The Doll (51 page)

‘Aha — the auction has started,' said Ignacy to himself, following them up the stairs.

At this moment he felt someone take hold of his arm and, turning, saw that same majestic gentleman who had obtained a rouble on account from Szlangbaum in the café. The stately personage was obviously in a hurry, for he was making way for himself with both fists among the packed mass of the Hebrews' bodies, shouting: ‘Out of my way, Yids! I am going to the auction …'

Against their custom, the Jews drew aside and looked at him with admiration: ‘What money he must have!' one muttered to his neighbour.

Ignacy, infinitely less presumptuous than the stately individual, yielded himself up to the favour and disfavour of fate, rather than push. The stream of Hebrews surrounded him on all sides. In front he saw a greasy collar, dirty neckerchief and still dirtier neck: behind, he could smell the odour of fresh onion: to the right, a grizzled beard pressed against his collar-bone, and to the left a powerful elbow was squeezing his ribs almost unbearably.

They thronged about, pushed, clutched at his coat. Someone grabbed his legs, another reached into his pocket, someone thumped him between the shoulder blades. It reached the point where Ignacy thought they would entirely crush his chest. He raised his eyes to Heaven, and saw he was already within the door … Now! Now! They were stifling him … Suddenly he felt an empty space before him, struck his head on someone's personal charms not very carefully veiled in a frock-coat and was inside the court-room.

He breathed again. Behind him resounded the shrieks and curses of the would-be bidders and from time to time the comments of the door-man: ‘Gents, why are you pushing so? What's this, gents? Are you a flock of sheep, then?'

‘I never thought it would be so hard to get into an auction sale,' Ignacy sighed.

He passed two court-rooms, so empty that there was not even a chair to be seen on the floor, nor a nail in the wall. These rooms formed the vestibule to one of the departments of justice, but were light and cheerful all the same. Floods of sun-beams and the warm July breeze, imbued with Warsaw dust, poured through the open windows. Ignacy could hear the twitter of sparrows and the ceaseless rattle of droshkies, and felt a curious sensation of disharmony: ‘Is it possible,' thought he, ‘that a court should look as empty as an unrented apartment and yet be so cheerful?'

It seemed to him that barred windows, grey damp walls and suspended handcuffs would be much more appropriate to a court-room in which people were sentenced to everlasting or at least lifelong imprisonment.

But here was the main court-room, into which all the Hebrews were hastening, and where the whole business of the auction was concentrated. It was such a large room that forty people might have danced a mazurka in it — were it not for the low barrier which divided it into two sections, for civil cases and for auctions. In the civil portion were carved benches, in the auction part was a platform, with a table on it, circular and covered with green baize. Behind the table Ignacy saw three officials with chains around their necks and senatorial dignity on their faces: they were the auctioneers. In front of each official lay a heap of documents concerning the properties for sale. Between the table and barrier, immediately in front of the latter, was a crowd of would-be buyers. All had their heads raised and were gazing at the officials with a spiritual absorption that inspired ascetics gazing at a holy vision might have envied.

Although the windows were open, a smell midway between the scent of hyacinths and aged putty prevailed in the court. Ignacy guessed it was the smell of Jewish gabardines.

Except for the rattle of droshkies, it was quite quiet in the court-room. The auctioneers were silent, absorbed in their documents, the buyers equally silent, gazing at the auctioneers: the remainder of the public, gathered in the civilian portion of the hall and separated into groups, was certainly murmuring, but softly. It was not in their own interests to be overheard.

Consequently the groan of Baroness Krzeszowska sounded all the louder as, clutching her lawyer by the lapel of his frock-coat, she cried feverishly: ‘Do not leave me, I beg you! I'll pay you anything you ask …'

‘Please, Baroness — no threats,' replied the lawyer.

‘I'm not threatening you in the least, but don't leave me,' the Baroness exclaimed with genuine feeling.

‘I'll come back for the auction, but just now I have to go to my murderer …'

‘So! A wretched murderer arouses more of your sympathy than a deserted woman, whose property, honour, peace of mind …'

The importuned lawyer fled so fast that his trousers looked even shinier around the knees than they really were. The Baroness began to run after him, but at this moment she fell into the embrace of an individual who wore very green spectacles and had the countenance of a sacristan.

‘Dear lady, what is wrong?' the individual in green spectacles asked sweetly, ‘no lawyer vill inflate the price of your house … That is vat I am here for. Gif me one per cent for every thousand roubles over the initial sum, and tventy roubles for expenses …'

The Baroness Krzeszowska started away from him and, recoiling like an actress in a tragic role, uttered a single word: ‘Satan!' The individual in green spectacles realised he had missed the boat and withdrew in discomfiture. At the same time, his path was crossed by a second individual with the features of a confirmed scoundrel, who whispered to him for a few moments, making very lively gestures. Ignacy was certain these two gentlemen would come to blows, but they parted quite peaceably and the individual who looked a scoundrel drew near the Baroness Krzeszowska and said in a low voice: ‘If the Baroness is not careful, we may even not let the price reach seventy thousand …'

‘My saviour!' cried the Baroness, ‘you see before you a wronged and deserted female, whose property, honour and peace of mind …'

‘What's honour to me?' said the individual with the visage of a scoundrel, ‘will you give me ten roubles deposit?'

Both went off into the furthest corner of the room and were lost to Ignacy's gaze behind a group of Hebrews. In the group were old Szlangbaum and a young, beardless Jew who was so pale and emaciated that Ignacy suspected he must very recently have entered into the bonds of matrimony. Old Szlangbaum was holding forth to the emaciated little Jew, whose eyes grew more and more sheepish; but just what he was holding forth about, Ignacy could not imagine.

So he turned to the other side of the room and caught sight of Mr Łęcki with his lawyer, a few paces away; the latter was clearly bored and wanted to be off. ‘If only a hundred and fifteen … or a hundred and twenty thousand,' said Mr Łęcki, ‘after all, you must know some method …'

‘Hm … hm …' said the lawyer, looking longingly at the door, ‘you're asking too much … A hundred and twenty thousand roubles for a house that cost sixty thousand …'

‘But, my dear man, it cost me a hundred thousand …'

‘Yes, but … you paid rather too much …'

‘Yet,' Mr Łęcki interrupted, ‘I'm only asking a hundred and ten thousand. It strikes me you ought to help me, no matter what. Surely there are ways of which I know nothing, since I'm not a lawyer …'

‘Hm … hm …' the lawyer muttered.

Fortunately one of his colleagues (also in a frock-coat with badge) called him from the room: a moment later the individual in green spectacles with the look of a sacristan approached Mr Łęcki and said: ‘Vhat is the matter, Your Excellency? No lawyer will outbid you for the house. That is vat I am here for. Gif me tventy roubles for expenses and one per cent per thousand above sixty thousand …'

Mr Łęcki eyed the sacristan with vast contempt: he put both hands in his trouser pockets (which struck even himself as odd) and declared: ‘I'll pay one per cent per thousand over a hundred and twenty thousand …'

The sacristan in green spectacles bowed, shrugged his left shoulder and replied: ‘You must excuse me, Excellency …'

‘Wait!' Mr Łęcki interrupted, ‘over a hundred and ten …'

‘Excuse me …'

‘Over a hundred, then!'

‘Excuse me …'

‘May the devil take you! How much do you want?'

‘One per cent on any sum over seventy thousand, plus tventy roubles for expenses,' said the sacristan, bowing low.

‘Will you take ten?' asked Mr Łęcki, purple with fury.

‘I won't say no even to a rouble …'

Mr Łęcki produced a splendid wallet, took a whole bundle of rustling ten-rouble notes from it and gave one to the sacristan who bowed: ‘You'll see, Your Excellency,' the sacristan whispered.

Two Jews were standing near Ignacy: one was tall and swarthy, with a beard so black as to be blue, while the other was bald, with such long whiskers that they reached down to the lapels of his frock-coat. Catching sight of Łęcki's ten-rouble notes, the gentleman with the whiskers smiled and said in an undertone to the handsome dark man: ‘See the bank-notes yonder gent has? Listen how they rustle … They're glad to see me. You understand me, Mr Cynader?'

‘Łęcki is your client, then?' asked the handsome dark man.

‘Why not?'

‘He has … a sister in Cracow who is bequeathing to his daughter …'

‘Suppose she doesn't, though?'

The gentleman with whiskers was taken aback for a moment: ‘Don't talk such nonsense to me! Why shouldn't his sister in Cracow make a will, seeing she's sick?'

‘I don't know nothin' about that,' the handsome dark man replied (Ignacy had to admit he had never before seen such a handsome man).

‘But he has a daughter, Mr Cynader,' said the owner of the flowing whiskers uneasily, ‘you know his daughter Izabela, don't you, Mr Cynader? I'd give her — well, a hundred roubles and no questions asked.'

‘I'd give her a hundred and fifty,' said the handsome dark man, ‘though of course that Łęcki is a doubtful case.'

‘Doubtful? And what about Mr Wokulski?'

‘Mr Wokulski? Ah — that's big business,' replied the dark man, ‘but she's stupid and Łęcki is stupid and so are they all. And they will destroy Wokulski, and he can't do anything about it.'

Ignacy saw red: ‘Good God!' he thought, ‘so they even talk about Wokulski at auction-sales, and about her. And they even predict she will destroy him. Good God!'

Some confusion had occurred at the table occupied by the auctioneers; all the spectators surged in that direction. Old Szlangbaum approached the table, nodded on the way to the emaciated Jew and winked imperceptibly at the stately individual to whom he had been talking in the café. At the same moment, Baroness Krzeszowska's lawyer hurried in, took his place in front of the table without so much as looking at her and muttered to the auctioneer: ‘Be quick, be quick, for goodness sake, I have no time to waste …'

A new group of persons entered the court a few moments after the lawyer. They consisted of a married couple apparently in the butchering line of business, an old lady with a teenage grandson and two gentlemen: one was stout and grey-haired, the other curly-haired and consumptive-looking. Both had humble expressions and shabby clothing but on catching sight of them, the Jews began whispering together and pointing at them with expressions of admiration and respect. Both stopped so near Ignacy that he involuntarily overheard some comments the grey-haired gentleman made to his curly-haired companion: ‘Do as I do, Ksawery. I am in no hurry, I assure you. I've been going to buy a nice little house for three years now, something costing a hundred thousand or so, for my old age — but I'm in no hurry. I see in the papers what houses are up for auction, I read them slowly, I work it all out in my head, then I come here to see what offers people make. And now that I've gained experience and want to buy a property — the prices all go up in a most impractical way, damnation take them, and I have had to start all my calculations over again. But when we start, I assure you we'll beat down the prices …'

‘Silence!' someone at the table shouted. The court-room grew quiet, and Ignacy listened to the description of an apartment house situated in so-and-so street, with three wings and three floors, a driveway, garden and the like. During this important event, Mr Łęcki went pale then pink by turns, and Baroness Krzeszowska kept sniffing a crystal flask in a gold case.

‘Why, I know that house!' the individual in green glasses like a sacristan, suddenly exclaimed, ‘I know that house! It's worth a hundred and twenty thousand roubles at least …'

‘What d'you mean?' exclaimed the gentleman with the look of a scoundrel, next to the Baroness Krzeszowska, ‘what sort of a house is it? It's a positive ruin, it's a morgue …'

Mr Łęcki turned very pink. He nodded to the sacristan and asked in a whisper: ‘Who is that scoundrel?'

‘Him?' asked the sacristan, ‘he'll be hanged one day … Don't pay no attention, Your Excellency.' And he added loudly: ‘Upon my word, a man could safely pay a hundred and thirty thousand for it.'

‘Who is that scoundrel?' the Baroness asked the individual with a wicked look on his face, ‘who's that in the green spectacles?'

‘Him?' asked the man, ‘he's a well-known criminal … he left jail not so long ago. Don't pay any attention to him, madam. Not worth spitting on …'

‘Silence, there!' an official voice called from the table.

Smiling in a familiar manner, the sacristan winked at Mr Łęcki and pushed his way between the bidders to the table. There were a total of four: the Baroness's lawyer, the stately individual, old Szlangbaum and the emaciated Jew, next to whom the sacristan stopped.

‘Sixty thousand and five hundred roubles,' said Baroness Krzeszowska's lawyer.

‘Good God! It's not worth a penny more,' put in the individual with the face of a scoundrel. The Baroness glanced triumphantly at Mr Łęcki.