When I come to see her in
her new matronly dignity, satisfied with her heroism, self-possessed,
in love, or apparently so, with her husband, watching me furtively to
see whether I have been punished, and punished sufficiently, full of
happiness and her own virtues, the ghost of my old love will be laid,
and I can go back to where the reindeer lives without Aniela's memory
following me like the sea-gulls in the track of ships.
It is possible that Pani Kromitzka will put on the airs of an injured
victim, and her whole manner to me may say: "It is your fault!" Very
well. We have seen some of that in the world. As artificial flowers
have one defect, the want of scent, artificial crowns of thorn have
one advantage, they do not prick, and may be worn as a bonnet, very
becoming to a pretty face. Whenever I met one of those victims who
married out of despair I felt a desire to say: "It is not true! you
were a victim maybe in good faith as long as the chosen one did not
approach you in his slippers. From that moment you ceased to be
pathetic, and are only ridiculous, and the more so if you pose as a
victim."
6 April.
How beautiful and wise is the Greek word "ananke." It was fated that
through a woman I should lose my peace of mind, though I had ceased
to care for her. The news that her ancestral seat is sold, and she
herself coming to live at Ploszow, moved me so deeply that I could not
sleep.
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