I had promised Stanisław Światełki some days beforehand that I would go to him one day in the course of the week to write his home letters for him--"very important letters," as he said. It was now Saturday, so I could postpone it no longer. Stanisław was lame, and, on account of both his lameness and his calling, he rarely left the house. He came from the district of Cracow--from Wiślica, as far as I recollect--and prided himself on belonging to one of the oldest burgher families of the Old Town, a family which, as far as fathers' and grandfathers' memories could reach, had applied itself to the noble art of shoemaking. Stanisław, therefore, was also a shoemaker, the last in his family; for although the family did not become extinct in him, nevertheless, as he himself expressed it, "Divine Providence had ordained" that he should not hand down his trade to his son. "God has brought him up, sir, and it seems to have been His will that the shoemaker Światełkis should come to an end in me," Stanisław used to say. He had a habit of talking quickly, as if he were rattling peas on to a wall. Only at very rare moments, when something gave him courage and no strangers were present, he would add: "Though His judgments are past finding out.... What does it matter? Why, my grandson will be a shoemaker!" He would then grow pale from having expressed his secret thought, turn round quickly, as though looking for something, shift uneasily, and--as I noticed sometimes--unconsciously spit and whisper to himself: "Not in an evil hour be it spoken, Lord!" thereby driving away the spell from his dearest wish. He was of middle height, fair, but nearly grey, and had lost all his teeth. He wore a beard, and had a broad, shapeless nose and large, hollow eyes; it was difficult to say what kind of person he was as long as he sat silent. But only let him move--which, notwithstanding the inseparable stick, he always did hastily, not to say feverishly--only let him pour out his quick words with a tongue moving like a spinning-wheel, and no one who had ever seen a burgher of pure Polish blood could fail to recognize him as a chip of the old block. Stanisław had not long carried on his trade in X----. Having scraped together some money as foreman, he had started a small shop; but he was chiefly famous in the little town as the one maker of good Polish sausages. He had a house next door to the shop, consisting of one room and a tiny kitchen. He did not keep a servant; a big peasant, known as Maciej, prepared his meals and gave him companionship and efficient protection. Hitherto, however, I had known very little of this man.