After a long night, the fresh morning breathed when Albano was to find
again the treasures of the most blessed dream, the flowers of fortune
which the moon had opened, in broad sunlight. Life shouted to him
exultingly, as he climbed again yesterday's heights, which shone
overspread with the varnish of light; not to a rose-feast, but to all
flower and harvest-festivals at once; to feasts of myrtles and lilies;
to gleanings and blossom-gatherings. The sun went forth over the
blessed region, and as a peacock with his trailing rainbow flies into a
blossoming tree, so did the young day, heavy with colors and laden with
gardens and full of reflections, mount the blue heights, and smile like
a child upon the world. Albano looked now from his height down on the
enchanted castle wherein yesterday the mighty enchantress had
disappeared.
He went down to it. A singing maiden on the flowery roof, who seemed to
have been waiting for him, pointed out, leaning over without
interrupting her singing, a near apartment below her into which he was
to enter. He stepped in; it was empty. Through the windows of oiled
paper streamed a wondrous morning light; on the wooden ceiling figures
from Herculaneum were painted; in a Campanian vase stood yellow
butterfly flowers and myrtle-blossoms, which diffused around them a
sweet perfumed atmosphere. The singular environs enclosed him more and
more closely, for he found, in fact, some pictures and articles of
furniture which seemed familiar to him. At last he saw, to his
amazement, on the table a half ring. He took out his half which he had
got from the pretended sister in the Gothic chamber on that ghostly
night, and which, to be ready for the opportunity of a comparison, he
always carried about with him. He pressed the semicircles into one
another; suddenly they closed, clasping, and formed a fast ring. "God!"
thought he, "what arm strikes again into my life?"
Just then the door was hastily opened, and the Princess Julienne
entered hurriedly, smiling and weeping, and exclaimed, flying to him,
"O my brother! my brother!" "Julienne," said he, seriously, and with
deep emotion, "art thou really my sister at last?" "O, long enough has
she been so!" replied she, and looked on him tenderly and blissfully,
and smiled through her tears. Then she again embraced him, and again
looked at him, and said: "Thou dear Albano-brother! So long have I,
like a moon, been sailing around thee, and had, like her, to stay
colder and farther off. Now will I love thee with exceeding fondness;
my love shall run backward, and run forward too!" "Almighty!" Albano
broke out, weeping, when he found himself so suddenly clasped by a
beneficent arm out of the cloud, "all this dost thou now give me at
once?" "Ah!" cried Julienne, with liveliness, "that I were only weeping
for pure joy! But I must eat my bitter crust of sorrow with it too!
Dear brother, Luigi writes me yesterday from Pestitz that I must hasten
back, else he will hardly live to see my return. Did I think of this on
my setting out? Thus what I receive with one hand I must give up with
the other." Albano said nothing to this, because he could not possibly
take the least interest in the Prince. So much the more did he refresh
himself with fresh, clear joy in the open, breathing Orient of his
earliest days of life, in the sight of this young, pure flower, which
grew and played, as it were, in and out of the bright, fresh fountain
of his childhood.
"But, heavens! explain to me," began Albano, "how all came to pass."
"Now, I know, the questioning begins," she replied. "The ostensible sum
and substance thou shalt shortly have; if thou askest for more, if thou
wilt peep into the book of mysteries, then I shut it to, and repeat to
thee some lies. Next October, it may be sooner, all comes to light.
This for the present, and first of all,--my mother was, and remains,
verily pure and holy in this relationship, by the Almighty God!"
"What a riddle!" said he. "Art thou the daughter of my father? Is Luigi
my brother? Is my dead sister Severina thy sister?" asked he.
_Julienne_. "Ask October!"
_Albano_. "Ah, sister!"
_Julienne_. "O brother, trust the daughter of Melchisedec. Further,--I
was indeed the sister in the apparition, whom the man with the bald
head introduced to thee in Lilar. I could not, and yet I felt that I
must, have thee ere thou hadst flown away into foreign parts. The old
age which I then had in the mirror was, as thou seest, made only by an
artificial mirror."[100]
_Albano_. "Truly, I thought then of no one but of thee. Only how comes
there a man like the Baldhead and like the Father of Death, who so
incomprehensibly predicted to me in Mola that I should find thee?"
_Julienne_. "That is impossible. Did he name my name?"
_Albano_. "That only was wanting. The Pater is, for the rest, in all
probability one and the same man with the Baldhead. Immediately after
the announcement he went toward heaven."
_Julienne_. "There let him stay, by all means, and the other too. Does
this dark bond of enchantment concern or disturb me or thee, which, in
its false miracles, has thus far always been interrupted by singular
real ones? It was quite innocently that I happened in Lilar at that
time, and perhaps I prevented something frightful."
_Albano_. "By heavens! I must ask what, then, is his object, who his
leader, his manager?"
_Julienne_. "Probably the father of the Countess, for he lives still, I
hear, unknown and unseen, although thy father is guardian. Be
astonished when thou art at home, and leave the riddles, which, be
assured, are unravelling themselves so agreeably for us both, and await
the October days."
_Albano_. "But one thing, beloved sister, deny me not, I pray thee,--a
clear word about my and thy wonderful relation to the noble Countess!
Only that!"
_Julienne_. "Has my heart, then, already denied it thee? The glorious
one,--well for her and me and thee! Thy first word of love,--which the
gods have now so firmly sealed,--was to be the signal-word for my
annunciation to thee; only from the beloved mightest thou receive the
sister. What jugglers and ghosts have done towards it, and how much of
it, no one knows better than--October; why shall I, meanwhile, be
choosing between lies and perjury? I simply did all, only to bring you
two together; the rest I knew beforehand. Nothing succeeded,--it all
was a stifling snarl; everything went up hill. I saw precious
beings[101] sowing in an unblessed spring dreadful griefs, and withal
smiling so hopefully! and I could not hold their unhappy hands,--I, who
with such certainty foreknew all the coming anguish. O thou pure, pious
soul above!" said she, all at once, with quivering lip, looking towards
heaven.
The brother and sister embraced each other softly, and wept in silence
at the thought of the innocent sacrifice.
"No," said Albano, very warmly, "no hell-conspiracy could have sundered
us had she only stayed with me, or even on the earth." "See, Albano,"
said Julienne, collecting again her more cheerful life-spirits, and
opening all blinds, "how the morning hill sparkles and swims up and
down! Let me speak out! By the very greatest good luck, I learned in
winter that thou wast turning thy thoughts toward Naples. Linda had
already been there once, and her mother at the baths of the
neighborhood. For me, I said to her, Ischia's baths would do as well as
any. Go with me; we will not disturb or go near your triste guardian in
Rome at all. She readily assented. Of course there was no mention made
of thee; previously, however, there had been often enough in letters
and otherwise, when I always praised thee beyond measure. And now _nous
voici donc_. Yesterday I received in Naples the mournful letter of my
brother. Of thy arrival I knew as yet nothing. I let the Countess go
alone to the feast of tones, and hastened home with heavy heart. When
she came back, she opened her glad heart, and told me all; and then I
told her all. Ah, thank God," she added, falling upon his neck, "that
we have now at last disembarked in Elysium, and that the rotten
Charon's-boat has not sent us to the bottom. But for all Europe, even
for thy Dian, mark me, the privy seal remains upon our relationship."
Albano must needs still put a few questions. She kept answering, in a
lively tone, "October! October!" till all at once, as if awaking, she
exclaimed, "O, how can I say that so gayly?" but without explaining
herself on the subject.
"Now will I bring thee, as I have heretofore done, to the Countess,
only by a shorter way," said she, took his hand, led him out, opened
the opposite apartment, where Linda lived, and said, "I present to thee
my brother." Deeply blushing, the noble form came to meet them, and
embraced, without a word, her dear female friend. When her eye met
again Albano's, she was so struck that she sought to draw away the hand
which he kissed, for she had yesterday hardly seen but in a glimmering
light his beautiful eye, and his noble brow, and the lips of love; and
this blooming man stood, inspired with double emotion, so bright and
still and earnest before her, full of noble, real love. Her heart would
gladly have fallen upon his; at least, she gave him back her hand into
his, and wished him joy of this morning. The obvious answer, "and of
yesterday evening," he could not get over his lips, from a peculiar,
modest shyness, of giving as of taking praise. "A third man is found at
last for the travelling-college," said Julienne; "for thou must go off
directly, in a few days; thou, too, must be off to Pestitz, Albano."
"I, too, sister?" said he; "I meant to stay a month, and here is the
visit of Vesuvius, Herculaneum, and Naples crowded into a few days." He
wondered afterwards himself at the sweetness of obedience under the
fair commands of love, since he used once to say, "Command me to
command, and I will not obey." "I accompany my friend," said Linda,
"glad as I should have been to go to Greece, to which I am already, for
the second time, so near."
"This very night I fly away," said he; "I will only wake, see, live,
and love." Julienne had already begun to show a sister's concern about
his health and his objects; divided between two brothers, gladly would
she, had it only been possible, have sacrificed herself to both. "The
good creature has not even yet enjoyed Ischia," said she; "he must have
that to-day."
Albano felt, at the expression of this new female love, that woman
was the human heart in the fairest form. Within him rang a glad
melody,--"What a day lies before thee, and what years!" Sweetly
entwined and overspun with a canopy of double love-blossoms, he saw
life and earth full of fragrance and light; over the morning dew of
youth a sun had now been ushered up, and the dark drops glistened up
and down through all gardens.
He cast, at length, a glance at the place which surrounded him. Niobe's
group, the Genius of Turin, Cupid, and Psyche, stood there in casts,
borrowed from the cabinet of an artist in Naples. The walls were
decorated with rare pictures, among which was--Schoppe sneezing. This
alone rushed with the northern past mightily into his softened heart,
and he expressed his feeling to his beloved. "You," said she, "prefer
friendship to art, for that portrait is the worst in my collection; but
the original deserves, indeed, all regard."
She went into the cabinet, and brought out a miniature likeness of
herself, which represented her, after the Turkish fashion, veiled, and
with only one eye uncovered. How livingly beside the twilight of the
veil did the open, soul-speaking eye look and strike! How did the flame
of its might burn through the covering of mildness! Linda named the
master of the magnificent picture, that very Schoppe, and added, he had
said in this case the master must, out of reciprocal complaisance,
himself praise a work which praised him more partially and powerfully
than any other work of his ever had. She explained this difference of
his pencil by another cause, which he had stated to her almost in these
words: he had, he said, in his earliest youth, loved her mother as long
as he had seen her, and afterwards never any one again; and therefore
he had, as she resembled her mother, painted her _con amore_, and
really striven to bring out something.
"O, honest old man!" said Albano, and could hardly keep tears out of
the eyes which so often were happy. But it was only the holy pang of
friendship; for there darted through him at last, like a beam of
lightning through the clearest sky, a presumption made certain by
everything,--by Schoppe's diary and Linda's words and Rabette's
letter,--that Linda was the soul whom the singular being secretly
loved. A sharp pain cut hastily but deeply through his brow; and he
conquered himself only by his present younger freshness of spirit, by
newly gathered power and force, and by the free thought that a friend
may well and easily give up and sacrifice to his friend a _loved_ one,
but cannot or dares not so easily surrender _one who loves him_.
Julienne said, "The only wonder is that my brother, between two such
fantastical beings as this Schoppe and Roquairol, has not himself
become one of the same feather." A running fire broke out. Linda said,
"Schoppe is only a southern nature in conflict with a northern
climate." "Properly with life itself," said Albano. Julienne simply
remarked, "I love always rules in life; with neither of them is one
ever tranquil and _à son aise_, but only _à leur aise_." She asked him
at once about Roquairol. "He was once my friend, and I speak of him no
more," said Albano, whose tongue was tied by the ruined favorite's
torturing love for Linda, and even his relationship to Liana. Linda
glided over the subject with the mere verdict that he was an
overstrained weakling, and without special mention of his love for her
or of her abhorrence of him. She quite as coldly forgot at a distance
every one who was repulsive to her inner being as she did vehemently
thrust him off when he was near.
Julienne withdrew to make arrangements for the little day's journey
over the island. Albano despatched a note to Dian, containing the
_marche-route_ to Naples. Linda said, in respect to Julienne, "A deeply
and firmly grounded character!" "The stem and twigs all buried in
little fragrant blossoms!" he added. "And exactly what she hates in
books and conversations,--poesy,--that she pursues right earnestly in
action. Individuality is everywhere to be spared and respected, as the
root of everything good. You, too, are very good," she added, with soft
voice. "Truly, I am so at present," said he; "for I love right
heartily; and only a complete being can one really love, and with
entire disinterestedness."
"So must the sun's image strike full and round, in order to burn." "Or
an image which one takes for it," said she; "I am what I am, and cannot
easily become anything else. If man has only a will once for all, which
goes through life, not alternating from minute to minute, from being to
being, that is the main thing." "Linda," cried Albano, "I hear my own
soul. There are words which are actions; yours are." When she thus
spoke out her soul, her beautiful form vanished from before his
enchanted spirit, as the golden string vanishes when it begins to
sound. Wounded and punished by the past for his often hard energy, he
breathed only with a gentle breath--although now life, the world,
and the very region made him bolder, brighter, firmer, and more
ardent--upon the _unisonant_ Æolian strings of this _many-toned_ soul.
But how must she have been charmed with a man at once so mighty and so
tender,--a soft constellation of near suns,--a beautiful war-god with
the lyre,--a storm-cloud full of Aurora,--a spirited, ardent youth,
whose thought was so honest! She said it not, however, but simply
loved, like him.
He threw an accidental glance at her little table-library. "Nothing but
French!" said she. He found _Montaigne_, the life of _Guyon_, the
_Contrat Social_, and, last of all, _Madame de Staël sur l'Influence
des Passions_. He had read this, and said how infinitely pleased he had
been with the articles upon love, parties, and vanity, and, in short,
with her German or Spanish heart of fire, but not with her bald French
philosophy, least of all with her immoral suicide-mania. "Good Heaven!"
cried Linda; "is not life itself a long suicide? Albano, all men are
still somewhere or other pedants, the good in morality so called, and
you especially. Maxims of Kant, great, broad classifications,
principles, must they all have. You are all born Germans, real Germans
of the Germans, even you, friend. Am I right?" she added, softly, as if
she desired a "yes."
"No," said Albano, "so soon as a man once pursues and desires anything
right earnestly and exclusively, then he is called a coxcomb or a
pedant." "O you everlasting readers and readeresses!" cried Julienne,
stepping in and seeing him with a book in his hand. "Never has the
Princess read preface or note," said Linda, "as I have never yet let
any one go." Women who read prefaces and notes are of some
significance; with men, at most the opposite were true. "We can set
out; all is ready," said Julienne.