I did not wish to prolong the conversation, so utterly disgusted was I with my own perversity.  I had sown the seed,—­a very small and pitiable seed to produce anything; and yet I clung to it tenaciously.  One thing revived my hope.  At the moment when I tried to make him believe that a ruined man ought to set his wife free, there was a certain constraint and trouble in his expression.  I also noticed that when I spoke about his millions a slight sigh escaped him.  To infer from this that he is on the brink of ruin, would be jumping at conclusions; but I may fairly conjecture that his affairs are in a precarious state.  I resolved to get at the truth as quickly as possible.

In the mean while my own self seemed to be divided in two parts.  The one said:  “If you waver ever so little, I will push you downward if it should cost me my whole fortune.  I will work your ruin, and when I come to deal with a broken man, it remains to be seen whether for certain transactions you do not find a gentler word than, ‘villany.’” Yet I was conscious at the same time that these were not my thoughts nor my ways of dealing; that they had been suggested to me by somebody else, and that but for my desperate position they would never have found room in me, as they are averse to my nature and repulsive to me.  Money never played any part in my life, either as means or as aim.  I consider myself incapable of using such a weapon, and I felt what a degradation it would be for me and Aniela to introduce that element into our relations to each other.  The thought of it was so repulsive to me that I said to myself:  “Will you not spare yourself?  Must you even drink from such a bowl?  See how you are degenerating step by step.  Formerly thoughts like these would never have crossed your mind; and what is more, schemes like these are utterly useless, and will only lower you in your own eyes.”

In fact, formerly, when my aunt spoke of Kromitzki’s affairs in a doubting spirit, it had always caused me some uneasiness.  The prospect that at some time or other he might want me to assist him or take a share in his transactions had made me consider what I should do in such a case; and I always vowed that I would decline and have nothing to do with any of his affairs; so repugnant to me was the thought of mingling money matters with my relations to Aniela.  I remember that I saw in this another proof of the nobility and refinement of my feelings.  To-day I grasp that weapon as if I were a banker and had lived by money transactions all my life.

I perceive with absolute certainty that my thoughts and deeds are worse than myself, and I ask myself how that can be.  Most probably because I cannot find the way out of the labyrinth.  I love a noble woman; my love is very great; and yet, putting the two together, the net result is crookedness, and enchanted circles where my character loses itself and even my nerves grow less sensitive.  When, in former times,