It is very probable that my going there and the
getting over the first meeting will be easier and far simpler than I
imagine. Expectancy of anything is always oppressive. When a young
lad, I had a duel; and on the eve of the day I felt troubled. Then,
too, I tried to think of something else, and could not manage it.
My thoughts are not at all tender, not even friendly, towards Pani
Kromitzka; but they swarm around me like angry bees, and I cannot
drive them away.
17 April.
I have been to Ploszow, and found things very different indeed from
what I had pictured to myself. I left Warsaw at seven in the morning
in a cab, counting I should be in Ploszow by eight. The oppressive
feeling still remained with me. I had said to myself that I would not
make any plans about that first meeting, or my future bearing towards
her. Let chance be my guide. But I could not help speculating how
it would be,--how she would greet me, what she would try to make me
understand, and what our future relation to each other would be. Not
having formed any plans of my own, I fancied, I do not know why that
she would want to act according to a well-defined system. Trying to
fathom this, I felt almost inimical towards her. Then again, at the
thought that the meeting might cause her pain, I felt something akin
to pity, and seemed to see her before me as she used to be.
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