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To this part of her speech the Judge listened with indescribable confusion and grief and with evident repugnance. As though fearing what she might say further, he bowed his head, made a gesture of assent, and flushed deeply. Telimena concluded by saying:— “I have had the care of her; I am of her kin, Zosia’s only guardian. No one but me shall ever plan her happiness!”
That Jacek provided money for Zosia’s education, and that he has assigned her a small yearly allowance, and has deigned to promise more, does not mean that he has bought her. Besides you both know, and it is pretty generally known too, that your generosity for us is not without its reasons; the Soplicas owe something to the family of the Horeszkos.”
Telimena observed her with the eyes of an expert; she drilled her niece, grew angry, and grimaced; finally at Zosia’s curtsy she cried out in despair:— “Unhappy me! Zosia, you see what comes of living among geese and shepherds! You stride along like a boy, and turn your eyes to the right and left like a divorced woman! Curtsy! see how awkward you are!”
In the air an immense cloud of insects gathered and whirled about, playing like the music of the spheres; Zosia’s ear distinguished amid the thousand noises the accord of the flies and the false half-tone of the mosquitoes.
Then, uncle, I shall remind you of your promise, then on my knees I shall greet my dear Zosia, and, if she is free, I shall beg her hand; but now I am abandoning Lithuania, perhaps for long, and perhaps in the meantime another man may win Zosia’s favour. I do not wish to bind her will, and to beg for an affection that I have not deserved would be a base act.”
Then the chambermaid, weaving into a wreath some freshly gathered cornflowers, gave them to Telimena, who pinned them skilfully on Zosia’s head, from the right to the left: the flowers were relieved very beautifully against the light hair, as against ears of grain! They took off the dressing-sack; the toilet was complete.
But there were very few hens: since the attack that bloodthirsty Buzzard Dobrzynski had made on the hencoop at the time of the foray, when he had annihilated Zosia’s establishment, without leaving a bit for medicine,190 Soplicowo, once famous for its poultry, had not yet managed to blossom out again with new birds.
Zosia curtsied politely; he bowed low, wanted to say something to her, and had already opened his lips; but, when he looked into Zosia’s eyes he was so abashed, that, standing dumb before her, he first flushed and then grew pale. What lay upon his heart, he himself could not guess; he felt himself very unhappy—he had recognised Zosia—by her stature and her bright hair and her voice!
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