Part 36
"My Son: To-day have I seen thee again,[149] after long times in thy B. (Blumenbühl); my heart is full of joy and anxiety, and thy beautiful image floats before my weeping eyes. Why can I not have thee about me and in my daily sight? How am I bound and distressed! But always did I forge for myself fetters, and beg others to fasten them upon me. Hear thine own history from the mouth of thy mother; from no other will it come to thee more acceptably and truly.
"The Prince and I lived long in an unfruitful marriage, which flattered our cousin Hh. (Haarhaar) with more and more lively hopes of the succession. At a late period thy brother L. (Luigi) annihilated them. One could hardly forgive us that. The Count C. (Cesara) retains the proofs of some dark actions (_de quelques noirceurs_) which were to cost thy poor brother, otherwise weakly, his life. Thy father was with me in Rome just as we learned it. 'They will surely get the better of us at last,' said thy father. In Rome we made the acquaintance of the Prince di Lauria, who would not give his beautiful daughter to the Count C. (Cesara) till he should have become Knight of the Golden Fleece. The Prince procured this order for him at the Imperial Court.
"For this Madam Cesara thought she ought to be very grateful to me, _une femme fort décidée, se repliant sur elle-même, son individualité exagératrice perca à travers ses vertus et ses vices et son sexe_. We learned to love each other. Her romantic spirit communicated with mine, particularly in the Land of Romance. This result was helped by the fact that she and I found ourselves at the same time in the right condition of female enthusiasm, namely, the hope of being mothers. She was confined with an exquisitely beautiful girl, exactly like her, Severina, or as she was called afterward, Linda. Here we made the singular contract, that, if I bore a son, we would exchange; I could educate a daughter without hazard, and with her my son could grow up without incurring that danger which had always threatened thy brother in my house. She said, too, I could better guide a daughter, she a son, as she had little respect for her sex. The Count was well satisfied with the plan; the Hh. Court had just before refused him the oldest princess, for whom he had been a suitor, under the ironical and insulting pretext of her yet childish youth, and he for the sake of avenging offended honor and injured vanity,--for he was a very handsome man, and used only to victory,--was ready for any measures and contests against the haughty court. Only the Prince did not approve of it; he considered an education abroad, &c., quite ambiguous and critical. But we women interwove ourselves so much the more deeply into our romantic idea.
"Two days after I brought forth thee and--Julienne at a birth. On this rich emergency no one had reckoned. Here much turned up quite otherwise and more easily than had been expected. 'I keep,' said I to the Countess, 'my daughter, thou keepest thine; as to Albano (so shall he be called), let the Prince decide.' Thy father allowed that thou shouldst be brought up as son of the Count, indeed, but under his eye, with the honest W. (Wehrfritz). Meanwhile he made provisions whose solid value I then, in the fanciful enthusiasm of friendship, was not in a condition wholly to weigh. At present I only wonder that I was then so full of spirit. The documents of thy genealogy were not only thrice made out,--I, the Count, and the Court Chaplain Spener, were put in possession of them,--but subsequently thou wast presented even to the Emperor Joseph II. as our princely son, and his gracious letter, which I shall one day commit to thy brothers and sisters, is of itself sufficiently decisive.
"The Count himself now took an active part in the mystery,--whether out of love for his daughter or from spite against the H. court,--by demanding, as a reward for his participation, that one day thou and Linda should make a match. Here the Countess stepped in again with her wonders and fancies. 'Linda will certainly resemble me in soul as she now does in form,--force can then never move her,--but magic of the heart, of the fairy-world, the charm of wonder, may draw and melt and bind her.' I know her very words. A singular plan of enchantment was then sketched, whose limits the Count, through the submissiveness with which his brother, adept in a thousand arts, let himself be hired for everything, extended still further, beside making the plan thereby more agreeable. Linda will, long before thou hast read this, have appeared to thee; her name will have been named; thy birth mysteriously announced. May thy spirit, O may it be happily reconciled to it all, and may the difficult play pour winnings into thy lap when the cards are turned up. I am anxious; how can I be otherwise? O what tidings have I not received even from Italy through the Count, before which now all the hopes I have set upon my Lewis (Luigi) are at once extinguished! Now would Hh. (Haarhaar) have conquered through the wicked B. (Bouverot), had it not been that thou livest. And I cannot but be so happy, that thou livest clear of his poisonous influences. Yes, it seems as if the Count had intentionally and gladly let the destruction of thy brother take place in order to strike so much the stronger terror with thy resurrection. Yet I will not do him injustice. But whom shall a mother trust, whom mistrust, at court? And which danger is the greater?
"For the space of three years thou wast obliged, for appearance' sake, to stay on Isola Bella with thy pretended twin-sister, Severina, although under the eye of the Prince, while I, with Julienne, went back to Germany. Longer, however, it could not last, much as thy foster-mother wished it; thou wast too much like thy father. This resemblance cost me many tears,--for on this account thou couldst never go from B. to P. (Pestitz) so long as the Prince still wore youthful features,--even the portraits of his youthful form I had, therefore, gradually to steal away and give in charge to the faithful Spener. Yes, this learned man told me that a convex mirror, which transformed young faces into old ones, had to be put aside, because thou immediately stoodst there as the old Prince when thou didst look into it. O, when my good, pious prince in his feeble days unconsciously prattled all sorts of things, and made me more and more anxious about the fate of the weighty secret, how I trembled, when he one morning (fortunately only Spener and a certain daughter of the Minister von Fr., a gentle, pure spirit, were by), said right out and joyfully, 'Our dear son, Eleonore, was up at the altar last evening; he is certainly a good young man, he knelt down and prayed beautifully, and I said to him only, for I would not discover myself, Go home, go home, my friend; the thunder is already near.'[150] I know that several individuals have already let fall hints about a natural son of the Prince.
"The Countess C. (Cesara) went off with S. (Severina) to V. (Valencia); previously, however, giving herself the name R. (Romeiro), and her daughter the name L. (Linda). The Prince di Lauria had to be drawn into this game, and his consent obtained, for the sake of the inheritance. By this change of names all could be covered up as closely as it now stands. Nine years after, the noble R. (Romeiro) died, and the Count had, under the prerogative of a guardian, the daughter in his sole protection and care.
"I saw her here shortly after the death of her mother.[151] When the flower has entirely unfolded itself out of this full bud, it belongs, as the fullest rose, to thy heart; only may the ghostly game, which I have too light-mindedly sworn to the Countess, pass over without mishap! Should I come to my death-bed before the Prince, I must also draw thy sister and thy brother into thy secret, so as to close my eyes in perfect assurance. Ah, I shall not live to be permitted openly to clasp my son in my arms! The symptoms of my decline come more and more frequent. May it go well with thee, dearest child! Grow up to be holy and honest as thy father! God guide all our weak expedients for the best!
"Thy faithful mother,
"Eleonore.
"P. S. Certain other very weighty secrets I cannot trust to paper, but my dying lips shall let them sink into the heart of thy sister. Farewell! Farewell!"
143. CYCLE.
Albano stood for a long time speechless, looked to heaven, let the leaf fall, and folded his hands, and said, "Thou sendest peace,--I must not choose war,--well, my lot is fixed!" Joy of life, new powers and plans, delight in the prospect of the throne, where only mental effort tells, as rather physical does on the battle-field, the images of new parents and relations, and displeasure at the past, stormed through each other in his spirit. He tore himself loose from his whole former life, the ropes of the whole previous death-chime were broken, he must, in order to win Eurydice out of Orcus, like Orpheus, shun looking back upon the way which he had past. He unveiled all to his new friend, for he battled, he said, now at length, on a free open field for his hitherto concealed right, and should set out immediately for the city. During the recital, the long and daring game which had been played with his holiest rights and relations incensed him still more, and his mistrust of his powers and weapons against the adversaries to whom Luigi fell a victim, and that very brother himself, who could hitherto embrace him in so hard and unbrotherly a mask. "How different was the true sister!" said he. "Why," he went on, "did they oblige me to owe so many thanks to so many a proud, stern spirit for my mere--birthright? Why did they not trust my silence quite as well? O, thus was I forced to misinterpret the poor dead one over yonder,[152] because she, in that hostile night, at the altar sacrificed her fair heart to my revealed rank! Thus was I compelled by presumptions and purposes to injure so many a genuine soul! How innocent might I be but for all this!" "Calm yourself," said Siebenkäs, with keen resentment, "the strength of the foe is driven to resistance, and drawn off from the defeat; and what would a victory have been on an empty battle-field?"
Siebenkäs had, at the revelation of his friend's illustrious rank, and at seeing the fire of his passionateness, which he knew only in common, not in noble manifestations, stepped back some paces,--a movement which Albano did not observe, because he had not presumed upon it. Siebenkäs sought as well as he could,--for his inner man was gradually unfolding again its limbs, which had been frozen stiff in the grave of his friend,--to win back his gentle mirthfulness, and with these flowery chains to bind the impetuous youth. "I rejoice," said he, "that I am the first to offer you wishes on your birth- and coronation-day, all which, however, merge in the single one that you may always assert your baptismal name,--for Alban is the well-known patron saint of the peasants. Except the Haarhaar Prince, whom the Knight truly hits off with the device of the founder of his order, Philip: _ante ferit quam flamma micet_,[153] no one, perhaps, is to be pitied in this connection but the financial stamp-cutter, who now receives nothing new to cut, as the old line continues in power." He added lightly, because he had never seen the heavy wooded and cloud-bearing rock, Gaspard: "What a singular game of names, which few _Cavalleros del Tuzone_ have ever played, it is, that he happens to call himself _De Cesara_, since, as you know, the Spaniards, like the old Romans, often appropriate to themselves the names of their actions or accidents. Thus it is everywhere known from the _Pieces Interassantes_, Tom. I., that Orendayn, for example, took the name _La Pas_, because he, in 1725, signed the peace between Austria and Spain,--he baptized himself with a third name, _Transport Real_, in order to remember and remark that he had carried away the Infante to Italy. _Cesara_ is of course more accidental."
Albano was, for the first time, by such resemblances of spirit to the free Schoppe, really drawn to his heart. He took leave of him, and said, "Friend of our friend, will we keep together?" "Verily, the doubt which rests upon the decision of your fate, Prince," replied Siebenkäs, "were alone sufficient to settle that, if only my heart alone had the business of settling it; but--" Albano shrugged his shoulders, as if irritated, but was silent; "meanwhile I will remain here," the other continued, more softly, "until the earth rests on the deceased; then I set up the black wooden cross over it, and write all his names thereupon." "Well, so be it!" said Albano. "But his dog I take, because he has been longer acquainted with me. I am a young man, still young in lost years, but already very old in lost times, and understand as well as many another who is bent by age what it is to lose fellow-creatures. Singular it is, that I always find on graves mirrors wherein the dead walk and look, alive again. Thus I found on Liana's grave her living image and echo; my old prostrate Schoppe I found, also, as you know, erect and stirring, behind a looking-glass, which my hand could as little break through. I assure you, even my parents were conjured before me; my father I can see in a cylindrical mirror, and my mother through an object-glass. Here, now, there is nothing to do, when one stands in a night, where all stars of life move downward, but stand very firm therein. But to my old humorist must I still say _Adio_."
He went into the chamber of death. Silently Siebenkäs followed him, struck with the unwonted quaintness of his--grief. With dry eyes, Albano drew the white cloth from the earnest face, whose fixed eyebrows no longer shaped themselves for any joke, and which slept away in an iron sleep without time. The dog seemed to be shy of the cold man. Albano sought, by sharp, vehement, dry looks, to imprint the dead face, even to every wrinkle, deeply on his brain, as in plaster, especially as the most living copy, the friend, had escaped him. Then he lifted the heavy hand, and placed it on the brow which was to wear the princely hat, as if therewith to bless and consecrate it. At last he bent down to the face, and lay for a long time on the cold mouth; but, when he finally raised himself up, his eyes were weeping, and his whole heart, and he tremblingly held out his hand to the spectator, and said, "Well, so mayest thou, too, fare well!" "No," cried Siebenkäs; "I cannot do that, if I go. Schoppe! I stay with thy Albano!"
Just then came Wehrfritz and Augusti, and interrupted the weeping solemnity of the threefold love with gay looks and words.
144. CYCLE.
The old foster-father called him Prince, indeed, and no longer thou; but, in patriotic rapture, he fervently pressed the nursling of his house to his heart. Augusti handed him, with grave courtliness and a brief congratulation, the following epistle from Julienne:--
"Dearest Brother: Now, at length, I can, for the first time, call thee rightly brother. I have in one eye tears of mourning, and yet in the other tears of gladness, now that all clouds are taken from thy birth; and in Haarhaar, too, all goes tolerably well. The Lector is despatched to tell thee all: where should I find time? He must also tell thee of Herr von Bouverot, whose red nose and bent-up chin, and greedy barbarity toward his few people and many creditors, and whose grossness and sensuality and dry malice I hate to such a degree. However, he is now so properly punished by thy manifestation. Of course all is, like myself, in disorder and confusion. Ludwig's testament was opened this morning, according to his will, and he gave thee thy whole right. I will not be angry about this, brother, in the midst of weeping. He was properly hard toward his brother and sister,--toward me exceedingly so; for he hated all women, even to his wife, who is only of some use when it goes well with her, and works of art themselves really hardened him against men. But let him rest in his peace, of which, indeed, he has found little! He must this very evening, on account of the nature of his complaint, and on account of the length of the way to Blumenbühl, be interred temporarily. Here am I now with thy foster-parents, in the neighborhood of our buried parents. On this account, come without fail! Thou art my only solace in the night of sadness. I must hold thee again to my heart, which will beat hard against thine, and weep and speak, if it only can. Do come! Now, at length, surely, as all stands ready in the hall for the dance, God will let no cold spectres or frightful masks creep in, I pray. Ah, only on thy account am I so happy, and weep enough.
"Julia."
Hardly had Albano given his foster-father the joyful promise to be this evening at his house, when the latter, without further words, hastened off to prepare his "folks" for the joy of the twofold visit.
The Lector was now entreated for his news, with which he seemed to hesitate cautiously on account of Siebenkäs, till Albano begged him freely to impart all to him and his new friend. His account, including some interpolations which came to Albano afterward, was this:--
Bouverot (with whom he began at the questioning of Albano, whose curiosity was excited) had been hitherto in secret league with the aspiring Prince of Haarhaar, and had, in the confident calculation of making through him his permanent fortune, and even an unexpected marriage, upon his word unhung his order-cross of a German _Herr_, linked at once to infamy and income, and caused to be delivered to the sister of this Prince, Idoine, through the Prince himself, who stood pledged to him for the repeal of her similar vow,[154] a miniature of her, which he insisted that he had stolen in his flight, together with half a picture-gallery, and with many fine allusions to his adopted name _Zefisio_, as that of a Romish Arcadian, and to the name of her Arcadia. "_Oh la différence de cet homme au diable, comme est-elle petite!_" said Augusti, with quite an unexpected vehemence. Albano must needs ask why. "He passed off an entirely different picture for that of the Princess," said the Lector. Of course it was Liana's own, Albano concluded, and had easily, by a few questions, drawn out that mournful history of the blind Liana chased by the tiger Bouverot.
"O wretched me!" cried Albano, half in fury, and half in pain. It distressed him to think of the sufferings wherewith the holy heart had had to pay for its short, pure, chary love toward him,--who became blind the first time because she so loved his father,[155] and the second time because the son misunderstood and loved her. But he restrained himself, and spoke not on the subject; the past was to him, as echo is to bees, hurtful. Siebenkäs testified his joy at Bouverot's punishment through the miscarriage of all his plans.
Albano heard that even Luigi had assumed the appearance of supporting Bouverot's connubial intentions, merely for the sake of seeing him fall from so much the higher elevation. "With what a long, cold, bitter, malicious pleasure," thought Albano, "could my brother, in the hope of the ditch which his death would dig for the hostile court and its adherents, look upon all their expectations, and graciously accept all their measures, from the marriage of the Princess even to the congratulations thereto appertaining, while he hated the Princess and all! And how could he maintain that life-long silent coldness toward me?" But Albano neglected to consider two reasons,--his own proud deportment toward the Prince, and the customary avarice of princes, which is shy of apanage[156] moneys.
Gaspard's transactions in Haarhaar, which the Lector gave, only with some omissions enjoined by Julienne, were these:--
With characteristic pleasure and silence had the Knight looked, of old, upon the intricacies of human relations, and given them over to their own disentanglement or dilaceration. Here he let all the dreams of others grow more and more lively and wild, until, with one snatch at the breast, he swept them all from the sleeper at once. His old indignation at the proud refusal of the princely bride was appeased, when he could show them, below the glittering triumphal gate of their wishes and efforts, the documents of Albano's birth, from the hand of the old Prince down even to that of the brother Luigi, as just the same number of armed guards, who should drive them back again out of the gate of victory. A sympathetic astonishment was expressed; nothing was agreed to. Albano had neither been presented to the country nor the empire. Gaspard brought on very calmly an early acknowledgment from Joseph II. This, too, was found out of rule and invalid. Thereupon he confessed, with the determined anger with whose lightning-sparks he so often suddenly pierced through men and relations, that he was going to unveil, without further ceremony, the whole conduct of the court toward Luigi in his eighth year and in his travelling years to all the courts of Europe.
Here they broke off in terror the forenoon's negotiations, to prepare themselves for new ones in the afternoon. In these--which the Lector was ordered to conceal from Albano--the wish of a continued nearer union between the two houses was shown at a distance. By the union was meant Idoine, whose resemblance to Liana, and thereby Albano's love for the latter, had long been known as gossip. But the involving of this guiltless angel ran counter to Gaspard's whole plan of his complete satisfaction; he--who with his high, jagged antlers easily flew through the confused low brush-wood of worldly life--pushed against the barriers of his complete power, gave a downright No! and they broke off in a rage, with the courtly reminder that Herr von Hafenreffer was to accompany him as plenipotentiary and transact the rest of the business in Pestitz.
So both arrived. Hafenreffer, quite as fine and cold as he was honest, easily searched out all the real relations of the case. Gaspard imparted to Julienne--still fancying that she retained her old love for his daughter Linda--the wish of the rival Court; but he was astounded at her disclosures, which spoke as much for Idoine as her former secret influences upon Albano. In addition to this, she further provoked him, in the confused twilight of her situation, by the well-meant offer to make good to him in some measure his paternal outlays upon Albano. "The Spaniard reads no household accounts, he merely pays them," said he, and sensitively took leave forever, in order to travel over all the islands of the earth. Albano he wished not to see any more, from chagrin at the accident that he had been cheated out of the enjoyment, by Schoppe's church- and grave-robbery, of punishing and humbling Albano, by the disclosure that he was only Linda's father and not his, for cherishing bold doubts of his worth. Whither Linda had gone on that night of his discovery as father, he coldly concealed from all.