Louisa of Prussia and Her Times Part 21

Without reflecting any further, she left her chamber and hastened once more through the rooms. Her hair now was waving wildly around her shoulders, and her purple dress, no longer held together by the golden sash, was floating loosely around her form. She took no notice whatever of her dishabille; only one idea, only one purpose filled her heart.

In breathless haste she hurried on, and now quickly opened a last door, through which she entered a room furnished in the most sumptuous and comfortable manner.

At her appearance, so sudden, and evidently unexpected, the elderly gentleman, who had reposed on the silken sofa, arose and turned around with a gesture of displeasure.

On recognizing Marianne, however, a smile overspread his features, and he went to meet her with a pleasant greeting.

"Back already, dearest?" he said, extending his hand toward her.

"Yes, your highness--I am back already," she said drily and coldly.

The gentleman upon whose features the traces of a life of dissipation were plainly visible, fixed his eyes with an anxious air upon the beautiful lady. He only now noticed her angry mien and the strange dishabille in which she appeared before him.

"Good Heaven, Marianne!" he asked, sharply, "what is the cause of your agitation, of your coldness toward me? What has happened to you?"

"What has happened to me? The most infamous insults have been heaped upon my head!" she exclaimed with quivering lips, an angry blush suffusing her cheeks, "For a quarter of an hour, nay, for an eternity, I was the target of the jeers, the contempt, and the scorn of the rabble that publicly abused me in the most disgraceful manner!"

"Tell me," exclaimed the old gentleman, "what has occurred, and whose fault it was!"

"Whose fault it was?" she asked, bending a piercing glance upon him.

"YOURS, my prince; you alone are to blame for my terrible disgrace and humiliation. For your sake the rabble has reviled me, called me your mistress, and laughed at my diamonds; calling them the reward of my shame! Oh, how many insults, how many mortifications have I not already suffered for your sake--with how many b.l.o.o.d.y tears have I not cursed this love which attaches me to you, and which I was nevertheless unable to tear from my heart, for it is stronger than myself. But now the cup of bitterness is full to overflowing. My pride cannot hear so much contumely and scorn. Farewell, my prince, my beloved! I must leave you. I cannot stay with you any longer. Shame would kill me. Farewell!

Hereafter, no one shall dare to call me a mistress."

With a last glowing farewell, she turned to the door, but the prince kept her back. "Marianne," he asked, tenderly, "do you not know that I love you, and that I cannot live without you?"

She looked at him with a fascinating smile. "And I?" she asked, "far from you, shall die of a broken heart; with you, I shall die of shame. I prefer the former. Farewell! No one shall ever dare again to call me by that name." And her hand touched already the door-k.n.o.b.

The prince encircled her waist with his arms and drew her back. "I shall not let you go," he said, ardently. "You are mine, and shall remain so!

Oh, why are you so proud and so cold? Why will you not sacrifice your faith to our love? Why do you insist upon remaining a Jewess?"

"Your highness," she said, leaning her head on his shoulder, "why do you want me to become a Christian?"

"Why?" he exclaimed. "Because my religion and the laws of my country prevent me from marrying a Jewess."

"And if I should sacrifice to you the last that has remained to me?" she whispered--"my conscience and my religion."

"Marianne," he exclaimed, solemnly, "I repeat to you what I have told you so often already: 'Become a Christian in order to become my wife.'"

She encircled his neck impetuously with her arms and clung to him with a pa.s.sionate outburst of tenderness. "I will become a Christian!" she whispered.

CHAPTER XVII.

LOVE AND POLITICS.

"At last! at last!" exclaimed Gentz, in a tone of fervid tenderness, approaching Marianne, who went to meet him with a winning smile. "Do you know, dearest, that you have driven me to despair for a whole week? Not a word, not a message from you! Whenever I came to see you, I was turned away. Always the same terrible reply, 'Madame is not at home,' while I felt your nearness in every nerve and vein of mine, and while my throbbing heart was under the magic influence of your presence. And then to be turned away! No reply whatever to my letters, to my ardent prayers to see you only for a quarter of an hour."

"Oh, you ungrateful man!" she said, smiling, "did I not send for you to-day? Did I not give you this rendezvous quite voluntarily?"

"You knew very well that I should have died if your heart had not softened at last. Oh, heavenly Marianne, what follies despair made me commit already! In order to forget you, I plunged into all sorts of pleasures, I commenced new works, I entered upon fresh love-affairs. But it was all in vain. Amidst those pleasures I was sad; during my working hours my mind was wandering, and in order to impart a semblance of truth and tenderness to my protestations of love, I had to close my eyes and imagine YOU were the lady whom I was addressing-."

"And then you were successful?" asked Marianne, smiling.

"Yes, then I was successful," he said, gravely; "but my new lady-love, the beloved of my distraction and despair, did not suspect that I only embraced her so tenderly because I kissed in her the beloved of my heart and of my enthusiasm."

"And who was the lady whom you call the beloved of your distraction and despair?" asked Marianne.

"Ah, Marianne, you ask me to betray a woman?"

"No, no; I am glad to perceive that you are a discreet cavalier. You shall betray no woman. I will tell you her name. The beloved of your distraction and despair was the most beautiful and charming lady in Berlin--it was the actress Christel Eughaus. Let me compliment you, my friend, on having triumphed with that belle over all those sentimental, lovesick princes, counts, and barons. Indeed, you have improved your week of 'distraction and despair' in the most admirable manner."

"Still, Marianne, I repeat to you, she was merely my sweetheart for the time being, and I merely plunged into this adventure in order to forget you."

"Then you love me really?" asked Marianne.

"Marianne, I adore you! You know it. Oh, now I may tell you so.

Heretofore you repelled me and would not listen to my protestations of love because I was a MARRIED man. Now, however, I have got rid of my ignominious fetters, Marianne; now I am no longer a married man. I am free, and all the women in the world are at liberty to love me. I am as free as a bird in the air!"

"And like a bird you want to flit from one heart to another?"

"No, most beautiful, most glorious Marianne; your heart shall be the cage in which I shall imprison myself."

"Beware, my friend. What would you say if there was no door in this cage through which you might escape?"

"Oh, if it had a door, I should curse it."

"Then you love me so boundlessly as to be ready to sacrifice to me the liberty you have scarcely regained?"

"Can you doubt it, Marianne?" asked Gentz, tenderly pressing her beautiful hands to his lips.

"Are you in earnest, my friend?" she said, smiling. "So you offer your hand to me? You want to marry me?"

Gentz started back, and looked at her with a surprised and frightened air. Marianne laughed merrily.

"Ah!" she said, "your face is the most wonderful ill.u.s.tration of Goethe's poem. You know it, don't you?" And she recited with ludicrous pathos the following two lines:

"'Heirathen, Kind, ist wunderlich Wort, Hor ich's, mocht ich gleich wieder fort.'"

"Good Heaven, what a profound knowledge of human nature our great Goethe has got, and how proud I am to be allowed to call him a friend of mine--Heirathen, Kind, ist wunderlich Wort."

"Marianne, you are cruel and unjust, you--"

"And you know the next two lines of the poem?" she interrupted him. "The maiden replied to him:"

"'Heirathen wir eben, Das Ubrige wird sich geben.'"