Page:Three stories by Vítězslav Hálek (1886).pdf/157

 Sunday we might dine together in your lodging.” He thought that in saying this he had said a great deal, and that it was a consequence of that much revolved sentence “When are you two going to pair off.” But any one at all versed in the expression of ideas, will agree with me that it really said very little.

Such apparently was Malka’s opinion. And she replied laughingly, “What an idea, Poldik, when we are as we are! What would people say?”

Malka said much more than Poldik had done previously, indeed she led him a good piece of the way to the goal he had in view, perhaps even farther than was becoming in so young a girl. But Poldik being, properly speaking, slow, vacillating, and indecisive in mind did not perceive that she beckoned him so far in order that he might say the word, and then that they might reach the end in view. Poldik only gathered from her reply that he was not to be admitted to her table or to eat in her company. “At present she thinks she couldn’t yet” he said to himself, and then wondered when the happy hour would come. And though it was his Sunday dinner and Malka had taken particular pains with it, Poldik scarcely smiled, and scarcely praised her cookery.

When the meal was over, Malka said “Dear me, Poldicek, aren’t you going anywhere this fine Sunday.”

Here Poldik did smile again, for he more easily understood this immediate project.