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Updated: June 19, 2025
Aloysius Darvid, the owner of this mansion, had not inherited his millions; he had won them with his own iron labor, and he toiled continually to increase them. His industry, inventiveness, and energy were inexhaustible. To him business seemed to be what water is to a fish: the element which gives delight and freedom. What was his business?
"Cara!" cried Darvid, "well, you are here, little one! How often have I asked you to come always boldly. How do you feel to-day? You have not coughed much, I think? Have you taken your daily walk? With whom did you go? With Miss Mary, or Irene? Come, come, sit here in this armchair." He held her small hand in his and led her toward the table, which was surrounded with armchairs.
Then that man, usually calm and regular in all his movements, rushed to the door of the antechamber with the spring of a tiger. "Carriage!" cried he. "When the most famous doctor in the city came out of the sick girl's chamber that day for the second time, Darvid met him in the blue drawing-room, alone.
Darvid went to the door hurriedly, saying, also hurriedly: "It is! It is!" At that moment, from the darkness which filled the adjoining room, into the abundant light of the study, came a maiden of fifteen years, in a bright dress; she was tall and very slender, with a small waist and narrow breast.
Still with grace which was unconscious, since it had passed long before into habit, he turned to Darvid. "Thou hast written to me, dear Pan Aloysius " "I have called you," interrupted Darvid, "for the purpose of proposing a certain condition, and a change."
Yes, yes, Darvid knew that many people loved nature. Art and nature must be powers, since a multitude of men bow down to them. Perhaps he, too, would have done so if the career of his life had led him into their presence, but the path of his life led him in another direction, far from nature and art, hence he did not know them; he had not had the time.
In the midst of the lofty chamber, above the round table, burned the lamp with a great and calm light; on the desk, in massive candlesticks, burned candles. In that abundant light Darvid stood near the desk, with bent shoulders; a number of wrinkles between his brows; his face inclined low toward the paper which he held in his hand.
Darvid returned through that darkness in the opposite direction, and when he had passed the two spacious chambers hastily, he felt in the twinkle of an eye as if from behind, from that interior, some weight had been placed on his shoulders. He looked around. There was nothing but vacancy, obscurity, and silence. "Stupid!
The dawn was in Darvid's study also; but the servant was lighting the hanging-lamp over the round table. Darvid, very pale, with a nervous movement, tore rather than drew the gloves from his hands. "Then did she return from me? Where did she come from? You say that she was with me, and returned in that condition? But she was not here yesterday; I did not see her; she was not here "
Through her widely opened eyes looked fear, and under bright curls her forehead was thickly wrinkled. Because of his absence of ten days Darvid, on his return from the hunting scenes, which had passed noisily and splendidly at Prince Zeno's, rushed into the whirl of business of labors and visits which even for him, who was so greatly trained, proved to be wearisome and difficult.
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