In Litka's chamber there was darkness, for the window-blinds were closed, and the sun was going down. Only through the slats did some reddish rays force their way; these lighted the chamber imperfectly and vanished soon, for the sky began to grow cloudy. Litka was sleeping soundly. Pan Stanislav, sitting near her, looked on her sleeping face, and at the first moment his heart was oppressed painfully. She was lying with her face toward the ceiling; her thin little hands were placed on the coverlid; her eyes were closed, and under them was a deep shadow from the lashes. Her pallor, which seemed waxen in that reddish half-gloom, and her open mouth, finally, the deep sleep,--gave, her face the seeming of such rest as the faces of the dead have. But the movement of the ruffles on her nightdress showed that she was living and breathing. Her respiration was even calm and very regular. Pan Stanislav looked for a long time at that sick face, and felt again, with full force, what he had felt often, when he thought of himself,--namely, that nature had made him to be a father; that, besides the woman of his choice, children might be the immense love of his life, the chief object and reason of his existence. He understood this, through the pity and love which he felt at that moment for Litka, who, a stranger to him by birth, was as dear to him then as would have been his own child. "If she had been given to me," thought he; "if she lacked a mother,--I would take her forever, and consider that I had something to live for." And he felt also that were it possible to make a bargain with death, he would have given himself without hesitation to redeem that little "kitten," over whom death seemed then to be floating like a bird of prey over a dove. Such tenderness seized him as he had not felt till that hour; and that man, of a character rather quick and harsh, was ready to kiss the hands and head of that child, with a tenderness of which not even every woman's heart is capable. Meanwhile it had grown dark. Soon Pani Emilia came in, shading with her hand a blue night-lamp. "She is sleeping?" asked she, in a low voice, placing the lamp on the table beyond Litka's head. "She is," answered Pan Stanislav, in an equally low voice. Pani Emilia looked long at the sleeping child. "See," whispered Pan Stanislav, "how regularly and calmly she breathes. To-morrow she will be healthier and stronger." "Yes," answered the mother, with a smile. "Now it is your turn. Sleep, sleep! otherwise I shall begin to command without pity." Her eyes continued to smile at him thankfully. In the mild blue light of the night-lamp she seemed like an apparition. She had a perfectly angelic face; and Pan Stanislav thought in spite of himself that she and Litka looked really like forms from beyond the earth, which by pure chance had wandered into this world. "Yes," answered she; "I will rest now. Marynia has come, and Professor Vaskovski. Marynia wishes absolutely to remain."