from beneath his shock of flaxen
hair. She remembered too, his embarrassed shyness.

"A good, honest man!" she said to herself, walking up and down the
room; but then the thought occurred to her that his visit was likely
to spoil her intended trip to Bielany, and her enthusiasm began to
cool. She determined she would speak to him briefly.

"I wonder what he wants of me?" Janina asked herself uneasily,
assuming the most impossible things.

"My father must be very sick and wants me to come to him," she
answered herself.

She stood in the center of the room almost dazed, with fear that she
must return to Bukowiec.

"No, it is impossible! . . . I couldn't stand it there a single
week . . . and moreover, he drove me away from home forever . . ."

A chaotic conflict between hate, sorrow, and a quiet, scarcely
perceptible feeling of homesickness began to rage in Janina's heart.

The bell rang in the anteroom.

Janina sat down and waited quietly. She heard the door opening, the
voices of Grzesikiewicz and Sowinska, and the sound of an overcoat
being hung up.

"May I come in?" asked a voice outside.

"Please do," she whispered, choking with trepidation as she arose
from her chair.

Grzesikiewicz entered. His face was even more sunburnt than usual
and his blue eyes seemed bluer. He walked stiffly and erectly like a
petrified block of meat squeezed into a tight surtout with
difficulty. He almost threw his hat upon a basket standing near the
door and, kissing Janina's hand, said quickly: "Good morning . . ."

He straightened himself, scanned her face with his eyes and sat down
heavily in a chair.

"I had a hard time finding you . . ." he began, and suddenly broke
off. Then, as if to bolster up his courage, he attempted to shove
aside a chair that interfered with his actions but pushed it so hard
that it fell over.

He sprang up, all red in the face, and began to apologize.

Janina smiled, so vividly did that impulsive action remind her of
their last talk and that unfortunate proposal. And for a moment it
seemed to her that it was now that he was to propose and that they
were sitting in the quiet parlor at Bukowiec. She could not explain
to herself the impression that he made on her with that honest face,
worn by suffering, and with those bright blue eyes which seemed to
bring with them echoes of those beloved fields and woods, those
quiet glens, that golden sunlight and the free and bounteous life of
nature. Fo