Their conversation went to say on tiptoe, for fear of outraging that which not long before had been raging very tempestuously.
Poldik suddenly burst in upon these placable remarks with the following monologue:—“Dotards, liars! And they tell us that God looks at the heart! He looks not at all at the heart. He allows the heart of him who hath one to be wrung from him—to be torn in pieces, and then the people flock around to laugh at those pieces as at the crucified Jesus. Yes! look at my heart! See how they pierce it but let them torture it. All your talking is not worthy that I should write it down on paper and then light my pipe with the paper.”
At these words all present looked at one another, and pointed to their foreheads as if they would say, “His reason has given way.”
CHAPTER IV
AFTER this scene Malka took her to the water-side, even when Poldik so pitilessly drove her away from him. She went with a faint notion that perhaps Poldik would soon follow her there himself, and that it would be easier to come to an understanding by the water-side than in the ale-house. But Poldik and cart never appeared, at least they did not appear so quickly as Malka thought they would. And when they did appear nothing more was to be seen of Malka, she was already with Francis in the skiff, and the skiff was—the Lord knows where.
For they had not by any means done with one another.
And we must say that Malka on the water recovered her spirits surprisingly soon. On the whole she liked life on the water far better than life in the street. Also, hitherto life with Francis had been far more agreeable to her than life with Poldik.
In the streets went on a monotonous, unexciting, sluggish, actually clattering carting of sand. Here on the water life acquired wings, and was swift, bird-like, and diversified. And such as the street was Poldik, and such as the water was Francis. With Poldik, before a thought got clothed in words, no brief interval of time was needed. With Francis a word was like a look. He could speak without let or stay, and never was in want of a topic. What a perfect convulsion of nature took place before Poldik managed to say that he loved her. Francis had said it to her at once with-
