13 November.

All my plans are shattered.  The doctor came this morning, and after examining Aniela, announced that there could be no question of any long journey for her, as it would be positively dangerous.  There seem to be some irregularities in her state.  What a torture to hear his professional jargon, when every word he utters seems to threaten the life of the beloved woman.  I told the doctor the position we are in, and he said that between two dangers he preferred the lesser one.

What troubled and angered me most was his advice to tell Aniela, after due preparation, about her husband’s death.  Alas!  I cannot deny that from his point of view he is right.  “If you are quite sure,” he said, “that you can keep it from Pani Kromitzka for some months to come, it would certainly be better to do so; but if not, it would be advisable to prepare her mind and then tell her; for if she receives the news suddenly there may be another catastrophe.”

What is to be done?  I must establish a quarantine around Ploszow, not let a paper or letter come in unknown to me, instruct the servants what to say, and to keep even their features under command.

What an impression news like this makes upon every one; I had an illustration in Pani Celina, to whom we had to tell the truth.  She fainted twice, and then went off into hysterics; which almost drove me frantic, because I thought she would be heard all over the house.  And yet she was not fond of her son-in-law; but she too, I suppose, was mostly afraid for Aniela.  I am strenuously opposed to the doctor’s advice, and do not think I shall ever agree to it.  I cannot tell them one thing,—­that Aniela did not love her husband, and that for that very reason the shock will be more terrible to her.

It is not merely a question of sorrow after the death of a beloved being, but of the reproaches she will apply to herself, thinking that if she had loved him more he might have clung more to his life.  Empty, trivial, and unjust reproaches, for she did everything that force of will could command,—­she spurned my love and remained pure and faithful to him.  But one must know that soul full of scruples as I know it, to gauge the depth of misery into which the news would plunge her, and how she would suspect herself,—­asking whether his death did not correspond to some deeply hidden desire on her part for freedom and happiness; whether it did not gratify those wishes she had scarcely dared to form.  My hair seems to rise at the very thought, because it is his death that opens a new life for her; consequently it will be a twofold shock,—­two blows to fall upon the dear head.  This, neither the doctor, my aunt, nor Pani Celina can understand.  No! she ought not to be told until after the event.