In answer to his inquiries for Megret, Arwed learned that he had retired into the garden in company with a strange officer. He followed him there, and their voices guided him through the leafless and snow covered walks to a thick grove of yew-trees, in which Megret and the stranger were sitting. A glance through an opening in the branches of the trees discovered to him the face of Siquier, pale and wasted by disease and affliction; and the interest of a conversation which now commenced between them, chained him with irresistible power to the spot.
'What is it that you particularly want of me?' asked Megret, with mingled embarrassment and vexation. 'We have both of us so long and so carefully avoided each other, that this unexpected visit may well excite my wonder.'
'I am about to leave Sweden forever,' answered Siquier, in a desponding tone, 'and have come to take my leave of you, and to procure money for my traveling expenses.'
'Money for traveling?' murmured Megret. 'We settled with each other long since, and balanced our accounts. Above all, how came you to form the resolution of leaving Sweden?'
'You know,' answered Siquier, in a low voice and looking carefully about him, 'with what ignominy common report has branded my honor since the king's death. I still hoped that those suspicions would gradually die away, but they continued daily to strengthen and increase, and I learned that my enemies with witty insolence pronounced my once honorable name,Sicaire,1thus, by a slight change of sound expressing the accusation with that atrocious word. Two duels followed, and still the rumor continued to spread. Had I fought half the army, it would have been unavailing. Finally my mental sufferings overpowered my physical strength. A raging fever seized me, and...' He ceased.
'And then?' asked Megret, with painful anxiety.
'In the paroxysms,' stammered Siquier, almost inaudibly, 'I am said to have accused myself of Charles's murder, and to have thrown up my windows and begged Sweden's pardon for the crime.'
'What consequence could they attach to such silly phantasies?' asked Megret, turning deadly pale.
'The government,' continued Siquier, 'had me confined in a mad-house, and when I recovered I received my dismission, with an injunction to leave the kingdom.'
'Are you also, like myself, dismissed?' cried Megret, with a ferocious laugh. 'They are right! The lemons have been squeezed, why should they not sweep out the useless peels?'
'It is dreadful to have no means of escaping the gnawing worm in the heart,' said Siquier, 'but, between ourselves, Megret, have we deserved anything better?'
While saying this he seized Megret's hand and gave him a piercing glance. The latter angrily tore himself from his grasp.
'You know our former agreement,' said he moodily, 'never to allude to bye-gone occurrences, even in our most secret conversations.'
'You are right,' said Siquier, with a look and tone of horror. 'The past is, for us, a black night, full of blood and flames! Let us wait until it re-appear in eternal futurity!'
'Here is money,' said Megret, placing a heavy purse of gold in his hand. 'Go and prosper.'
'It contains more than thirty pieces of silver,' said Siquier, weighing the purse in a sort of mental abstraction. 'There is more than enough to purchase a potter's field for a wanderer's grave!'
'The fever has weakened you, poor Siquier!' exclaimed Megret, with forced laughter. 'You have grown learned in the scriptures, and will no doubt become one of the professing brothers of La Trappe, in your old age. Do hasten to get there.'
'Mock me not, seducer!' said Siquier, grating his teeth and grasping the hilt of his sword. After a few moments he observed, 'you are right! I believe in a hereafter,--I believe in future rewards and punishments, and may I therefore live to repent and reform. You entertain a different belief, and you have only to shoot yourself when your conscience awakens from its death-sleep!'
'That may become advisable!' said Megret, in a low tone, and both remained sitting near each other, their arms resting on their knees, and their faces buried in their hands. They remained silent, each absorbed in his own reflections, while the thickly falling flakes of snow gradually wrapped them in white mantles, without attracting notice.
At length a heavy sigh escaped from Siquier's laboring breast. He rose up, threw the purse of gold before Megret's feet, and suddenly left the garden, without bidding him farewell. Megret, uttering no word, remained sitting in the same posture, and Arwed was detained motionless for some time, by the feelings which this singular and dreadful disclosure awakened, and by a want of decision, which of the two first to call to account for their hidden deed of horror. He finally concluded: 'why should I contend with the miserable man, whom the judgment of God has already stricken, whose marrow has been already consumed by sickness and remorse, who has neither strength nor courage to oppose me, and who, perhaps, would welcome death from my hand? No, the insolent transgressor, in all the pride and bloom of life, shall be the object of my wrath--theseducer! as his accomplice called him. I will punish not theknife, but thehand!'--and he quickly approached the entrance to the grove, which Megret was that moment leaving.
The latter shrunk before the indignant glance of the youth. The flush of anger and the paleness of terror alternately played upon his countenance, and it was dreadful to see the two manly forms confronting each other with looks of enmity and defiance.
The fearful silence was interrupted by Arwed. 'I have overheard your conversation with Siquier, colonel,' said he, 'and, as you know how strong was the love I bore the king, you will not be surprised when I declare to you that we must fight!'
'You have an especial passion for pistol-shooting!' calmly and jestingly replied Megret. 'Probably you wish to revive the custom of the ancient pagans, with whom the companions in arms of a hero prince reciprocally slaughtered each other on his grave; as an evidence of their love and respect for him.'
'Name your time and place!' cried Arwed, whose anger was increased by his insolent witticisms.
'Eight days from this, about the same hour,' answered Megret, after some little reflection, 'in the first iron mine of Danemora.'
'That is a late and distant rendezvous,' said Arwed. 'You will not let me wait for you there in vain?'
The Frenchman's eyes flashed, and in his anger he resembled an evil spirit in the human form. 'Young man!' he cried, 'doubt every thing--doubt even of Megret's eternal salvation--but doubt not his word or his courage,--or you will compel him to annihilate you even against his will.' And with a proud step he left the garden.
Some days later, Arwed, prepared for his journey, approached the sick bed of his uncle to take leave of him.
'You are going once more to Danemora?' asked the old man. 'What occasion calls you there?'
'I wish to see how it goes with the poor Christine,' answered Arwed, unwilling to disturb the sick man by naming the true motive.
'You are deceiving me,' said the old man reprovingly. 'Your business is of a more unpleasant nature. You have executed the charge I gave you. Megret has left us, and your journey relates to him. Danemora is only a pretext to keep me in ignorance.'
'Truly no,' answered Arwed. 'Megret has appointed it for our place of meeting.'
'Is it so!' cried the old man. 'I am sorry for it, and have a thousand times repented of the charge I gave you. It would be a dreadful thing if you should fall in this miserable combat. You can and must yet become right useful to your father-land. Promise me at least that you will pursue this affair no further than honor absolutely demands.'
'Forgive me, dear uncle,' said Arwed. 'I cannot give you that promise. But one of us will leave the field alive. Yet quiet yourself with the assurance that it was not your request, with which indeed there was no necessity for my compliance, which occasions this duel; it has a more weighty cause.
'What can that be?' doubtingly replied the uncle.
'Excuse my naming it to you,' answered Arwed. 'I fight not for our house, nor for my own honor. I fight for Sweden!'
'Go then, bold combatant, and may God fight with you!' cried the old man. 'It is possible you may not find me alive when you return. For which reason receive now my thanks for your filial love and truth. That I consider myself your father in the full sense of the word, my testament, which I have already deposited with the high court at Stockholm, will inform you. I have also written to your father and to the queen. You must become my successor in the government of West Bothnia.'
'Never!' cried Arwed, impetuously.
'You must!' persisted his uncle. 'Not for love of the queen, nor for your own advantage; but for the welfare of this province. I may be permitted to say that with me the office has been in good hands, and I am unwilling that an unworthy courtier or unfeeling soldier should demolish what has cost me so many long years to build up. You are intelligent, brave and good; and you have, with me, become familiar with the civil duties. You are the most suitable person, and you must be governor; where the happiness of the people is concerned, anger, vindictiveness, and similar trifling hindrances, must not dare to raise their heads in such a heart as yours.'
'My dear uncle!' said the yielding Arwed, and kneeling down before the bed, he kissed the invalid's wasted hand.
'God bless thee, my son!' said the latter, laying his hand upon the youth's head.
'And also the poor Christine! is it not so?' asked Arwed.'
'Tell her--I--do not curse her!' cried the old man with a severe struggle; 'and now leave me. These feelings are too strong for my exhausted powers.'
He turned his face to the wall, and Arwed departed in sadness.
At the appointed hour Arwed entered the shaft of the first mine in Danemora, with his pistols under his arm. In consequence of the perfect mental repose with which he proceeded upon his bloody business, he had this time a better opportunity to look about him and observe the peculiarities of the monstrous cavity. A strange feeling seized him when he took a nearer view of the active operations of this subterranean world. The miserable huts and wooden booths here and there erected among the rocks; the larger hut with a small belfry which denoted the church of the immense abyss; the market, which the venders of the indispensable necessaries of life, attracted by all-powerful avarice, held here below; the ceaseless prosecution of the mining operations--gave to the whole scene the appearance of an abortive attempt to create a subterranean city; while the black dresses and earth colored faces of the perpetual residents of these melancholy regions were well calculated to strengthen the illusion. The whole was lighted only by pans of pitch which fumed and smoked here and there in their elevated niches. No glimmer of daylight penetrated there. The firmament of these abodes was the roof of the mines, which, indeed, had no sun, but had its fixed and wandering stars in the fires, torches and lamps of the workmen--and, in the frequent explosions which took place, their thunder and lightning, like the upper world. Arwed bent his course directly to the little edifice which served for the church, and upon reaching it discovered in its rear a small building, which rather more than the others deserved the name of a house. It was the dwelling of the clergyman. Upon entering he discovered Christine, whom sorrow and confinement had rendered still more pale and emaciated, busily plying her needle by lamp light.
'Ah, Arwed!' cried she overjoyed, and springing towards him she held out her bandaged hand as before. A dark cloud soon flitted over her beautiful countenance, and she asked distrustfully, 'have you no secret object in this visit?'
'A very secret and serious one,' answered Arwed--'from which, however, you have nothing to fear. On the contrary, I bring you your father's permission to remain here, the consolation that your child is well attended to, and the assurance of a pecuniary allowance sufficient to preserve you from want.'
'And I have to thank you, still you, for all these blessings!' cried Christine with grateful enthusiasm. 'Ah, how happy you make me, and at the same time how inexpressibly unhappy!'
'Poor Christine!' said he with deep sympathy--'How miserable has the vehemence of thy nature rendered thee!'
He laid his pistols upon, the table, and listened to ascertain if any one was approaching.
'You said just now,' remarked Christine sorrowfully, 'that a secret and serious purpose brought you here. I hope those weapons which you have brought with you into this peaceful hut, have no connection with it?'
Arwed walked silently to the window and looked impatiently out into the eternal night.
'Do you apprehend any further malice from my husband?' Christine anxiously asked. 'I will be answerable for him with my life. He reveres you as our guardian angel. Moreover he has become much better in this abode of darkness than he was in the upper world; and should I with the aid of time be enabled to banish the deep sorrow which still constantly hovers about him, I have reason to hope that we may once more attain to something like happiness.'
Arwed, who had scarcely listened to the poor sufferer, now suddenly asked, 'has not Megret been recently here?'
'Do you then seek him?' cried Christine with astonishment. 'Yes, he was here scarcely an hour since. He caused Mac Donalbain to be called from his labor, and retired far into the mine in private and earnest conversation with him. I had already become somewhat alarmed on account of their long absence. Megret is a fiend, and bears the most bitter hatred towards my husband.'
At this moment Arwed heard voices from without. He raised the window, and to his astonishment saw Megret arm in arm with Mac Donalbain and in earnest conversation with an old clerk of the mine.
'I repeat it my friend,' said Megret, 'your way of exploding is bad. Greater results may be produced with half the labor and powder, when one begins right.'
'I have all proper respect for your mathematical sciences, sir officer,' the clerk peevishly answered; 'but still I think that we, who are in constant practice here, must better understand how to obtain the ore than you can by theoretical calculations.'
'Must not the engineer be also familiar with the practice?' asked Megret. 'Our mines traverse every variety of earth, and we are often under the necessity of calculating the resistance of walls and masses of stone.'
The clerk, who adhered as pertinaciously to old customs as the ore to its native mountains, shook his head in token of disbelief.
'You want proof,' said Megret, with some apparent irritation. 'Show me a suitable place and let me spring a mine in my way. I will pay for the labor and powder if I do not make my words good.'
'Vivat!' cried the clerk, confident of victory; at that moment Arwed stepped directly in front of Megret, with his pistols in his hand and bowed in silence.
'I rejoice to find you here,' said Megret with great equanimity, courteously returning his greeting. 'Allow me but to settle a contest between the old practice and the new science, and I shall immediately afterwards have the pleasure to be at your service.'
During these few moments Mac Donalbain had hastened into the house, and now returning in a state of great excitement, seized Megret by the arm and drew him away.
The clerk followed them, talking to himself and gesticulating with great animation, and they all soon disappeared in the dark windings of the mine.
Christine now came out, casting her troubled glances in every direction. As soon as she perceived Arwed she hastened to him. 'Mac Donalbain was with me just now,' said she anxiously. 'He pressed me silently to his bosom, and then rushed forth as if frantic! Where is he? where is Megret?'
'Megret is essaying a new method of springing mines,' answered Arwed, 'and will soon be here again.'
'And Mac Donalbain has accompanied him!' cried the trembling wife. 'I fear some mischief is on foot here.'
'Causeless apprehension!' said Arwed; 'the clerk is with them. Megret's undertaking will require the presence of several workmen, and his honor as an officer is pledged for his speedy return.'
'What have you to do with that bad man?' asked the still suspicious Christine--but the approach of two men prevented a reply. They were Swedenborg and the superintendent of the mines. The latter separated from Swedenborg with a respectful inclination, and passed on in obedience to the calls of duty to some other portion of the mine. Swedenborg however advanced towards Arwed.
'I greet you, vigorous swimmer upon the sea of misfortune,' said Swedenborg to Arwed, offering his hand in a most friendly manner.
'Welcome to your kingdom, sir mining-counsellor!' answered Arwed. 'What news do you bring from the upper world into this abyss?'
'I bring news of a diet which will take Ulrika's crown and place it upon her husband's head,' said Swedenborg; 'of an armistice with Denmark, and peace with Poland and Prussia.'
'And Russia?' asked Arwed hastily.
'Remains implacable, and is making new preparations,' answered Swedenborg, shrugging his shoulders.
'These false steps are a great misfortune to my father-land!' cried Arwed despondingly. 'Peace with powerful Russia should have been the first object.'
Swedenborg had meantime kept his eyes immovably fixed upon the youth, and now appeared to have subjected the lineaments of his face to a sufficient trial. He became so gloomy, and the glances of his black eyes so piercing, that Arwed could hardly support it.
'How came you by this love of peace?' he finally asked the youth in a reproachful tone, 'when your heart is destitute of it, and you have descended into this mine with bloody intentions?'
'If your spiritual eyes are sharp enough to read my heart,' answered Arwed, with surprise, 'you must know and honor the motives which actuate me.'
'Every motive is blameworthy,' answered Swedenborg, with an elevated voice, 'which induces an earthworm to endeavor to anticipate the dispensations of Providence. Yet will His mercy spare you this sin; for behold, the arm of the fearful Nemesis is already raised, and at the Lord's command it will fall in destruction upon the criminal.'
Christine had drawn close to Arwed during this conversation, and he now perceived the feverish trembling of her frame, caused by Swedenborg's prophecy.
At this moment a young miner came and asked, 'where shall I find major Gyllenstierna.'
'Here he stands!' answered Arwed, 'probably you wish to bring me to the officer who was just now here.'
'No, he merely sends you this billet,' said the young man, departing.
'What can he have to write to me about, situated as we are?' Arwed peevishly exclaimed. Unfolding the billet, which was written in pencil, and stepping to the nearest pitch-pan, he read as follows:
'To appease the manes of your king, you have demanded satisfaction of me. I had however previously promised it to myself and to myself therefore, precedence is due. From you I have only to expect apossibledeath. I shall inflict it upon myself with a surer hand. Mac Donalbain shares my fate. In gratitude to the countess Gyllenstierna for the manner in which she rejected my addresses, I have persuaded her husband that he belongs to this earth as little as myself. Many will think the manner of my death strange; but I wish to die in the way of my profession, and at the same time to preserve my body from the ignominy of a judicial investigation. I have the honor to greet you.Au revoir, I dare not say.
Megret.'
The horror-stricken Arwed had hardly read to the end, when suddenly the whole broad space swam in a sea of fire. A terrible explosion, as of a powder magazine, of which echo increased the frightful roar a thousand fold, shook the ground under Arwed's feet, and displaced heavy masses of stone from the sides of the cavern which fell with a crash to the bottom of the mine. Loud screams suddenly arose on all sides, to which a mournful silence immediately succeeded, and from the direction in which Megret and Mac Donalbain had gone, came rolling in a dense white-gray powder-smoke, which twirled in waving clouds along the top of the arch, and soon filling the whole mine, wrapped every object in its impenetrable veil.
'What was that?' stammered Christine, clinging to Arwed for support.
'God's judgment!' solemnly and majestically answered Swedenborg. 'Wo to the sinner who wickedly and presumptuously draws it down upon his head before the appointed time.'
'Let us go and see if it be possible to render any assistance,' proposed Arwed; and proceeded with Swedenborg toward the place whence the smoke issued. Christine followed them with a misgiving heart. They were met by the old clerk, who ran up to them with a black and disfigured face.
'You appear to have been near the scene of the accident,' said Arwed to him. 'Are there many people injured?'
'Thank God only two; who, moreover, are no great loss!' answered the clerk, turning again to show them the way. 'An officer, wishing to instruct us how to blow out the ore, so managed that instead of the ore he blew himself into the air, and a piece of the roof of the mine with him.'
'The explosion was too violent for a mere removal of ore,' remarked Swedenborg.
'Very true, most honored sir,' answered the clerk. 'There also went with it a small cask of powder which was standing near.'
By this time they had arrived at the place. The thick smoke almost suffocated them. The torches of the miners, hurrying to and fro, like nebulous stars, faintly lighted the scene of destruction. A monstrous mountain mass, consisting mostly of rocks and stones, had become loosened by the force of the shock, and covered the bottom to a great height with fragments, through the fissures of which little flames were seen playing.
'They will lie quietly in this coffin until the last day!' observed the clerk.
'In God's name!' shrieked Christine, 'who is the other sufferer?'
'The brigand leader, who was sentenced here for life,' answered the clerk, with indifference.
'Mac Donalbain!' murmured the poor wife, sinking lifeless to the earth.
Christine lay at the parsonage in that last hard struggle which releases the soul from its earthly imprisonment. At her bed-side sat Arwed, with humid eyes, his hands in the cold grasp of hers. Near her pillow stood Swedenborg, with his piercing prophet-glance fixed immovably upon the sufferer.
'The symptoms of death are already observable,' whispered he to the weeping curate. 'Her end is near.'
'She has suffered so much,' said Arwed, 'that if her heart were iron it must break under these hard and repeated blows.'
At this moment Christine suddenly rose in her bed, turned her beauteous eyes with heavenly tenderness upon Arwed, and eagerly pressed his hand to her bosom.
'At the brink of the grave,' said she, 'all false appearances must vanish. So near the source of eternal truth, I may now speak the truth to you. I have loved you, Arwed, loved you with all the powers of my passionate soul, from the moment when you stood before me in the knight's hall in the full perfection of youth and manliness. But this love was my misery, for I was already secretly married. The caprices with which I often tormented you, alas, they came from a bleeding heart! At Ravensten did Mac Donalbain's infamous profession first become fully clear to me, and I made every possible effort to withdraw him from it. But the chains of vice hold strong! Only by slow and gentle degrees could my husband disengage himself from his associates; and, before he had time to accomplish the work, his punishment overtook him. What I have done for him was but the performance of a wife's duty. His self-murder is my divorce for this world and the next, and now my only consolation is, that I shall be able to extend to you a FREE hand when we hereafter meet in eternal light.'
As she proceeded, her voice had increased in clearness and fulness of tone, her eye became bright and flashing, and purple roses burned upon her wasted cheeks.
'You have spoken too fast and too earnestly, countess,' said the curate. 'In your present situation this excitement may cause your death.'
'I have it already in my heart, reverend sir,' said the invalid in a low voice; 'and I know but too well that it is too late to preserve life. Yet I thank you for this care, as well as for the religious consolation you have afforded me in this last heavy trial.'
She held out her hand to him, which the weeping man pressed to his lips, and the deep silence which followed, was only broken by the sobs of those present.
'I have now but one wish in this world,' resumed Christine. 'Alas, but one, the fulfilment of which would soften the pangs of death; but I dare not hope.'
'Thy son is mine!' cried Arwed. 'By God and my own honor, I will adopt him and he shall bear the name and arms of Gyllenstierna.'
'I know,' answered Christine, 'that you will do whatever is great and good, and I have ceased to be anxious about the fate of my child since I confided it to you. But my poor old father--' and here her voice faltered,--'that I may not once more kneel before him and implore his pardon, that, that alone embitters my death.'
'Poor woman!' cried Arwed, who witnessed the extent of her sorrow with the perfect conviction that no consolation could be offered.
'Hope, sinner!' cried Swedenborg with emotion, laying his hand upon Christine's head. 'True repentance may do much; a weeping, penitent child, it presses strongly against the gates of heaven; and behold! the ruby gates fly open, and the eternal mercy, sitting upon a throne woven of rays of light, takes the weeping child softly to her bosom and dries her tears with maternal love!'
He stepped apart, folded his hands, and silently and fervently raised his eyes on high. Christine also folded her hands and moved her lips in a murmured prayer.
'Thou art heard!' suddenly exclaimed Swedenborg; and at the same instant Christine sprang up, and with outspread arms joyfully cried, 'my father!'
A white ray floated through the room, and the strings of the piano reverberated like the dying harmony of an Eolian harp.
'He has pardoned me, he has preceded me, he expects me there!' cried Christine in ecstasy, and immediately sank back upon her pillow.
Swedenborg approached her, and as his glance fell upon her fixed eyes, he exclaimed with emotion: 'she is dead!'
And the clock struck the third hour of the morning.
The black funereal flag was waving from the towers of Gyllensten as Arwed slowly approached it with the remains of poor Christine. The tolling of bells was heard from the castle chapel and from Umea, and the domestics of the family surrounded the carriage with weeping eyes.
'How is my uncle?' asked Arwed, with fearful apprehension.
'I bring you his last greeting,' said the gray old steward, with a trembling voice. 'He went to his God early on the day before yesterday, about the third hour. His last word was, 'Christine!''
Long years had passed, and Gustavus the third sat firmly upon Sweden's throne, as at Lubec a noble dame, upon whose pure beauty time had left no traces, sat upon a sofa in her cabinet. She had leaned her thoughtful head upon her full white arm, while the strong heaving of her bosom and the mild fire of her large brown eyes betrayed the sad and absorbing nature of the reminiscences which occupied her mind. The door was softly opened, and a blooming maiden cautiously protruded her head into the room and was about to withdraw it again.
'Come in, Georgina!' cried the dame. 'I am not yet asleep. Have you any thing to say to me!'
'A young officer wishes to speak with you, mamma,' answered the beautiful maiden, entering.
'An officer?--of the city militia?' asked the mother with some surprise.
'No mamma,' answered the maiden, laughing. 'He appears altogether different from them. He wears a short blue jacket with straw-colored facings turned up, a white band upon his arm, the sword belt over the shoulder, and a round hat looped up, with a black plume.'
'It is a Swede?' cried the mother with great vehemence. 'His name?'
'He will only tell it to yourself,' answered Georgina; 'which I consider particularly ill-bred.'
'It is very wonderful,' said the mother:--'ask him to come in.'
Georgina went, and soon returned, ushering in a well formed youth with the head of an Apollo, who reverently bowed to the dame, and immediately resumed his erect military position.
He would have spoken; but his eyes had wandered from the elder form to the younger, and the lovely maiden's face and figure embarrassed him so much that it cost him time and effort to collect himself.
'My father begs to assure your grace of his high respect,' he finally faltered out, 'and requests permission to place in your own hands an autograph from his majesty the king of Sweden.'
'Who is your father?' asked the lady with a trembling voice, whilst her eyes seemed to be seeking for remembered features in the unknown face.
'A noble Swede,' answered the youth.
'And his name?' asked the lady, with a movement as if she would fly to him.
'He has the honor to be an old acquaintance of your grace,' continued the officer.
'And his name?' cried she, with a fire which seemed inconsistent with her years.
'The governor of West Bothnia, count Gyllenstierna,' was the answer.
The lady turned pale and sank back upon the sofa. Her bosom labored powerfully, and the anxious daughter hastened to her with Cologne water.
'Leave me,' said she, averting her head. 'My nerves are yet strong. I faint not so easily.'
With tottering steps she advanced towards the youth and examined his features yet more intently than before.
'A certain family likeness,' said she, 'is undoubtedly to be found in his face; yet I wonder that it does not appear more distinctly.'
'I am only the adopted son of the count Gyllenstierna, whose name I bear,' answered the youth. 'The count has always remained unmarried.'
The lady sighed and motioned him to retire.
'When may my father wait upon your grace?' courteously asked the youth.
'In an hour I hope to have sufficiently recovered,' answered she--and, with a glance at the charming daughter which called a blush into her cheek, he took his leave.
'Mamma,' said she at length, in a tone of timid remonstrance, 'if the Swedish count is your old acquaintance, you ought to have invited the young count to come with him. He is at any rate his foster son, and such a modest young man.'
'You appear to be pleased with him, Georgina?' said the mother, looking earnestly at her daughter. The latter dropped her eyes to the floor, blushed deeply, and remained silent.
'It is our duty to suffer ourselves to be sought,' said the matron to the maiden. 'It is proper for the other sex to seek. If the young man's heart speak as prematurely as yours, he will come, even without an invitation.'
'You are wholly right, mamma!' cried the daughter, as if now first struck by an important truth, passionately kissing her hand.
'Leave me alone, my child,' said the mother. 'I have need of solitude to prepare myself for a sweet, sad hour. Seat yourself meantime, at your piano, and practise the bass of that beautiful sonata for four hands.
'Now?' cried Georgina, clasping her hands in despair. 'Ah, mamma! I positively cannot practise now.'
'It may perhaps cost you some effort,' said the mother, smiling, 'but it will do you good. Go to your practice, my daughter.'
Georgina departed, shrugging her shoulders, and the storm of emotion, so long restrained, once again floated over the face of the mother, who had hitherto struggled with all her power, to conceal her feelings from the eyes of observers. 'God give me strength for the sorrow and the joy of this interview!' cried she, sinking upon the sofa.
The hour had struck. The daughter opened the door of the cabinet, and, accompanied by his adopted son, Arwed count Gyllenstierna entered. Neither years nor sufferings had been able to bow his tall figure. The lineaments of his face, however, told of sad mental struggles and glorious victories. His locks of gold were bleached to silver, and upon his newly made black national uniform shone the magnificent seraphim-order, and with the sword and crown of the order of military merit, the peaceful sheaf of the order of Vasa. He remained standing, and cast upon the beloved of his youth, from his large blue and still brilliant eyes, a glance which cut her to the soul. Lady baroness von Eyben!' said he, in a tone in which love and anger, reproach and rapture, were strangely mingled.
It was too much for the heart of the matron. 'Not so, Arwed, not so!' cried she, beseechingly, and attempted to approach him; but, her heart impelling her forward while profound respect held her back, she remained irresolutely standing in the centre of the room.
'Please to permit, baroness,' said Arwed, 'that my son and your daughter retire to the ante-chamber. My communication requires no witnesses.'
The young pair seemed to be well pleased with the proposition. The baroness looked doubtingly at Arwed, as if she feared a private interview; but finally her heart conquered. She nodded permission to Georgina, and the two disappeared with a celerity that astonished the mother.
The former youthful lovers were alone. Georgina motioned Arwed to a seat upon the sofa, placed herself beside him, and both remained a long time silent, whilst the past was loudly speaking in their hearts.
'Georgina!' at length Arwed exclaimed, seizing her hand.
'Be tranquil, dear Arwed!' said she. 'If the strong man cannot control his feelings, how can a feeble woman command hers? Let us first speak of the present. Have you not a letter for me from the king?'
'Cruel!' sighed Arwed, drawing forth a letter and solemnly rising from his seat, 'You have petitioned his majesty for the restoration of your father's confiscated property in the German provinces. I bring you the king's answer.'
'The person selected as its bearer is a guaranty of a merciful decision,' said Georgina, also rising. With trembling hands she took the letter, unfolded and attempted to read it,--but her vision became indistinct, her hands shook, and at length amid streaming tears she cried, 'I cannot! Read the letter for me, dear Arwed.'
He read:
'I esteem the memory of the renowned and unfortunate baron von Goertz too much to receive without emotion the intelligence that there is yet remaining one of those children who were made orphans by the tyranny and shocking injustice of the queen Ulrika Eleonore and of the persons who presided in her courts and councils. His innocent blood has remained too long unavenged. Sweden, through long, unhappy, desolating, distracting years, has paid the tribute demanded by the anger of heaven for the crime committed against a great and unfortunate man. I therefore wish, as first citizen of my native land, in the name of that native land, to hasten the reparation of the injustice of my predecessors. To this title, which I look upon as one of the fairest granted to me by Providence, I add that of my family, for whom Goertz was made an offering. You may easily judge, madam, how very much I am disposed to grant you that justice which you claim as daughter and heiress of the deceased baron von Goertz.'
Georgina, almost frantic with joy, snatched the letter from Arwed's hand, and pressed it to her lips and heart. 'Lord God, we praise thee,--Lord God, we thank thee!' she shouted in her exultation, sinking upon her knee, and raising the paper towards heaven in her clasped hands.
'It is truly a royal letter,' said the deeply moved Arwed; 'but such a letter from him would surprise no one who knew him.'
'Oh, my father!' cried Georgina, holding the writing up towards heaven, 'learn in thy place of bliss that thy honor is restored before the world, and that thy happy daughter has been instrumental in its accomplishment!'
'You see, my dear Georgina,' said Arwed, 'that Sweden is not unjust. The public character of a people can only appear through its government. That justice which the cruel Ulrika, the weak Frederick, the chained Adolphus Frederick, derided or denied, the worthy Gustavus, now that his hands are free, grants in the fullest measure.'
'Much,' said Georgina, endeavoring by the introduction of new topics of conversation to allay the violence of her emotions, 'much was said in Germany of the revolution which delivered the crown from the usurped supremacy of the royal council, and I, at least, have cause to bless the Nemesis who guided it.'
'That occurrence,' remarked Arwed, 'stands like a rare and brilliant meteor in the horizon of Europe. A national revolution, originating with the king himself, accomplished in a few days, without bloodshed, and calculated to promote the welfare of the whole country, is perhaps unparalleled in the history of the world!'
Both remained a long time silent. At length Arwed inquired, 'how is your sister, the good little Magdalena?'
'She died many years since, in Hamburgh, the wife of the privy counsellor von Laffert,' answered Georgina.
'And you--are a widow?' he asked in a low tone.
'Since four years,' she answered with downcast eyes.
'It is the penalty of age,' cried he, sorrowfully, 'that, one by one, all whom we have loved go before us to the eternal world. Life's way becomes every day more dreary and desolate, and wo to the unhappy being to whom remains not even one companion of the good old times. His is a solitary death, with none to drop a tear of regret upon his grave.'
'Very true!' said Georgina with deep feeling, and wiping the tears from her eyes.
'Georgina!' cried Arwed, suddenly and with vehemence; 'in my youth I was never able to subdue or conceal the emotions of my heart. Age has not changed me in that respect. That I might see you once again, and have an opportunity to lay before you my last request, I have obtained the king's permission to be the bearer of this letter. Hear me with kindness.'
'Spare me,' said she, greatly agitated.
'Your father's honor is restored to all its original brightness,' continued Arwed, without heeding her remark. 'My father has long slept in his grave. The causes no longer exist which once forbade my earthly happiness. I have sacredly kept my truth. You are again free. Do not now refuse me your hand.'
'Oh, my God!' cried the terrified Georgina. 'No, it is not possible!'
'Refuse me not your hand, Georgina!' said Arwed with all his former tenderness of tone.
'Dear Arwed,' answered she, with a smile, 'what would our children say?Theirsis the season of love.'
'How happy is youth!' exclaimed Arwed, sighing.
'Honorable age has also its pleasures and enjoyments,' said Georgina, placing her hand in his.
'When it wanders arm in arm with the chosen companion of its youth,' answered Arwed with emotion. 'But when it is compelled to creep alone to a solitary grave, then are honors and riches a miserable compensation for a life without an object.'
'Arwed!' exclaimed Georgina in the sweet tone of former times.
'Wilt thou be mine?' cried Arwed, passionately.
'Thine, eternally!' murmured she, while a faint blush threw the glow of undying youth over her cheeks, and she sank sobbing upon his bosom.
Footnote 1: A French word, signifyingassassin.