A German Pompadour Part 33

She reflected grimly on the blessings of powder to age-silvering locks; none would see that her black hair was streaked with white.

Her step had never been prouder than when she walked through her empty antehall which, but a few days earlier, had been filled with a bowing crowd of courtiers. She was almost surprised to find Baron Schutz awaiting her as usual in the 'Landhofmeisterin's business-room,' that small room on the ground floor of the west pavilion whence for twenty years had issued the ruling orders of Wirtemberg. She worked as she had done each morning for many years. Sitting at the large middle table she transacted the business of the Dukedom. Beside her was a pile of unwritten papers signed at the bottom of each page by Eberhard Ludwig. It was only needful to write any decree above his Highness's signature, to affix his seal beneath, and to add her own official name 'W. von Gravenitz-Wurben, pro Landhofmeister Wirtembergs,' to make the writing an una.s.sailable, all-powerful, official doc.u.ment. Gradually things had come to this pa.s.s. The Duke preferred hunting, shooting, riding, to affairs of State, and in the course of years the Gravenitz had succeeded in grasping complete, autocratic power. There was no one to hinder her; her brother was Prime Minister in name, but he was forced to bring each important matter to her, for she represented his Highness.

The Geheimrathe were one and all her creatures; the Duke refused to meddle, and if he expressed a wish, it was so promptly and ostentatiously carried out that he never realised how entirely he had ceded the reins of government to his mistress. To the Landhofmeisterin's working-room came the officers of the Secret Service, bringing their reports on the doings of all Wirtembergers of high or low estate, each report of value being carefully noted and locked away in the wire-protected shelves which furnished the walls.

The Landhofmeisterin laboured, according to habit, on the morning after the banquet, and if she detected a freer tone in the heretofore obsequious Schutz's voice, a shade of insolence in his manner, she gave no sign thereof. If anything, she was more haughty, more dictatorial than ever.

'I am retiring to La Favorite for a few days' rest, Baron Schutz,' she said, when the affairs of the day were accomplished; 'you will bring me any business which it is necessary for me to consider. I shall have these with me'--she tapped the signed pages--'the seal I shall also have with me. As I am fatigued, I shall not work longer this morning. Au revoir, Baron.' He was dismissed.

'Your Excellency would do well to leave me the signatures. I may have need of them,' he said hurriedly, stretching out his hand towards the pile of signed warrant papers.

'Since when can Baron Schutz dispose of his Highness's signature? I have already told you that if urgent business arises, in spite of my fatigue, I shall be prepared to attend to it at La Favorite. Au revoir, Baron.'

She spoke resolutely, yet in a perfectly unconcerned voice, and Schutz, fearing lest his observations had failed him, and the 'great one' was after all not nearing her downfall, bowed himself out with his accustomed obsequiousness. He would have changed his mind could he have seen the cloud of misery and anxiety which settled on her face directly she was alone. She arranged various papers, extracting several from the neatly docketed packets. These she regarded as instruments in her hands; this doc.u.ment was a sword of Damocles which she could suspend over the head of that enemy; this other a pistol which, an she willed it, she could level at the credit and honour of another; here a short report spelling ruin to a n.o.ble family's pride; there a note to convict an honoured courtier of fraud or of traitorous intrigue. If she was indeed to fall, she would not alone be flung from her eminence; those who had hated her should also be dragged down with her. She smiled bitterly. After all, even though she wreaked vengeance as she fell, what would it avail her? This triumph of her spite would be a satisfaction, but----She sighed, and would have replaced the d.a.m.ning papers in their hiding-place. No! she would take them with her. If the crushing misfortune came, at least she would have the consolation of retaining some power over others.

Sadly she mounted the stairs to her own apartments, and calling the waiting-maid, she bade Maria gather together all the jewels and gold; a few of her best-loved books; some of her most gorgeous clothes.

Grumbling, Maria packed them in a huge nail-studded chest.

The Landhofmeisterin stood watching till the last chosen object was safely packed away, then she bade Maria summon lackeys from La Favorite.

They came quickly, and her Excellency ordered them to carry the chest to her little Chateau Joyeux. Her voice was perfectly steady as she gave these orders, her face stern and calm. Her whole action was unhurried, deliberate; she might have been making arrangements for a gay hunting expedition. There was no trace of anxiety in her manner.

Maria hovered about, after the lackeys had departed with the chest. Did her Excellency wish for this or that? Should she accompany her Ladyship's Grace to La Favorite? Calmly the Landhofmeisterin bade her precede her, she would follow in a few moments. She heard Maria locking the wardrobes in the chamber below, listened to her giving orders for the redding up of the apartments, exactly as she had heard the maid finish her preparations for departure a hundred times before starting for Urach or Freudenthal.

'Beloved, the coaches await us; shall we begin our journey?' The Landhofmeisterin started. Yes; that was how Eberhard Ludwig had summoned her in the old, happy days. Her nerves had tricked her, it was only an echo of long ago. Could everything, indeed, be ended? Was she leaving Ludwigsburg for ever? Ah, no, no! how absurd! Of course Serenissimus would recall her directly this bl.u.s.tering King had gone back to his drill at Berlin! And yet----

She moved slowly round her rooms. Fifteen years since Frisoni had conducted her to her pavilion! She recalled how she and Eberhard Ludwig had laughed at the little Italian's ruse, when he led them up and down corridors and stairs in order to reach her apartments from his Highness's rooms. The memory of their mirth was torture to her. Once more she took the key from her bosom and, pa.s.sing through the statue gallery, she gained the hiding-place behind the arras. She listened, but there was no sound; she pressed the secret spring of the tapestry door and entered the writing-closet. Slowly she walked round the room; she had not come to rob the bureau this time, nor to upbraid her lover, nor to tempt him once again. No; she had come to bid farewell, to look her last upon the familiar scene. One of the Duke's gauntleted hunting-gloves lay on the floor; she stooped and lifted it and put it to her lips. Then the full sense of her loneliness came to her, and she sobbed aloud. She hurried away, and her last vision of that well-known room was blurred by her tears.

One parting look round her own apartments, and she pa.s.sed out on to the roofed terrace which led from the Corps de Logis to the West Pavilion.

Here her own face met her on sculptured vaulting and ornamented wall. Her face, young, smiling, voluptuous, surrounded by the emblems of music held by Cupids. Love, music, and herself. What a mockery it seemed to her, this open homage, this enduring monument of a dead pa.s.sion!

With steady tread she paced down the flight of stone steps to the second terrace. Again a statue with her features met her eye. Frisoni had designed the pedestal. She remembered how she had laughed at the Italian for drawing a figure of Time with huge wings and holding giant sickle-blades in his oversized hands. She had called it awkward and ill-conceived, and the Italian had told her that Time was an awkward giant; that he crushed strength and glory sometimes, and left weakness and shame to live. She had hardly noted the answer then, but it came back to her now. She looked at the sickle-blades and shuddered, knowing that Time had mown her down at last.

All day the Landhofmeisterin busied herself with her books, with playing upon the spinet, and singing her favourite songs. She was a prey to fearful unrest. Night fell, the hunters had returned, and yet his Highness sent no word to her he had called 'Life of my Life.' Perchance he was much occupied. The Prussian King was an exacting guest, she told herself; framing excuses, reasons, all the pitiful resources of a woman's heart, to explain away her beloved's coldness. The fact that the courtiers held aloof from her caused her no pain, only bitter anger, yet even for these she elaborated reasons of absence. How often had she wearied of these people's importunities, how often longed to be left in peace, and yet now she would have given vast sums could she have seen her antechamber full again. She knew that Friedrich Wilhelm's visit would terminate on the morning following the wild-boar sticking in the Kernen forest. Would he go, this rough, virtue-loving despot? She remembered how he had tarried four whole weeks at Dresden when he had paid a visit to Augustus the Strong some years before. And this in spite of his disapproval of the reigning favourite, the Countess Orzelska, and the many lesser stars of that licentious court. Good Heavens! would he stay four weeks at Ludwigsburg? She smiled; even in her despair there was something humorous in her being which no sadness could dull, and she found her own dismay at the honoured guest's possible procrastination a trifle comic.

Eberhard Ludwig must come back to her--he must; she repeated it over and over again. The night brought her no rest; always the same hammering thought, the torturing, nagging possibilities, the tangle of recollections. Sometimes she slipped away for a few moments into a restless sleep, but her dreams were as terrible as her waking thoughts.

She was journeying in her coach to Stetten, the horses galloped fast--ever faster!--Eberhard Ludwig was at her side, then, with a gesture of anger, he flung himself out of the carriage. She was alone, and the horses were rushing onwards. A giant figure, of pitiless face, stood in their way--a being with huge, gnarled hands which held enormous sickle-blades. The horses were mown down, now the blades were descending over her. 'Great G.o.d! Mercy! he is cutting out my heart!' she awoke screaming.

Then the strain of agonised thought began once more to whirl in her mind.

Eberhard Ludwig must come back--he must. She fell asleep, and again the Dream Demon took hold of her. Now she was in Duke Christopher's Grotto in Stuttgart. The mob was nearing her, and her feet always slipped back on the slimy steps--she would never gain the first gallery. A shadowy figure with bleeding hands barred her way--the White Lady--the murderess. 'Back to the world to take your punishment!' the ghost whispered, and oh, horror! she pushed her back with those terrible, bleeding hands--_back_, down the slippery, slimy steps towards the crowd.

Eberhard Ludwig led the mob, and the Prussian King was with him. 'Beloved of my life, heart of my soul!' the Duke said, and clasped her to him; but his arms had become sickle-blades and they cut her to the heart, while Friedrich Wilhelm laughed and waved a cudgel. It hit her on the brow, blow after blow. 'Wanton, wanton, witch and wanton!' the King bawled at each stroke. She was dreaming; she knew it, she must awake; but the Dream Demon had not done with her. Now she was with Wurben, now with Madame de Ruth, now at Gustrow, now at Urach in the Golden Hall, but always the glistening sickle-blades followed her. Wurben cut at her with them; Madame de Ruth, Monsieur Gabriel, every one had got these searing blades, and always Eberhard Ludwig stood watching, watching, and he did not save her!

In the grey dawn she awoke. It was all a dream, then. What was wrong, though? There was something--ah, yes! Eberhard Ludwig had ceased to love her. Absurd! It was a phantasy of her weary brain! She was ill, feverish.--Eberhard was occupied with an exacting guest, that was all. He would come back to her--he must. At last she slept dreamlessly. Fatigue conquered agony, and she slept.

The Landhofmeisterin awoke to a smiling world. Such a glory of Spring, of blossom and lilac. Maria threw open the windows, and the sound of the gardeners raking the paths of La Favorite gardens came in with the lilac scent. It was a good world, a very young world! Alas! the Gravenitz felt old and broken, ill from her night of agony. Maria told her that the Prussian King had left Ludwigsburg. Very early the cavalcade had started, and Serenissimus had ridden away with his guest.

'At what hour does his Highness return?' her Excellency queried.

'Not for several days; they say his Highness stays at Heilbronn to-night, and rides to the frontier with the King to-morrow, then goes boar-sticking in the Maulbronn forest, and will not return for four or five days,' the maid answered. The Landhofmeisterin sighed; in happier days the Duke had bidden her adieu tenderly, if he were forced to leave her for an hour, and now---- But it was absurd; of course he could not always worship her like a young lover, but he would never desert her.

'Who is in the antehall this morning, Maria?' she asked.

'No one, your Excellency.'

So the parasites were dropping away from the threatened tree.

All that day and the next, no one disturbed the solitude of La Favorite, even Baron Schutz held aloof. On the third morning the Landhofmeisterin sent for him, but the answer came back that the Finance Minister had left Ludwigsburg for a few days' rest. The Landhofmeisterin reflected grimly that Baron Schutz had never needed repose before.

Eight days pa.s.sed ere Eberhard Ludwig returned. The Landhofmeisterin's fears had grown dim, habit had resumed sway. She worked at the affairs of State each morning, and save that the business was transacted at La Favorite instead of at the palace, and that Baron Schutz was replaced by an underling clerk, everything seemed to have lost that touch of the unusual which is part of the menace of coming disaster. True, the courtiers were scarcely a.s.siduous in the visiting of the Landhofmeisterin, but they dared not absent themselves entirely, for they were uncertain as to her fate, and they feared both her revenge and her reputed witchcraft. So they repaired perfunctorily to La Favorite, and though her Excellency refused to receive visitors, still she was informed of the courtiers' visits. Thus the old life seemed to be unaltered, and the Landhofmeisterin forgot her anxiety in a measure, yet a deep melancholy remained over her.

At length Maria reported that Serenissimus had returned, and once more a feverish unrest seized the Gravenitz. Would he come to her? Would he summon her? The night drew near, and no word came from the palace. The Landhofmeisterin's fears reawoke. She paced restlessly up and down the Favorite terrace whence she could see his Highness's windows. The lights were lit. She watched; gradually the palace grew dark. It was as though the light of her youth was extinguished when his Highness's windows grew black. She waited; perchance he would come yet? A terrible weariness fell on her. The night was very beautiful, moonlit and enchanted; the scent of the lilac smote heavy on the air--the lilac and the red thorn blossom---- How beautiful it was, how still, how divinely young it all seemed; and she was old, old and weary, and forsaken and unutterably sad!

'Your Excellency must rest; come, dear Madame!' It was Maria, the faithful friend, the only one who had not profited by her mistress's vast power; she alone who had never sought gain.

'Maria, I am too weary to sleep, and I dream so cruelly,' the Gravenitz said sadly.

'Come and rest, and I will sit beside you all night,' the good soul replied; and indeed, it seemed as though her honesty had driven away the Dream Demon, for the great Landhofmeisterin slept like a tired child watched over by this faithful peasant woman.

The next day the Gravenitz was utterly deserted. No word came from the palace, no Secret Service officers came to report to her, no courtiers thronged the antehall. It was Sunday, and the bells of the palace chapel rang. Maria had heard that Serenissimus had intimated his intention of attending church twice that Sunday. The Landhofmeisterin's thoughts followed him wistfully. Would he sit in his accustomed chair in the gilded pew? Would his eyes wander to the sculptured figures in the chapel, the figures which bore her features? Would he remember how often she had sung to that organ? Alas! Change is Death, and more cruel than Death.

The day pa.s.sed, and still came no sign from Serenissimus. Then the Landhofmeisterin sent Maria to the town to gather news, and the maid returned and told her that it was rumoured his Highness would start on the following morning to attend the grand military review at Berlin. She had met one of the palace grooms, and he had said that the horses were to be in readiness soon after dawn. Good G.o.d! was Eberhard Ludwig taking this way in order to rid himself of her? It was entirely contrary to etiquette to hurry on a visiting monarch's heels in this manner.

Her pride was swallowed up in gnawing anxiety. She wrote to Eberhard Ludwig.

'Love has its rights, you cannot leave me without a word. What have I done? how have I offended you? you, for whom I would give my life! I ask nothing. If you have ceased to love me, then banish me, imprison me, all you will, but come to me once--once only. O beloved! remember the past; come to me and tell me the truth. Tell me to go, and you need never see my face again,' she wrote.

No letter came in answer; only a verbal message, delivered by a sullen court lackey, that his Highness would visit her Excellency ere he rode to Berlin. Her Excellency was to expect him in the early morning, as he commenced his journey betimes, owing to the long distance.

Another night of fierce unrest. Early she rose and made an elaborate toilet. She dressed in yellow, the colour he loved; her hair was freshly powdered, her face carefully painted.

The dew glistened on the close-cropped gra.s.s of the gardens, the lilacs were more radiant than ever, the birds in the chestnut-trees sang their spring melody--the chant of nest-building, the mating song.

Eberhard Ludwig rode up the avenue of La Favorite, and dismounted before the terrace steps. His attendant took his horse, and walked the beautiful animal up and down in the shade of the chestnut-trees.

The Landhofmeisterin received Serenissimus in her yellow-hung sitting-room. He was cold and distant, and she was formal and restrained.

'I hope your Highness is in good health?' and 'your Excellency appears to be mighty well!' Then the ice broke, and she held out her arms to him.

'My beloved! my beloved! Ah! to see you again----' But he drew back.

'Madame, life is hard. We must part, you and I.'

'Oh no, no, not that! Tell me what has changed you? I have been true always,' and she clung to him.