The Merchant of Berlin Part 50

"Faithfully and honorably," said he, with feeling.

"Faithfully and honorably!" cried Elise, deeply moved. "Oh those are words as strong as rocks, and like the shipwrecked sailor, I will cling to them to save myself from sinking. Oh, Bertram, how good you are! You love my father, and desire to be his son, only for the sake of helping him."

"And if need be, to work for him, to give up my life for him!"

With her bright eyes she looked deeply into his, and held out her hand to him. "Give me your hand, Bertram," said she, softly. "You were a better son to my father than I have been a daughter. I will learn from you. Will you be my teacher?"

Bertram gazed at her astonished and inquiringly. She replied to this look with a sweet smile, and like lightning it shot through his heart, and a happy antic.i.p.ation pervaded his entire soul. "My G.o.d! my G.o.d!

is it possible?" murmured he, "is the day of suffering, indeed, past?

Will--"

He felt Elise suddenly shudder, and pressing his hand significantly, she whispered, "Silence, Bertram, look there!"

Bertram followed the direction of her eyes, and saw Gotzkowsky, who had opened the door of his study, and was entering the room, his features pale and distorted, and his gaze fixed. "He does not see us,"

whispered Elise. "He is talking to himself. Do not disturb him."

In silence she pointed to the curtains just behind them, concealing a recess, in the middle of which stood a costly vase. "Let us conceal ourselves," said she, and, unnoticed by Gotzkowsky, they glided behind the curtains.

CHAPTER XV.

THE RESCUE.

Gotzkowsky had closed with life and earthly affairs. He had signed the doc.u.ment declaring him a bankrupt, and he had delivered over all his property to his creditors. The die had been cast. He had been powerful and great through money, but his power and greatness had now gone from him, for he was poor. The same men who yesterday had bowed down to the ground before him, had to-day pa.s.sed him by in pride and scorn; and those who had vowed him eternal grat.i.tude, had turned him from their door like a beggar. Why should he continue to bear the burdens of a life which had no longer any allurements, and whose most precious jewel, his honor, he had lost?

De Neufville had done right, and only a coward would still cling to life after all that was worth living for had disappeared. They should not point scornfully at him as he went along the streets. He would not be condemned to hear whispered after him, "Look! there goes Gotzkowsky the bankrupt." No, this fearful word should never wound his ears or pierce his heart.

Once more only would he pa.s.s through those streets, which had so often seen him in his glory--once more, not poor, nor as the laughing-stock of children, but so that those who now derided him should bow down before him, and honor him as the mourning emblem of departed honor: only his body should pa.s.s by these men who had broken his heart. He had determined to quit this miserable existence, to leave a world which had proved itself to him only a gulf of wickedness and malice, and his freed spirit would wing its way to regions of light and knowledge.

With such thoughts he entered the room which was to be the scene of his last hours. But he would not go down to the grave without bearing witness to the wickedness and malice of the world. His death should be a monument of its disgrace and ingrat.i.tude.

For this purpose he had sought this room, for in it was the costly _etagere_ on which stood the silver pitcher presented to him by the Council of Leipsic as a token of their grat.i.tude, and from it he would drink his fatal draught. He took it and emptied into it a small white powder, that looked so innocent and light, and yet was strong enough to drag him down with leaden weight into the grave. He then took the water-goblet and poured water on it. The draught was ready; all that was necessary was for him to put it to his lips to imbibe eternal rest, eternal oblivion.

Elise saw it all--understood it all. She folded her hands and prayed; her teeth chattered together, and all that she could feel and know was, that she must save him, or follow him to the grave. "When he raises the pitcher to his lips, I will rush out," she whispered to Bertram, softly, and opened the curtains a little in order to watch him.

Gotzkowsky had returned to the _etagere_. He took the silver-oaken wreath, the civic crown presented to him by the city of Berlin, and looked at it with a bitter, scornful smile. "I earned this," he said, half aloud--"I will take it with me to the grave. They shall find my corpse crowned with this wreath, and when they turn away in shame, the broken bankrupt, John Gotzkowsky, will enjoy his last triumph over a degenerate world." And as if in a dream, in the feverish delirium of grief, he placed the wreath on his brow, then for a moment stood with his head bent in deep thought.

It was a strange picture to see his proud, tall figure, his pale, nervous face, crowned with the silver wreath, and opposite to him, looking through the curtains, his daughter, whose glowing eyes were eagerly watching her father.

And now Gotzkowsky seized the silver pitcher, raised it on high--it had already touched his lips--but suddenly he staggered back. A dearly-loved voice had called his name. Ah, it was the voice of his daughter, whom he had forgotten in the bitterness of his grief. He had believed his heart dead to all feeling, but love still lived in him, and love called him back to life. Like an electric shock it flew through his whole frame.

He put the pitcher down, and covering his face with his hands, cried, "Oh, unnatural father! I forgot my child!"

Behind him stood Elise, praying to G.o.d eagerly and fervently. She wished to appear quite composed, quite unsuspicious, that her father might not have even an inkling of her knowledge of his dark design.

Her voice dare not tremble, her eye must remain clear and calm, and a smile play about her lips, which yet quivered with the anxious prayers she had just offered to G.o.d. "My father!" she said, in a low but quiet voice--"my father, I come to beg your blessing. And here is the myrtle wreath with which you were to adorn me."

Gotzkowsky still kept his face covered, but his whole frame trembled.

"I thank Thee, O my G.o.d! I thank Thee! the voice of my child has saved me." And turning round suddenly, he stretched out both arms toward her, exclaiming aloud: "Elise, my child, come to my heart, and comfort your father."

Elise uttered a cry of joy, rushed into his arms, and nestled close to his heart. She whispered in his ear words of fervent love, of warmest affection. They fell on Gotzkowsky's heart like soothing balm; they forced tears of mingled joy and repentance from his eyes.

A long while did they remain locked in each other's arms. Their lips were silent, but their hearts spoke, and they understood each other without words. Then Elise raised herself from her father's embrace, and, again offering him the myrtle-wreath, said with a smile, "And now, my father, bless your daughter."

"I will," said Gotzkowsky, drying his eyes. "Yes, from my whole soul will I bless you. But where is the bridegroom?"

Elise looked at him inquiringly. "Will you bid him, also, welcome?"

"That I will with all my heart!"

Elise approached the curtain, drew it back, and taking Bertram's hand, led him to her father, saying, with indescribable grace: "My father, bless your children."

"This is your bridegroom?" asked Gotzkowsky, and for the first time a sunbeam seemed to flash across his face.

Bertram with a cry of delight drew Elise to his heart. She clung to him, and said warmly: "I will rest on your breast, Bertram. I will be as true and as faithful as yourself. You shall reconcile me to mankind. You will make us both happy again. My father and I put our hope in you, and we both know it will not be in vain. Is it not so, my father?" She extended her hand to Gotzkowsky.

He took it, but was too much affected to speak. He pressed it to his eyes and his breast, and then looked with a smile into the countenance of his daughter.

Elise continued: "Look, father, life is still worth something. It gives you a son, who is happy to share your unhappiness with you. It gives you a daughter, who looks upon every tear of yours as a jewel in your crown; who would be proud to go as a beggar with her father from place to place, and say to all the world, 'Gotzkowsky is a beggar because he was rich in love toward his fellow-men; he has become poor because he was a n.o.ble man, who had faith in mankind.'" And as she drew her father into her own and Bertram's embrace, she asked him, smiling through her tears, "My father, do you still wish to leave your children?"

"No, I will live--live for you!" cried Gotzkowsky, as, almost overcome with emotion and pleasure, he threw his arms around their necks, and kissed them both warmly and lovingly. "A new life is to begin for us,"

said he, cheerfully. "We will seek refuge in a quiet cottage, and take with us none of the show and luxury for which men work and sell their souls--none of the tawdriness of life. Will you not be content, Elise, to be poor, and purchase the honor of your father with the loss of this vain splendor?"

Elise leaned her head on his shoulder. "I was poor," she said, "when the world called me rich. Now I am rich when it will call me poor.

Give up every thing that we possess, father, that no one may say Gotzkowsky owes him any thing, and has not kept his word." With ready haste she loosened the necklace from her throat, the bracelets from her arms, and the drops from her ears. "Take these, too," said she, smiling. "Add them to the rest. We will keep nothing but honor, and the consciousness of our probity."

"Now I am your son, father," cried Bertram, with beaming eyes. "Now I have a right to serve you. You dare no longer refuse to accept all that is mine for your own. We will save the honor of our house, and pay all our creditors."

"That we will do," exclaimed Gotzkowsky; "I accept your offering, my son." And joining Elise and Bertram's hands together, he cast grateful looks to heaven, saying: "From this day forward we are poor, and yet far richer than many thousands of rich people; for we are of sound health, and have strong arms to work. We have good consciences, and that proud contentment which G.o.d gives to those only who trust in His help."

CHAPTER XVI.

RETRIBUTION.

The appointed hour had arrived, and in the full splendor of his rich uniform, decorated with orders, and glittering with diamonds bestowed upon him by the favor of two empresses, Prince Feodor von Stratimojeff entered Gotzkowsky's house. With the proud step of victory he ascended the stairs that led to the apartments of his bride. The goal was at last reached. The beautiful, lovely, and wealthy maiden was finally to become his wife. He could present her at the court of St. Petersburg, and with her beauty, her virtue, and his happiness revenge himself on the fickle empress. These were his thoughts as he opened the door and entered Elise's room. There she stood in her white bridal attire, as delicate, as slender, and as graceful as a lily to the sight. There stood also her father, and the friend of her youth, Bertram. The witnesses to the ceremony were present, and nothing more was necessary but to lead her to the altar. Elise had requested of her father that she herself should see the prince, and give him his dismissal. She had also requested that Bertram should be present. She wished to show him that her heart had, at once and forever, been healed of its foolish and unholy love, and that she could face the prince without trembling or hesitation. This was an offering which she wished to bring to the honor of her future husband and her own pride; and she would have despised herself if a motion of her eyebrow or a sigh from her breast had betrayed the sadness which, against her will, she felt in her heart. She looked, therefore, with a cold and calm eye on the prince as he entered, and for the first time he seemed no longer the handsome man, the being endowed with numberless fascinations, of former days.

She read only in his flaccid features the sad history of the past. The charm was broken which had held her eyes captive. Her vision was clear again, and she shuddered before this wild, demoniacal beauty which she had once adored as G.o.d's image in man. As she looked at him, she felt as if she could hate him, because she had loved him; because she had spent her first youth, her first love, her first happiness, on him; because he had defrauded her of the peace and innocence of her heart; and because she no longer had even the right of weeping for her lost love, but was forced to turn away from it with blushes of shame.

Feodor approached with an air of happy triumph and satisfaction, and, bowing low to her father, said, with a most exquisite smile, "I have come to seek my bride--to request Elise's hand of her father."