Janina knew when the Cabinskis were leaving, so she went down to the steamboat landing. She stood upon the bridge and watched them steam away. She gazed at the gray waves of the Wisla splashing against the sides of the pier and at the distant horizon veiled in autumn mists, and such an intense sadness and grief overwhelmed her that she could not move from the spot, or tear her eyes away from the water. Night fell and Janina still stood there, gazing before her. The rows of lights on the river banks sprang up from the darkness like golden flowers and dotted the rocking, greenish surface of the water with quivering gleams. The din and hum of the city echoed dimly behind her, the hacks sped with noisy clatter across the bridge, the bells of the tramcars clanged incessantly, crowds of people passed by with laughter; sometimes the echo of a song reached Janina, or the merry tones of a hand organ, then again, a warm breath of wind, saturated with the raw odor of the river, fanned her feverish face. All these sights and sounds beat against her as against a lifeless statue and rebounded again without making any impression on her. The water in its depths began to pass through ever stranger transformations: it turned black, but that blackness was interwoven with gleams of light, flames of red, streaks of violet, and rays of yellow, like the glowing flame of pain. There, in those silent depths, there seemed to be a better and fuller life, for the waves murmured so joyously, broke against the piers and stone bulwarks and, as though with frenzied laughter, united again, blended, tumbled over one another and flowed on. Janina seemed almost to hear their care free laughter, their calling to one another and their voice of mighty joy. "What are you doing here?" suddenly said a voice behind her. Janina trembled and turned around slowly. Wolska was standing before her and curiously and uneasily watching her. "Oh, nothing, I was just gazing about." "Come with me, the air here isn't healthy," said Wolska, taking Janina by the arm, for she read in her dimmed eyes a suicidal intent. Janina allowed herself to be led away and only after they had gone some distance, she asked quietly, "So you have not left with Cabinski?" "I couldn't. You see, my Johnnie's health is again worse. The doctor has forbidden me to move him from bed and I believe that it would kill him," whispered Wolska sadly. "I had to stay, for, of course, I can't send him to the hospital. If it comes to the worst, we shall die together, but I will not forsake him. The doctor still gives me some hope that he will recover."