Janina kept looking out of the window. Grzesikiewicz, all flushed and flustered and unlike himself, began to say something, taking little swallows of coffee in between, until, finally, he drained it off at the gulp and shoved his cup and saucer aside so vigorously that they went tumbling over the table. She laughed at his violence and embarrassment. "At a moment like this a man could swallow a lamp without noticing it," he remarked. "That would be quite a feat," she answered, again bursting into empty laughter. "Are you laughing at me?" he asked uneasily. "No, only the idea of swallowing a lamp seemed comical." They relapsed into silence. Janina fidgeted with the window-shade, while Grzesikiewicz tore at his gloves and impulsively bit his moustache; he was literally shaking with emotion. "It is so hard for me, so awfully hard!" he began, raising his eyes to her entreatingly. "Why?" she queried tersely and evasively. "Well, because . . . because . . . For God's sake, I can't stand it any longer! No, I can't endure this torment any longer, so I'll come right out with it: I love you, Miss Janina, and beg you for your hand," he cried aloud, at once sighing with immense relief. But immediately he struck his forehead with his hand and, taking Janina's hand, began anew: "I have loved you ever so long, but feared to tell you. And now I don't know how to express it as I would like to. . . . I love you and beg you to be my wife. . . ." He kissed her hand fervently and gazed at her with his blue, honest eyes burning with blind love. His lips twitched nervously and a pallor overspread his features. Janina arose from her chair and, looking straight into his eyes, answered slowly and quietly: "I do not love you." All her nervousness had vanished. Grzesikiewicz recoiled violently, as though someone had struck him, as though he did not understand. He said with a trembling voice: "Miss Janina . . . be my wife . . . I love you!" "I do not love you . . . I cannot therefore marry you . . . I will not marry at all!" she answered in the same cold tone, but at the last word her voice wavered with an accent of pity for him. "God!" cried Grzesikiewicz, holding his hand to his head. "What does it mean? . . . You will not marry! . . . You will not be my wife! . . . You do not love me!" He threw himself impulsively on his knees before her, seized her hands, and, covering them with kisses, began, with what seemed almost tears of feverish terror, to entreat her fervently, humbly.