The Daughter of an Empress Part 54

"It is Count Alexis Orloff," said the young maiden, blushing.

"You know him, know his name, and yet you confide in him!" exclaimed the cardinal. "But it cannot be that you know his history: have you any idea to whom he is indebted for his prosperity and greatness?"

"The Empress Catharine, his mistress," said Natalie, without embarra.s.sment.

The cardinal looked, with increasing astonishment, into her calm, smiling face. "I now comprehend it all," he then said; "they have laid a very shrewd and cunning plan. They have deceived you while telling you a part of the truth!"

"No one has deceived me," indignantly responded Natalie. "I tell you, Sir Cardinal, that I am neither deceived nor overreached, easy as you seem to think it to deceive me!"

"Oh, it is always easy to deceive innocence and n.o.bleness," sadly remarked the cardinal. "Listen to me, princess, and think, I conjure you, that this time a true and sincere friend is speaking to you."

"And how shall I recognize that?" asked the young maiden, with a slight touch of irony. "How shall I recognize a friend, when, as you say, it is precisely my pretended friends who are my enemies!"

"Recognize me by this!" said the cardinal, drawing a folded paper from his bosom and handing it to the princess.

"That is Count Paulo's handwriting!" she joyfully exclaimed.

"Ah, you recognize the handwriting," said the cardinal, "and you see that this letter is addressed to me. Count Paulo therefore considers me his friend!"

"May I read this letter?"

"I beg you to do so."

Natalie unfolded the letter and read: "Warn the Princess Tartaroff; danger threatens her!"

"That is all?" she asked with a smile.

"That is all!" said the cardinal; "but when Paulo considered these few words of sufficient importance to send them to me, you may well suppose they are of the utmost significance."

"Count Paulo is in Siberia," said Natalie, shaking her head; "how could he have written you from thence?"

"How he succeeded in doing so, I know not, but the firm, determined will of man often conquers supposed impossibilities! Enough--in a mysterious, enigmatical manner was this letter put into the hands of our amba.s.sador at St. Petersburg, with the most urgent prayer that he would immediately send it to me by a special courier, with all the necessary particulars."

"And was that done?" asked Natalie.

"It was done! I know why your life is threatened! Princess Tartaroff, you are the daughter of the Empress Elizabeth; and therefore it is that this Empress Catharine, upon her usurped throne, trembles with fear of you--therefore was it that she said to her favorite: 'Go, and deliver me from this troublesome pretender. But do it in a sly, cautious, and noiseless manner. Avoid attracting attention, murder her not, threaten her not; I wish not to give people new reasons for calling me a bloodthirsty woman. Entice her with flatteries into our net, induce her to follow you voluntarily, that the people of no country in which she may be may have an occasion to accuse us of using force.' Thus did Catharine speak to her favorite; he understood her and swore to execute her commands, as he did when Catharine ordered him to throttle her husband, the Emperor Peter; as he also did when she ordered him to shoot poor Ivan, the son of Anna Leopoldowna, for the criminal reason that he had a greater right to the imperial crown of Russia than this little German princess of Zerbst!"

"And he shot that poor innocent Ivan!" shudderingly asked Natalie. "Ah, this Catharine is bloodthirsty as a hyena, and her friends and favorites are hangmen's servants--ah, history will brand this murderer of Ivan!"

"It will," solemnly responded Cardinal Bernis, "and people will shudder when they hear the name of the man who strangled the Emperor Peter, who shot Ivan, and who, at the command of Catharine, has come to Italy to ensnare the n.o.ble and innocent Princess Tartaroff with cunning and flatteries and convey her to St. Petersburg. Shall I tell you this man's name? He is called Alexis Orloff!"

The young maiden sprang up from her seat, her eyes flashed, and her cheeks glowed.

"That is false," said she--"a shameful, malicious falsehood!"

"Would to G.o.d it were so!" cried the cardinal. "But it is too true, princess! Oh, listen to me, and close not your ears to the truth.

Remember that I am an old man, who has long observed men, and long studied life. I know this Russian diplomacy, and this Russian craft; they have in them something devilish; and these Russian diplomatists, they poison and confound the shrewdest with their deceitful smiles and infernal cunning. Guard yourself, princess, against this Russian diplomacy, and, above all things, be on your guard against this amba.s.sador of the Russian empress, Alexis Orloff!"

"Ah, you dare to defame him!" cried the young maiden, trembling with anger. "You have, therefore, never seen him; you have never read in his n.o.ble face that Count Alexis Orloff can never betray. He is a hero, and a hero never descends to a murder! Ah, if the whole world should rise up against him, if it should point the finger at him and say: 'That is a murderer!' I would cry in the face of the whole world: 'Thou liest!

Alexis Orloff can never be a murderer! I know him better, and know that he is pure and clear of every crime. You may continue to call him a betrayer! I know why he suffers himself to be so called! I know the secret of his conduct, and a day will come when you will all learn it; when you will all feel compelled to fall down at his feet and confess, "Alexis Orloff is no false betrayer!" For the sake of her to whom he has vowed fidelity has he borne this shame. For her whom he loved has he staked his blood and his life. Alexis Orloff is a hero!'"

She was strangely beautiful while speaking with such spirit and animation. The cardinal observed her n.o.ble and excited features with an admiration mingled with the most painful emotions.

"Poor child!" he murmured, dropping his head--"poor child, she loves him, and is therefore lost!"

"You, then, do not believe me!" he asked aloud.

"No," said she, with a glad smile--"no, all the happiness I ever expect, all the good that may hereafter come to me, I shall receive only from the hands of Alexis Orloff!"

"Poor child!" sighed the cardinal. "In many a case even death may prove a blessing!"

"Then will I also joyfully receive even that from his hands!" cried the young maiden, with enthusiasm.

"It is in vain, she is not to be helped!" murmured the cardinal, with a melancholy shake of the head, and, grasping the hand of the young maiden, with a compa.s.sionate glance at her fair face, he continued: "I would gladly aid you, and thereby expiate the evil you once suffered at my festival! But you will not consent to be aided. You rush to your destruction, and it is your n.o.blest qualities, your innocence, and your generous confidence, which are preparing your ruin! May G.o.d bless you and preserve you! How glad I should be to find myself a liar and false prophet!"

"And you will so find yourself!" exclaimed Natalie.

"You believe it, because you are in love, and when a woman loves she believes in the object of her love, and smilingly offers up her life for him! Like all women, you will do so! You will sacrifice your life to your love; and when this barbarian thrusts the dagger in your heart, you will say with a smile: 'I did it! I, myself--'"

And, bowing to her with a sad smile, slowly and sighing, the cardinal left the room.

Some hours later came Alexis Orloff. Natalie received him with an expression of the purest pleasure, and, extending both hands to him, smilingly said:

"Know you yet what my mother said to her lover?"

Looking at her, he read his happiness in her face. With an exclamation of ecstasy he fell at her feet.

"I know it well, but you, Natalie, do you also know it?" he pa.s.sionately asked.

Natalie smiled. "Alexis," said she, "I love you, and therefore will I raise you to my side as my husband!" and with a charming modest blush she drew the count up to her arms.

"You do not deceive me, and this is no dream?" he cried, while glowingly embracing her.

"No," said she, "it is the truth, and I owe you this satisfaction.

You have been slandered to me to-day. Ah, they shall see how little I believe them. Alexis, call a priest to bless our union, and make me your wife. Whatever then may come, we will share it with each other. If I am one day empress, you will be the emperor, and I will always honor and obey you as my lord and master."

On the evening of this day a very serious and solemn ceremony took place in the boudoir of Princess Natalie. An altar wreathed with flowers stood in the centre of the room, and before the altar stood Natalie in a white satin robe, the myrtle-crown upon her head, the long bridal veil waving around her delicate form. She was very beautiful in her joyful, modest emotion, and Count Alexis Orloff, who, in a rich Russian costume stood by her side, viewed her with ecstatic and warm desiring glances. The inhuman executioner led the lamb to the slaughter without pity or compunction!

At the other side of the altar stood the priest, a reverend old man, with long flowing silver hair and beard. Near him the sacristan, not less reverend in appearance. No one else was present except Marianne, who, in tears, knelt behind her mistress, and with folded hands prayed for her beloved princess, who was now marrying Count Alexis Orloff.

The solemn ceremony was at an end, and the young wife sank weeping into the arms of her husband, who, with tenderest whisperings, led her into the next room.

Marianne, overcome by her tears and emotions, hastened to her own room, and the reverend priest remained alone with his sacristan.

They silently looked at each other, and their faces were distorted by a knavish, grinning laugh.

"It was a wonderful scene," said the priest, who was no other than Joseph Ribas. "In earnest, I was quite affected by it myself, and I came near weeping at my own sublime homily. Confess, Stephano, that a consecrated priest could not have better gone through the ceremony."