The Youth of the Great Elector Part 13

"And yet you have done it, so often, so grievously!" cried he, and his handsome open countenance grew quickly dark, while his eyes flashed with indignation. "Ludovicka," he continued, "you have tortured and tormented me, and often when I have seen how you smiled upon others and exchanged glances with them, and allowed yourself to be pleased by their homage, their devotion--often have I felt then as if an iron fist had seized my heart to tear it from my breast, and felt as if I enjoyed this, and as if I exulted with delight over my own wrath. Tear out my foolish heart, you iron fist of pain, said I to myself; cast it far from me, this childish heart, for then shall I be happy and glad, then shall I no longer feel love but be freed from the fearful bondage it imposes upon me. How often, Ludovicka, how often have I been ashamed of these chains, and bitten at them, as the lion, languishing in a dungeon, bites at his."

"Truly, fair sir," cried Ludovicka, as arm in arm she and her beloved moved toward the divan--"truly, to hear you talk, one would suppose that love was a misfortune and a pain."

"It is so indeed," said he, almost savagely--"yes, love is a misfortune and a pain; for with love comes doubt, jealousy, and jealousy is the most dreadful pain. And then I have often said to myself as I wept about you for rage and woe because I have seen you more friendly with others than with me--I have often said to myself that it is unworthy of a man to allow himself to be subjected by love, unworthy to make a woman the mistress of his thoughts, of his desires; that a man should strive for higher aims, aspire to n.o.bler things."

"To n.o.bler things? Now tell me, you monster, is there anything n.o.bler than a woman? Is there a higher aim than to win her love?"

"No; that is true, there is nothing higher!" cried he pa.s.sionately. "No there is nothing n.o.bler. Oh, forgive me, Ludovicka, I was a heathen, who denies his G.o.ddess, and finds fault with her out of excess of feeling. My G.o.d! I have suffered so much through you and your cruelty! And I tell you if you had not now at last heard my pet.i.tion, at last granted me a rendezvous, then--"

"Then you would have killed yourself," interrupted she--"then you would have stabbed yourself on the threshold of my door, while you cursed me. Is not that what you would have said?"

"No; I would have found out the man whom you preferred to me, and I would have killed him, and you I would have despised--that is what I would have said. But no, no, I can not conceive of or imagine myself despising you--loving you no more! My whole soul is yours, and my heart flames up toward you as if it were one vast and living lake of fire. You smile; you do not believe me, Ludovicka! But I tell you, if you do not believe me, neither do you believe in love itself."

"I do not believe in it, either, cousin; and you are quite right, your heart is a lake of fire. You know, though, all fires become extinct?"

"When fuel is denied them, Ludovicka--not till then. They burn constantly, if supplied with constant fuel."

"So then, my Electoral Prince, my heart is the fuel you would require?"

"Yes, my Princess, I do require it. I implore it of you. Be good, Ludovicka, torment me not. Let me at last feel myself blessed--let me put my arm around you, and say and think, she is mine! mine she remains!"

"Mine she remains!" repeated Ludovicka, sighing. "Alas! Frederick, how long ere you will no longer wish that I were yours; how long ere all the oaths of your heart will be forgotten and forever hushed? I have heard it from all women--they all say that the love of men is perishable; that, like a flash of lightning, it shines forth with vivid blaze, then vanishes away."

"And they have all deceived you or been deceived themselves, Ludovicka.

The love of men never expires, unless forcibly extinguished by women. Be trustful, my Ludovicka, trustful, and pious, and let love, holy and still, ardent and glowing, penetrate your heart, just as I do, without trembling, without hesitancy, and without the fear of men."

"You love me, then, love me truly?" asked Ludovicka, tenderly clinging to him.

"I love you with wrath and pain, love you with rapture and delight, love you in spite of the whole world! I will know nothing, consider nothing, hear nothing of the folly of the wise, of the irrationality of the rational, of the stupidity of the sage. I will know nothing and hear nothing, but that I love you! Just as you are, so cruel and so lovely, so coquettish and so innocent, so pa.s.sionate and yet so cold. Oh, you are an enchantress, who has changed my whole being and taken possession of all my thoughts and all my feelings. Formerly I loved my parents, feared my father, respected my friend and early teacher, the faithful Leuchtmar, listened to his counsels, followed his advice. But now all that is past--all is swallowed up. I think only of you, only know you, only hear you."

"And yet a day will come when I shall call upon you in vain, a day when you shall no longer hear my voice."

"It will be the day of my death."

"No; the day when you leave this place. The day on which you return to your native land to become there a reigning lord, and leave the poor humbled Princess Ludovicka behind here deserted and alone."

"But you? Will you not go with me?" he asked, in amazement. "Will not my country be yours? And if I am a reigning lord, will you not stand as sovereign lady by my side?"

"I?" asked she, bewildered. "How do you mean? I do not understand you."

"I mean," he whispered softly, while he clasped her closely to himself--"I mean that you shall accompany me as my wife."

"But!" cried she, smiling, and with an expression of radiant joy--"but you have never said that I should be your wife."

"Have I not told you that I love you? Have I not been repeating to you for a year that I love you? And does it not naturally follow that you and you alone are to be my wife?"

"But they will not suffer it, Frederick!" cried she, with an expression of pain. "No, they will never suffer you to make me your wife."

"Who will not suffer it, Ludovicka?"

"Your parents will not suffer it, and the great Lord von Schwarzenberg, who rules your father, as my mother has told me, and Herr von Leuchtmar, who rules you and--"

"n.o.body rules me," interrupted he indignantly, and a flush of anger or shame suffused his face. "No, n.o.body rules me, and I shall never be subject to any other will than my own."

"So you say now, Frederick, while you look into my eyes, while you are at my side. But to-morrow, when I am no longer by, when your tutor shall have proved with his cold, matter-of-fact arguments that the poor Princess Ludovicka is no fit match for the Electoral Prince of Brandenburg--to-morrow, when your tutor will chide his beloved pupil for ever having allowed so foolish a love to enter his heart, then--"

"I am a pupil no longer," interrupted he with glowing cheek. "I am seventeen years old, and no tutor has any more power over me."

She seemed not to have heard him, and continued in her sweet, melancholy voice: "To-morrow, when perhaps another messenger comes to summon you home, when he brings you a letter from your father with the command to set forth immediately, in which you are informed that he has selected a bride for you, oh, then will the Electoral Prince Frederick William be naught but the obedient son, who obeys his father's commands, who leaves this country to seek his native land, and to wed the bride who has been chosen for him by his father."

"No!" shouted the Electoral Prince fiercely, while he leaped up from the divan, and stamped his foot upon the ground--"I say no, and once more no.

I shall not do what they order. I shall only follow my own will. And it is my will, my fixed, unalterable will, to make you my wife, and this will I shall carry into effect, despite my father, the German Emperor, and the whole world. Ludovicka, I here offer you my hand. Do you accept it? Will you be my wife?"

With a countenance irradiated by energy, pride, and love he held out his hand to her, and smilingly she laid her own small hand in his. "Yes," she said, "I will be your wife. With pride and joy I accept your beloved hand, and swear that I love you, and will honor and obey you as my lord and my beloved!"

He sank upon his knees before her, and kissed the hand which rested in his own. "Ludovicka Hollandine, Princess of the Palatinate," he said, with distinct and solemn voice, "I, Frederick William, Electoral Prince of Brandenburg, vow and swear hereby to love and be faithful to you ever as your wedded husband."

"I accept your oath, and return it!" she cried joyfully. "I, too, swear to love and be ever true to you, and to take you for my husband. And here you have my betrothal kiss, and here you have your destined bride. Take her, and love her a little, for she loves you very much, and she will die of chagrin if you forget her!"

"I shall never forget you, Ludovicka!" cried he, tenderly embracing her.

"Storms indeed will come, violent tempests will rage about us, but I rejoice in them. For strength is tried by storms, and when it thunders and lightens I can then prove to you that my arm is strong enough to protect you, and that you are safe from all danger upon my heart."

"O Frederick! and still, still would they separate us. My mother just said to me yesterday, 'Take care not to love the Electoral Prince seriously, for he can never be your husband.' And when, trembling and weeping, I asked the reason, she at last replied, 'Because you are a poor Princess, and because the misfortunes of your house overshadow you likewise.' The Elector and his minister will never give their consent to such a union, and the Electoral Prince will never have the spirit to be disobedient to his father and to marry in opposition to his wishes."

She darted a quick, searching glance at his face, and saw how he reddened with indignation. "I shall prove to your mother that she is mistaken in me," he said vehemently. "I am indeed yet young in years, but I feel myself in heart a man who bows to no strange will, and is only obedient to the law of his conscience and his own judgment. I love you, Ludovicka, and I will marry you!"

"If they give us time, Frederick," sighed Ludovicka. "If they do not force me first to wed some other man."

"What do you say?" cried the Electoral Prince, growing pale, as he clasped his beloved yet closer to his side. "Could it be possible that--"

"That they sell and barter me away, just as they do other princesses? Yes, alas! it is possible. Ay, Frederick, more than possible--it is certain that they have such views. Wherefore think you, then, that the Electoral Prince of Hesse is here--that he came yesterday with my uncle, the Stadtholder, to visit my mother, and that he was even presented to me in my own apartment? O Frederick! my mother has told me it is a settled thing--that the Electoral Prince of Hesse has come to marry me. They have already made arrangements, and got everything in readiness. Day after to-morrow is to be the day for his formal wooing, and if you do not save me, if you know of no way of escape, then in eight days I shall be the bride of the Electoral Prince of Hesse. I had planned, Frederick, to try you first--to hear from yourself whether you actually loved me, whether your love was earnest. Had I discovered that you were only making sport of my heart, had you not formally offered me your hand and sued for me as your wife, then would I have gone silently away, would have buried my love in the depths of my soul, sacrificed myself to my mother's wishes and the misfortune of my house, and become the wife of the Electoral Prince of Hesse. But you do love me, you offer me your hand, and now I confess my love openly and joyfully--now I cast myself in your arms and entreat you: Save me, my Frederick, do not let them tear me away from you! Save me from the Electoral Prince of Hesse!"

She flung both her arms around him, pressed him closely to her, and looked up to him with tenderly beseeching eye. With pa.s.sionate warmth the Electoral Prince kissed those alluring eyes and lips responding to his pressure. "You shall be mine, you must be mine, for I love you inexpressibly. I can not, I will not live without you!"

"Let us fly, my beloved," whispered she, always holding him in her embrace.

"Let us fly before the wrath of your father, before the courtship of the Electoral Prince of Hesse. Let us preserve our love in some quiet corner of the earth; let us fly where no one can follow us, where your father's will and his minister's hate can have no power--let us fly!"

"Yes," said he, clasping closer in his arms the tender, glowing creature who clung so affectionately to him--"yes, let us fly, my beloved. They shall not tear you from me; I will have you, in spite of them all--you shall be mine, even though the whole world should rise up in opposition.

To-morrow night let us make our escape. You are right; there must be some quiet corner of the world where we can hide ourselves, living for happiness, for love alone, until it is permitted us to emerge from our seclusion, and a.s.sume the station in the world due to us both. Yes, we will flee, Ludovicka, we will flee, no matter where!"

"Oh, I hope I know a place of refuge, where we may be sheltered from the first wrath of our relatives, my Frederick. I have friends, influential, mighty friends, who will gladly furnish us with an asylum, and from whom we may accept it. To them I shall turn--to them apply for a retreat. They will provide us with the means for flight. Only, my beloved," she continued, hesitating and with downcast eyes, "only one thing is needful to enable me to flee with you."

"What is that, my beloved, tell me?"

"Frederick, I can only follow my husband, only go with you as your wife."

"Yes, you sweet, lovely girl, you can only follow me as your husband.