creeper comes near me. I always feel as if my evil angel stood at my
side, ready to plunge me into destruction."
"Psha! Superstitious fancies, which do not become so sensible a woman.
Your intended shall decide."
"Well," cried Althea; "decide, dear Tausdorf. You know that a year ago
Christopher Friend solicited my hand and was rejected. Now I may add,
what I before concealed; in the vexation of his disappointment, he
spoke of you most unbecomingly. But he now perceives his injustice, and
seeks for a reconciliation."
"Forgive, and you shall be forgiven," said Tausdorf good-naturedly.
"My own words!" cried Schindel.
"Oh, for that," said Althea impatiently, "I am as prompt as willing;
but he requires a formal reconciliation, and as the seal of it would
have our presence at his banquet to-morrow; this I deem as superfluous
as it would be disagreeable to me."
"Who says A must say B too," retorted Schindel. "Christopher will not
believe in the sincerity of your forgiveness, and thinks that you scorn
him if you refuse to appear at his banquet. You owe some compliance,
besides, to his rich and powerful family, to which in addition you are
allied."
"Still the untiring peacemaker and mediator! and inexhaustible in
arguments, where the point is to reconcile the nobility and citizens!"
"I can't help it, niece, since, as a nobleman and a proprietor at
Schweidnitz, I have become a sort of doubtful thing, and don't well
know whether I am a bird or a mouse. I am compelled, therefore, to
speak in the way of reconciliation on both sides, lest a feud should
break out, and it should eventually fare with me as with the
flittermouse in the fable. May I call up the petitioner?"
"Call him in God's name, uncle," said Tausdorf: "I read my Althea's
_yes_ in her lovely and peaceful countenance."
"Excellently spoken!" cried the uncle, and hurried out.
"Heaven grant that we may never repent this _yes_," said Althea with
heavy heart. "I only wish the wild Francis were not of the party!"
"Why is he so terrible to you?" asked Tausdorf, smiling.
"Because he is so rough, so fond of frays and drinking, and because he
detests the nobles so irreconcilably. Since too he has been forced to
submit to the long imprisonment, on account of the late unlucky affair,
there is no managing with him."
"I have never seen him; but I should not like to subscribe to the
damnatory sentence pronounced against him by the nobles of our
acquaintance. Hot-headed men are frequently the best. As I have heard
from good authority, this Francis fought bravely against the Turks, and
I find it natural and pardonable that a soldier should not willingly
suffer himself to be played upon. His late misfortune grieved me much.
As he was absolved after all, he certainly did not belong to Bieler's
murderers; and to suffer a year's undeserved imprisonment must embitter
even the heart of a lamb."
"Heaven grant that you may never come in contact with this lamb; you
would find in him a furious wolf. I tremble at the thoughts of it, for
I think fire and water could not meet more hostilely than your
dispositions. Your person would show him a true mirror of what he
ought to be and is not; that would shame him, and shame exasperates
vulgar minds. His roughness and your cultivation, his furious violence
and your noble calmness, his inclination to every excess and your
purity----"
"Still! still!" interrupted Tausdorf, ashamed, and gently pressing his
hand upon the lips of the animated eulogist. "Do not forget that I also
am no more than a frail man, and that exaggerated praise from an
estimable mouth can corrupt even better than I am."
"Come along," cried Schindel, dragging in the sky-blue Christopher.
With a pitiful sinner-face he approached Tausdorf, and timidly
stretched out his hand to him.
"All is forgotten and forgiven," cried the knight, shaking him by the
hand; "only as a first proof of friendship, do me the favour not to
speak a single syllable of the past."
"You are too good, sir," replied Christopher, smiling; "but I will not
fail to requite so great a favour to the best of my power."
He then went to Althea, and, kissing her hand, said--"You owe me some
reparation, noble lady, for the banquet which was put off four years
ago on account of that murderous history. I may, therefore, the more
boldly presume that you will this time favour me with your invaluable
company at a feast, which, please God, I intend giving to-morrow, at
Barthel Wallach's, for my own house is just undergoing a thorough
repair."
"Will your brother, Francis, be there?" asked Althea hastily.
"Heaven forbid!" rejoined Christopher; "We do not want this quarreller
and roarer. I have taken good care not to invite him. At first I feared
that he might intrude himself, unasked; but to my great delight I have
learnt that he goes on this day to a drinking-party at Freiburg, so
that we are quite safe from him. I have asked but a small party, a few
quiet nobles, and two or three honest citizens of the first class.
After the cloth is taken off, we'll have a little dance amongst
ourselves."
"We will come," said Althea with lightened heart.
"Excellent!" cried Christopher, rubbing his hands, while a singular
piercing glance of triumph fell from his eyes upon the fair widow, who
immediately changed colour. "Now I can set about the preparations for
my feast with a right joyful heart. I thank my dear friends for their
courtesy, and commend myself to their recollection."
He made a profound bow and departed, accompanied out by Schindel and
Tausdorf; but Althea looked after them anxiously, and sighed--"Oh that
I could recall my word!"
* * * * *
The morrow of the 27th of July was come. In Barthel Wallach's great
room on the ground floor, just before the entrance, sat Christopher
Friend with his guests at the epicurean banquet, while the upper seat
was graced by the betrothed pair. The first course was removed; the
strong dark Hungary went unremittingly about the table in the great
cups; and while the females, according to the good old custom, seemed
only to kiss the goblet, the men drained it frequently till their faces
glowed, and many a broad jest cast the reflection of this red upon the
delicate cheeks of the ladies. Tausdorf only sat still and wrapt up in
himself, and with his fork scratched letters on the pewter-dish before
him.
"What ails you?" said the mild Althea sportively, and passed her white
hand across his eyes. "You are not yourself, and cannot plead in excuse
that your thoughts are absent with the object of your passion, for she
sits by you in her honoured person, and you trouble yourself but little
about her."
"My good Althea!" sighed Tausdorf, and with a mournful smile kissed the
hand that caressed him.
"And what are you graving so earnestly upon the plate? I must see it,
and woe betide you if it should be the name of a fortunate rival."
She bent down more closely to read what he had written.
"_Memento mori!_ For God's sake, how is it that you are seized on a
sudden with these death-thoughts at a pleasure-banquet?"
"It is a way of mine to think on death in the midst of enjoyment. I
deem it pardonable at least, as in return one can blend with death the
thought of the eternal joy that waits us in the world beyond."
"My worthy Herr von Tausdorf," interrupted Christopher with a
disagreeable laugh, "I do not doubt your oratorical powers, or your
piety, and am convinced that you could, if you pleased, make an
excellent funeral sermon extempore; but that would be too dull an
entertainment with the full goblet: therefore take up the glass before
you, and pledge me as fairly as I pledge you to the health of your
noble bride."
Tausdorf seized the goblet, but again lost himself in a sea of thought,
and forgot to pledge.
"Well, dreamer," said the intended bride with good-humoured reproach,
"do you hesitate to drink the health of your Althea?"
He raised the cup mechanically, drank, and set it down again. Schindel,
who sat near him, was surprised.
"What is the matter with you, Tausdorf? I never saw you thus before?"
"I do not comprehend myself. An anxiety has possessed me, as if I were
to commit a murder. It must have been so that the poor king, Saul, felt
when the evil spirit was upon him. I am ashamed of this childish
feeling, and yet I can so little master it, that I shudder every time
the door opens, thinking that some great misfortune must enter under a
dreadful form."
"All this comes only of thick blood," replied Schindel; "you must be
bled."
As he spoke the word, the door was flung open, and Francis Friend burst
into the room with his usual impetuosity.
"Ah, woe!" cried Althea.
Schindel clasped his hands in terror, while Christopher asked
piteously, "Why, whence do you come, brother? I thought you were long
ago at Freiburg, and enjoying yourself?"
"He is a fool," replied Francis, "who hunts after pleasure miles off,
when he knows where to find it at once. I heard yesterday of your
present feasting, upon which I thought directly of surprising you, and
put off mine."
"Well, all that's true," said Christopher; "you have surprised us all,
and most agreeably: so let us draw together. Set yourself here at my
right hand, and enjoy with us the meat and drink that God has sent us."
"Spare all this idle talk," cried Francis, "I'll find out a good place
for myself;" and he carried his chair to the upper part of the room,
seating himself between Tausdorf and Schindel, and saying to the
former, "I see by your place near my cousin that you are the knight
Tausdorf. I'm glad to have an opportunity of knowing you, for though I
do not in general care much about the nobles, you please me well. There
is a command and intelligence about you such as one does not usually
see in your knights. For the rest, I am the wild Frank Friend, of whom
no doubt you have heard all manner of stories, and more bad than good.
In troth, I am a mad companion, but I mean it fairly with him who means
it fairly with me, and I now heartily wish you joy of your marriage
with my handsome cousin Althea here."
Tausdorf returned a fitting compliment, while Schindel, who had got
behind Althea's chair, whispered to her, "The bear does not seem in one
of his worst bear-moods to-day. Heaven help us farther."
In the mean time the second course was served up. Francis ate little,
but stuck so much the more diligently to the wine, and kept up a
constant talk with Tausdorf, in a tone of frank importunity, which did
not sit amiss upon him. Soon the conversation turned upon the Turkish
war; and he was ready to leap out of his skin for joy on finding that
Tausdorf had served against the infidels in Transylvania, at the very
time he had been fighting with them in Hungary.
"Heaven confound me!" he cried, while his face glowed with drinking;
and holding up the goblet--"Why, you please me better and better,
comrade, and therefore we'll now pledge each other in a brave draught,
and swear eternal friendship and brotherhood."
Tausdorf hesitated at this unexpected proposal, and was about to
decline it courteously, when Althea pressed his hand under the table,
and in low brief words requested him to accede for her sake; upon which
he took up the crystal goblet, and Francis did the same to pledge him;
but in the moment that the glasses touched, both rang hollowly, and
burst with a sharp jarring sound, which echoed lamentably through the
wide hall, while the noble wine poured down in streams upon the floor,
to the indignation of the avaricious Christopher, who called out, "You
are, and always will be, Frank the clumsy, and do nothing like rational
people; all with noise and fury. You have broken now my beautiful
crystal cups with your rough pledging."
"Yes, every thing is to be laid to me," growled Francis: "I pledged my
goblet as neatly as possible; it was not till afterwards that both
broke, and how that chanced, the devil only knows."
"It is not your brother's fault," said Tausdorf, drying the wine from
his doublet. "I do not myself understand how it happened."
"We have examples," observed Schindel thoughtfully, "that empty glasses
have broken upon people calling out loudly in the same key to which
they were tuned; but these goblets were full, and all was still in the
room. God grant that this accident may not prognosticate the rupture of
your new-formed friendship as early as the glasses!"
"No fear of rupture," cried Francis, shaking Tausdorf's hand cordially.
"We must both agree to that first, but our hearts have been amalgamated
and hardened together in the same war-fire, and will hold together for
life and death."
"Gentlemen," said the butler, entering with a respectful bow, "there
are some well-dressed personages--masks,--standing without, before the
door, who would ask of the honourable company through me whether they
may come in to amuse you with song and dance, and other allowable
pleasantries."
"They are welcome," cried the restless Francis, starting up. "This
tedious sitting at table has long been abominable to me."
He ran to the door and opened it. Three gipsies danced in, playing with
pipe, triangle, and tambourine: these were followed by three females in
black clothes, slashed with red, and wearing black masks.
"Trim wenches, brother," said Francis, with eager look, to Tausdorf,
upon whose chair he was leaning. "So slim, and at the same time so
full! By heavens! it makes one wish to become a gipsy for the pleasure
of possessing them."
"This masking is not to my taste," replied Tausdorf. "The burning eyes
that sparkle from the fixed black faces have to me something almost
supernatural. The open brow, and an open heart whether in joy or grief,
are what I love."
"I understand you, my poor knight," said Francis mockingly. "You are
already in the cage, and dare no longer take any pleasure in a handsome
face, at least not _show_ it, lest your lady wife should be angry, and
hold a criminal court upon her faithless shepherd."
"Do you know any of the party?" asked Althea, to interrupt this
conversation.
"Not I," answered Francis. "The devil knows where stupid Kit has picked
up the handsome wenches; but my acquaintance with them shall soon be
made, and then I'll let you know more about them."
With this he would have forced himself upon the masks, but the gipsy
with the triangle, an old gray-beard, waved him back, and gave the
women a sign to begin their revels. The music immediately struck up,
and the three gipsies commenced a wild fantastic dance, in which the
twines of their round well-formed arms, the turnings and bendings of
their slim, delicate figures, the springing and agility of their feet,
were shown off in full perfection. One of them, whose auburn hair was
adorned with coloured ribbons and Bohemian stones, particularly
distinguished herself by the gracefulness of her movements; and
Francis, after having looked on for some time, tore open his doublet,
exclaiming, "Zounds! what a figure! It warms an honest fellow who has
got a few bottles of Tokay in him."
"This mad springing may please you," said Althea contemptuously; "it is
just calculated for the taste of a drunkard; but to me it seems like
the wild dance of fiends about a lost soul. It grates me to see that a
woman can so far forget the female dignity as to expose herself thus."
"Heaven deliver me from a tribunal where you preside," said Francis
laughing; "why, it must be worse than that of the emperor at Prague.
Your virtue is of so fierce a nature, there's no reasoning with it.
That which is to please must be a little free: your decorum and modesty
are the most tedious things on the face of the earth."
The trio was at an end. The gipsies fanned themselves with their
motley-coloured handkerchiefs, but they would not move their masks, and
on that account rejected the wine which was proffered to them by the
master of the feast.
"These girls seem to be buttoned up to their chins," said Francis, "but
for all that I'll have a peep behind their black masks, or die for it.
Above all, I must try the fair-haired witch." And in the delirium of
the moment, he dashed his goblet through the window, and leaped upon a
chair, shouting "Huzza! huzza! away with the tables; we have had enough
of eating, and will dance you one till the floor shakes, and the
rafters crack again."
"Man! are you alone here?" exclaimed Tausdorf indignantly; but in his
frenzy, Francis heard him not, and, springing from the chair over the
table with a neck-breaking leap, alighted again just before the mask
with the auburn hair.
"Take away," said Christopher with vexation. "When once he breaks out,
there is no managing with him."
The tables were removed, the seats placed close to the walls, and the
guests made room for the dancers. Passing over the usual forms of
courtesy, Francis seized his chosen one with a rude grasp, and shouted
to the musicians, "A waltz! a waltz! but quick! quick!"
The music began, and the feet of the dancers kept pace with its
rapidity. The space about them grew wider and wider, for the spectators
could hardly get their feet out of the way in time from the stamping of
the intoxicated Francis, who kept clapping his hands, and shouting,
"Faster! faster! I can stand it, and so can she." At last the piper
stopped from want of breath; in a little time too the triangle was
unable to follow; and now only the tambourine gave a fit measure to
this bacchanalian revel.
"And this is called pleasure?" said Althea to Tausdorf, who had
retreated to a bow-window.
"Where the soul is incapable of enjoyment," he replied, "pleasure must
be sensual, or the vulgar mind would have no joy on earth whatever."
At last the sprightly bacchanal was exhausted, and danced off with his
female into the next room. There he threw himself into a chair, forced
his companion into the seat beside him, and panted out, "You dance as
gracefully as lightly, and only so much the more stimulate my desire to
see your face. It certainly won't have to be ashamed of the feet. Come,
take off the damnable Moor's visor."
"It is not yet time," replied the gipsy in a low tone, that sounded
still more hollowly from the mask.
"Not yet?" said Francis, with a rough grasp of her hand; "but soon?
to-day?"
"If all goes as it should, perhaps," was the answer.
"Then I must have patience, however little I am used to it; so let us,
in the mean time, have a friendly chat together. You are so sparing of
words. I only wish your tongue had half the nimbleness of your feet."
"I am not fond of talking," replied the gipsy with cutting coldness;
"there is little pleasure in it."
"And yet you are a woman," cried Francis, merrily. "For Heaven's sake,
how could you have so degenerated? Only think, if every one were to be
as you are, what a poor sort of entertainment we should have in the
world."
"The world would gain by it," retorted the mask. "How much foolish, how
much evil, talk would be spared! How much falsehood and deceit! How
much perjury!"
"Oh, this is dull gossip," exclaimed Francis, struck by her words.
"Rather tell me my fortune; you have visited us as a gipsy, and should
keep up the character."
"Do not ask it," she replied, in a warning tone: "you might hear
something that would not please you."
"Yes, if I were fool enough to believe such nonsense. Prophesy away,
and be it at my peril. Here is my hand."
The gipsy hastily seized it. Her bosom heaved violently, and her eyes
darted piercing looks from out the mask.--At length she said, "These
lines do not please me; you are like to use your sword this very day."
"That would be the devil," cried Francis; and looked about with an air
of defiance, as if seeking for his adversary.--"But I have no
objection: to my mind the best of a feast is wanting if there is not
something of a row to wind it up."
"So much for the future," said the gipsy, releasing his hand. "The past
you will be contented to leave alone."
"By no means," exclaimed Francis. "Of the future you can lie as much
as you please, because no one can peep behind the curtain; but in the
past your art is put to the proof of fire, and if it does not come well
out of it, I shall mock you soundly."
Again the gipsy took his hand, examined it; but shuddered and
retreated, saying, "For the last time I warn you."
"That, by my troth, sounds like earnest," cried Francis,
mockingly.--"But go on, at my peril."
"You have murder on your soul!" said a voice hollowly from beneath the
mask.
Francis drew back, shuddering, but in the next moment he collected
himself, as he replied, "In the Turkish war I helped more than one
infidel to hell; but I pride myself upon it, and do not reckon it for a
murder."
"I speak of that which happened four years since, and of which you were
acquitted at the royal tribune of Prague."
Francis uttered a cry of terror, and would have started up, but the
gipsy grasped his hand firmly, and he sank back upon his seat as if
paralysed.
"Properly speaking," continued the gipsy, "you have two souls to answer
for above. An honest old man was sacrificed for your safety. You
deceived him by an oath to marry his daughter, whom you had seduced:
justice gave way before the son of the all-powerful patrician, and, to
save vice, innocence went out to die."
Francis sate pale and motionless. The fumes of the wine were for a
short time dissipated by strong horror; and, though he saw that nothing
would do here save bold denial either in wrath or ridicule, yet he was
not sufficiently master of his tongue; and the moment in which
impudence would have been in place passed by unemployed. The music from
the next room sounded merrily, as if in mockery of his anguish. At
length he stammered out with difficulty, "Avenging Nemesis, who are
you?"
"You may, perhaps, learn to-day," replied the gipsy, "as I have already
given you to hope. But that you may not send me to the stake for a
witch," she added, passing over to a tone of jest, "I must confess that
I had my information from a sure hand. The stately knight yonder, who
is conversing so familiarly at the window with that handsome lady, told
the strange tale a little time ago to a noble Hungarian. I listened to
him unseen, and heard him calling you a pitiful boy, who did not know
when death became a man more than life."
With the passion thus excited, returned intoxication also in the wild
brain of Francis. His face became a dark red. He started from his seat,
and snatching up his sword from the corner, girded it on with trembling
hands, as he exclaimed, "For the first time I have trusted a noble, but
never again.--And the scoundrel caught me so with his knightly bearing
and open manners, was so frank and friendly with me, and yet attacked
my honour behind my back like a hired murderer!--Perhaps at the very
moment he drank to our brotherhood, he was plotting to rake up old
forgotten stories from their oblivion, that he might capitally denounce
me to the furious emperor, with whom he has so much weight. Now it is
clear why the goblets broke in pledging. But, by the infernal hosts, I
will do myself right upon this hypocrite!"
"You will do well," said the gipsy, still firmly grasping his hand;
"but if it imports you to accomplish your revenge, don't begin the feud
here. All would take part against you, and he would be warned. Entice
him out, and then let your swords decide in the battle-ordeal."
"That is hard," exclaimed Francis; "hard that I am to speak the
scoundrel fair, when I should like to fall upon him at once, tooth and
nail. But you are right. I am called the wild Frank, and, as I should
not dare to tell the real cause, I should be thought by every one in
the wrong. I'll look out, therefore, for a quiet spot where I may right
myself without any interruption or disturbance. But where shall I find
you afterwards to thank you for your information?"
"When all is done, you will see me again, unmasked," replied the gipsy
with peculiar emphasis. "My word upon it! I shall keep that word better
than many a man his oath!"