Page:Henryk Sienkiewicz - In Vain.djvu/147

Rh phas Visberg left to his wife, inconsolable in her sorrow, about nine times one hundred thousand zlotys, and he would have left more if inexorable Fate had not cut short his days. He entered the kingdom of shadows more sated with years than with income.

But this income fell to good hands, for both ladies had excellent hearts. They helped widows and orphans; they paid their servants, male and female, regularly; they paid tithes to their church faithfully; in a word, they performed all Christian deeds which concern soul and body.

They received the countess with open arms, and with as much cordiality as if they had been her relatives. Malinka, an honest though simple maiden, was in love out and out with the noble orphan. How much she promised herself from the first glance to be kind and obliging to her, how much she wished to comfort her, how much she dreamed of a pure friendship with her in the future, it would be difficult to tell; enough that Yosef found as good protection for the countess as if she had been in the house of her own parents—it could not have been better.

It is true that the countess was well fitted to rouse sympathy. The silent and deep sorrow