"Who never ate his bread in sorrow,Who never spent the darksome hoursWeeping and watching for the morrow,—He knows ye not, ye heavenly powers."[1]
"Who never ate his bread in sorrow,Who never spent the darksome hoursWeeping and watching for the morrow,—He knows ye not, ye heavenly powers."[1]
Bettina looked puzzled.
"And what does it mean, dear grandfather?"
The old man took her on his knee.
He held one little hand in his, and with his other he smoothed her soft hair.
"It means, dear child," said he very solemnly, "that we never can know the dear God well until, when all the world is fast asleep, we weep because of our own troubles. Then it is that it seems that we know best the dear God who, in the night, seems to comfort us. Do you understand, my Bettina?"
The little girl nodded.
"I prayed to the good God, dear grandfather, when mother was there," she shuddered, "and I was with Hans and Baby in the forest. Do you think, dear grandfather," her lips quivered, "that the poor Queen has such a trouble? Did that wicked Napoleon kill her dear mother, too?"
Hans' face twitched, and he drew his arm closer about little Bettina.
"The Queen's mother, my child, died when her little girl was six, and she lived all her child life with her grandmother."
He smoothed Bettina's hair with his hand, but his thoughts were with his Annchen.
"Grandfather," Bettina patted his cheek with her hand, "grandfather, tell me, please, what is the trouble of the Queen? Why is she so unhappy?"
Then the old man explained how a Queen is the mother of all the people in her country, and of how, when a foe comes and with sword and war slays these people, it is her trouble and she must weep for her children.
"Then Queen Louisa, my Bettina, weeps for her poor husband, the King, who has lost his kingdom, and for her poor children, who are driven from their home and the palace. And now," he added, "in cold and ice and snow she has had to fly, as the landlady told you, with not enough to eat and no fit place to rest in."
Bettina sighed.
"Ach ja, dear grandfather."
Her own feet were very tired and she was certain that she understood that part of the Queen's trouble.
"Grandfather," she asked, "please, what is a foe?"
"Napoleon, child, Napoleon. He comes to do us harm, to work evil. He is the foe of the good King and Queen, but especially does he hate our Queen and seek to do her harm."
Bettina opened her blue eyes.
"Grandfather," she said, "how can he?"
The old man shrugged his shoulders and sat absently stroking her hair.
As for the little girl herself, she was thinking. How anyone could be a foe of that lovely Queen it was hard to understand. But then, it was so with all the fairy princesses. There was always an ogre, Bettina remembered, but it was true, too, that the foes were always conquered by a knight, or a prince, a dragon, or something.
She remembered the cave of Kyffhäuser.
"Grandfather," she said, pulling at one of the buttons of his coat, "why don't the ravens wake Barbarossa? I told one at our Forest House. I think, dear grandfather, it is time for him to wake up, don't you?" and she gazed quite anxiously into his face. As for Hans, he laughed for the first time in days.
"It would surprise the Emperor a little, my Bettina," he said, and then told her that their journey was ended. "The King, dear child, is at Königsberg, and there we will rest for a long time."
"God be praised," said little Bettina, in the way the Germans do. "I shall truly be glad, dear grandfather, to sit down and do a little quiet knitting."
On a certain day in the January following Jena the snow was falling fast.
It clung to the tree limbs and turned the feathery firs to fairy trees. On the low bushes and oaks the ice glittered and gleamed, and a piercing blast, sweeping through the branches, crackled the crusted limbs and filled the air with a mysterious sound of coldness. Now and then a high-runnered sleigh dashed along the highway, its driver muffled to the eyes in fur, the breath frozen on his beard or moustaches. From the Baltic Sea the breath of the frozen North swept over the East Prussian land and, obedient to its command, life seemed to still its slightest sound and the whole world freeze into silence.
Suddenly the voice of a child broke the quiet.
"Grandfather,"—oh, how tired it sounded,—"truly, dear grandfather, I can go no farther."
It was little Bettina, wrapped in a woollen shawl and trudging by the side of old Hans, whose face was almost hidden in a huge cape of fur.
They were still on their journey, though Königsberg had been passed two days before.
"Ja, ja, Liebchen," the old man paused in the road; "it is cold, indeed. But have courage, little one; we shall soon reach a village, and then sausages and bread."
"God be thanked," said little Bettina, and on she trudged, her poor feet so cold she could not feel them moving.
On they went for a time in silence. Then the old man, with a short laugh, said:
"God be praised we have left the French behind us."
Before Bettina could answer, or Hans himself say more, the Baltic sent a breath sharp with icy edge. It cut the falling snow, it dashed the flakes in their faces, it beat against their bodies; and, gathering strength, it drove them apart, tossing and twisting Bettina.
There was no speaking.
The wind howled in icy salutation; the snow struck their eyes, drove itself into their mouths, lodged in the necks of their garments, whitened their hair and froze on their gloves and chilled them to almost fainting.
Then suddenly the wind gave a shriek like a terrified spirit. The snow began to whirl, and upward went leaves, sticks, and even lumps of the earth itself.
Hans caught Bettina in his arms. He drew her to the edge of the road.
"Down! down!" he cried, and pulled her into a gully. Harmless, the whirlwind passed above their heads, the ridge of earth protecting their bodies.
"Lie close, lie close, my Bettina," cried Hans, and he drew her within the folds of his great cape with fur lining.
Winds from the north, east, west, and south fought for mastery, the four beating and screaming and whirling the innocent snow in their fury, until, rising, the white confusion became like a veil concealing everything.
But wheels were approaching. They reached the road above the travellers, and then, their horses losing power any longer to struggle, suddenly stopped short in the road. Even their stamping sounded faint and exhausted, so great was the fury of the awful war of winds which nature had excited on that narrow neck of land in East Prussia.
Then suddenly came a lull. The winds retreated from their battle ground.
Both Hans and Bettina raised their heads in wonder. In the sudden quiet they heard a voice, a voice whose sweetness sounded a note quite familiar and a voice whose owner seemed ill and suffering.
"I am in a great strait," it said; "let us fall now into the hand of the Lord, for His mercies are great; and let me not fall into the hand of man."
Even while the voice was speaking the whirling snow fell like a curtain of white wool to the ground, and Hans and Bettina, rising, saw in the snow of the road a travelling carriage, on whose cushions, covered with a feather bed, lay a lady, white and pale, whose golden head, for want of a pillow, rested on the arm of an attendant. With her were ladies and a physician.
Hans' face flushed.
"Curtsey," he whispered to Bettina. "Curtsey, child, it is the Queen!"
Bettina forgot her own cold. She was no longer tired, no longer hungry, in her pity for the poor, ill lady, who, when she saw a child, smiled her a greeting, quite feebly, but as sweet as the one at Jena.
It was Queen Louisa of Prussia, flying still before her foe, Napoleon.
He had entered her palace; he had ransacked her private desks; he had read all her letters to her husband; he had published dreadful things against her in the French paper in Berlin; he had proclaimed her the cause of the war; declared her to be vain, foolish, and unworthy of the love of her people; and loudly had he declared that never would he rest until he had brought the King and Queen of Prussia so low that they must beg for their bread.
He had driven them from place to place, and now was advancing on Königsberg.
When Hans and Bettina had arrived in that old city the King had gone, the court was flying, and so, never heeding the snow, on they had gone, too, fleeing like the rest, before that dreadful Emperor.
And here was the poor Queen, who had been ill to death in Königsberg, journeying in the cold and snow to Memel, with not even a pillow to rest her head upon!
When the carriage started again Hans and Bettina walked behind it.
"It will shelter us," said the old man, for the wind blew little Bettina almost off her feet.
Ach, as the Germans say, but it was cold!
The blasts, sweeping from the Baltic to the Kurischehaff and from the Kurischehaff to the Baltic, still fought for mastery, and the curtain of the northern night began to fall about them early in the afternoon, and on they struggled in the gathering darkness.
At last, through the snowy gloom, they saw the lights of a village, and, nearly frozen, they sought lodgings.
Hans asked a woman whom he saw at a door to shelter them.
She stoutly refused him.
She was tall, dark, with sallow complexion and gleaming dark eyes, whose lids she had a trick of narrowing. Hans pointed to Bettina shivering and wet to her skin.
"You cannot refuse us a room," he said.
The woman shrugged her shoulders and hesitated.
Truly, Bettina would have moved any heart.
"Because of the child, poor darling," at last said the woman, "though my man, if he comes, may not like it." She shrugged expressively.
She rubbed Bettina's hands and feet with snow and made her dip them in water, and, undressing her, she wrapped her in a warm bed-gown of her own and covered her with a feather bed.
"Drink this," and she held warm milk to her blue little lips, and when the child was sinking into a doze, she started towards her kitchen. At the door she paused.
"I must dry the child's clothes," she said, and coming back gathered up the damp, draggled garments, Bettina never noticing.
As she was cleaning them in her kitchen she started violently. Bearing the dress on her arm she went to her room.
"I thought so!" she said, and her eyelids narrowed.
As for Hans, when he had dried himself somewhat and partaken of bread, cheese, and beer, he was off to the shoemaker's house, where they had taken the Queen. In its kitchen, with its great stove and its pots of blooming geraniums, he found some court servants, who, now they were resting, were glad enough of a gossip.
Especially was the driver of the carriage fond of talk.
"Ja," he said, "our good Queen has been ill to death of a nervous fever."
Then he told of how she had been with the King; her children, with the Countess Voss; and first little Princess Alexandrina, and then Prince Carl had been ill, and the Queen could not reach them.
At Königsberg little Carl had been near to death, and the Queen from nursing him took the fever.
"Ach Himmel," said the driver, gazing from face to face in the hot, steaming kitchen, "it was terrible, for we thought we should lose her! Herr Doctor Hufeland arrived from Dantzic. His Excellency found her near death. Ach, friends, but it was a dreadful night, and all hearts were anxious, for at sea was a ship, and on board Baron Stein, bearing to Königsberg the state treasure. He had saved the gold and jewels in Berlin from that thief Napoleon."
Then he told how in the night, while the wind howled and blew, there had come a crash which had startled old Königsberg.
It was a wing of the old castle which had fallen in the storm.
"And it brought bad luck," continued the driver, "for a courier arrived soon after with despatches. 'Fly!' they said, 'fly! the French approach Königsberg!'"
And then had come the flight, and he told how, the night before, the Queen had slept in a room whose windows were so broken the snow had drifted in all night over her bed and nearly frozen her.
There was much to talk about, and all were eager to listen. The warmth from the stove was comfortable, and the shoemaker brought out some beer. The driver, who certainly was fond of talking, told of the sufferings of the Royal children; how the old Countess had not been able always to get them bread, nor find clothes to keep them clean and in order.
"And they have grown most noisy," he said. "The Queen is an angel. Never does she complain, but is always sweet and amiable, and the old Countess is very noble. But our King is gloomy and wrapped in thought and no one reproves the children."
The shoemaker asked questions about them.
"Prince William is the best," said the man; "he looks like his father, but in disposition he is like our Queen. The old Countess calls him 'A dear good child,' and that he is always."
Before he could continue a messenger arrived from Memel with bouillon from the King for the Queen.
This arrival brought much excitement, and when again they were quiet they all fell to talking of the French and how the Emperor coveted the great fine city of Dantzic and of how its people vowed that he never should enter its gates while they could prevent him.
"Where is he now?" asked Hans, hatred burning in his eyes and his cheeks flushing.
"They say in Königsberg that he is at Helbsberg. Our army is in that neighbourhood, also. They report that both are approaching Eylau. Perhaps they may fight there."
The shoemaker's wife came into the roomful of men, interrupting a second time.
At first she coughed loudly, for they were puffing smoke everywhere. Then, with a beaming face, she told them how the Queen had just said she was more comfortable than she had been anywhere on her flight.
"Our Queen is an angel!" Hans raised high his glass. "Hoch!" he cried, as the Germans say when they drink to anything or anybody.
"Hoch!" answered the others, but low, that they might not disturb the Queen.
"Long may she live," said the voices.
Then "Three times hoch!" and they clinked their glasses softly and drained them.
Then, it being late, Hans returned to Bettina.
She was fast asleep, one little hand, thin and pale, lying outside the feather bed. On a chair by the bedside were her clothes, clean and dry, and everything quite in order.
Hans, in terror, felt for the letter.
It was safe between the lining and the waist material, and, tired himself, he was soon fast asleep.
Next day they all started forth, Hans and Bettina walking behind the carriage, and presently they came to the ferry at Memel.
In those days Memel was a flourishing little city of about six thousand people, noted for its cleanliness and its English ways of living. It lies on water, and into its harbour came Dutch ships and English ones, giving it a look of activity.
As the Queen entered Memel a strange thing happened.
As if Nature, whom she loved with all her heart, wished to welcome her, the clouds suddenly parted like a curtain and there was the sun, which no one had seen for days, smiling forth gloriously.
"God be praised!" cried Hans. "It is a good omen."
As he and Bettina started into the city they came upon a lady and some children. She was stout and comfortable looking and wrapped in fine furs. The oldest of her children was a girl about fifteen, and the prettiest girl Bettina had ever seen.
When this lady saw Hans she gave a shriek.
"My goodness!" she cried. "Why, Hans, how came you here?"
As for Hans, he was all excitement.
"Mademoiselle Clara!" he cried. "Ach Gott! that I see you again!"
When the lady, with many exclamations, heard of Hans' journey, she raised her hands in horror.
"Heavens!" she cried, "but you must come home at once with me. I am married now, Hans, and these are my children."
Then she turned to the pretty girl.
"Daughter," she said, "this is Hans, Johannes Lange. He was with your grandfather when he was Colonel. Come, Hans; come, child," she smiled kindly at Bettina. "My husband is home and will welcome you kindly. Come, come!"
And off she led them into Memel.
The stout lady, asking Hans question after question, led the way to a large, roomy house surrounded by a garden, now bare and wintry, the limbs of fruit trees, birches, and shrubs crackling with ice.
"This is, naturally, not our own house, Johannes," explained the lady, who had just finished telling him how she and her family had fled from Berlin upon the approach of Napoleon. "This is my husband's brother's home," she continued, leading the way to the door. "In the spring we shall move to Königsberg, where my husband will become professor in the University. Come in, Hans, come in. Ja, ja, you are right. It is a comfortable house, but the cold here in Memel is awful. Carl," she turned quickly to the small boy who was teasing his sister, "behave yourself, or I'll send you to Napoleon!"
It was funny to see him straighten up and become quickly as good as his sisters.
"Come in, come in," she closed the door quickly. "Husband! Richard!" she called very loudly.
A door at the end of the hall opened in response, and out came a grave, learned-looking man, who smiled kindly from face to face.
"Richard! Richard!" the lady's voice screamed with excitement, "who do you think is here?"
She drew forward Hans and Bettina.
"An old soldier of my dear father's regiment," her voice vibrated with pride, "and one, dear Richard, who was with the great Frederick, and, oh, such a favourite with father, was it not so, Hans?"
The old soldier shrugged his shoulders as much as to say, "It is not for me to agree."
"Ja, ja, Richard, he was, and a favourite of our dear lost little Erna. It was such a surprise to see him," and she motioned the group to the warmth of the sitting room. Then, all crowding around the tall, green stove, Hans told his story.
"Heavens, dear Richard!" the stout lady pulled out an embroidered pocket handkerchief, "but seeing him brings back the past."
Then she turned to the pretty young girl.
"Mariechen, take the twins upstairs and see that they are quite dry as to stockings; go, also, dear child," she smiled at Bettina, who, feeling shy and strange, followed across the hall and upstairs to the room into which the young lady entered.
"The child is tired," she heard the lady saying, "and Hans must see our King. He has brought messages. They must stay here. Ja, ja, Hans. The house is big, and our brother Joachim gives me my will."
Then the door closed and Bettina heard no more.
In the great room where she found herself sat a dark-haired young lady embroidering.
"Pauline, Pauline!" called the children, "Hans has come, and here is Bettina."
Then, before the pretty young girl could explain, in came the stout lady and told the one called Pauline how once this Hans had saved her little sister's life, and how the family never could forget it, and that Bettina must be dressed drily in one of the children's bed-gowns and given warm milk and at once sent to bed and left there.
"I'll tell you the story presently. The child must not hear it again. It is dreadful."
When Bettina was safely in bed, up came Hans and the gentleman.
"My oldest son, Franz, was at Jena," she heard the latter saying—and then to her surprise her grandfather called him "Herr Professor."
Bettina, her eyes sparkling, sat up in bed.
"Grandfather, dear grandfather!" she called, and when he came close, she drew down his head and whispered most eagerly.
"Nein, nein, child," they all heard him reply, and then Bettina insist:
"But, yes, dear grandfather. Please, please ask him, I know it, dear grandfather, I know it."
"What is it, Hans?" and the Herr Professor came close to Bettina, smiling in his kind, fatherly way.
"She will have it, sir," answered the old soldier, "that your name must be 'Von Stork,' and that you are the father of the young Prussian soldier whom we nursed in the Forest House!"
"I know it, dear grandfather, I know it," burst out Bettina in high excitement. "The Herr Lieutenant told me of Carl and Ilse and Elsa and Mademoiselle Pauline and his big sister, Marianne, and of how our Queen kissed Carl—and——"
Bettina could say no more.
Screaming and crying out, they all crowded round exclaiming that it was their Franz, their own dear Franz and no other.
And then they would know everything and all he did and said and just where he was wounded and how they took him prisoner, and Madame von Stork fell to weeping, and all the others cried, "Ja, ja," and "Nein, nein," so loud and so much that poor, tired little Bettina was almost deafened.
And then Hans must go all over the whole story for them again, and it set Bettina to weeping, and the old man to vowing vengeance against Napoleon.
Madame von Stork first rejoiced because her boy was alive, and then wept because he was a prisoner, and she thanked Hans over and over, and told him that she would care for Bettina so long as they remained in Memel.
And then they all went from the room and Bettina fell sound asleep, and did not move until the next morning.
But, no, she moved once, for her grandfather, coming into the room, waked her and asked her if she had taken the letter from her dress lining.
"Nein, grandfather," she had answered and then had gone off to sleep.
When next morning she opened her blue eyes, her grandfather was packing his bundle.
Her little heart sank and her eyes filled. Was she to go forth in the ice and the wet and the snow and that awful wind again?
"Nein, nein, little one," said the old man, patting her cheek very kindly. "You shall stay here with my good Mademoiselle Clara," for so he called Madame von Stork, as he had known her when she was as small as Bettina, and he explained that he was going alone, but would return in a day or two to Memel.
Then, sitting on her bed, he asked her question after question.
Had she told anyone of the letter, had a person touched her dress?
"Nein, grandfather, nein," she said.
At first she was quite certain.
But, presently, she remembered the woman they had lodged with, and how she must have cleaned her dress and dried it.
The old man clapped his knee with his hand.
"Ach Himmel, child!" he cried. "It is she who has stolen it."
Then he shouldered his bundle, declaring he must fetch it.
"Auf wiedersehen, my Bettina," he said, and departed from Memel.
It was only a day's journey to the village, but a week passed and no Hans. Then another.
Madame von Stork shook her head.
"His trouble has crazed him," she said. "We will keep the child, yes?" and she looked at her husband.
The Professor nodded.
"Our Franz loved her," he answered. "She is not noble, it is true, but she is sweet and good, and our children love her. The Stork's nest, dear wife," and he smiled at her lovingly, "is always big enough for one more, it is not, my dear Clara?"
Madame von Stork nodded.
Pauline was not their child, but a French refugee whose parents were nobles who had perished in the Revolution. The Stork's nest had received her; so why not another?
"Let her remain," concluded the Professor, "until the old man returns, or we can make some provision for her."
So Bettina became one of the "Nest", as the von Storks always called their home, and with so much love and kindness about her, the little girl soon forgot much that she had suffered.
"But I should like to see Willy Schmidt and my little brothers," once she said to Marianne, who was her favourite.
The little round-faced, tow-headed twins flew to her sides, each taking a hand and pressing it against her chubby cheek.
"When Barbarossa, that you told us of, Bettina, comes out of the cave, our father will take us all to Thuringia," promised Ilse.
"What nonsense, you geese," and Carl laughed scornfully. "There isn't a Barbarossa. Otto says so, and he's fifteen and knows everything. Anyway," he looked very proud of his knowledge, "nobody can conqueror the Emperor!"
But when he heard that Bettina had really seen the awful Napoleon, he listened with wideopen blue eyes and was not so important.
Perhaps, after all, Bettina did know something.
"And you saw him," he asked, "saw Napoleon?"
"Ja wohl," answered Bettina, glad to have the young hero listen respectfully.
"And he didn't run away with you?" Carl looked eager.
Bettina shook her golden head.
"Nein, nein, or I should not be here." The twins roared. As for Carl, he laughed very rudely and snapped his fingers at Marianne.
"You just hear, Mariechen," he said, "Bettina's seen Napoleon and he didn't do a thing to her."
At that was the whole Stork's Nest most sorrowful, for now they knew that Carl would never behave, since Napoleon was the only thing he was afraid of.
While they were talking, Elsa and Ilse cried out to come quickly and see who was passing, and they all crowded to the windows, breathing on the frost that they might see out more clearly.
What they saw was a tall, handsome gentleman with a kind, but very sad face, a lovely lady leaning on his arm, and two little boys, one tall and handsome, the other, delicate-faced with soft curly hair, clinging to the hand of the lady.
It was the King and Queen of Prussia, with the Crown Prince and little Prince William.
"God be praised," said Madame von Stork. "Our dear, dear Queen has recovered." She stood behind the group and watched, having entered the room while they were talking.
As for little Bettina, a great happiness filled her.
Her lovely Queen lived here in Memel and she walked out like other people.
"Perhaps," she said to Ilse, "one day we shall meet her."
But Ilse did not answer.
"Look, Bettina," she cried, "our King is talking to father."
Sure enough there was the Professor standing with their Majesties, first looking cheerful, then becoming grave and attentive.
As soon as he entered the house he called to his wife. They talked for a long time in private, and after that day everybody in the house was very, very kind to Bettina. Sometimes Madame von Stork's eyes would fill when they gazed at her, and once, when the little girl told her that she was making a nice pair of stockings for her grandfather, the lady began to weep.
Bettina thought her tears were for the Herr Lieutenant, and sat very quiet. Only she could not help wondering why no one ever said a word about her grandfather.
As Madame von Stork had told Hans, her family had taken refuge in Memel when the news came that Napoleon, having conquered the King at Jena, would advance upon Berlin.
Old Major Joachim von Stork had welcomed his brother's family into his great empty house in Memel, and in the safety of a new nest the Mother Stork had gathered beneath her wings all her startled, frightened brood, but two sons who had gone against Napoleon.
Bettina nearly laughed aloud when she saw the old Major. He was stout, and red-faced, and wore a stock as high as three inches. On each side of his head were four curls, frizzled and powdered, as they once wore hair in the army, and his pig-tail boasted a huge cockade.
Bettina heard him talking one day with his housekeeper about his stocks:
"They must be exactly three inches high," he ordered, "exactly, my dear Frau, and as to my cockade, are you quite certain that it is large enough?"
And he looked very anxiously at his housekeeper, who held up her hands.
"Gracious, Herr Major," she said, "it is immense."
But the Major, puffing a little, looked offended.
"Immense, my dear woman, what on earth are you talking of? Why Captain von Schallenfels of my regiment had always seventy or eighty ells of ribbons on his queue. Fact, I assure you," added the indignant old gentleman. "It trailed so on the ground that he was forced to tuck it into his coat pocket when on parade. True, my dear woman, true, I assure you."
The old Major, however, was kindness itself, though he went his way just the same as if his house was still empty. And this way was to have his meals to himself and, at four o'clock each day, to depart to the house of one Monsieur von Schrotter, and, with six other Memel gentlemen, drink beer, smoke, and discuss the army, Prussia, or Napoleon, until bedtime.
His wife, Bettina learned, had died many years before and he had but one son.
"Our cousin, Rudolph," Carl told her. "He is with my brother Wolf in the army."
In the evening all the family gathered in the sitting-room and there Bettina saw everybody.
First, there was the Professor, tall, kind-looking and very fond of his wife and children. He still wore his hair in a pig-tail and not brushed forward like the King, and he liked silver buckles on his shoes, and a stock, but not high like that of his brother.
"And our father knows, oh, everything," the twins told Bettina, "so much that our Queen used to send for him in Berlin to talk to her. He has read, oh, all the books in the world."
Madame von Stork was as kind-looking as her husband, but she was stout, and her skin was pink and white like a girl's, and she wore her hair very high, and on top of its rolls one of the huge turbans then the fashion. Sometimes she seemed quite like a large hen, clucking about her children, her feathers ruffling if a thing went wrong with any one of them.
Especially was she troubled about her pretty daughter Marianne.
"And no wonder," Bettina heard her telling the Major's housekeeper, Frau Winkel. "She is a girl, and yet is the one most like her dear father. She must always be at her books, and I cannot make her care for her embroidery, her tent stitch, nor the cooking. And what good is a German girl who cares for none of these things? Who will marry her, my dear Frau Winkel? She is fourteen, and most girls are married at fifteen or sixteen. Pauline, now, is entirely different. When there are clothes to be mended, her fingers assist me. When the children are noisy, she can quiet even Carl. It is she who makes the puddings, and if she has a spare moment she is busy over her embroidery; a true house-wife by nature, and French, too," added Madame von Stork, as if the two things were impossible. Perhaps it was Pauline's troubles which had subdued her. Before the flight from Berlin, Marianne had known nothing but joy and petting, but Pauline had a history as sad as Bettina.
One day, many years before the days of Memel, an old Frenchman had appeared at the "Stork's Nest" in Berlin.
Though his hair was white, his shoulders bowed with trouble, and his clothes worn and poor, the Professor recognised him as a once very elegant-looking servant of a French nobleman whom he had known well in Paris. He led by the hand a little girl of eight or nine.
"My master and mistress lost their heads in the Revolution," the man explained, "but I escaped to Berlin with Mademoiselle Pauline."
Then he told of his dangers and all they had endured.
"Monsieur," he said, "I am old, poor, and alone. What shall I do with a fine young lady?"
Madame von Stork's quick eye had been studying the child. The sadness of the pale little face, the neatness of the black dress, the daintiness of the Marie Antoinette kerchief warmed her heart to the homeless little girl.
She looked at her husband, a question in her kind grey eyes.
He nodded, and so Pauline came to the shelter of the "Nest," which so kindly welcomed Bettina also.
And now Pauline was like Madame von Stork's own child, and, since she was noble and hated the French Republic, and loved her poor King, she, too, had no good for Napoleon and, like the Prussians, hoped to see him conquered.
"And what I should do without Pauline, Heaven only knows," Madame von Stork was often saying, "my own Marianne being so useless."
Marianne might be useless, but Bettina thought her almost as pretty as the Queen, in her short-waisted dress, her puffed sleeves, her long mitts and her lovely curling hair tied in place with a snood of blue ribbon.
When they all came to the sitting-room in the evening Bettina would arrange her stool quite near the "gracious Fräulein Mariechen," and, while she knitted away, she used to gaze up shyly at her pretty neighbour and make up stories about the Prince who would one day come and marry her.
"Pauline's worth ten of her," Otto was always saying. He was nearly sixteen and was always wanting someone to do things for him, and, "Marianne," he said, "is so stupid. Pauline can mend a fellow's things in a minute."
But Elsa and Ilse, the twins, who were so alike only their mother seemed always to know which was which, and Carl preferred Marianne.
"She can tell you stories," they told Bettina.
As for Marianne herself, sometimes she was quite unhappy. She wanted to be useful, but she did so love to read, and then she forgot. And house work and cooking were not amusing.
Madame von Stork had little good for idleness.
"It is German," she always said, "to work. Even our good Queen is never idle. I have seen a handkerchief she herself embroidered, Marianne, with beautiful flower designs and a crown in gold placed in one corner."
Settling herself with a huge bundle of mending, she with her keen eyes would inspect the family group each evening.
"Come, now, Marianne, no reading," she would say. "You do not know what to do? Nonsense. There is your tent stitch. Pauline? Yes, yes, you of course are busy. Ilse, Elsa? Bettina? Knitting, that's good. Carl? You are a boy? What foolishness. Get your pencils and drawing book. You don't like that? Very well then. Let Otto bring you the silhouettes that Mademoiselle von Appen began in Berlin, and you can cut others. But, Otto, first fix the lamp. There, where the light can fall on your father's book. There, that is good."
Her eyes travelled from needle to scissors, from pencil to work.
"There, there," she said, her face beaming, "we are a busy German family. Begin now, dear husband, we are all quite ready to hear your book."
The father of the family often read aloud to them in the evenings. But the books he read were not such as children would even look at to-day.
Bettina and Marianne, the twins, Carl and the others all listened, on those long, cold Memel evenings, to grown-up histories, to romances, or sometimes to plays or poems, very long and very serious.
Now and then the Professor would talk, not read, and then Bettina loved it. He told of the new Republic across the sea, America, which had fought a great war and was now free and independent, and there were stories of the great men called Washington and Franklin, and of all the excitement when they had signed a treaty of peace in Paris.
"I was young then," said the Professor, "and in Helsingör, and there was much talk of a new life beginning for the world with the Declaration of Independence,—you must read it, Otto,—and the ships and the harbour were gaily decorated and cannon were fired and we all drank to the health of this new Republic at a fine party given to celebrate the birth of Liberty. And they raised the American flag and lit bonfires, and heavens, children, but there was hurrahing!"
And he told of a great Englishman, named Nelson, who had conquered Napoleon at Trafalgar, and of the Revolution in France, and all that in his day had happened. But often he read, and sometimes Bettina's little head fell to nodding. One night she was almost asleep when the Professor's voice stopped suddenly.
"Richard," interrupted his wife, and her tone was furious, "see our Marianne."
Bettina dropped her knitting and stared. So did the twins, and Carl stopped cutting. What had Marianne done? Her cheeks were quite crimson and one hand held something under the table cover.
"My Heavens, Richard, think of it! Let me see it, Marianne. Obey me."
Never had Madame von Stork spoken so severely. The twins nearly fell from their chairs. Carl opened his mouth, and his eyes stared at Marianne. Pauline never looked up once from her embroidery. Bettina's knitting needles shook in her hands.
"She's been reading under the table cover," announced Otto with the superior air boys wore in those days with their sisters. "It's the 'Sorrow of Werther.' I see the cover."
Such a thing had never happened in the "Stork's Nest."
The father's face grew stern, and anger made even his neck red to the roots of his queue.
"Marianne," he began, when the maid opening the door announced:
"His Excellency, Herr Doctor Hufeland, and the gracious Herr Brandt."
A great cry of "Ludwig!" "Cousin Ludwig!" welcomed the entrance of a tall, handsome man of perhaps thirty-five, with a serious face and English features. He was dressed in one of the long-tailed coats then the fashion, coming down to the top of his high, spurred boots. His hair was brushed forward, and within the high collars of his coat appeared a soft lawn stock. The other gentleman Bettina at once recognised as the physician who had been with the Queen on the road from Memel.
"We call him 'Cousin Ludwig,'" whispered Elsa. "He was betrothed to our Aunt Erna who died."
"He won't speak French," whispered Isle; "he says Germans should not imitate the French people as upper-class people do, but should speak their own language."
Bettina was glad of this, for often she had to sit for hours without understanding a word, unless the twins explained things.
There was much to talk about.
Madame von Stork bustled from the room to give orders for refreshments, and while she was gone, Herr Brandt, who had settled himself near Pauline, explained that he had come over from Königsberg.
"I was with Baron von Stein," he added. "We escaped from Berlin with the royal treasure and arrived in Königsberg at Christmas time. Since then I have been at Dantzic."
Bettina opened her little ears. Dantzic was a great, free city of Germany, around which was the army of Napoleon. Its people were holding out bravely and it was hoped that Napoleon would withdraw.
"But the city is bound to fall," said Ludwig. "All who can are escaping."
That dreadful Emperor! Bettina seemed to see him on his white horse before the gate of the brave old city.
When Madame von Stork returned, the maid followed her with cake and wine.
"God be thanked, gentlemen," she said, "our brother Joachim has a full cellar and as yet we have something to offer our visitors."
Pauline and Marianne served the guests, one, dark and handsome in a red dress trimmed with bands of fur, her arms and neck like ivory, her dark hair arranged in curls tied back with ribbon, the other, golden-haired and pink-cheeked, in a gown of blue, her curls tied back also with ribbon, the ends of her narrow sash floating about as she moved in her quick, merry way. As they ate and drank, Dr. Hufeland told his old friends all the sad things which had happened to the Queen because of Napoleon. He described her flight from Jena, relating how she rode through the lovely Harz Mountains to Brunswick and from there went to Magdeberg.
"And all the time, dear Madame," the doctor turned to Madame von Stork, "our poor lady had no idea of how the battle had gone, nor did she hear a word of the fate of the King. The Countess von Voss tells me that for courage she has never seen her equal. The Queen held fast her hand and all through that dreadful flight, with the fear of Napoleon behind her, she repeated over and over texts which had words to sustain her."
"What were they, dear Doctor?"
"From the eighth chapter of Romans, dear Madame," said the Doctor, consulting a little note book.
"Marianne," commanded her father, "fetch the Bible. Let us hear what words gave comfort to our Queen."
Marianne tripped across the room and returned in a moment with a Bible which she laid before her father.
All listening, he found the place and read aloud:
"The Spirit helpeth our infirmities, for we know not what we should pray for.
"We know that all things work together for good to them that love God.
"Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or peril, or sword?
"Nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Jesus Christ our Lord."
"Our good Angel," murmured Madame von Stork, wiping her eyes.
"Ach, ja," said the Doctor, "she had much to endure, poor lady."
Then he related how, tired to death herself, she had tried to encourage the soldiers at Magdeburg, and of how in dread and trembling she had driven across the flat country towards Berlin, and at last had entered the old city of Brandenburg.
"It was by the old stone, Roland," continued the Doctor, "that a courier stopped her with the news. 'Majesty,' he said, 'all is lost! Everything!' Then the Queen, seizing the papers from his hands, read the awful news, her figure trembling like a leaf! 'The battle was lost at Jena. The King has been defeated at Auerstädt. Napoleon is making on Berlin. Your Majesty must fly with the Royal children.'"
Bettina's tears fell as the Doctor's voice faltered. The Mother of the Nest wiped her eyes on her embroidered handkerchief and the gentlemen and Otto blew their noses. Marianne sobbed.
"And our Queen," went on the Doctor, "turned like a child to the old Countess. She has been to her like a mother, you know. 'Voss, dear Voss,' she said, 'my poor, poor husband.' Then she forced back her tears. 'Dear Voss,' and she clung to her hand. 'I must go at once to my children.'"
Then the Doctor told of how her carriage had dashed into Berlin to find the city a scene of wild confusion. The people, deceived by early news of a victory, were now driven into panic by the disaster at Jena. When the Queen entered they were pouring through the city gates in flight.
"Napoleon is coming! Napoleon! Napoleon!" was the cry which everywhere met her ear.
"It was terrible," put in the Professor. "I had to pay a fortune for the travelling carriages which brought us to Memel."
"But the Queen," the Doctor continued, "found only disappointment at the palace. Springing to the ground, she cried: 'My children!' to the attendant."
"But they were gone," interrupted Otto, "they left before we did. Their tutor took them to Swert-on-Oder."
The Doctor nodded, while the Professor frowned at Otto for his rudeness.
"Her Majesty," resumed the Doctor, "sent at once for me. When I saw her I started in amazement. Her dress was travel-stained and crumpled, her hair in wild disorder, her face wet with tears. Never had I before seen her any way than very neat and smiling. She held out her hands. Oh, dear Madame, it brought tears to my eyes. 'I must fly to my children,' she cried, 'and you must go with me.' Then, just as fast as we could, we proceeded to Swert, leaving things just as they were in the palace."
"A great pity, too," put in Herr Brandt, whose ways were most orderly. "For Napoleon, as we all know, found the Queen's letters to her husband, read what he pleased, and published all that might injure her."
"The monster!" cried Madame von Stork, motioning Marianne to fill the Doctor's glass and pass the cake to Herr Brandt.
"Thank you, many thanks," and the visitor smiled at Marianne and went on with his talk.
"The meeting, dear friends, between our dear Queen and her children was most heartrending. The poor little things had been torn from their play in the palace, hurried into the travelling carriage and borne away with very little idea of what had happened. When they heard that their mother, whom they adore, had arrived, they rushed with cries of joy to meet her. Even the baby Alexandrina, holding the hand of little Prince William. But when they saw their mother, her face all wet with tears, her dress so tumbled and with such a wild look in her eyes, the poor little things started back in fright. The baby set up a wail, and even the Crown Prince looked frightened."
"Poor things," murmured Madame von Stork, her handkerchief again to her eyes.
"'My poor children! my poor children!' cried the Queen. Truly," and the Doctor gazed from the faces of Elsa, Ilse, and Bettina to the grown ones, "it was a pitiful thing to see the frightened little faces. Our Queen, ashamed that she had frightened them, put her own feelings entirely aside and thought only of them! 'Come with me, my darlings,' she said, and taking the baby she led the way to her room. When she had removed her wraps, she gathered them all around her. 'Fritz, Willy,' she said to the two older boys, 'stand before me. Charlotte, Carl, sit one on each side. I will hold the baby. Listen now, and I will tell you why your mother comes to you thus in tears. My dear, dear children,' I have written down every one of her words in my diary," explained the Doctor, reading from his little book, "'We have suffered a great and terrible defeat. Your poor, unhappy father and all the soldiers of Frederick the Great, your famous uncle, have been defeated in two terrible battles, one fought at Jena, the other at the same moment at Auerstädt.'"
Then the Doctor told how she related the news of that dreadful October, and told of her journey and the flight to Berlin. And she spoke so simply that even little Carl had an idea of all the trouble.
"My darlings," and she gathered Carl and Charlotte in her arms, "you see me in tears. I weep for the destruction of our army, for the death of relatives and of many faithful friends."
The older boys wiped their eyes, and Carl began to sob, for his lively Cousin Louis Ferdinand, who always brought him toys and had a joke ready, was dead, too, his mother had told him.
"Fritz, Willy," the Queen turned to them, speaking only to them, "my dear, dear sons, you see an edifice which two great men built up in a century, destroyed in a day; there is now no Prussian army, no Prussian empire, no national pride: all has vanished like the smoke which hid our misery on the fields of Jena and Auerstädt. Oh, my sons, my dear little children, you are already of an age when you can understand these unhappy things. In a future age when your mother is no more, recall this unhappy hour. Weep again in your memories my tears, remember how I in this dreadful moment wept for the downfall of my Fatherland."
Then she described to them the glorious death of their cousin, Prince Louis Ferdinand, and again addressed the little princes especially.
"But do not be content, little sons, with tears. Bring out, develop your own powers, grow great in them, Fritz, Willy. Perhaps the guardian angel of Prussia gazes on you now. Free, then, your people from this humiliation which overpowers it. Seek to shake off France as your grandfather, the Great Elector, did Sweden. Do not forget, my sons, these times. Be men and heroes worthy of the names of Princes and grandsons of Frederick the Great, and for Prussia's sake be willing to confront death as Louis Ferdinand encountered it."
The fire which thrilled her voice caught the souls of the two boys and their eyes glowed with excitement.
"We promise, dear mother," said the Crown Prince, and both boys kissed her. "We promise," said little William.
Then the Queen being so tired sent the children from her, and attendants appeared from Berlin, couriers arrived with despatches, and Count Hardenburg, the Prime Minister, waited on Queen Louise with news of the King.
His Majesty, he assured her, was safe and sent word that the Queen and the children must go at once to Stettin.
On the twentieth they arrived in that strong town, and the Queen said good-bye to her children.
"Go, darlings," she told them, "with our Voss to Dantzic. Mother will join father at Custrin."
Then she held them a moment one by one in her arms and begged them to be good and to pray always for their country.
"Auf wiedersehen, darlings, as soon as possible you will see both your dear father and your mother."
Then they had separated, the Countess Voss and the children going towards the Baltic, the Queen joining her husband in the strong old fortified town where he was then in hiding.
But something very annoying happened to the Queen at Stettin.
There she had been promised fresh horses. She waited and waited and none were brought forth. At last it was discovered that all the horses had been turned into the field after her arrival, and that she must go on to the King with her tired one.
"It was the work of that villain, Napoleon. All believe that everywhere," put in Ludwig.
When Dr. Hufeland had finished his story, Ludwig Brandt told of the entrance of Napoleon into Berlin; how he came in a splendid procession with flags flying and trumpets sounding.
"But the Berliners, watching him from the windows, wept," he added, his face glowing.
Then he related how Napoleon had said all manner of things against the Queen, and of how surprised he was when he first beheld her portrait at Potsdam. "I had no idea that she looked like that," he said, and began to ask questions about her and listened attentively to all the praise which on every side was given her.
But, however much he was interested, it did not prevent his accusing her of having caused the war, before an assembly of Berliners he called to discuss matters. Only one of these Prussians had courage to defend the Queen. He was an old clergyman named Erman.
Up he stood and looked Napoleon straight in the eye.
"Sire," he said, "that is not true."
Not a soul believed that he would escape with his life, but he did.
"Perhaps," said the Professor, "Napoleon respected one brave man among such a group of cowards."
Before the Doctor could reply, a thundering knock at the door made all stop and look at each other in consternation.
It was the Major, who never could wait a minute.
His face was red and the powder from his curls had been shaken off in his hurry. He greeted no one.
"Richard, Richard," he cried, "there is news of a battle at Eylau!"
The gentlemen sprang from their chairs, Madame von Stork turned pale. Her Wolfgang was with the army.
"Yes, yes," cried the Major, speaking French very rapidly, "there has been a battle, a dreadful one, something terrible. There is no news yet that is certain. Some say, victory, others, defeat, but the whole town is in wild excitement. I have heard that the suffering of the soldiers was awful."
"Naturally," said Herr Brandt in German—not a word of French would he speak, "with all this ice, snow, and freezing."
"I have but one boy," said the Major, "and he is with the army. Here, Clarchen, some wine. Ah, many thanks, Mademoiselle Pauline." In spite of his worry he made a gallant bow, the cockade on his queue bobbing.
"My Rudolph," he said, "is a soldier, and perhaps at Eylau. But he can be nothing better than his father was, now can he?" He settled his double chin over his high stock and gazed from his blue eyes at the gentlemen.
The Professor motioned them all to seats.
"Clarchen," he said to his wife, "it is bedtime for the children." His voice was trembling.
The children all bowed and curtsied, and, kissing their mother's hand and wishing pleasant dreams for everybody, departed; Marianne, Pauline, and Otto, also.
The gentlemen, for Madame von Stork in a moment followed to give orders to her servant, sat with filled glasses and discussed Napoleon and their country.
Presently the Professor left the room to order another bottle of wine and some sandwiches.
"That older girl, Mademoiselle Pauline, is an excellent maiden," remarked Dr. Hufeland, in tones of admiration. Herr Brandt nodded, his face growing serious.
"Did you notice how calm she kept amid all the excitement?"
"Yes, yes," said the Major, "she is excellent, always ready to arrange my stock or tie the ribbon on my queue. Very different from my niece, Marianne," he added, "very different, I assure you."
Herr Brandt raised his eyebrows.
"Richard has spoiled that girl," he remarked; "see here." He picked up "The Sorrows of Werther," which lay under Marianne's chair.
Then he read aloud high-flown passages marked by Marianne's pencil.
"How her parents expect any sensible German man to marry her I cannot form an idea. A German man desires a wife who can cook, sew, and keep his house in order."
The Doctor raised his hand, for the Professor was entering with the bottle.
Almost immediately his wife followed.
Her eyes at once fell on "The Sorrows of Werther," and her face darkened.
"See, Richard, see," she cried, "we quite forgot to scold Marianne."
"Come, come, Clarchen," the Professor's voice was kind and soothing, "let the girl be. We have far more serious things now to worry over."
Then he lifted the book from the table.
"Ah, Goethe," he cried, and, in a moment, the battle of Eylau and all else was forgotten, while his eager eye conned the familiar pages. Madame von Stork turned to the others, who burst into laughter as they watched her husband.
"Just see him!" cried the poor lady, her turban bobbing as she shook her head with violence.
Startled, the Professor looked up from his book, his mild, learned face full of wonder.
"What is it?" he asked, "is it supper time?"
"Nein, nein, Richard," and Herr Brandt slapped his shoulder with sarcastic affection. "It is nothing, you know, only the cannon of Napoleon."
He, himself, had not the least good for Goethe, who had remained quietly at his dinner in his garden in Weimar when the cannon were thundering at Jena, and who sang no songs of patriotism, had nothing to cry out against Napoleon.
"But, Richard," his wife laid her hands on his arm, "you must pay heed to Marianne." The gentlemen nodded. "She is more trouble to me than all my other children. Even the twins and Carl are more useful. Reading, talking, dreaming, that is Marianne. She is good for nothing else. It is Bettina Brentano who has ruined her. I have never approved of that friendship. But, O Heavens, why worry over anything when my Franz is a prisoner, and my Wolfgang, I know not where!" and she burst into tearful sobbing. Herr Brandt and Dr. Hufeland arose in haste, and, kissing her hand and saying good-night to the Professor and Major, they fled.
There was little sleep for anyone that night, for dreadful pictures of Wolfgang, or Rudolph, frozen, or dead in the snow, arose before every eye, and drove away all slumbers.
On the morning, when the courier brought the truth to Memel, Marianne was writing a letter to her friend Brentano.
She had met this famous friend of Goethe when she was a year younger, and on a visit to her aunt in Frankfort-on-Main.
Never had Marianne seen anyone who had seemed to her so clever.
Both of them adored the poet Goethe, it being the fashion in those days for young girls to worship some poet.
Bettina Brentano knew Goethe's mother, a fine old lady whom everyone called "Frau Rat," and often she and Marianne went to see her.
When Marianne returned to Berlin she was changed entirely.
From a merry, jolly, little girl she had become a mournful maiden who convulsed her family with the most melancholy speeches. She spoke of the gloom of living, of the joy of dying while one was still beautiful, and if anyone talked of Goethe, or even so much as mentioned his name, Marianne clasped her hands and rolled her eyes and behaved, her brother said, "like an idiot."
The Professor only laughed.
"She has the Goethe fever, Clarchen," he told his wife. "It has spread at times all over Germany."
But on the day when Carl had been lost and the Queen had kissed him, the fault of the whole affair was to be laid on the shoulders of Marianne.
Then the Professor had at last listened to his wife and heard how Marianne would do nothing but read books, keep a foolish, sentimental journal, and write letters to Bettina Brentano.
"And, dear husband," his wife had added, "our Marianne talks of love and hopeless sorrow, our Marianne, who used to be so merry. Her thoughts are never with the coffee-cake, never with her sewing. And tell me, please, how is a girl to get a husband with this nonsense? Her wedding chest, which every German girl, as you know, must have ready, has not a thing to boast of, and Pauline's is entirely ready. She will not stitch, knit, or embroider, only read, read, read."
"It is the Goethe fever, I tell you, dear wife," said the Professor. "It will vanish."
"But, Richard," pleaded the Mother Stork, "consider the candles."
"Candles?"
Ah, that was a different matter.
"Yes, yes, dear husband, the candles. Do not think for an instant that I permit all this nonsense to go on in the daytime. If I see Marianne with a book, I take it away and provide needlework. And what does she do but burn candles!"
"Ah," said the Professor, "that will never do. I will see to the matter."
Now, at that moment Marianne was safe, she thought, in her room, her pretty hair floating over her blue dressing jacket, her paper on her desk, her pen in her hand.
"Ah, my chosen friend, my Bettina," she wrote in the high-flown style of that day, "who but thou understands thy Marianne? On every side I meet with derisive laughter when I would speak of him whose name I am not worthy to mention, our Master, thine and mine, our Goethe! Oh, to be again with thee, to sit with thee beneath the free, open Heaven, gazing upward at the celestial orbs whose silver beams thrill into thought, mysterious wonder of that law-ruled world of Nature which none but poets truly know. Oh, Bettina, how worthless is life when spent amid the trivialities of nothingness. Oh, to wander with thee, my heart's true friend, chosen of my spirit, to wander on the wings of thy imagination into the realms of infinite calm, and there to prepare our souls to be a sacrifice to him who——"
A knock at the door had interrupted this flight of sentimental fancy.
In had come her father.
With a laugh he had shut the writing-desk.
"Liebchen," he said, "it is time for bed. Do your writing by daylight."
Then he kissed her cheeks and patted her hair, and told her he could have no such wasting of candles.
"To bed in five minutes," he had commanded, and that ended the burning of candles. But nothing yet had cured her of her thoughtlessness, and it was still Pauline who did everything to assist the mother.
On the day that the news came of Eylau, Madame von Stork and Pauline were busy making coffee-cake, Bettina, Ilse, and Elsa helping stem currants and stone raisins.
In her room Marianne was telling Bettina Brentano all about their life in Memel. She was not sure that she could send a letter, but it was amusing at all events to write it. It was stupid to make coffee-cake.
"It is pleasant, dear Bettina," she wrote, "that our dear Queen and King are in Memel. Often, now, father is sent for to talk with the Queen, and one day mother took me to pay our respects to the Countess von Voss, who is a friend of my dear grandmother. She is a very lively and beautiful old lady, Mistress of the Court, and like a mother to our Queen. She is very clever, and the gentlemen greatly admire her. She is so stately, and will not forgive a lack of ceremony. I was in the greatest terror, as you may imagine. We were shown into her room where she was engaged at her toilette, some gentlemen, among them a Mr. Jackson, an Englishman, laughing and talking as her maid did her hair.
"I made my curtsey and saluted her hand.
"'And this is your daughter,' she said very kindly to mother. 'Dear Clara, the child has a look of poor Erna.'
"That was my aunt, my Bettina, who died when she was a girl, and who was engaged to Ludwig Brandt.
"Then the Countess asked us to be seated, and when at last her hair received its crown of a turban, she gave us some fine tea from England, which Mr. Jackson had given here.
"It was most kind in her, but I prefer our coffee.
"She told us story after story about our Queen, for it is of her that she best likes to talk; and, also, she spoke of dear little Prince William, and of how he had entered the army.
"It happened on New Year's Day, because the coming of the French made the King fear that he could not present him with the honour on his birthday.
"When the Royal children appeared before our King, he greeted them for the New Year, and then turned to little Prince William, and, oh, he is the dearest little fellow, my Bettina! so sensible-looking and so, in face, like our King. 'To-day,' said our King, 'something very important is to happen. William,' and he turned directly to him, 'I have nominated you to a commission in the army. We can no longer stay here in Königsberg, because of the approach of the enemy, and we must go to Memel at once. I might not be able to give you the appointment on your birthday, as I had intended to do, so I give it to you now.' Then, indeed, as you may imagine, little William was happy.
"The Countess told us how they arrayed him in a blue coat, with a red collar and narrow, dark trowsers and high boots to his knees. Exactly like the Guard, you remember.
"Then, suddenly, everybody began to cry 'Ah Heaven!' and lift up hands in horror. It is a rule that the Guard must wear queues, and Prince William's hair was too short for a pig-tail. 'And there they were,' said the Countess, 'acting as foolishly as they are doing about this war, when I simply sent out for a false queue and tied it on the child's hair, and ended the trouble.' Then they gave him a little cane, and behold, a fine soldier!
"He is my favourite, and sometimes I think that the Countess likes him better than the Crown Prince, who certainly knows that he is clever, but he is very handsome. Then the Countess told us of how dreadful it was at Königsberg, where our dear Queen was so ill, and how, when they told her that the French were at hand, she begged to be allowed to travel. She had a great horror of that monster, Napoleon, who has vowed to capture her, and so she told them it was better to fall into the hands of the good God, than into the hands of man.
"Mother asked the Countess why Napoleon so hated the Queen. Before she could answer her parrot suddenly called out in the funniest way: 'Napoleon is a monster! Our Queen is an angel! Down with the French!' You can guess how startled we were, but...."
Before Marianne could end her sentence she heard Otto calling: "Marianne! Marianne!"
She flew downstairs and into the great kitchen.
There were Pauline, her mother, the children, and her father all listening to her uncle.
"The courier has come!" cried Otto. "Uncle will tell us the news!"
Both Russians and French claimed the victory, but such sufferings had never been known in the world's history.
Amid the ice and snow, all had waited for days, the Russians occupying a church and graveyard, the camp fires lighting snowy fields and trees and bushes which crackled.
"The courier, dear Richard," the old major addressed his brother, "says thousands are sleeping a sleep from which even the love of their families never can wake them."
He blew his nose with great violence.
"The snow is red with the blood of thousands," he continued, "the Russians, God be thanked, kept their ground. They are not conquerors, it is true, but they have checked Napoleon!"
The Major's face flushed crimson.
"God be praised!" cried all the company, and the kitchen rang with rejoicings.
But they had not heard all the good news.