Louisa of Prussia and Her Times Part 86

Anna placed her burning hand on the shoulder of the landlady, and looked at her long and tenderly.

"You were married?" she asked. "You loved your husband?"

"Yes," said the landlady, bursting into tears, "I was married, and G.o.d knows that I loved my husband. For twenty years we lived happy and peacefully together, and when he died last year, my whole happiness died with him."

"He was sick, I suppose, and you nursed him?"

"He was sick for a month, and I did not leave his bedside either by day or by night."

"Well, then, what would you have replied to him who would have tried to keep you back from your husband's death-bed, and to persuade you to leave him in his agony, because it might have injured your health? Would you have listened to him?"

"No, I should have believed him, who had made such a proposition to me, to be my enemy, and should have replied to him: 'It is my sacred right to stand at my husband's death-bed, to kiss the last sigh from his lips, to close his eyes, and no one in the world shall prevent me from doing so!'"

"Well, then, dear mother, I say as you have said: it is my sacred right to stand at my husband's death-bed and to close his eyes. My husband's death-bed is in Braunau; I am not so happy as you have been; I cannot nurse him, nor be with him and comfort him in his agony; but I am able, at least, to see him in his last hour. My mother, will you still ask your daughter to stay here and take care of her health, instead of going to her husband's death-bed in Braunau?"

"No, my daughter," exclaimed the landlady, "no; I say to you, go! Take not a minute's rest until you reach your husband. G.o.d will guide and protect you, for He is love, and has mercy on those whose heart are filled with love! Go, then, with G.o.d; but, for the sake of your husband, take some nourishing food; try to eat and sleep, so as to gain fresh strength, for you will need it."

"Give me some nourishing food, mother, I will eat," said Anna, placing her arms tenderly around the landlady's neck; "I will try also to-night to sleep, for you are right: I shall need my whole strength! But after I have eaten, I may set out at once, may I not?"

"Yes, my poor, dear child, then you may set out. Now come to my room--your meal is already waiting for you."

Half an hour later the landlady herself lifted Anna into the carriage, and said to her in a voice trembling with tearful emotion: "Farewell, my daughter. G.o.d bless you and grant you strength. When alone one day, and in need of a mother, then come to me! May the Lord have mercy on you!"

"Yes, may the Lord have mercy on me, and let me die with him!" whispered Anna, as the carriage rolled away with her.

At noon on the following day, August 30th, 1806, she arrived at Braunau.

CHAPTER LVIII.

THE WOMEN OF BRAUNAU.

In the mean time Palm had constantly been in the French prison at Braunau. During the sixteen days since he had been in jail, he had only twice been taken out of it to be examined by the court-martial, which General St. Hilaire had specially convoked for his trial.

This court-martial consisted of French generals and staff-officers; it met at a time of peace in a German city, and declared its competence to try a German citizen who had committed no other crime than to circulate a pamphlet, in which the misfortunes of Germany, and the oppressions of German states by Napoleon and his armies, had been commented upon.

The whole proceedings had been carried on so hastily and secretly, that the German authorities of Braunau had scarcely heard of them at the time when the French court-martial was already about to sentence the prisoner.

The French, however, wanted to maintain some semblance of impartiality; and before Palm was called before the court-martial, it was left to him either to defend himself in person against the charges, or to provide himself with counsel.

Palm, who was ignorant of the French language, had preferred the latter, and selected as his counsel a resident lawyer of Braunau, with whom he was well acquainted, and even on terms of intimacy, and whom he knew to be familiar with the French language.

But this friend declined being a "friend in need." He excused himself on the pretext of a serious indisposition which confined him to his bed, and rendered it impossible for him to make a speech.

Palm was informed of this excuse only at the moment when he entered the room in which the trial was to be held; hence he had to make up his mind to conduct his own defence, and to have his words translated by an interpreter to the members of the court.

And he felt convinced that his defence had been successful, and satisfied the men who had a.s.sumed to be his judges, of his entire innocence.

He had, therefore, no doubt of his speedy release; he was looking every day for the announcement that his innocence had been proved, and that he should be restored to liberty and to his family. This confident hope caused him to bear his solitary confinement with joyful courage, and to look, in this time of privations and pain, fondly for the golden days to come, when he would repose again, after all his trouble and toil, in the arms of love, gently guarded by the tender eyes of his affectionate young wife, and his heart gladdened by the sight of his sweet children.

From dreams so joyous and soul-stirring he was awakened on the morning of the 26th of August by the appearance of the jailer and of several soldiers who came to summon him before the court-martial which would communicate his sentence to him.

"G.o.d be praised!" exclaimed Palm, enthusiastically. "My sentence, that is to say, my release. Come, let us go; for, you see, it is hot and oppressive in my cell, and I long for G.o.d's fresh air, of which I have been deprived so long. Let us go, then, that I may receive the sentence which I have so ardently yearned for."

And with a kind smile he offered his hand to the jailer who stood at the door with a gloomy, sullen air. "Do not look so gloomy, Balthasar,"

he said. "You always used to be so merry a companion and have often agreeably enlivened the long and dreary hours of my confinement by your entertaining conversation. Accept my thanks for your kindness and clemency; you might have tormented me a great deal, and you have not done so, but have always been accommodating and compa.s.sionate. I thank you for it, Balthasar, and beg you to accept this as a souvenir from me."

He drew a golden breastpin richly set with precious stones from his cravat, and offered it to the jailer.

But Balthasar did not take it; on the contrary, he averted his head sullenly and gloomily. "I am not allowed to accept any presents from the prisoners," he muttered.

"Well, then, I shall come and see you as soon as I am free, and from the free man, I suppose, you will accept a small souvenir?" asked Palm, kindly.

The jailer made no reply to this question, but exclaimed, impatiently: "Make haste, it is high time!"

Palm laughed, and, nodding a farewell to the jailer, left the prison in the midst of the soldiers.

"Poor man, he suspects nothing," murmured the jailer to himself, and his features now became mild and gentle, and his eyes were filled with tears. "Poor man, he believes they will set him at liberty! Yes, they will do so, but it is not the sort of liberty he is looking and hoping for!"

Palm followed the soldiers gayly and courageously to the room where the members of the court-martial were a.s.sembled seated on high-backed arm-chairs which had been placed in a semicircle on one side of the room, awaiting the arrival of the prisoner.

He greeted them with an unclouded brow and frank and open bearing; not a tinge of fear and nervousness was to be seen in his features; he fixed his large and l.u.s.trous eyes on the lips of General St. Hilaire who presided over the court-martial and now rose from his seat. The secretary of the court immediately approached the general and handed him a paper.

The general took it, and, bending a stern glance on Palm, said: "The court-martial has agreed to-day unanimously on your sentence. I will now communicate it to you."

The other officers rose from their seats to listen standing to the reading of the sentence. It is true, their faces were grave, and for the first time Palm was seized with a sinister foreboding, and asked himself whether his judges would a.s.sume so grave and solemn an air if they were merely to announce to him that he was innocent and consequently free.

A small pause ensued. The general then raised his voice, and read in a loud and ringing tone: "Whereas at all places where there is an army it is the first and most imperious duty of its chief to watch over its safety and preservation;"

"Whereas the circulation of writings instigating sedition and murder does not only threaten the safety of the army, but also that of the nation generally;"

"Whereas nothing is more urgent and necessary than the prevention of the propagation of such doctrines which are a crime against the rights of man and against the respect due to crowned heads--an insult to the people submissive to their government--and, in short, subversive of law, order, and subordination:"

"The military commission here a.s.sembled declares unanimously that all authors and printers of libellous books of the above-named description, as well as booksellers and other persons engaged in circulating them, shall be deemed guilty of high-treason."

"In consideration whereof the defendant, John Frederick Palm, convicted of having circulated the pamphlet, 'Germany in her Deepest Degradation,'

has been charged with the crime of high-treason, and the commission has unanimously found him guilty of the charge."

"The penalty incurred by the traitor is death."

"Consequently the traitor, John Frederick Palm, will suffer death, which sentence will be carried out this afternoon at two o'clock, when he will be shot." [Footnote: "Memoires d'un Homme d'Etat," vol. ix., p. 247.]

"John Frederick Palm," added the general, "you have heard your sentence, prepare for death!"

The interpreter repeated to the unhappy prisoner the sentence of the court-martial slowly, impressively, and emphasizing every word; and every syllable fell like a cold tear on Palm's heart and froze it.

It was, however, not only cold with terror and dismay, but also with determination and calmness.