
 missed his aim — reversed the whip, and lashed out 
 with all his strength at the wolf. He hit him this 
 time, and the brute, slowly rising, with his neck still 
 lowered, stood for a moment where he had sat. Kozak 
 threw up his head and gave a dismal howl, which 
 struck cold to the very marrow of the bones. 
 
 At the second lash, the wolf moved off heavily, 
 slinking towards the brushwood, with his head turned 
 backwards, and his lips drawn up from his teeth in a 
 sullen and hideous snarl. 
 
CUTTING FOR PARTNERS. 201 
 
 The horses, bounding forwards, cleared the bridge, 
 and galloped wildly along the road. 
 
 "It is all over," said Kazimir, half regretfully. 
 " Pani Xenia, it is all over." 
 
 Her face was still hidden on his arm ; he could feel 
 how she was trembling with nervous excitement. She 
 looked up now and glanced fearfully around. "Are 
 you sure it is over? are you sure the wolf is gone? 
 Take me home — oh, take me home to Vizia! " she broke 
 out, bursting into hysterical sobs. Her face was so 
 pale that Kazimir thought she would faint. It was 
 his dangerous privilege to soothe her, to comfort her, 
 to support her with his arm, to promise that they 
 should be at home presently, and that till then she 
 must trust to him. There are some men who are 
 repelled by the extremes of feminine helplessness, and 
 there are some men who are attracted by it ; some 
 whom hysterical tears harden, and some whom they 
 soften. Kazimir was of the latter sort. The more a 
 woman seemed able to take care of herself, the less 
 sympathy he felt for her; and the more anxious a 
 woman was to lean upon him, the more ready he was 
 to be leant upon. He was the very stuff of which the 
 knights of the middle ages were made of; anything 
 weak, anything in want of protection appealed straight 
 to his honour, and to his heart. Widows and orphans 
 and ill-used people generally were the peculiar objects 
 
202 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 of his sympathy. Women who were neither widowed, 
 orphaned, nor ill-used, appeared to a certain disad- 
 vantage before his eyes. If Xenia had not been an 
 orphan, he might not have felt so mightily drawn 
 towards her. Of course, as the orphan in question 
 happened to be transcendently beautiful, it did not 
 detract from the effect upon him. 
 
 He was half trembling himself as he supported her, 
 and gave her every care which he could think of, — 
 chafing her hands with snow, which he snatched in 
 passing— imploring her to rely on him ; * for, look," he 
 said, " we are almost out of the forest now." 
 
 And soon she revived, and the colour flowed back 
 to her cheek, and she begged him not to think her 
 foolish (he only thought her adorable). She was com- 
 posed enough to blush at the thought of how she had 
 clung to him a minute ago, and yet still flurried 
 enough to leave her hand in his for support. 
 
 " And we shall be out of the forest soon," she 
 whispered. " Oh, how glad I am ! The forest will 
 always frighten me now ; I should like to get away 
 from it. I should like to go to Krakow; there are no 
 forests there, and no wolves." 
 
 " But if some one begged you not to go to Krakow," 
 answered Kazimir, in a whisper, too, " would you not 
 stay then ? " His pulses were throbbing so intolera- 
 bly hard, that he could scarcely hear his own voice. 
 
CUTTING FOR PARTNERS. 203 
 
 He had been able to check himself a little time ago ; 
 but that was before the wolf — before she had clung 
 to him and hid her face on his arm ; he was no 
 more able to check himself now. He would not 
 now have been deaf to the insinuating chirp of 
 the linnets, and to the delicious temptation they 
 suggested. 
 
 " If some one asked you to stay ? " he urged, not 
 hearing or not heeding the jingle of approaching 
 sledge-bells. 
 
 " If who asked me to stay ? " breathed Xenia, al- 
 most inaudibly. 
 
 " If I asked you — if I begged you as a favour — if I 
 told you that the thought of your going there made 
 me miserable." 
 
 " I don't want to make you miserable." 
 
 " Then make me happy ! " broke out Kazimir. 
 
 "Ha, Kazio ! is that you?" The call was close at 
 hand, the bells were jingling by his ear, and he had 
 not heard them. He started, and beheld, a few yards 
 from him, his brother Lucyan beside Vizia. There 
 was a quiet smile on Lucyan's face. " Have you been 
 looking for foxes in the forest, Kazio ? and did you 
 find any there ? " 
 
 " We have got a fox ! " shouted another voice from 
 another side ; and the amiable young giant appeared 
 abreast of the sledge. 
 
204 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 They had reached the place of rendezvous, and that 
 wild delightful drive was at an end. 
 
 As soon as they got home, Xenia threw herself into 
 her cousin's arms, and said — 
 
 " Pity me, Vizia, I have been so frightened ! I was 
 nearly torn to pieces by a wolf in the forest." 
 
205 
 
 CHAPTER XL 
 
 SHE LOST THE TRICK. 
 
 Why was I made for love, and love denied to me ? " 
 
 — Coleridge. 
 
 " I AM ready to wager," said Kogdanovics, when the 
 company was sitting round a gay and well-covered 
 board — " I am ready to wager that we shall not be 
 troubled with another fox this winter ; we have done 
 our duty by them, I fancy." 
 
 The young giant blushed because he had brought 
 two foxes home, and Kazimir blushed because he had 
 brought home none. And yet he would not for a 
 good deal have changed places with that gigantic and 
 amiable youth ; for it was an understood thing that 
 each gentleman sat beside the lady whom he had 
 accompanied in the sledge. 
 
 " Well, we saw a wolf at least, instead of killing a 
 fox," said Kazimir, laughing a little guiltily. 
 
 " If it ivas a wolf," observed Lucyan, coolly. 
 
 " Ask Pani Xenia if it was not." 
 
206 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 " Oh, if Pani Xenia says so ! " Lucyan inclined 
 his head with a sort of half- courteous, half-contemp- 
 tuous surrender, and with nothing more than the very 
 faintest flavour of a sneer mixed with the smile on his 
 face. 
 
 " A wolf ! and why should it not have been a 
 wolf?" broke out the choleric old gentleman at the 
 foot of the table. "You youngsters make more fuss 
 about one wolf than we used to make of a whole pack 
 of them in our days. Why, I remember the time 
 when you could not take a sledge-drive through this 
 very forest without being chased within an inch of 
 your life. Ah ! they were fine times those ! " 
 
 " For the wolves, no doubt," remarked Lucyan, drily. 
 
 " I have shot more wolves than any one else in the 
 room," proclaimed a gentleman with a tremendous 
 voice, rolling his eyes round the circle, in the hopes of 
 challenging a denial. 
 
 " A propos of wolves, they have sent me a new 
 song from my music-dealers," said a musical youth 
 bashfully. " ' The Wolf's Lament,' it is called," and he 
 glanced at the company inquiringly ; but the com- 
 pany, knowing well that when this musical youth once 
 sat down at the piano, there was little hope of remov- 
 ing him from it, displayed' a discouraging coolness 
 about ' The Wolf's Lament,' and the musician relapsed 
 into silence. 
 
SHE LOST THE TKICK. 207 
 
 " No good old times for me," broke in the host 
 cheerily; progress for me, — inventions, discoveries, 
 steam-ploughs, electricity, railways. Ah, wait a little ; 
 when the railway gets here — my railway, I call it — 
 see if it does not whistle off the foxes and wolves 
 in no time ! Ah yes, gentlemen, our ground will 
 then double, treble, quadruple itself; we shall reach 
 Lwow in half a day, — yes, half a day, I tell 
 you ! " 
 
 The choleric old gentleman gave a stormy sigh. 
 " In my time we used to take four days on the road 
 — unless we were robbed and had a free fight by the 
 way. Ah, that was interest, that was excitement ! 
 Life was worth living then ! " 
 
 " Has there been any more surveying of the coun- 
 try lately ? " asked the young giant, who being the 
 heir to a large property, had a serious interest in 
 the question. 
 
 "Don't know, Tiburtio — don't know, really," said 
 Eogdanovics ; " one never hears any news as long as 
 Aitzig Majulik is away buying up horses. The only 
 thing I have heard is that the church at Tarajow has 
 caught fire again, though they put it out ; seems 
 expressly constructed for the purpose ; burns down 
 every five years, I fancy." 
 
 " No man present has seen so many wooden churches 
 burnt down as I have," said the gentleman with the 
 
208 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 rolling eyes defiantly ; but this assertion again passed 
 unchallenged. 
 
 " News ! is any one in want of news ? " asked 
 another ; " there is plenty of news in the telegrams 
 to-day. The Government stocks are falling as hard as 
 they can ; depend upon it, in another month Italy 
 and Austria will be at each other's throats." 
 
 Kazimir, as an authority on the subject, was 
 stormed with questions. Yes, he said, it was true ; 
 the thunder-clouds were no sham thunder- clouds, but 
 real thunder-clouds, which meant to burst presently. 
 When last he had heard from his regiment, he had 
 been warned to prepare himself for an immediate call 
 at any moment. 
 
 " They cannot begin before spring. Let me see, — we 
 are barely at the middle of February now — they will 
 have to drag on till March at least ! " 
 
 " I am ready to wager — ha ! what is that ? a shot 
 outside ? " 
 
 The gentlemen put down their forks, the ladies 
 started; Xenia screamed, then hid her face in her 
 handkerchief. There was s -arcely the pause of a 
 second before Pawel re-enteied the room, looking a 
 little breathless, but betraying otherwise no agitation, 
 as, with perfect aplomb, he presented the dish next 
 in course. 
 
 " Was that a shot outside, Pawel ? " asked his master. 
 
SHE LOST THE TRICK. 209 
 
 " Yes, Panie." 
 
 " Who fired it ? " 
 
 « I did, Panie." 
 
 " I hope," said Eogdanovics F a little testily, " that 
 you have not again been cleaning your guns during 
 dinner ? " 
 
 "No, Panie; I cleaned them during breakfast. I 
 was shooting at something now/' 
 
 " What have you shot ? — a hare ? " 
 
 " A fox, I think," said Pawel, proudly; " but I have 
 not had time to look." 
 
 " A fox ? That's right ; go and see ! " 
 
 Pawel went and looked, and returned a minute 
 later quite out of breath and quite scarlet in the face. 
 " If you please, Panie, it is a wolf I have shot ! " 
 
 "A wolf?" The company were on their feet in 
 a moment. A wolf shot between the roast and the 
 pudding, or rather, I should say, between the pud- 
 ding and the roast, — that was enough motive to leave 
 the roast untouched on the table, and hurry out to 
 prove the truth of the statement. Even the ladies 
 rose under the influence of excited curiosity, and 
 streamed towards the door. Xenia alone did not rise. 
 When she heard that it was a wolf that was shot, 
 she hid her face again, and shuddered just as she 
 had shuddered in the sledge. 
 
 " A glass of water, perhaps," suggested Kazimir, in 
 vol. I. 
 
 ±j 
 
210 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 distress. " Mademoiselle Vizia" — for Vizia, at that 
 moment, was passing on her way to the door — " wonld 
 you be so infinitely kind as to push me that carafe ? I 
 think your cousin is a little — alarmed." 
 
 Vizia looked from Kazimir to Xenia ; a frown came 
 to her forehead, and an angry flush leapt to her cheek. 
 She pushed the carafe towards him — rather roughly, it 
 seemed to Kazimir. 
 
 " You are easily touched ? " she said, disdainfully. 
 " It is so very alarming, is it not ? especially as the 
 wolf is shot ! " 
 
 " Mademoiselle Vizia ! " exclaimed Kazimir, entirely 
 taken aback at this display of temper, and startled by 
 the angry quiver of her voice. 
 
 " What a blessing to have weak nerves ! How in- 
 teresting ! how charming ! Don't you see that it is 
 
 all " she broke off, and brushed past him; but 
 
 between her teeth he heard her mutter, " affectation ! " 
 
 Kazimir looked after her aghast. All that he 
 thought was, " What a pity that her temper is so 
 bad!" 
 
 The rest of the meal was of a tumultuous sort, — 
 to all intents and purposes, the company dined off the 
 wolf. Even after they had sat down again, the gentle- 
 men, from time to time, felt moved to rise and have 
 another look at the fallen monster. It was a large 
 and heavily gorged beast that had died by Pawel's 
 
SHE LOST THE TRICK. 211 
 
 gun. Stupidly prowling round the house, it had been 
 an easy mark; and one glance at the ugly carcass 
 convinced Kazimir that this was their acquaintance 
 of the bridge. " I knew I could not be kept out 
 of the sport," said Pawel a dozen times that evening, 
 with proudly beaming eyes. He was the hero of the 
 hour: his health was drunk (one young gentleman, 
 who was unused to a second glass of wine, drank the 
 wolf's health by mistake), his hand was shaken all 
 round ; his master presented him with a gold piece on 
 the spot. 
 
 The conservative old gentleman admitted that the 
 good old days were not quite past after all ; the gentle- 
 man with the rolling eyes repeated his statement, to 
 the effect that no one present had seen as many wolves 
 shot as he ; and Lucyan remarked, with a smile, " Then 
 Pani Xenia was right after all." 
 
 When the general excitement had somewhat calmed, 
 the tables were cleared, and a little unpremeditated 
 dancing began. It was the musical young gentleman 
 who indirectly proved the moving spirit. Bashfully 
 he had produced a large roll of music ; and having 
 lured an unfortunate man to the piano, he commenced, 
 amidst burning blushes, to make himself into a general 
 nuisance by wailing forth " The Wolfs Lament." When 
 " The Wolf's Lament " had died off into a long-drawn 
 dismal note, and from that into silence, the man at the 
 
212 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 piano, feeling probably the want of shaking off the 
 depressing effect, struck the chord of a Mazur, and 
 rattled his hands down the piano. It was as if he had 
 struck a match : the room caught fire in a moment ; 
 the gentlemen got to their feet, — heels clicked and 
 silk dresses rustled as they led their partners down 
 the room. 
 
 " You do not dance ? " asked Rogdanovics of Lucyan, 
 who stood in the doorway watching. 
 
 " Never ; that is to say, hardly ever." 
 
 " Your brother is a perfect Mazur dancer." 
 
 Lucyan bowed. 
 
 " The most graceful in the room," put in Eogdano 
 vics's hot-tempered friend ; " he has got the old stamp 
 about him. Graceful men are quite out of fashion now- 
 adays." 
 
 Lucyan bowed again. 
 
 " Ah, he takes after his father ; that was just Bogu- 
 nnTs manner and look," said the host. " How is your 
 mother, by the by, Bielinski ? " 
 
 "Thank you," said Lucyan, "much better lately, 
 but since yesterday hardly so well." 
 
 " Tut, tut, that's all as it should be ; never say die. 
 It's always a good sign when a patient does not mend 
 too fast." 
 
 "She certainly is not mending too fast," replied 
 Lucyan. 
 
SHE LOST THE TRICK. 213 
 
 " That's right. There, the Mazur is at an end ; we 
 must have a KrakowiaJc now." 
 
 The Krakowiak was a much more noisy affair than 
 the Mazur. This is a dance which leaves much scope 
 for the genius and invention of the dancer. Each 
 gentleman in turn selects a lady, leads her down the 
 room to the sound of the music, and having reached 
 the end, distinguishes himself either by executing some 
 extraordinary pas, or singing some improvised verse, 
 drinking the lady's health, presenting her with a 
 flower, or otherwise paying her some ingenuous com- 
 pliment ; the principal point of the performance 
 lying in variety, and the great ambition of every 
 dancer being to outshine the last. Each couple for 
 the time being is virtually on a stage, with the eyes 
 of the audience upon them. 
 
 Every one danced, young and old. The choleric 
 gentleman selected the dust-coloured maiden, perhaps 
 as a relic of the olden times, and sidling nimbly down 
 the room, with an alternate chasse and click of his 
 heels, emphasised his devotion by drinking her health 
 in three glasses of atrociously sweet wine. 
 
 Next came Rogdanovics, exciting much wonder by 
 the vigour of his stamps and the length of his strides. 
 
 Upon him followed close the musical young man, 
 who, having reached the terminus, sang, in an agony 
 of shyness, a verse to the effect that night and morn- 
 
214 BEGGA.R MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 ing, he would wish to stand under his lady's window 
 and pour out his heart in song, — a prospect which 
 made every one present shudder apprehensively. 
 
 The young giant's turn came then. Entering into 
 the spirit of increasing wildness, he performed some 
 astounding feats ; but it was neither to poetry nor to 
 wine that he had recourse. His strength lay in muscle ; 
 and at sight of the extraordinary activity with which, 
 at every fourth bar of the music, he dropped on one 
 knee before Xenia and shot up again, a murmur of 
 applause ran round the room. 
 
 The man with the rolling eyes, who prided himself 
 on having seen more Krakowiaks danced than any one 
 present, and stimulated by the applauding murmur, 
 made a desperate attempt at originality by flying 
 along with the lady's hand held high above his head 
 at an angle almost as picturesque as it was uncom- 
 fortable. 
 
 Kazimir's turn had arrived. With a flush on his 
 face he stepped up to the still breathless Xenia, who 
 stood beside the big Tiburtio. It was impossible to 
 beat the giant on his own ground, and Kazimir did 
 not attempt it ; struck by a happy thought, he knelt 
 on one knee and laid his drawn sword at Xenia's 
 feet. 
 
 " Bravo ! bravo ! " shouted the much excited spec- 
 tators, while Xenia turned aside blushing. 
 
SHE LOST THE TRICK. 215 
 
 There was but one more pair now. Kazimir looked 
 up, and to his surprise beheld his brother Lucyan 
 with Vizia. It startled him almost as much as if one 
 of the pictures on the wall had come down to join the 
 revels. There was no reason why a young man of 
 twenty-four should not dance a Krakowiak ; but some- 
 how Kazimir never did think of his brother as a 
 young man of twenty-four. After the wildness of 
 some of the last dancers, Lucyan's dancing produced 
 a sort of chill and sober reaction. He was as pale 
 and as cool as ever as he went down the room with a 
 noiseless gliding step, and reaching the end, he bowed 
 low and ceremoniously, and drawing a magnificent red 
 rose from his button-hole, presented it to Vizia. 
 
 "Who would have thought it?" said Kazimir to 
 himself; "who would have thought that Lucyan could 
 be so easily smitten ? " but " smitten " did not seem 
 to be exactly the word. His brother puzzled him ; 
 Lucyan's manner towards women was altogether 
 baffling. He had not the manner of a so-called 
 " ladies' man," nor did he appear to be at the slight- 
 est trouble to please. He was cool and watchful, 
 listening more than he talked, never contradicting 
 the most foolish speech, seemingly because he did not 
 think it worth while; and with a sneer ever mixed 
 with his smile. Even when with the customary 
 " Padam do noy" he professed to fall at a lady's feet, 
 
216 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 there never was absent a lurking twitch in the corners 
 of his mouth, or a passing gleam of his eye, which 
 made of the words almost an insult, instead of the 
 high and courteous compliment which these same 
 words sounded in Kazimir's lips. 
 
 And yet, reflected Kazimir, though this was not his 
 own manner of being in love, it apparently was Lu- 
 cyan's. Why else should he have been in such con- 
 stant attendance upon Vizia, and have paid her the 
 most marked attentions all day long ? and Lucyan, 
 who prided himself on being a connoisseur of female 
 beauty ! No, he gave up the problem ; there was no 
 accounting for tastes : and feeling perplexed, and 
 moreover heated with the Krakowiak, Kazimir left 
 the room, and strolled out through the passage, to 
 the dark verandah outside. Vizia was a nice girl in 
 her way ; but then, near her cousin ! Besides, her 
 temper was undoubtedly bad. How sharply did her 
 harsh words contrast with Xenia's acknowledgment 
 of cousinly affection, which he had heard in the 
 morning ! 
 
 Ah ! what a day it had been ! There was but one 
 dark spot on the sky, but that spot was large, gigan- 
 tically large ; it was the young giant Tiburtio, in fact. 
 For Tiburtio was a rich man, and he had all evening 
 perseveringly, if awkwardly, been contending against 
 Kazimir for Xenia's smiles. And Xenia had smiled 
 
SHE LOST THE TRICK. 217 
 
 on him ; but then, to be sure, she had smiled just as 
 much on every old lady-guest in the room. Xenia 
 had one manner for all the world ; and that, no doubt, 
 was one of the secrets of her charm. She was far too 
 young to have acquired that double-beauty manner 
 which is cold to one sex and warm to the other. 
 Vizia's manner, which was cold to both sexes, made a 
 startling foil to her cousin's. There was more sweet- 
 ness in Xenia's frown than there was even in Vizia's 
 smile. Watching the two, a more cynical man than 
 Kazimir might have been tempted to say : " If this is 
 artificial, then art is charming ; if that is nature, then 
 nature is repelling." But this was not Kazimir's 
 thought; he was busy weighing his own hopes of 
 success, and he almost thought that his chances were 
 good : " A rich marriage, and I am a poor man," he 
 repeated ; " never mind, I shall win her." 
 
 Eeflecting thus, Kazimir stood leaning against a 
 pillar, with his head thrown back upon it, his arms 
 folded across his breast, while with an eager thirst 
 he drank in the bitter winter air. In front of him 
 stretched the white country, of a more ghostly white 
 under the moonlight. To the right and to the left 
 of him stood the deep forest ; and the moon, less chary 
 of its beams than the sun had been, touched the heavy 
 ice-ropes till they seemed to grow alive with glittering 
 light, and hung a diamond on every icicle. There was 
 
218 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 a little breeze to-night, and the murmur in the tree- 
 tops seemed to Kazimir like the echo of long dead 
 nightiugales, come out of their graves expressly to 
 sing for him. Far, far off in the great forest, there 
 was the solitary howl of a hungry wolf. Everything 
 was silent beside. 
 
 Kazimir wondered why he should never before have 
 discovered the magic of moonlight silence, nor the 
 poetry of moonlit solitude. Moonlight, roses, nightin- 
 gales, he had never heeded them before, but he began 
 to lose himself in dreams of them to-night. Nightin- 
 gales, however, were scarcely enough to suggest the 
 exquisite inflections of that voice which had first be- 
 witched him. Was there a parallel on earth, a single 
 metaphor, worthy of her voice ? Kazimir did not think 
 so. Having passed in review such things as splashing 
 fountains, crystal bells, mountain breezes, and silver 
 flutes, he rejected them all as unworthy. It was quite 
 surprising what an unexpected store of poetical images 
 he possessed. They had lain dormant in his mind for 
 years, but now the hour had come and the woman, 
 and they all awoke from their sleep. He was just 
 weighing the merit of angel harps, as the least un- 
 worthy comparison, when a rustle of silk and a light 
 step aroused him. He looked round with a start of 
 hope, and saw a woman advancing. Was it possible 
 that she was coming? He peered through the dark 
 
SHE LOST THE TRICK. 219 
 
 anxiously, — yes, surely — no ; she came a step nearer, 
 and he recognised the plain cousin. 
 
 " Mademoiselle Vizia ! " he exclaimed, perhaps 
 rather blankly, " is it wise of you to come out here ? 
 It is freezing hard ; look at the icicles ! " 
 
 Vizia did not look at the icicles, she gazed at 
 Kazimir steadily, and stopped only when she was 
 close to him. Her face was set and somewhat pale, 
 he thought. 
 
 " Do you wish to say anything to me ? " he asked, 
 struck by her look. 
 
 " Yes ; I want to say something to you," answered 
 Vizia, in a low, quick voice. " Pan Bielinski, do you 
 remember my words a little time ago, when the wolf 
 was shot ? " 
 
 " Yes," said Kazimir, gravely, " I remember them." 
 
 " I spoke ill of my cousin ; I said she was foolish 
 and absurd ; I said it was affectation. Do you re- 
 member ? " 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 " I have come to retract every word I said. Xenia 
 is not foolish, not affected. I have come" — she 
 paused for a second, and flushed scarlet — " I have come 
 to beg your pardon." 
 
 " My pardon ! " cried Kazimir, disarmed in a mo- 
 ment. " You have done nothing which needs pardon ; 
 you were excited, and frightened, perhaps " 
 
220 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 " I was not frightened — not in the least frightened ; 
 it was only my bad temper. Never believe me when 
 I speak like that — never let your faith be shaken in 
 her." The extraordinary energy of her words drove 
 the blood np to her very hair-roots. Kazimir saw it, 
 and he saw also the working of her mouth, and stood 
 silent, staggered by her vehemence. 
 
 " Xenia is better, a hundred times better than I am ; 
 an angel — do you understand ? " she said with eager- 
 ness, almost with violence. " Do you believe me ? " 
 
 " I do believe you," replied Kazimir, fervently. He 
 did not think it wise to say that he had not believed 
 her before, and that his faith had not been shaken, 
 and could never be shaken, merely by angry words. 
 If he felt any relief now, it was on Vizia's account, 
 not on Xenia's ; it was a good thing, at least, that 
 she possessed the courage to undo the effects of her 
 brusquerie. He held out his hand with a frank smile. 
 " And now surely we are reconciled ; why is it that 
 we are always quarrelling? We quarrelled the very 
 first day we met, — about spades, and sickles, was it 
 not? Do you remember?" 
 
 She had put out her hand also ; but when he said, 
 " Do you remember ? " she drew it back suddenly, 
 before he had touched her fingers, and turning ab- 
 ruptly away, she vanished into the house. 
 
 In the doorway she almost ran against Lucyan, but 
 
SHE LOST THE TRICK. 221 
 
 passed him without a word. Lucyan started, looked 
 after her, then strolled towards his brother. 
 
 " Playing Don Juan ! eh, Kazimir ? You look it to 
 the life, I must say. The moonlight is the very thing 
 for your uniform, — stage decoration." He was smil- 
 ing as he spoke, but the smile was a little anxious, 
 and the look was a little scrutinising. " Moonlight 
 and a fair lady — not quite as fair as the other one, 
 though." 
 
 " Nonsense, Lucyan ! " said Kazimir, impatiently — 
 and he too entered the house. 
 
 Lucyan followed his brother with his eyes. The 
 anxious smile was still on his face, but it was 
 fading already. He shook his head and shrugged his 
 shoulders. 
 
 " No danger, I think ; just the sort of man who will 
 not look further than a pretty face. Confoundedly 
 pretty that cousin is, too ; but then — seventy thousand 
 florins ! Pity it is not the other way." 
 
 It was soon after this that the company broke up ; 
 and presently, the last guest gone, Vizia and Xenia 
 were alone in their bedroom. 
 
 " Was it not a charming day 1 " exclaimed Xenia, all 
 in a glow of delight, sitting up on the bed with her 
 head propped on her pillow. 
 
 "Very," said Vizia. She was plaiting up her hair 
 at the other end of the room. 
 
222 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 " And it was better, after all, that there should have 
 been no sunshine ; don't you think so ? It would only 
 have got into one's eyes. The drive was much pleas- 
 anter without it. Don't you think so, Vizia ? " asked 
 Xenia, unconsciously playing the part of the fox in the 
 fable. Any bunch of grapes, even the tiniest bunch, 
 that hung too high for Xenia's arm, always and at once 
 became sour in Xenia's eyes. She could not bear to 
 admit that she should have missed a drop of happi- 
 ness, or even a drop of pleasure, by failing to grasp 
 that bunch ; rather she went through life making 
 these little compromises with fate, and gaining through 
 them much ease of mind, as well as retaining much 
 sweetness of temper. 
 
 But this was not Vizia's manner of viewing the 
 grapes. The fox in the fable had always struck her 
 as filling the most pitiably absurd position in the 
 world. She preferred to proclaim boldly that the 
 grapes were ripe, and that they were sweet, and to 
 confess defiantly that she could not reach them, much 
 as she regretted the fact. Xenia having asked, " Don't 
 you think it was better without the sunshine ? " she 
 answered promptly, " No, I don't think it was better 
 without the sunshine; it would have been much 
 pleasanter with it." 
 
 Xenia submitted at once, sank back on her pillow, 
 and changed the subject. 
 
SHE LOST THE TRICK. 223 
 
 " I wonder whether you enjoyed your drive as much 
 as I did mine ! " she began, somewhat shyly. " I en- 
 joyed mine so much, all except the wolf; and — and 
 — do you know, Vizia, he, Kazimir Bielinski, was so 
 kind when I was frightened, he did not laugh at me 
 at all ; he held my hand to soothe me. Is his brother 
 like that also ? " 
 
 " He did not hold my hand," said Vizia, pushing 
 aside the red rose that she had tossed on the table. 
 
 " No," laughed Xenia ; " but you did not see a wolf. 
 And, Vizia, he seems very anxious I should not go to 
 Krakow ; and, do you know, this evening, in saying 
 good-bye, he managed to whisper, ' Shall you go to 
 Krakow, or shall you stay here ? ' And I answered, 
 I think I shall stay here ! ' " 
 
 Xenia paused ; but her cousin, standing with her 
 back turned, made no comment. 
 
 " It was not saying too much, was it ? " asked 
 Xenia, humbly. 
 
 " I don't know," was the short and weary answer. 
 
 "And, of course, I shall not go to Krakow now." 
 Xenia gave a very soft sigh. " I wonder whether the 
 Wieliczka ball will be good ! " 
 
 Vizia offered no opinion. 
 
 " Are you tired, Vizia ? " her cousin ventured. 
 
 " Rather." 
 
 " Poor Vizia ! But we have had such a charming 
 
224 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 day. Tell me, did — did — you get on well with Lucyan 
 Bieliuski?" 
 
 " Pretty well." 
 
 " Oh, Vizia ! " Xenia gave an innocently mischiev- 
 ous laugh. " Why do you pretend not to understand 
 me ? Everybody noticed it. Come near me, close to 
 me ; you have not kissed me yet," said Xenia, turn- 
 ing her head on the pillow, and stretching one beauti- 
 ful arm towards her cousin. " Every one noticed it, 
 Vizia ; and Kazimir Bielinski noticed it too." 
 
 " How do you know ? " asked Vizia, slowly. 
 
 " Oh, because he said it. I think he was pleased 
 with it. Do come nearer me, Vizia ! " 
 
 Vizia came across the room and knelt beside the 
 bed. 
 
 " Just fancy," whispered Xenia, putting her arm 
 round her cousin's neck — "just fancy how charming 
 it would be — two brothers, and we are like sisters, 
 
 you know — if we were to " she broke off in alarm, 
 
 crimsoning at the boldness of her own thought ; but 
 Vizia understood. 
 
 " That shall never be, Xenia ; my part of it shall 
 never be. Nothing can force me to marry Lucyan 
 Bielinski ! " 
 
 " But how do you know ? How can you tell yet ? 
 Are you not afraid of saying that ? " 
 
 " Afraid ! What do you mean ? " 
 
SHE LOST THE TRICK. 225 
 
 " I don't know what I mean," said Xenia, beginning 
 to yawn ; " but I should be afraid to say that. I am 
 rather afraid of Lucy an Bielinski, I think. He only 
 spoke to me once this evening. I had got my fan 
 entangled in my fringes, and he got it out for me. It 
 was very troublesome ; I wanted to tear it out, but he 
 would not let me. He went on unwinding it quite 
 quietly, and said, with such a queer smile, * I never 
 give up a thing that I have once taken into my head 
 to do!'" 
 
 " And he got out the fan ? " 
 
 " Of course he did. He is really agreeable, you 
 know," added Xenia, afraid of having hurt her cousin's 
 feelings. " You and he ought to suit so well ; you 
 are both grave. I am sure you like him." 
 
 " I hate him," said Vizia, calmly. 
 
 " Oh, Vizia, you are joking ! He is very different 
 from his brother, of course. How sleepy I am 
 getting ! " 
 
 Vizia seized her cousin's hand, with a sudden look 
 of eagerness. " Tell me this, Xenia — only this one 
 
 thing ; do you " she was gazing deep into Xenia's 
 
 eyes, but those eyes were closing slowly. 
 
 " Do I what ? " she murmured, in sleepy accents. 
 
 " Never mind ; go to sleep, my darling." The 
 fringe of lashes touched the cheek already. Vizia 
 remained on her knees gazing at her cousin in spell- 
 
 VOL. I. P 
 
226 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 bound admiration. " No wonder ! " she thought as 
 she gazed — "no wonder!" One long plait of chest- 
 nut hair fell over the coverlet, the lips were softly 
 parted, the beautiful brow was unruffled. She bent 
 over the hand she still held and pressed one kiss upon 
 the round white arm. It was so fiery, that kiss, that 
 the blue eyes opened once more. Drowsily, like a 
 child half awakened, Xenia stretched out her hand 
 towards her cousin's face, moved over it caressingly ; 
 then the hand sank down, and the blue eyes shut 
 again. With the smile of a happy child on her face, 
 Xenia was asleep. 
 
 Vizia, rising, crossed the room with her bare feet, 
 and stood for a moment beside her bed ; then all at 
 once she turned and threw herself upon it, hiding her 
 face deep in the pillow. So still she lay thus, and so 
 motionless, that had it not been for the tightening 
 grasp with which her fingers clutched to the coverlet, 
 she might have been thought asleep. Presently her 
 frame began to work ; she trembled, and her breast 
 heaved ; with her face thus buried in the pillow, Vizia 
 was sobbing convulsively. She drew the covers up, 
 hoping to choke the sound of her sobs ; she swallowed 
 the bitter drops, and buried her face deeper, biting 
 her pillow between her teeth in the frantic effort of 
 self-control. But this energy of grief was not to be 
 controlled. She gasped and panted in the convulsion 
 
SHE LOST THE TRICK. 227 
 
 of weeping, starting at the fiery heat of her own tears ; 
 for she was weeping with all the strength of a strong- 
 heart shaken to the very core. And through it all 
 Xenia slept on, in the sweet slumber of a happy 
 child tired out with a long day of pleasure. 
 
 Yes, — she loved him ; boundlessly, passionately, and 
 hopelessly. She loved him, and she had loved no 
 other man before ; she loved him, — and he loved her 
 cousin. With fierce pride she had battled against this 
 love for months, and with this same fierce pride she 
 confessed that she had battled in vain. As she had 
 been too proud to surrender then, so was she too proud 
 to deceive herself now. She hated everything that even 
 distantly flavoured of mockery or sham, she abhorred 
 any evasion from the stern bitterness of truth. 
 
 And her pride was not only stern but morbid ; and 
 in this morbid pride lay the key of her nature. She 
 had never forgiven fate for having made her plain, but 
 neither had she ever attempted to persuade herself 
 that she was otherwise than plain. No plain woman 
 had ever so vehemently and so bitterly hungered after 
 beauty than did this plain woman. Of course there 
 are plain women who shine in society by their man- 
 ners, by their conversation, by their intellectual charms. 
 If Vizia had so willed, she might have shone in that 
 way ; but here it was her morbid pride which inter- 
 fered. For fear of appearing to strive for a thing 
 
228 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 which had been denied her, she rigorously abstained 
 from making herself agreeable ; for fear of appearing 
 to wrestle against fairer women for the attraction of 
 men, she flew to the other extreme and became 
 austere — became, in fact, far more unamiable than 
 nature had ever intended her to be. 
 
 For one short week, barely one week, she had 
 thought that what she had never dared to hope for 
 was going to be given her after all ; but that dream 
 had been short. As now, recovering from her burst 
 of grief, she lay on her pillow exhausted, reviewing 
 her situation, she knew also that it had been sweet. 
 To turn her back upon an enemy was to her an im- 
 possibility. Stripping off every particle of hope that 
 might obscure her sight, she looked her fate in the 
 face ; and though her lips were quivering, her teeth 
 were set. 
 
 It was strange that she should have held out so 
 long, to break down so suddenly ; and yet it was not 
 strange either. That moment in the moonlight, stand- 
 ing alone beside Kazimir, had been too dangerously 
 sweet. Had she not overtaxed her strength when she 
 stepped on to the moonlit verandah where he was stand- 
 ing alone ? Even had she never seen him before, that 
 tall and graceful figure, leaning with folded arms against 
 the pillar, might have taken her fancy by storm ; — 
 having loved him for months, her courage had tottered 
 
SHE LOST THE TRICK. 229 
 
 and failed. Thinking of the hopes she had been mad 
 enough to foster, during that first short week of their 
 acquaintance — of the charm, the gaiety, and the earn- 
 estness of their first talk; thinking, above all, of 
 that moment when, half laughing and half moved, 
 his lips had touched her hand, — she had felt now a 
 stab of pain, as though a dagger, striking her heart, 
 had wounded it. 
 
 "Do you remember?" he had said to her a little 
 while ago. Did she remember ? God ! would she 
 ever forget ? 
 
230 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 CARTES OUVERTES. 
 
 "And how like you this shepherd's life, Master Touchstone?" 
 
 — As You Like It. 
 
 " Nicht so redlich, ware redlicher."— Lessing. 
 
 The N curojjoeticon had not done its duty. Madame 
 Bielinska had not become twenty years younger, she 
 had not been restored to muscle and cheerfulness, nor 
 had she grown " astonishingly nimble " — all of which 
 transformations had been pompously predicted in a 
 flowery advertisement. The relapse which took place 
 about this time proved to be a serious one. Day by 
 day the patient was sinking, slowly but surely : the 
 doctor could name no probable term of duration, but 
 neither could he hold out any hope. 
 
 Strangely enough, the weaker Madame Bielinska 
 grew, the more feverishly anxious did she become on 
 the subject of money matters and business. She made 
 more than one attempt to renew that discussion with 
 Kazimir which had been so abruptly broken off. It 
 
" CARTES OUVERTES." 231 
 
 was almost as though she had some thought weighing 
 on her mind, and that she was anxious, and at the same 
 time a little reluctant, to impart this thought to her 
 eldest son. At any rate she had never succeeded 
 in the attempt. Either Lucyan happened to be in 
 the room, or aunt Eobertine arrived to enforce her 
 authority, and to draw a veil over the sick-chamber. 
 The veil was always drawn with a more savage zest 
 when it was Kazimir who was in the question ; for 
 Kazimir's nature and manner, and voice even, were of 
 the very sort which grated most upon his aunt's feel- 
 ings. His repelling openness of character, and tactless 
 frankness of speech, were continually jarring upon her 
 sight and hearing. Only yesterday he had offended 
 her finer sensibilities by mentioning aloud at table 
 the fact of his mother having dined off the wing of a 
 chicken. If repeated, to what endless misconstruc- 
 tions might it not give rise as to the state of Madame 
 Bielinska's health ! how might it not misrepresent 
 their income and their manner of living ! Made- 
 moiselle Eobertine had never read Pickwick, and 
 therefore could not know to what a dangerous use 
 even chops and tomato-sauce may be put in a court 
 of justice. Her caution was entirely intuitive. And 
 this proclamation of the chicken's wing was by no 
 means his blackest offence. It was more unpardon- 
 able still, when, on knocking a china vase off the table, 
 
232 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 he had laid bare one of her pet mysteries to the light 
 of day. " I am sorry it is broken," Kazimir had said, 
 picking up the fragments ; " but, dear me ! how does 
 this big key come to be there ? " There was a servant 
 in the room at the moment, and Eobertine, with a dark 
 frown, seized the key, and plunged it deep into the 
 abyss of her capacious pocket, crushing down several 
 pocket-handkerchiefs on the top of it. The key of a 
 secret treasure ? of a mysterious cabinet ? perhaps a 
 bloody Bluebeard's key? Not a bit of it. It was 
 only the key of the press where the jam-preserves 
 were kept ; but it was Eobertine's rooted habit to hide 
 every key, however harmless, in mysterious places — 
 and, for greater safety, to vary the hiding-places fre- 
 quently. So mysterious were these places, and so 
 frequently were they varied, that Eobertine herself 
 generally lost the clue, and mourned for the vanished 
 keys in secret. If she had disliked Kazimir before 
 the adventure of the broken vase, she positively hated 
 him from that moment, and with all the more vigour 
 did she strive to exclude him from the sick-room. 
 Kazimir himself, seeing his mother's great weakness 
 and increasing irritability, made no endeavour to 
 obtain solitary interviews ; he could not avoid agree- 
 ing with Lucyan, who declared that every business 
 conversation must now be harmful. He was therefore 
 all the more surprised, when, entering the sick-room 
 
" CAETES OUVEETES." 233 
 
 one afternoon, he found his youngest brother engaged 
 in just such a business conversation. 
 
 " Enough of that, mother," Lucyan was saying, as 
 Kazimir, not exactly noisily, but audibly, entered the 
 sick-room. " You are tiring yourself." 
 
 " I am not," said the invalid, with some fretfulness. 
 "•As I was saying, 34,000 to 35,000 florins is what I 
 can leave you, what you can expect : I want you and 
 both your brothers to understand that clearly. If 
 Kazimir cannot be persuaded to leave the army, then 
 you will have to take the management, for Marcin is 
 useless." A violent fit of coughing interrupted her 
 here, and Eobertine seized the opportunity to clear 
 the room of all intruders. 
 
 This was the first moment that Kazimir had ever 
 felt his curiosity aroused with regard to business. 
 Why was Lucyan allowed to talk business if he was 
 not? He taxed his brother point-blank with the 
 question. Lucyan was surprised at the attack, but 
 had recourse to his ivory comb, and having passed it 
 several times through his hair, he answered coolly : 
 " My dear Kazio, if you had had your ears open you 
 would have heard, as you entered, that, instead of en- 
 couraging the subject, I was begging her to drop it." 
 That was true, reflected Kazimir ; Lucyan certainly 
 had been discouraging the subject just as he appeared 
 on the scene. But his curiosity was not yet pacified. 
 
234 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 He began reproaching his brother with treating him 
 like a child, and with keeping him in the dark. Luc- 
 yan's answers were both sensible and good-natnred ; 
 and Kazimir having, in his new-born curiosity, put 
 the question, " Why, for instance, do you keep those 
 account-books from me, as if they were state secrets ? " 
 began to feel a little ashamed of his fit of ill-humour. 
 
 There were grounds for his ill-humour, however. It 
 was now more than a fortnight since the fox-hunt, and 
 he had not seen Xenia again. In his mother's critical 
 condition he could not well leave the house for six 
 hours at a time, even had the state of the thawing 
 roads permitted it. One day, when she appeared to 
 have rallied, he had made the attempt; for he felt 
 that, after what had passed between Xenia and him, it 
 was necessary to come to a clear understanding ; but 
 his attempt had failed miserably. Stuck fast in the 
 melting snow, with one of Aitzig Majulik's "grand" 
 horses turned dead lame, he had been thankful to reach 
 home again on any terms ; and here, unable to move 
 from the house, yet excluded from the sick-room, he 
 led a useless and helpless existence. 
 
 His fit of bad humour was therefore excusable — at 
 any rate Lucyan excused it. Instead of resenting the 
 unvarnished question, he gave a courteous and strik- 
 ingly frank answer. Before giving this answer, Luc- 
 yan paused for a moment, drawing the comb slowly 
 
" CARTES OUVERTES. 235 
 
 through his hair, and throwing an eagle eye over all 
 the bearings of the situation, like a practised general 
 who reviews his forces, and weighs the pros and cons 
 of covert or open tactics. That mental glance was 
 clear, shrewd, and quick; and the decision, being 
 fixed, was boldly acted upon. 
 
 " Why are these account-books kept from you, as if 
 they were state secrets ? " he repeated. " Well, Kazio, 
 I am delighted to hear you talk in this tone. I did 
 not keep them from you because they are state secrets, 
 but because I thought they would be bores. If you are 
 curious on the subject, or — anxious, why, then, you 
 shall not only see the account-books, but the whole 
 estate, inch by inch, if you like." Apparently Lucyan 
 had decided for the open tactics. 
 
 " Would not the account-books be less trouble ? " 
 suggested Kazimir, a little staggered at being taken so 
 literally by his word. 
 
 " Of course you shall see them ; but practice first, 
 theory afterwards : besides, Kazio, if you are to be a 
 farmer some day, you must not talk of trouble now." 
 
 " Yes, but " began the disconcerted Kazimir. 
 
 " No buts, mon cher Kazio ; nothing like acting on 
 an impulse," said Lucyan, who never in his life had 
 acted upon any impulse whatever. " I had better 
 take you over the ground immediately." 
 
 " Do you mean to-morrow ?" asked Kazimir, ruefully. 
 
236 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 " I mean to-day, now, at once. To be sure it is a 
 little muddy, and we shall have to drive about in a 
 paasant-cart; but a farmer must sacrifice a few pairs 
 of boots as price of his apprenticeship." 
 
 " Now, — at once ! " repeated Kazimir, aghast. 
 
 " Of course," said Lucyan, in his smooth, slow, al- 
 most languid way ; for he never spoke fast upon any 
 occasion. " Why, Kazio ! what has become of your 
 zeal 1 ? I was beginning to hope that there was the 
 staff of a farmer in you, after all." 
 
 Kazimir, out of pure shame, had to submit. Met 
 by this startling frankness, his curiosity suddenly grew 
 cool. The more ready Lucyan showed himself to 
 initiate him into all the secrets of the estate, the less 
 anxious did he become' for the initiation. But there 
 was no escape now. He found himself hurried into 
 an uncomfortable peasant-cart, where, seated upon 
 straw, they began to splash through the mud. The 
 day was not only damp and raw, but drizzly at inter- 
 vals ; and from every branch and roof half-melted 
 snow was dropping. Kazimir secretly wondered at 
 his brother's equanimity under the trying circum- 
 stances. Lucyan, who was generally as afraid of get- 
 ting his feet wet as any woman, now calmly suffered 
 the splashing and the drizzle, — keeping not only his 
 good-humour, but talking in an almost cheerful strain. 
 "When Kazimir faintly suggested umbrellas, as a slight 
 
" CARTES OUVEETES." 237 
 
 alleviation of their sufferings, Lucyan suppressed the 
 idea at once, for umbrellas would only embarrass their 
 sight, and he wanted his brother to have a good 
 general view of the grounds. 
 
 This certainly beat any military hardships hollow, 
 thought Kazimir, after two hours' endurance. A march 
 on horseback would be a luxury after this. Lucyan 
 was an indefatigable mentor : every ten minutes the 
 cart was stopped, while Kazimir stood in the rain 
 and listened to minute explanations as to the value 
 of single potatoes, or microscopical proportions of 
 wheat and corn. He bore away with him a very 
 distinct idea as to the difficulty of hitting off the 
 exact moment for taking up the potatoes in autumn, 
 and putting in the grain in spring. It appeared to be 
 all but impossible not to be either too early or too 
 late. Then there were the pigs, for instance, and the 
 cows. It was ruin to a farmer should he lose a batch 
 of them, but then it did not seem that there was very 
 much to be gained if they lived. As a general rule, 
 he was to bear in mind, that a fruitful year was not 
 really preferable to a barren year ; for if in the latter 
 there was too little to sell, so was there too much 
 to sell in the former; the market was glutted, and 
 the prices went down. 
 
 Next there came the Projrinacyas, the most import- 
 ant feature of the estate, as Kazimir had heard from 
 
238 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 his mother. These spirit-shops, of which almost every 
 second bouse in the village owned one, were each ten- 
 anted by a ministering and tattered Hebrew, who held 
 his lease from a larger, less tattered, and more im- 
 portant Hebrew. This important Hebrew, Naftali 
 Taubenktibel by name, held in his turn the lease di- 
 rect from the mistress of the place, and having proved 
 himself an honest and faithful servant, had long since 
 grown grey on the estate. 
 
 " Well, Jacob," said Lucyan, entering the first of 
 the dirty spirit-huts, followed by his reluctant brother ; 
 " how goes your business ? No better than usual ?" 
 
 " No better — Panie, no better at all," gabbled the 
 Jew in reply. " Ah, it is a miserable time for spirit- 
 sellers !" Of course Kazimir could not know that it 
 always is a miserable time for every Jewish spirit- 
 seller. " What rent does he pay % " he asked, with an 
 heroic effort at evincing interest, for the Propinacya 
 was the only thing which at all presented a distinct 
 idea to his mind. 
 
 "You will see all that in the account-book," said 
 Lucyan ; "we must go on ; " and Kazimir, thankful to 
 escape from the choking atmosphere, left the hut, and 
 found himself plunged at once into a field of slushy 
 snow. 
 
 " We have done enough for to-day," said Lucyan ; 
 " the rest can wait till to-morrow. It will be shorter 
 
" CARTES OUVERTES. 239 
 
 to walk home across the field than to drive round 
 in the cart. I suppose you don't mind about your 
 boots ? " 
 
 Kazimir, whose spirit was broken, and whose boots 
 were already so full of water that they could not 
 well be fuller, answered that he did not mind, and 
 walked on dejectedly; while two paces ahead Lucyan 
 stepped along lightly through the mud, humming a 
 cheerful tune to himself :— 
 
 " Savez vous planter les choux, 
 A la mode, a la mode ; 
 Savez vous planter les clioux, 
 A la mode de chez nous ?" 
 
 " Has one got to do this sort of thing often ? " in- 
 (juired Kazimir, rather moodily, when they were half- 
 way across the field. 
 
 " Often ! Oh, well not so very often ; once or twice 
 a-week S" 
 
 " Isn't it rather hard work ? " 
 
 "Perhaps, when you are not used to it. But you 
 who are so much stronger than I am, will get to bear 
 the fatigues of farming wonderfully, no doubt." 
 
 " The fatigues are great, then ? " 
 
 " Not so very great j you have to get up at four, of 
 course." 
 
 " But you get up at eight," objected Kazimir. 
 
 " Ah, but I have been bred up to the business ! I 
 
240 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 could direct out of an arm-chair ; you will need to be 
 on the spot at first, till you have got your hand in." 
 
 " And how long would that take ? " 
 
 " Not so very long ; a few years — five, perhaps ! " 
 
 Kazimir groaned. 
 
 " Cheer up, Kazio," said Lucyan, amiably ; " it is 
 not as hard as you fancy. With strong health, untiring 
 energy, constant application, and judicious manage- 
 ment, I daresay you will — after a little experience, of 
 course — manage to get along not much worse than 
 your neighbours. Here we are at home." 
 
 "Five years of constant application and judicious 
 management," repeated Kazimir to himself, as he sat 
 in his bedroom, mournfully pouring the water out of 
 his high boots. "I'll be shot if I look at another 
 potato-field in my life ! " 
 
 He had heard so many explanations that he remem- 
 bered none. All he knew was that he had been 
 dragged half over the estate in the rain, and had 
 returned splashed up to his eyebrows with mud, to 
 find that, for the last hour and more, his dinner had 
 been slowly congealing on the table. 
 
 At the same time Lucyan was changing his boots 
 up-stairs. " I wonder," he reflected, " whether Kazi- 
 mir will be very keen, about those account-books to- 
 morrow ? " 
 
 Leaving his room in search of his cold dinner, 
 
" CARTES OUVERTES. 241 
 
 Kazimir found himself confronted by his aunt. She 
 stood on the threshold, holding one hand in her 
 pocket, and fixing her nephew with an impressive 
 stare. "Anything the matter?" he inquired, care- 
 lessly ; for not only was he hungry, but those impress- 
 ive looks had long lost their effect upon him. 
 
 " Not exactly the matter," said Eobertine, slowly. 
 
 " Has anything happened then, or not ? " he asked, a 
 little impatiently. 
 
 " Not precisely happened, either." 
 
 Kazimir began to feel anxious. 
 
 " My mother is not worse, is she ? " 
 
 " I will not go to the length of saying ivorse" 
 answered Eobertine, unable to miss so good an op- 
 portunity for throwing out a dark hint. " On the 
 whole her head seems better — on the whole, I say ; 
 but her feet are perhaps less well." 
 
 " It is not about my mother, then ? " 
 
 " I cannot say that it concerns your mother — 
 directly." 
 
 " Aunt Eobertine, you have news for me." 
 
 " In one sense — yes ! " 
 
 It was a baffling answer. " I suppose," thought 
 Kazimir, resignedly, " that she will dole out the infor- 
 mation slowly during the next few days." That was 
 precisely aunt Eobertine's desire; but unfortunately 
 the circumstances of the case demanded haste. 
 
 vol. i. Q 
 
242 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 " Is the news good or bad ? " he asked, with growing 
 mpatience. 
 
 " That depends how you take it." 
 
 Kazimir's patience gave way. " Aunt Eobertine, I 
 must know what this means : do you intend to keep 
 me waiting for the explanation till next week ? " 
 
 Eobertine smiled gloomily. " Who knows where 
 you may be next week ! " 
 
 " Aunt Eobertine ! " she was slowly drawing a paper 
 from her pocket, disclosing it inch by inch. Kazimir 
 made a grab at the paper, caught it, — it was a telegram, 
 — and unfolding it, he read these words — 
 
 "Lieutenant Bielinski, instantly rejoin regiment 
 Orders for march expected? 
 
243 
 
 CHAPTEE XIII. 
 
 THE CARDS ARE SHUFFLED. 
 
 Malbrough s'en va-t-en guerre, 
 Mironton, mironton, mirontaine ; 
 Malbrough s'en va-t-en guerre, 
 Qui sait quand il viendra ? " 
 
 " Xot so loud, not so loud," whispered Eobertine in 
 an agony, turning a bunch of keys into impromptu 
 castanets, in hopes of drowning her nephew's voice : 
 " don't you know that the apothecary's boy is in the 
 house ? " 
 
 " Instantly rejoin regiment," repeated Kazimir, rather 
 louder than before. In the first moment of surprise, 
 he was not quite sure whether it was a shock of joy or 
 of disappointment that he felt. 
 
 " Orders for march expected ! " That meant war, 
 action, glory perhaps, — all that he had always longed 
 for : on the other hand it meant a farewell, an eternal 
 farewell to his mother; and it meant something else, 
 — it meant another farewell, a very bitter and very 
 sweet one — a farewell to Xenia. 
 
244 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 He was all in a tumult of excitement; nnable to 
 distinguish clearly what his feelings really were ; 
 but through the midst of the tumult one thought 
 stood upright. He must see her again, only once 
 again, before going ; he must speak one word to 
 her, even if to speak that one word required that 
 he should wade to Lodniki on foot through the 
 mud. 
 
 He be^an in hot haste to calculate the hours that 
 remained to him. The order was express, and Kazimir 
 was far too thorough a soldier even to contemplate the 
 possibility of delay. To-morrow night at latest he 
 must start; it was dark now — scarcely twenty-four 
 hours remained to him. " It must be done," thought 
 Kazimir, setting his teeth. " It shall be done ! " 
 
 The evening was an agitated one for the household, 
 for in spite of Eobertine's efforts to hush up the whole 
 matter, the truth had leaked out. The news was 
 slowly broken to the invalid. Lucyan expressed 
 much polite concern; and Marcin languidly remarked 
 that, according to his opinion, life was a great deal 
 too short for cutting ourself up in warfare. Bogumil 
 attempted to look more indifferent than he felt. 
 
 " We might have time to do the second half of 
 the estate to - morrow forenoon," suggested Lucyan, 
 obligingly. 
 
 " On no account," was the almost vehement reply. 
 
THE CARDS ARE SHUFFLED. 245 
 
 " I am going to drive to Lodniki, and say good-bye 
 there." 
 
 " Oh, just as you please," said Lucyan, and he left 
 the room. 
 
 " Father," began Kazimir, on impulse, " I will tell 
 you why I must drive over to Lodniki to-morrow." 
 
 " I never questioned you," said the old man, some- 
 what irritably ; " I never asked you to tell me any- 
 thing." 
 
 But Kazimir did tell him, all the same ; not in 
 order to ask for his consent — for, never having had 
 any one but himself to look to, Kazimir had acquired 
 the habit of asking help from no one — but merely as 
 a dutiful attention. 
 
 Bogumil shook his head and sighed wearily, repeat- 
 ing the old formula, which saddened Kazimir each 
 time ; he was a cipher, and his sons must not look to 
 him for advice. The words sounded cold and feeling- 
 less, but Kazimir did not fail to see that his eyes 
 were dim ; and, mightiest symptom that could be, his 
 pipe had gone out unnoticed. There had always been 
 a peculiar though tacit sympathy between father and 
 son. With all their dissimilarity, there was much 
 resemblance. Without his military training, Kazimir 
 might have been as passionate, as reckless, and as 
 ungoverned as his father, though never such a weak 
 mixture of uncalculating selfishness and improvident 
 
246 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 generosity ; with such a training, Bogumil might have 
 been a stronger man. 
 
 Kazimir slept little that night ; every hour he awoke 
 with a feverish start, wondering whether it were not 
 daylight already, and time to start for Lodniki. He 
 heard the rain dripping on the roof, and he knew that 
 each one of those drops was making the roads deeper 
 and heavier ; each was an obstacle the more, building 
 a rampart between him and her. 
 
 In the morning he looked from the window: alas ! it 
 was raining still ; the road was a stream of turbulent 
 and muddy water. The whole country was flooded with 
 melting snow. Kazimir's courage was very resolute, 
 but even he felt staggered ; was it possible that he 
 could be back from Lodniki in time to reach the 
 station and catch the night train? Everybody told 
 him that it was not possible. At the mere mention of 
 driving, his brother laughed : " If you said swimming, 
 it would be more to the point," said Lucyan. 
 
 "Well, then, riding?" said Kazimir, desperately. 
 " To Lodniki I must go, whether I reach it alive or 
 dead!" He would listen to no arguments, and he 
 would be beaten by no obstacles. The least bad of 
 the two carriage-horses was saddled for the first time 
 in its life, and Kazimir galloped off through the rain, 
 hardly knowing that it was raining. 
 
 He was not quite unconscious of the apparent 
 
THE CARDS ARE SHUFFLED. 247 
 
 insanity of his conduct, but he did not feel as if he 
 could go to the war without having said one word to 
 her. His mind was quite made up, and his plan was 
 fixed — he was going to stake everything upon one 
 card. He wanted only to put a question to Xenia ; he 
 wanted only to ask, " Do you love me ? " And should 
 the answer be "Yes," then he would put a second, 
 " Will' you wait for me?'* He did not mean to bind 
 her by a positive engagement, for, young as he was, 
 and impulsive by nature, Kazimir had learnt a few 
 lessons already. He knew that she was poor, and 
 that he was poor; he had heard of an aunt with 
 ambitious ideas. It did not discourage him in the 
 least, but it made him more careful. He had tasted 
 the bitter flavour of poverty already — in small sips, it 
 is true, but still he had tasted it ; for he had served in 
 a cavalry regiment among rich comrades (those were 
 the flowery times of the Austrian army), and he him- 
 self had been a poor man among them. It had cost 
 him much effort, and several slips, before he had learnt 
 that a lieutenant who owns fifty florins a-month, can- 
 not, even for the sake of camaraderie, keep a carriage, 
 and dine off game and truffles every day, without 
 getting inconveniently short in his cash. 
 
 This experience, though unpleasant, had served to 
 temper his natural imprudence. No, he would not 
 bind Xenia to anything but a tacit engagement : if 
 
248 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 she loved him she would wait for him; and in the 
 meantime, silence ! He had told the truth to his 
 father, but to no one else. Towards Lucyan he had 
 grown reserved. It was not only that his passion, in 
 proportion that it deepened, grew less expansive ; but 
 ever since that talk between the brothers in the sledge, 
 and Lucyan's general remarks upon women, Kazimir 
 had felt a strange reluctance to recurring to the subject. 
 
 Horse and rider were soaked in mud, when, towards 
 eleven, they stood before the door of Lodniki. Pawel 
 stared hard at the strange apparition, but Kazimir was 
 perfectly callous to that look of astonishment. Was 
 everybody at home ? No, Pan Eogdanovics was not 
 at home; he was busy with his new machine for 
 digging out roots ; but the young lady was in the 
 drawing-room. 
 
 The young lady — ah, which ? He did not stop to 
 ask, but rapidly entered the house and the drawing- 
 room, while Pawel, slowly following, wrung his hands 
 at the muddy trail on the floor. 
 
 The young lady was there ; she was bending over a 
 table. She turned — and it was Vizia. 
 
 " I beg your pardon," faltered Kazimir ; " I am only 
 here for a minute — for a moment. Do you think I 
 could say a word to your cousin ? " 
 
 Vizia stood staring, scarcely less staggered at the 
 apparition than Pawel had been. 
 
THE CARDS ARE SHUFFLED. 249 
 
 " Pan Bielinski, what has happened ? what is the 
 matter ? My cousin is not here ; but please sit 
 down," she added instinctively, for, after all, she was 
 a Pole. 
 
 " Thank you," said Kazimir, sitting down on a red 
 velvet chair, while the wet began trickling from his 
 hair over his face, and out of his verv sleeves on to 
 the cushions. " I have just ten minutes to spare," and 
 he drew out his watch. 
 
 " But you cannot see Xenia," answered Vizia, still 
 somewhat bewildered. 
 
 " Why not ? She is not ill ? For heaven's sake 
 tell me the truth ! " 
 
 " She was quite well when I heard from her last." 
 
 " Heard from her ! " A cold suspicion seized upon 
 him. " Where was she ? " he managed to say. 
 
 " She is at Krakow. She went there last week." 
 
 " Impossible ! " In the first shock of surprise, Kazi- 
 mir got to his feet, and stood as immovable as if he 
 were meditating a rush straight to Krakow. "Are 
 you sure, Pani Vizia ? " 
 
 " Of course I am sure." 
 
 He stood with his hand to his forehead, trying to 
 collect his thoughts into a distinct shape. Never for 
 a moment had he contemplated this possibility. Ever 
 since she had whispered, " I think I shall stay here," 
 he had blindly believed that she would stay. At 
 
250 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 Krakow ! It was very natural that she should be 
 there, and yet it sounded to him very strange at that 
 moment. 
 
 Slowly and mechanically he sat down again, for it 
 struck him that his conduct must appear rude. 
 
 There was silence for a minute. It took fully that 
 minute to blunt the first keen edge of disappointment. 
 He would have to pass through Krakow to-morrow 
 night, so there was a shred of hope remaining after all. 
 
 " At Krakow ! " he repeated aloud ; " but she said, 
 
 at least I thought " he broke off, and looked at 
 
 Vizia somewhat wistfully. He had come here with 
 the very words he had to say trembling on his lips, 
 and he felt that they would not let themselves be 
 thrust back thus roughly. Might he not glean some 
 hope by questioning her cousin ? Vizia was just the 
 sort of sensible and intelligent woman who ought to 
 make a first-rate confidant. He had felt drawn to 
 confide in her on the very first day of their acquaint- 
 ance, and that recollection gave him the courage to 
 speak now. 
 
 " Pani Vizia," he began, " do you think I should 
 be able to see your cousin when I pass through 
 Krakow ? " 
 
 * But where are you going to ? " 
 
 "Did I not tell you? To join my regiment — to 
 the war ! " 
 
THE CARDS ARE SHUFFLED. 251 
 
 She made no answer, but she started and turned a 
 little pale. 
 
 " That is why I came here to say good-bye ; but 
 perhaps I can see her — Mademoiselle Xenia in Kra- 
 kow ? Do you not think so ? " 
 
 " I daresay you can." 
 
 " I want to see her very much, if only for a mo- 
 ment, before I go. Will it be difficult ?" 
 
 " I really cannot say." 
 
 " But you can tell me where to find her." 
 
 " I can give you the address." 
 
 " I hope my sudden appearance will not be disagree- 
 able to her ? " 
 
 " I hope not." 
 
 " It is such a strange feeling, is it not, to go off this 
 way without knowing whether you will ever come 
 back a^ain ? " 
 
 " I suppose it is strange." 
 
 " At any rate," — and Kazimir smiled, — " it is a com- 
 fort to know that I can go this time, instead of stand- 
 ing behind a tree and watching the others start." He 
 looked at Vizia, expecting some such sign of sympathy 
 as she had shown on that first day, three months ago ; 
 but no such sign came, and suddenly it struck him 
 that she was changed. It had never struck him before. 
 During these three months he had seen her often, ex- 
 changed greetings, and good-byes, and passing words ; 
 
252 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 but never another conversation. For the first time 
 again he found himself alone with her ; and without 
 hesitation, he had attempted to take up their acquaint- 
 ance on the same footing. He saw no reason for the 
 change : he was not changed towards her ; his senti- 
 ments were as friendly to-day as they had been then. 
 He could not know that they had appeared then, to 
 Vizia's inexperienced eyes, to be more than friendly. 
 But Vizia's eyes were experienced now. Having seen 
 him beside her cousin, she wondered at herself for 
 ever having mistaken that other manner for anything 
 but an amicable interest. Kazimir's manner was, in 
 one sense, his misfortune. It condemned him to go 
 through life as an imposture, — an innocent flirt, who 
 killed his victims with an excess of kindness. In this 
 age of polished deceits and polite falsehoods, — when 
 striplings languish with ennui, and beardless boys can 
 find nothing to smile at under the sun, — a nature fresh 
 and earnest like Kazimir's is a far more dangerous 
 nature than that of the most hardened worldling that 
 ever breathed. He was too busy a man to be vain, 
 yet few male flirts accomplished more havoc than did 
 this true-hearted young man, with his unlucky warmth 
 of tone and glances, and his unfortunate propensity for 
 making the best of any man or woman he met. 
 
 His friendship was almost as ardent as another 
 man's love ; and his love, — Vizia, in her limited ex- 
 
THE CARDS ARE SHUFFLED. 253 
 
 perience, had never seen anything which approached 
 the fervour, the fire, and the entirety of his love. She 
 had watched him, and she had seen how his eyes had 
 hung on her cousin's lips — how he had thrilled at her 
 laughter, — how his words had wandered when unex- 
 pectedly she entered the room, — with what reverence 
 he touched her hand, or even any object which belonged 
 to her. Vizia had seen it all, — and only since then had 
 she understood the man, arid seen her mistake. 
 
 Kazimir felt the change, and wondered. She had 
 chilled his confidence ; and it was not till he rose to 
 go, that, all at once, the words broke from his lips — 
 
 " Pani Vizia, you know why I must stop at Kra- 
 kow ? " 
 
 Vizia was standing now, — they were both standing ; 
 and that hard set of her features had all at once given 
 way to a look of painful agitation. 
 
 " Yes," and she met his eyes ; " I know why you 
 must stop." 
 
 " Your cousin is like a sister to you : can you give 
 me any hope ? " 
 
 Her lips contracted, and she frowned. " Don't ask 
 me," she said, hurriedly ; " how can I say ? " 
 
 " But you advise me to stop, do you not ? " 
 
 She paused one moment, and paled by another 
 shade : she had never recovered her colour from the 
 first. 
 
254 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 " Yes/' she said, with energy ; " stop at Krakow, — 
 by all means stop." 
 
 " Thank you, — that gives me hope ; and now, good- 
 bye. Will you not wish me success 1 " 
 
 " I wish you success in the war." She smiled a 
 rather ghastly smile. 
 
 " And at Krakow, what do you wish me there ? " 
 
 " I wish you,"— she would have said " success," but 
 her conscience cried within her — " Hold ! you do not 
 wish that in truth." " I wish you happiness," she 
 finished faintly. 
 
 The terms were synonymous to Kazimir. 
 
 "Thank you," he said, and with cruel warmth he 
 pressed her hand. " Will you think of me sometimes ? " 
 
 She nodded, not choosing to trust her voice ; for 
 even had she said no more than the one word " yes," 
 that one word might have been said at the cost of her 
 dignity. And he turned and left her. And if on the 
 way there he had not been aware of the rain, he was 
 conscious of every single drop that fell on him now. 
 The sky was of a dismal grey ; the road was deserted, 
 save for a solitary peasant who sang, as he waded 
 through the mud — 
 
 " Krakowiaczek jeden 
 Mial Koniku siedem, 
 Mial Koniku siedem, 
 Pojehal na wojnu 
 Zustal sie mu jeden." 
 
THE CAUDS ARE SHUFFLED. 25 
 
 (A Krakau peasant had seven horses, had seven horses. He went to 
 the war and there remained only one. ) 
 
 "Two o'clock," said Kazimir, as he entered the 
 house. " Great God ! in an hour I must be gone." 
 He stood still, for he heard his name pronounced. 
 His mother's door was ajar. He went up to it: 
 
 " Are you calling me, mother ? " 
 
 " Kazio, come here ; I am alone, come quick." He 
 groped his way forward. " I must speak to you be- 
 fore you go. Are you going now ? " 
 
 " Not for an hour yet." 
 
 " Are your things packed ? " 
 
 " Nothing is packed." 
 
 " Well, listen then. Go and finish everything, and 
 when you are done, the last thing before you go, 
 come here to me. I must see you alone; I want 
 to speak to you. There is something that I must 
 say to you before you go." She held her son's hand 
 and looked at him with a long and wistful gaze. 
 " You understand me, Kazio ? You will come to 
 me soon?" 
 
 " I shall be back in ten minutes, mother," and 
 Kazimir hastened to his room, tore off his dripping 
 coat, and began stuffing cravats and boots into his 
 portmanteau. 
 
 There was a sound at the door, and he looked up 
 hot and flushed, with his wavy hair all falling into his 
 
256 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 face. Lucyan was standing in the entrance, most 
 irritatingly cool and self-possessed. He held in his 
 hand a little packet of paper-covered books. 
 
 " Oh, you have not done your packing yet ; I 
 thought you might have time to look over these 
 account-books which you wanted to see. This is the 
 account of the Propinacyas, and these are the wood 
 accounts, and this " 
 
 Kazimir sprang to his feet, clutching a handful of 
 collars and tossing the hair out of his eyes. " In the 
 name of the devil, Lucyan, keep your odious books 
 to yourself! Do you wish to drive me mad, or do you 
 not ? " 
 
 " Now don't fly out at me, Kazio," laughed Lucyan. 
 "You said yesterday that you wanted to see them." 
 
 "And I say to-day that if you so much as mention 
 them again in my hearing, I'll do, I don't know what, 
 but something violent at any rate. Don't you see 
 that I am half out of my senses between all these 
 things ? I can't get half of them in : everything has 
 got twice as large as it used to be, except the port- 
 manteau, which has got twice as small." 
 
 " No wonder, if you stick things in in that barbaric 
 fashion. Good gracious ! muddy boots and collars 
 combined — this will never do ; " and Lucyan, pocket- 
 ing the account-books, began very deftly folding out 
 some ill-treated shirts. 
 
THE CARDS ARE SHUFFLED. 257 
 
 " Oh, they're used to that," said Kazimir, as he 
 rolled his best Attila into a round hard ball. 
 
 " I suppose we shall not see you for years again," 
 remarked Lucyan presently, as he bent over the port- 
 manteau. 
 
 " H — m, yes, — perhaps, — I really don't know." 
 
 " See that you bring back plenty of laurels and 
 dozens of decorations : you might bring back a scar or 
 two ; that would do no harm ; it is just what you need." 
 
 " By way of embellishment ? " 
 
 " By way of disfigurement. Don't stare, Kazio ; 
 that is exactly your fault. At the present moment 
 you are just a shade too handsome, several shades too 
 young, and several shades more too cheerful." 
 
 "I look uncommonly handsome just now, don't I ? " 
 asked Kazimir rather grimly, as he eyed his heated, 
 dishevelled, and mud - spattered image in the glass. 
 " Positively fascinating, I declare, especially in my 
 shirt-sleeves." 
 
 "I am not joking," said Lucyan, with his quiet 
 smile. " There, give me those stockings. You are a 
 handsome boy at present, and boys are not the fashion 
 nowadays; now, if you could look a little weather- 
 beaten, or rugged, or haggard, or get a good slashing 
 scar across your nose — or if you could undergo some 
 severe mental anxiety, or shoot a man in a duel and 
 become a prey to remorse, or see a ghost, or lead a for- 
 
 vol. I. R 
 
258 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 lorn-hope, or even only get your heart broken, — you 
 would see how that would improve you." 
 
 " I don't think I am going to have my heart 
 broken," said Kazimir, with a rather confident smile ; 
 " but I have no objection to leading a forlorn-hope, if 
 I am lucky enough to get the chance." 
 
 " The effect would be equally satisfactory in either 
 case, I have no doubt." 
 
 " Thank you ; and what improvement are you in 
 want of?" 
 
 " I will do very well as I am, I fancy. I am not 
 handsome, nor have I any ardent wish to be so ; 
 except sometimes when I have moments of envy for 
 your looks, mon frere" 
 
 Lucyan was wonderfully candid and wonderfully 
 complimentary to-day, thought Kazimir ; the impend- 
 ing separation must have caused this change of 
 manner. He himself could not honestly say that 
 he had ever envied his younger brother anything — 
 neither his looks, nor his disposition, nor his tastes, 
 nor even the chance of winning Vizia. "We are 
 very different, of course," was all he could say. 
 
 " Of course we are, — you are a Pole and I am a 
 Greek: there lies the whole difference. Why, here is' 
 Marcin ; is he going to offer help in the packing ? " 
 
 Marcin had wandered in by the open door, and after 
 stumbling over one hat-box and sitting down upon 
 
THE CARDS ARE SHUFFLED. 259 
 
 another, observed, as he contemplated the wreck, that 
 it is the last straw that breaks the camel's back. 
 Then he lifted a boot from the floor, gazed at it fix- 
 edly, dropped it, and wandered out again. 
 
 " He is as vague as ever," said Kazimir ; " and do 
 you know, Lucyan, he goes on just the same about 
 pill-boxes and medicine-glasses. What can it mean? 
 I can't imagine." 
 
 " You have very little imagination then," said 
 Lucyan, who was attempting to lock the portman- 
 teau. "Here, Kazio, you must kneel upon it, or it 
 won't close. Make your mind quite easy about the 
 pill-boxes : it is only that he sees black eyes on every 
 lid and pink cheeks in every medicine-bottle. 
 
 " Marcin in love ! " exclaimed Kazimir, as he knelt 
 on the portmanteau. 
 
 "I did not say that," answered Lucyan, with a 
 shrug ; " but undoubtedly he is flirting with the 
 apothecary's very vulgar and very pretty little daugh- 
 ter. It is a harmless occupation, you know, and will 
 do as well as anything else to keep him amused." 
 
 Though Lucyan was on his knees, with his head 
 bent, as he tried the key, Kazimir knew that his 
 brother was smiling ; and the thought of that unseen 
 smile once more grated upon his sensibilities. It was 
 again one of those moments when he discovered with 
 a start that he had not succeeded in getting fond of 
 
260 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 his brother; not yet succeeded, that is to say; it 
 could only be a question of time. Was it his own 
 fault, perhaps, that the process demanded so very 
 much time? 
 
 " Is that key not turned yet," he asked, impatiently. 
 " I have barely a quarter of an hour, and my mother 
 is waiting for me." 
 
 " No, it is not shut yet ; press harder. There is 
 plenty of time ; the carriage won't be round till three." 
 
 " Four, five, six, seven, eight, nine," counted Kazi- 
 mir. " It will take quite six hours to reach the station 
 with the roads in this state. I am running myself 
 pretty close as it is." 
 
 " I assure you you are not — (can't you make your- 
 self a little heavier? this lock is as obstinate as a 
 mule), — your watch must be fast. Now that the 
 packing is done, you would even have time to throw 
 a look over those accounts." 
 
 "Lucyan, don't forget what I said," interrupted 
 Kazimir, glowering down threateningly from the top 
 of the portmanteau. 
 
 " Well, if you won't, it is not my fault, remember 
 that. But some day when you have to take the estate 
 into your hands " 
 
 ' ( That I shall never do, rest assured ; I have quite 
 enough with the trial I gave it yesterday." 
 
 " But if you ever happened to marry, for instance ? " 
 
THE CARDS ARE SHUFFLED. 261 
 
 " Ah, that has nothing to do with it," said Kazimir 
 with a bright flush. The idea of giving up his pro- 
 fession, even for the sake of Xenia, had never occurred 
 to him. If she loved him, she would be ready to be 
 a soldier's wife. "It is more likely you will settle 
 down here." 
 
 " Possibly," — Lucyan bent lower over the lock, — " I 
 might even say probably." 
 
 " Very probably," repeated Kazimir, with emphasis, 
 as he thought of the evening of the fox-hunt, of the 
 Krakowiak, and the red rose presented to Vizia. 
 
 " It does not surprise you, then ? " 
 
 " Not in the least," and Kazimir again thought 
 of the red rose. " I am not quite as blind as you 
 imagine me, Lucyan." 
 
 " Ah ! " Lucyan bent still lower. In their respec- 
 tive positions neither of the brothers could see the 
 other's face. 
 
 " Well, I don't mind telling you that my wishes do 
 lie that way. They say, you know, that a farmer 
 must marry." 
 
 " Especially if he is smitten," agreed Kazimir. 
 
 " Who said I was smitten ? " Lucyan hastily moved 
 his head upwards, and gave his brother one piercing 
 glance. Kazimir was quite at a loss to read that 
 glance ; and before he had attempted to do so, Lu- 
 cyan's head was down again. 
 
262 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 " Yes," he was saying, in his usual voice again, " I 
 am smitten, deeper than you think." The last words 
 were beneath his breath, and Kazimir did not hear 
 them. 
 
 It touched him most strangely to be taken even 
 thus far into his brother's confidence. They seemed 
 to have changed places for the moment — the reserved 
 Lucyan to have grown expansive, while Kazimir, the 
 communicative, was listening to a confidence, instead 
 of imparting one. For the moment he asked himself 
 whether he, on his side, should not tell his brother 
 of his hopes and of his project. He was about 
 to speak, but something checked the words ; at the 
 thought of Lucyan's smile he shrank back with a 
 feeling of aversion, and locked up his hopes within 
 himself. 
 
 " I wish you may get what you want," was all he 
 said. "But, Lucyan, in heaven's name, is that key 
 -not turned ? Give it me ; I will have it round in a 
 moment." 
 
 " There, I have just got it," said Lucyan, with a 
 final twist. 
 
 There were barely ten minutes to spare. Kazimir, 
 with all possible haste, finished his arrangements and 
 left the room. 
 
 Aunt Eobertine met him in the passage. She had 
 considerably softened since she knew that she was to 
 
THE CAEDS ARE SHUFFLED. 263 
 
 be rid of him so soon. At this moment she was 
 almost smiling. 
 
 " Yes," she said, " you can go in to your mother. 
 She is alone now ; but no noise, and no agitation." 
 
 Closing the door softly behind him, Kazimir en- 
 tered. He was alone with his mother at last. The 
 room as usual was half darkened, and in the dim 
 light Kazimir could barely distinguish the figure of 
 his mother on the sofa. She made no movement as 
 on tiptoe he approached. She made no movement 
 yet when he reached her; she neither put out her 
 hand nor turned her head on the pillow. 
 
 " Mother," whispered Kazimir, as he bent over 
 her ; but he saw that her eyes were closed, and 
 they did not open at his whisper. He looked nearer ; 
 her breath was coming soft and regularly, — she was 
 asleep. 
 
 "She will awake in a minute," thought Kazimir, 
 and he sat down beside the sofa. As his eyes got 
 used to the darkness, he distinguished his mother's 
 features more clearly. Lying thus asleep, with her 
 face in perfect repose, she looked younger than she 
 had looked for years. The hair, though streaked with 
 silver threads, was still of a jetty black at places, and 
 the spotless skin by contrast appeared of a waxen 
 whiteness ; the fine chiselling of the straight Greek 
 features came out with almost startling delicacy under 
 
264 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 the hand of wasting disease. Never had Kazimir so 
 vividly realised what his mother's past beauty must 
 have been, as at this moment when he sat gazing at 
 the motionless face, printing it off on his memory 
 as a picture which should never fade. One hand w T as 
 beneath the coverlet, the other hung by her side ; it 
 was wasted almost to the bone, and the heavy rings 
 were slipping on to each other. One of them had 
 dropped to the carpet. 
 
 It was a picture painfully beautiful ; it wrung 
 Kazimir's heart with the bitter feeling of fare- 
 well. He dropped his face into his hands unable 
 to look longer, and he sat thus, waiting for her to 
 awake. 
 
 One minute passed, another passed, and she slept 
 on softly. He looked up again with some uneasiness, 
 and drew out his watch. The time was all but up. 
 With his watch in his hand he sat and waited ; there 
 was no other sound but that gentle tick-tick. In 
 another moment it was drowned by the rattle of 
 wheels at the door. There was the bustle of luggage 
 being carried through the passage and down the steps. 
 Surely that would awake her? Kazimir rose and 
 leant over her again ; but she breathed on softly in 
 her exhausted sleep. What was he to do? Awake 
 her, and tear her from this healing slumber into the 
 
THE CARDS ARE SHUFFLED. 265 
 
 terrible reality of parting? Could she bear it in 
 her feeble state ? Would it be kindness or downright 
 murder ? He scarcely knew which. She had wanted 
 to say something to him ; she had wanted to speak to 
 him alone. Kazimir wondered what it could have 
 been, — perhaps, after all, only an invalid's fancy. 
 Surely it would be more merciful to spare her the 
 last dreadful embrace. 
 
 He was still standing thus uncertain, when the door 
 glided open, and Lucyan whispered hurriedly, " Quick, 
 Kazimir, quick ; your time is up." 
 
 " I am coming," said Kazimir. " Mother," he said 
 once more ; and then, as she did not move, he paused 
 for one moment, and, kneeling down on the floor, he 
 raised the wasted hand and kissed it. Not even the 
 hot tears which fell on that hand roused the invalid 
 from her deep slumber. He stood up and turned 
 resolutely away, though he could scarcely see the 
 door for the mist before his eyes. He knew that 
 for this parting there would be no more meeting here 
 below. 
 
 The early dusk was falling when a dying woman 
 started up from her sleep, and cried out, " Where is 
 my son ? Oh, where is Kazimir ? There is something 
 I must tell him ! " 
 
266 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 But her son was far on his way by that time, and 
 her weak voice could not call him back. 
 
 It was too late to give him the warning, so long, 
 half-shamedly withheld, and which, had it but been 
 uttered, might have altered many things in his life. 
 
267 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 KING AND QUEEN. 
 
 . . . " I'll speak to her, 
 And she shall be my queen " 
 
 — Mri/roN. 
 
 It was quite dark when Kazimir reached Krakow next 
 evening. The streets were full of rolling carriages, 
 and the houses shone with lights. " What a gay 
 town ! " he thought, as he stared out. He drove 
 straight to the address which Vizia had given him, 
 and rang the bell with all the fury of hot haste. 
 
 After a torturing interval, a maid-servant looked 
 out leisurely. 
 
 " Are the ladies at home ? " asked Kazimir, anything 
 but leisurely. 
 
 " The ladies at home ! " The swarthy servant stared 
 at him, as if this supposition was of the most insane. 
 " What ladies are at home on the last day of the car- 
 nival ! " 
 
 He had never reflected that this was indeed the last 
 
268 BEGGAll MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 day of the carnival : he remembered it now. So they 
 were out ; but they might not be far. 
 
 " Where are they, then ? " 
 
 " Where else should they be but at a ball ? " 
 
 "At a ball, of course," said Kazimir, with a pang 
 of disappointment. " But where ? Is it near ? " 
 
 The girl laughed impertinently. The idea of not 
 knowing where the ladies were ! Why, where every- 
 body else — everybody belonging to the society, that is 
 to say — was to-night. Where else but at Wieliczka, 
 attending the splendid festivity which his Imperial 
 Highness had arranged in the salt-mines ! 
 
 Imperial Highness — splendid festivity — salt-mines ! 
 The words darted in by Kazimir's ears through Kazi- 
 mir's brain. The salt-mines were seven miles off. 
 For a minute his spirit sank and his courage flagged, 
 but in the next they rose again. He had made a rapid 
 calculation, and found that he could still reach Wie- 
 liczka and return in time for the next train. " Thank 
 you," he said, with a suddenness which rather aston- 
 ished the impertinent servant-girl ; and ten minutes 
 later he was on his way to Wieliczka. 
 
 It was a very close run, but it stood within the 
 bounds of possibility ; and in Kazimir's present state 
 of mind, anything short of flying seemed feasible. He 
 reached Wieliczka after a short eternity, and found no 
 difficulty in being directed to the salt-mines. The 
 
KING AND QUEEN. 269 
 
 road which led there was crowded, and the entrance 
 most brilliantly lighted. " Card of invitation, please," 
 said a voice beside him, in a quick mechanical tone, 
 which betrayed the weariness of having repeated this 
 question several hundred times that evening ; and 
 Kazimir turning, met a pair of expressionless eyes, 
 and saw a hand stretched out towards him. He had 
 never stopped to consider this emergency. Of course 
 he had no card of invitation, — no one had invited 
 him, and no one expected him ; but the thought of his 
 helplessness only fixed his resolve. Every obstacle 
 made him more determined that he should not be 
 conquered. 
 
 The expressionless eyes were still fastened on him ; 
 the gloved hand was still mechanically held out. 
 
 Drawing himself up to his fullest height, and gazing 
 steadily at the man, Kazimir, with great distinctness, 
 answered, " I have no card of invitation." 
 
 The expressionless eyes began to show a little ex- 
 pression, — they looked surprised. 
 
 " But without a card you cannot enter. " 
 
 " I must enter," said Kazimir, with a calmness born 
 of his despair. 
 
 " But your dress " and the man threw a glance 
 
 down the figure of this mud-and-travel-stained hussar. 
 
 " Oh, that is all right," said Kazimir, haughtily. 
 " Let me pass." 
 
270 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 " But the Archduke " 
 
 " It is just the Archduke that I must see ; he knows 
 me well, do you hear ? " Kazimir had once, at half a 
 mile's distance, caught sight of his Imperial High- 
 ness's highly imperial back. 
 
 The man looked staggered, though he still protested. 
 
 " But my orders are strict." 
 
 " I daresay, but my business is urgent. It is on 
 account of the war," said Kazimir, with magnificent 
 vagueness. "I take the whole responsibility upon 
 myself; let me pass ; it will be the worse for you if 
 you do not." 
 
 The official, thoroughly intimidated, shrank to one 
 side, feeling an undefined impression that this im- 
 perious stranger must, from the very fact of having 
 no invitation, and of being splashed with mud from 
 head to foot, be some extremely exalted personage, 
 else surely he would not dare to stalk past the barrier 
 in this undaunted fashion. On second thoughts the 
 official was inclined to think that he must be some 
 near connection of the Imperial family, and that his 
 business was probably some secret mission connected 
 with the impending war. 
 
 There was some little delay before Kazimir found 
 himself safely landed in the lower regions, and caught 
 the sound of music, and was almost blinded with the 
 glitter around him. In the long passages there were 
 
KING AND QUEEN. 271 
 
 strange figures, standing in rows — mountain spirits 
 they seemed to Kazimir — with the orange light burn- 
 ing over their forehead, and their hammers and pick- 
 axes by their side. He passed through a double row 
 of these workmen, and seemed to be walking into an 
 endless cavern of crystal, which divided at every turn 
 into smaller and various-sized caves. 
 
 The music sounded nearer every moment, and the 
 lights shone out more brilliantly. Kazimir, having in 
 great haste traversed several long passages, started 
 back suddenly as a louder burst of music, and a 
 brighter glare of light, warned him that he was near 
 the ball-room. In the ball-room he dared not show 
 himself in his present plight; for, in spite of his 
 unflinching replies to the official at the entrance 
 above, he knew well enough that his Imperial High- 
 ness was celebrated for possessing an eagle eye with 
 regard to any deficiency in military adjustment; and 
 the sight of a muddy hussar, making a blot upon the 
 brilliancy of shining salt -columns and sparkling 
 candelabras, could not have escaped him. 
 
 He retreated into the passages, scanning every 
 person anxiously, but seeing nothing but strange faces 
 and unknown figures. He spent a quarter of an hour 
 in these regions, having often to step aside into a niche 
 as some party of chattering and brightly dressed 
 women passed him. Eefreshments and flowers were 
 
272 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 carried by ; officers without a spot of mud upon their 
 uniforms, and with magnificently stiffened moustaches, 
 clinked past ; and yet not a face came that Kazimir 
 knew. At the end of that quarter of an hour he began 
 to contemplate the possibility of failure. Might he 
 not wander about here for hours without getting even 
 a clue to Xenia? He had reached a comparatively 
 solitary spot now; the little chapel cut in the rock 
 where, once a -year, a solemn Mass is held. Two 
 figures knelt upon the steps, — hooded monks, with 
 heads bent and hands clasped in prayer. Kazimir 
 would have wished to shake one of them out of his 
 devotions, and send him as a messenger to Xenia. 
 But, alas ! the monks could not help him ; for, like the 
 steps and the altar, the ceiling and the walls, they 
 were of solid salt. Tor centuries their salt hands had 
 been clasped, and their salt heads been bent, and for 
 centuries more would they pray thus motionless. Had 
 he spent so much energy for nothing ? thought Kazi- 
 mir, beginning to despair. Had he carried down every 
 obstacle by the mere force of resolution, only to gain 
 this ? What ! And when he knew that she could 
 not be more than a few hundred yards off. No, he 
 would not lose courage yet ; and as if in answer to 
 this thought, he suddenly caught sight of a back that 
 appeared familiar. It was a broad black back, belong- 
 ing to a very large gentleman who was hurrying down 
 
 1 
 
KING AND QUEEN. 273 
 
 the passage. In half-a-dozen strides Kazimir had 
 caught him up, and laid a hand on his shoulder. The 
 man turned round with a start, and Kazimir saw that 
 he had guessed right : it was that amiable young giant, 
 Tiburtio. 
 
 Tiburtio stared hard, dropping one lavender glove 
 in his amazement. " In the name of the marvellous, 
 how do you come here?" he would probably have 
 said, had Kazimir left him time to speak ; but Kazi- 
 mir did not leave him time. Dragging him aside into 
 the chapel, he put the abrupt question, "Is Pani 
 Xenia here ? " 
 
 "Pani Xenia," said the giant, staring still harder. 
 " What is that to you ? " 
 
 " What is that to you ? " retorted Kazimir, with a 
 sudden pang of jealousy, beginning to wish that he 
 had not met the giant in the salt-mine. "Is she 
 here ? " 
 
 " Yes, she is," said Tiburtio, drawing on his lavender 
 gloves with an attempt at supercilious triumph. " I 
 am going to dance the next Mazur with her." 
 
 " Oh, you are, are you ? " Kazimir bit his lip. 
 " Look here : I must speak to her at any price, and you 
 see I cannot enter the ball-room." 
 
 " I should think not," said the giant, with a smile 
 meant to be sarcastic. 
 
 " Well then ; will you be so kind as to take a nies- 
 vol. i. s 
 
274 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 sage, privately ; I beg her to speak to me out here, for 
 a few minutes only." 
 
 " Oh, but I cannot do that." 
 
 " You will do it if I ask it as a favour." Kazimir 
 had a remarkably steady gaze : the giant had grown 
 small under it already on the day of the fox-hunt ; he 
 grew small again now. 
 
 " She could not come, you know," he faltered, " her 
 aunt is so strict." 
 
 " Don't ask her aunt, ask her." 
 
 " And the Mazur ? surely you don't want me to lose 
 my Mazur?" 
 
 " Oh, man, man ! " cried Kazimir, with a stamp on 
 the salt-floor, " what does a Mazur matter ? I tell you 
 that I must see her ; I am going off to the war. It is 
 only to say good-bye, — don't you understand? I 
 shall probably be shot in a month." 
 
 " To be sure, yes." The giant brightened up at the 
 idea. " Of course you may be shot." 
 
 " Of course ; and if you were going to be shot, I 
 would do the same by you — I really would. There, go, 
 like a good fellow, and I shall be eternally grateful." 
 
 The giant, fairly carried away by the impetuosity 
 of his rival, went off on the errand; and Kazimir 
 paced about in a fever of impatience. 
 
 Faintly the first note of the Mazur reached his 
 ears, and with that first note all sorts of horrible 
 
KING AND QUEEN. 275 
 
 suppositions were engendered in his brain. Suppos- 
 ing Tiburtio had not been true to his word, — suppos- 
 ing Xenia had refused to come, — supposing the aunt 
 had interfered, — supposing — ah ! — Kazimir stood still, 
 rooted to the spot, at sight of the dazzling vision be- 
 fore him. 
 
 Through the entrance of the chapel a beautiful 
 nymph was floating towards him; her feet seemed 
 scarcely to touch the ground, as, wrapped in misty 
 blue clouds, she advanced. Silver dewdrops sparkled 
 among the clouds, and crystal flowers flashed in 
 her hair and on her breast. The softest blush w r as 
 on her cheek, and the shyest smile upon her lips. 
 She was so beautiful that the bright walls beside her 
 seemed to grow dull ; so beautiful, that Kazimir, 
 forgetting his hurry, stood and gazed in speechless 
 admiration. 
 
 " You want to speak to me ? " she whispered shyly, 
 as Kazimir remained dumb. How much sweeter was 
 her voice than he had ever before realised ! 
 
 " Yes," he said, still half in a dream. That figure 
 in sea-blue and silver seemed to his excited fancy 
 almost too lovely to be human. She must be a Majka, 
 a fairy of the mountains ; a RusseUca, a nymph of the 
 waters ; an Undine or a Loreley, with a Loreley's bright 
 beauty, but not with a Loreley's cold heart. 
 
 " I hope you have not waited long for me ? " 
 
276 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 " No ; it does not seem long now." 
 
 " It was so difficult to get away, just when the 
 Mazur was beginning ; it is the last Mazur this carni- 
 val, you know. I am afraid they will miss me, but 
 perhaps I can get back before the end. What a pity 
 you can't come into the room and look at the dancing, 
 it is so delightful to-night ! " Her eyes were shining, 
 and her lips glowing with the animation of the last 
 waltz ; her hair, hanging in soft curls, had got loosened 
 by the movement, and strayed in charming disorder 
 down her back. She was panting and flushed with 
 triumph — her young head still in a whirl at the recol- 
 lection of the last compliment paid to her. His 
 Imperial Highness had deigned to express the opinion 
 that the girl in blue and silver was the queen of the 
 ball-room, and half-a-dozen voices had whispered to 
 her the remark in an improved form. No wonder if 
 the seventeen-year-old heart fluttered, and the seven- 
 teen-year-old blood tingled again and again. " I have 
 danced so much to-night ! " She looked at him won- 
 deringly as he still stood silent. 
 
 " How beautiful you are ! " he said at last. Xenia 
 blushed crimson. 
 
 " I think my dress is pretty," she said, with a smile 
 which was scarcely coquettish. " I copied it from the 
 ' Journal des Demoiselles.' I was not quite sure 
 about the flowers, so I wrote and asked, and the 
 
KING AND QUEEN. 277 
 
 answer was, ' Camellias bleues avec poudre crystalline.' 
 They give questions and answers every week, you 
 know." 
 
 "It is the most beautiful thing I have seen in 
 my life." 
 
 " Eeally ? And oh, do you know, Pan Bielinski," 
 she gazed at him with large and earnest eyes, " in the 
 last number of the ' Journal des Demoiselles/ the same 
 that had my dress, there were two more chapters of 
 the story ; and do you know what the end is ? The 
 second ring is found, and in it there is another will, 
 which reverses the first ; and so Palmerie has got no 
 choice but to take the poison she has discovered in a 
 hole of the wall. The number just breaks off when 
 she is raising the poisoned goblet to her lips. And 
 Barbarin " 
 
 " Barbarin be d d ! " burst out Kazimir, all at 
 
 once recovering his full senses. 
 
 " Oh, Pan Bielinski ! " she started a step aside, " I 
 have never heard you swear before, — and we are in a 
 chapel, too ! " 
 
 " I beg your pardon a hundred times ; I beg it a 
 thousand and million times," said Kazimir, feeling 
 perhaps that he was acting ungratefully by Barbarin, 
 who in the months past had proved a faithful friend, 
 and done him many a good turn. 
 
 Of course they were in a chapel, and he had no 
 
278 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 right to disturb the devotions of those two salt-monks 
 beside them. 
 
 " You must really forgive me ; I have gone through 
 a good deal ; I have tried so hard to find you. I went 
 to Lodniki first, thinking you would be there. Oh, 
 Pani Xenia, why did you not stay there ? You said 
 you would." 
 
 " I meant to stay." Xenia looked at him somewhat 
 fearfully. " I really meant to stay, but my aunt 
 wrote me such an urgent letter to come for the three 
 last balls ; and even then I did not want to go. I asked 
 Vizia what I was to do, and she wouldn't tell me ; she 
 said I must decide for myself: and then a second 
 letter came " 
 
 "You would not have gone if you knew how un- 
 happy it made me," exclaimed Kazimir, bringing 
 down his hand somewhat violently on the polished 
 shoulder of the salt-monk. " I was so sure that you 
 would stay." 
 
 Xenia drooped her head, and shrugged one white 
 shoulder, pulling forward a loose curl against her 
 cheek. " I would not have come out of the ball-room, 
 if I thought you would talk so angrily to me." Her 
 under lip was quivering, and Kazimir, on the instant, 
 called himself a brute. 
 
 tl Pardon me again, only once more; it is only I 
 who am to blame. You are an angel of sweetness and 
 
KING AND QUEEN. 279 
 
 kindness, to come from that lighted ball-room, where 
 you are admired and worshipped, out to me here, only 
 because I asked you." 
 
 " Oh, but that does not matter," said Xenia, while 
 the pout melted quickly to a smile. " I shall be back 
 again before the Mazur is done. I was told that you 
 wanted to speak to me very much." 
 
 " Do you know why I want to speak to you now at 
 this moment, and in this hurry ? " 
 
 " No." She looked up, startled by the sudden change 
 in his tone. 
 
 " It is because I am going away." 
 
 " Are you ? Where to \ " 
 
 " I am called off to my regiment, and in a fortnight 
 the war may be declared." 
 
 " You are going to the war ! " the blue eyes dilated 
 with alarm. 
 
 " Yes, that is why I begged you to speak to me. I 
 wanted to see you to say good-bye." 
 
 " Oh, don't go, don't go ! " she cried. 
 
 " I wanted to see you, Xenia, because I cannot go 
 away without telling you that I love you." 
 
 Xenia shrank back in fear ; but Kazimir, with grow- 
 ing vehemence, went on. " You may not have guessed 
 it, I have not betrayed it before ; but on the first day 
 that I saw you, I knew that the world had been empty 
 for me till then. I had never guessed that there could 
 
280 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 be such happiness as what I felt when I met your 
 eyes. I love you, Xenia; there is no word that can 
 tell you how I love you. Believe me only that you 
 are more to me than sunshine, light, and life itself; 
 believe me, Xenia, — believe me, it is you are the sun- 
 shine of my heart and the ideal of my life." 
 
 With one white arm thrown round a salt-column, 
 Xenia stood and looked back at him — shrinking, 
 blushing, and trembling, as for the first time in her 
 young life she listened to the tale of love. And 
 it was a wild and fiery tale she listened to; for 
 Kazimir had given reins to his passion, and it ran 
 away with him at headlong pace. It seemed that 
 never till now had the meaning of that one word 
 Love been understood, and it appeared that every- 
 thing which had ever been celebrated under that 
 name was mere weak imposture compared to this 
 feeling. He went on to tell her that his love was 
 deep as the sea and countless as the stars of night, 
 and to wish that he had the blood of ten thousand 
 men to shed for her sake. The metaphors were, to 
 put it mildly, imperfect; but fortunately neither of 
 the two people concerned was calm enough to ana- 
 lyse words, for she was dizzy with the delicious 
 agitation of the moment. She could make no attempt 
 to stop him ; but remembering the short measure of 
 his time, Kazimir, with an effort, checked himself. 
 
KING AND QUEEN. 281 
 
 " Listen, Xenia — tell me this : Is there any other 
 man whom you — God, must I say it ? — whom 
 you love?" 
 
 " No — oh no/' faltered Xenia, sinking her burning 
 face. 
 
 "Thank heavens!" he muttered. "And tell me 
 this still : Your friends want you to make a rich 
 marriage ; do you want that too ? " 
 
 " Oh no ; not at all." She raised her head and looked 
 at him quite openly. It was impossible to doubt for 
 a moment the answer of those innocent blue eyes. 
 They were as pure and as candid as the eyes of any 
 child. " I never thought of that at all." 
 
 " I knew it," cried Kazimir's heart, exultantly. 
 " She is an angel of disinterestedness ! " 
 
 " And there is no man you care for?" he persisted, 
 while the figure of the wealthy Tiburtio flitted through 
 his mind. " No man who is richer than I am ? " 
 
 "None — none at all," she repeated. 
 
 " And," — he came a step nearer and took both her 
 hands, — "Xenia, I have not known you long; but I 
 have thought sometimes — I have dared to hope— that 
 you cared for me, Xenia. Was I right — is it so ? Is 
 it indeed so'?" He was straining both her hands be- 
 tween his own ; he was striving to read an answer under 
 the downcast lashes. Xenia was trembling from head 
 to foot. The passionate tremor of his voice, and the 
 
282 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 intensity of fire in his eyes, were so new and strange 
 to her as to be almost alarming. It frightened her to 
 find herself loved in this terribly earnest fashion. Her 
 lips were quivering ; while the necklace of crystal 
 beads flashed up, and grew dull, and flashed up again, 
 as they rose and fell upon her panting breast. 
 
 " Is it so, Xenia — is it so indeed ? " urged Kazimir, 
 and he bent to catch her whisper. It was all he could 
 do to hear the one word " Yes." 
 
 That syllable was the key which opened the gates of 
 paradise upon earth ; without hesitation or reflection 
 he threw his arm around her and kissed her. Oh the 
 fire and the sweetness of that kiss ! All the world 
 seemed to fade around him ; nothing to be real but 
 this one spot on which they stood ; no one to exist 
 except these two, and those salt and silent witnesses 
 of the scene. Ah ! now would be the moment to defy 
 every earthly prejudice — to kneel down on the salt- 
 step before the salt- altar, to shake one of those hooded 
 figures by the arm, and to cry into his ear — " Arise, old 
 monk, and wed us ! " Alas ! alas that it could not be ! 
 This very moment, when all the world seemed distant 
 and dim, was just the moment when they must respect 
 its laws. With a tremendous effort of will, Kazimir let 
 go the hands he held, and made an attempt — a rather 
 late attempt — at calmness. In the momentary silence 
 that ensued, the strains of the Mazur fell upon their ears. 
 
KING AND QUEEN. 283 
 
 " Xenia, you have said Yes ; that is enough for 
 me ; it is more even than I dared to hope. I am 
 quite content to wait now, for years even, if neces- 
 sary ; but I hope it may be sooner. I will try and 
 explain what I mean. I am a poor man, as you know, 
 and it would be ungenerous of me if I were to take 
 advantage of your innocence and inexperience to bind 
 you to a poor man's life. Soon I shall have made 
 my way — this war will help me to make it — and I 
 shall then be in a position to claim you ; but it may 
 be years instead of months. I do not want to bind 
 you, my darling, but if you love me you will wait 
 for me. Is it not true ? " 
 
 "Yes," whispered the trembling girl; " I will wait. 
 Will it be long?" 
 
 " I have told you that it may be years. Is that 
 too long?" 
 
 " Oh no, I don't think so." 
 
 " Are you quite sure you understand me, Xenia ? " 
 said Kazimir, struggling all the time to quell his 
 passion. "I do not ask you to give any promise ; 
 but when I come back some day and ask you to 
 marry me, you will not be frightened, will you?" 
 
 " No, I won't be frightened," said Xenia, shrinking 
 at the plain word " marriage ; " " we can speak of that 
 then, you know. Oh, I hope this is not wrong ; what 
 would my aunt say? I wish Vizia was here ! " 
 
284 BEGGAR MY NEIGHBOUR. 
 
 " I am sure I don't/' said Kazimir between his 
 teeth. 
 
 " May I tell Vizia ? " she asked, anxiously. 
 
 " Tell your cousin, of course ; she will help you 
 and advise you ; she has guessed it already. Good 
 heavens, my time is nearly up ! " 
 
 " Must you really go to this dreadful war ? " The 
 ready tears started to her eyes. 
 
 " I must ; and if I should not return " 
 
 " Oh, don't speak like that ; " she clung to him for a 
 moment, and the tears sparkled on her lashes and fell. 
 
 " I will not say a word to distress you. There is 
 only time now to say good-bye." 
 
 " I am so glad I gave up the Mazur," she whispered. 
 " I really don't mind losing it at all." 
 
 " Oh yes," he said, with a start. He had forgotten 
 just then that there were such things as Mazurs in 
 the world. He was wondering whether he could not 
 pass the rest of his life in the salt-mines ; but alas ! 
 again, this also could not be. 
 
 " It is good-bye, now — really good-bye. I do not say, 
 ' Don't forget me ' — I know you will not ; but " — he 
 hastily detached a small coin from his watch-chain 
 — " keep this as a memory of to-night — keep it till 
 I come again ; and, Xenia, let me have something in 
 exchange — anything, a flower off your dress — it will 
 help me to wait." 
 
KING AND QUEEN. 285 
 
 " Yes, but not that one," said Xenia, as he pre- 
 pared to pluck one of the crystal blossoms ; " here is 
 one that will not be missed. And must you really go ? 
 Oh, is there not some one coming ? " 
 
 There were steps and voices approaching in the 
 passage. The Mazur music had come to an end. 
 Kazimir caught her in his arms once more. One more 
 kiss, one more word, and they had parted. The beau- 
 tiful nymph, drying her eyes, floated back into her 
 crystal cave — back to the lights, the music, and the 
 triumphs of the evening ; and Kazimir, having stood 
 and watched till she had vanished, turned to go his 
 own way, a way that led through the dark night to 
 duty, hardships, and danger — who knows ? perhaps 
 to death. 
 
 In the deserted chapel the saline monks prayed 
 on with their salt -heads bent and their salt -hands 
 clasped just as though there were nothing in the 
 world but salt ; nothing as sweet as a lover's kiss, 
 nothing as bitter as a lover's parting ! 
 
 END OF THE FIRST VOLUME. 
 
PRINTED BY WILLIAM BLACKWOOD AND SONS. 
 
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