Sir Heinz Schorlin's servant was on intimate terms with many of the
servitors of the imperial family, and one of them conducted him to the
balcony of the city pipers, which afforded a view of the great hall.
The Emperor sat there at the head of the banquet table, and by his side,
on a lower throne, his sister, the Burgravine von Zollern. Only the most
distinguished and aristocratic personages whom the Reichstag attracted to
Nuremberg, with their ladies, shared the feast given by the city in their
honour.
But yonder, at a considerable distance from them, though within the space
enclosed by a black and yellow silk cord, separated from the glittering
throng of the other guests, he perceived--he would not trust his own
eyes--the Knight Heinz Schorlin, and by his side a wonderfully charming
young girl.
Biberli had not seen Eva Ortlieb for three years, yet he knew that it was
no other than she. But into what a lovely creature the active, angular
child with the thin little arms had developed!
The hall certainly did not lack superb women of all ages and every style
of figure and bearing suited to please the eye. Many might even boast of
more brilliant, aristocratic beauty, but not one could vie in witchery
with her on whom Katterle had cast an eye for his master. She had only
begun a modest allusion to it, but even that was vexatious; for Biberli
fancied that she had thereby "talked of the devil," and he did not wish
him to appear.
With a muttered imprecation, by no means in harmony with his character,
he prepared to leave the balcony; but the scene below, though it
constantly filled him with fresh vexation, bound him to the spot
as if by some mysterious spell.
Especially did he fancy that he had a bitter taste in his mouth when his
gaze noted the marvellous symmetry of Heinz Schorlin's powerful though
not unusually tall figure, his beautiful waving locks, and the
aristocratic ease with which he wore his superb velvet robe-sapphire blue
on the left side and white on the right, embroidered with silver falcons-
or perceived how graciously the noblest of the company greeted him after.
the banquet; not, indeed, from envy, but because it pierced his very
heart to think that this splendid young favourite of fortune, already so
renowned, whom he warmly loved, should throw himself away on the daughter
of a city merchant, though his motley wares, which he had just seen, were
adorned by the escutcheon of a noble house.
But Heinz Schorlin had already been attracted by many more aristocratic
fair ones, only to weary of them speedily enough. This time, also,
Biberli would have relied calmly on his fickleness had Katterle's foolish
wish only remained unuttered, and had Heinz treated his companion in the
gay, bold fashion which usually marked his manner to other ladies. But
his glance had a modest, almost devout expression when he gazed into the
large blue eyes of the merchant's daughter. And now she raised them!
It could not fail to bewitch the most obdurate woman hater!
Faithful, steadfast Biberli clenched his fists, and once even thought
of shouting "Fire!", into the ballroom below to separate all who were
enjoying themselves there wooing and being wooed.
But those beneath perceived neither him nor his wrath--least of all his
master and the young girl who had come hither so reluctantly.
At home Eva had really done everything in her power to be permitted to
stay away from the Town Hall. Herr Ernst Ortlieb, her father, however,
had been inflexible. The chin of the little man with beardless face and
hollow cheeks had even begun to tremble, and this was usually the
precursor of an outburst of sudden wrath which sometimes overpowered him
to such a degree that he committed acts which he afterwards regretted.
This time he had been compelled not to tolerate the opposition of his
obstinate child. Emperor Rudolph himself had urged the "honourable"
members of the Council to gratify him and his daughter-in-law Agnes, whom
he wished to entertain pleasantly during her brief visit, by the presence
of their beautiful wives and daughters at the entertainment in the Town
Hall.
Herr Ortlieb's invalid wife could not spare Els, her older daughter and
faithful nurse, so he required Eva's obedience, and compelled her to give
up her opposition to attending the festival; but she dreaded the vain,
worldly gaiety--nay, actually felt a horror of it.
Even while still a pupil at the convent school she had often asked
herself whether it would not be the fairest fate for her, like her Aunt
Kunigunde, the abbess of the convent of St. Clare, to vow herself to the
Saviour and give up perishable joys to secure the rapture of heaven,
which lasted throughout eternity, and might begin even here on earth, in
a quiet life with God, a complete realisation of the Saviour's loving
nature, and the great sufferings which he took upon himself for love's
sake. Oh, even suffering and bleeding with the Most High were rich in
mysterious delight! Aye, no earthly happiness could compare with the
blissful feeling left by those hours of pious ecstasy.
Often she had sat with closed eyes for a long time, dreaming that she was
in the kingdom of heaven and, herself an angel, dwelt with angels. How
often she had wondered whether earthly love could bestow greater joy than
such a happy dream, or the walks through the garden and forest, during
which the abbess told her of St. Francis of Assisi, who founded her
order, the best and most warmhearted among the successors of Christ, of
whom the Pope himself said that he would hear even those whom God would
not! Moreover, there was no plant, no flower, no cry of any animal in
the woods which was not familiar to the Abbess Kunigunde. Like St.
Francis; she distinguished in everything which the ear heard and the eye
beheld voices that bore witness to the goodness and greatness of the Most
High. The abbess felt bound by ties of sisterly affection to every one
of God's creatures, and taught Eva to love them, too, and, as a person
who treats a child kindly wins the mother's heart also, to obtain by love
of his creatures that of the Creator.
Others had blamed her because she held aloof from her sister's friends
and amusements. They were ignorant of the joys of solitude, which her
aunt and her saint had taught her to know.
She had endured interruptions and reproaches, often humbly, oftener
still, when her hot blood swept away her self-control, with vehement
indignation and tears; but meanwhile she had always cherished the secret
thought that the time would come when she, too, would be permitted, at
one with God and the Saviour, to enjoy the raptures of eternal bliss.
She loved her invalid mother and, often as his sudden fits of passion
alarmed her, she was tenderly attached to her father; yet it would have
seemed to her an exquisite delight to be permitted to imitate the saints
and sever all bonds which united her to the world and its clogging
demands. She had long been yearning for the day when she would be
allowed to entreat the abbess to grant her admittance to the convent,
whose doors would be flung wide open for her because, next to the
brothers Ebner, who founded it, her parents had contributed the largest
sum for its support.
But she was obliged to wait patiently, for Els, her older sister, would
probably soon marry her Wolff, and then it would be her turn to nurse her
invalid mother. Her own heart dictated this, and the abbess had said:
"Let her enter eternity clasping your hand before you begin, with us, to
devote all your strength to securing your own salvation. Besides, you
will thereby ascend a long row of steps nearer to your sublime goal."
But Eva would far rather have given her hand now, aloof from the world,
to the Most High in an inviolable bond. What marvel that, with such a
goal in view, she was deeply reluctant to enter the gay whirl of a noisy
ball!
With serious repugnance she had allowed Katterle and her sister to adorn
her, and entered the sedan chair which was to convey her to the Town
Hall. Doubtless her own image, reflected in the mirror, had seemed
charming enough, and the loud expressions of delight from the servants
and others who admired her rich costume had pleased her; but directly
after she realized the vanity of this emotion and, while approaching the
ballroom in her chair, she prayed to her saint to help her conquer it.
Striving honestly to vanquish this error, she entered the hall soon after
the Emperor and his young daughter-in-law; but there she was greeted from
the balcony occupied by the city pipers and musicians, long before
Biberli entered it, with the same fanfare that welcomed the illustrious
guests of the city, and with which blended the blare of the heralds'
trumpets. Thousands of candles in the chandeliers and candelabra
diffused a radiance as brilliant as that of day and, confused by the
noise and waves of light which surged around her, she had drawn closer
to her father, clinging to him for protection. She especially missed
her sister, with whom she had grown up, who had become her second self,
and whom she needed most when she emerged from her quiet life of
introspection into the gay world.
At first she had stood with downcast lashes, but soon her eyes wandered
over the waving plumes and flashing jewels, the splendour of silk and
velvet, the glitter of gold and glimmer of pearls.
Sometimes the display in church had been scarcely less brilliant, and
even without her sister's request she had gazed at it, but how entirely
different it was! There she had rejoiced in her own modest garb, and
told herself that her simplicity was more pleasing to God and the saints
than the vain splendour of the others, which she might so easily have
imitated or even surpassed. But here the anxious question of how she
appeared among the rest of the company forced itself upon her.
True, she knew that the brocade suckenie, which her father had ordered
from Milan, was costly; that the sea-green hue of the right side
harmonised admirably with the white on the left; that the tendrils and
lilies of the valley wrought in silver, which seemed to be scattered over
the whole, looked light and airy; yet she could not shake off the feeling
that everything she wore was in disorder--here something was pulled awry,
there something was crushed. Els, who had attended to her whole toilet,
was not there to arrange it, and she felt thoroughly uncomfortable in the
midst of this worldly magnificence and bustle.
Notwithstanding her father's presence, she had never been so desolate as
among these ladies and gentlemen, nearly all of whom were strangers.
Her sister was intimate with the other girls of her age and station,
few of whom were absent, and if Eva could have conjured her to her side
doubtless many would have joined them; but she knew no one well, and
though many greeted her, no one lingered. Everybody had friends with
whom they were on far more familiar terms. The young Countess von
Montfort, a girl of her own age and an inmate of her own home, also gave
her only a passing word. But this was agreeable to her--she disliked
Cordula's free manners.
Many who were friends of Els had gathered around Ursula Vorchtel, the
daughter of the richest man in the city, and she intentionally avoided
the Ortliebs because, before Wolff Eysvogel sued for Els's hand, he and
Ursula had been intended for each other.
Eva was just secretly vowing that this first ball should also be the
last, when the imperial magistrate, Herr Berthold Pfinzing, her
godfather, came to present her to the Emperor, who had requested to see
the little daughter of the Herr Ernst Ortlieb whose son had fallen in
battle for him. His "little saint," Herr Pfinzing added, looked no less
lovely amid the gay music of the Nuremberg pipers than kneeling in prayer
amid the notes of the organ.
Every tinge of colour had faded from Eva's cheeks, and though a few hours
before she had asked her sister what the Emperor's greatness signified in
the presence of God that she should be forced, for his sake, to be
faithless to the holiest things, now fear of the majesty of the powerful
sovereign made her breath come quicker.
How, clinging to her godfather's hand, she reached the Emperor Rudolph's
throne she could never describe, for what happened afterwards resembled a
confused dream of mingled bliss and pain, from which she was first
awakened by her father's warning that the time of departure had come.
When she raised her downcast eyes the monarch was standing before the
throne placed for him. She had been compelled to bend her head backward
in order to see his face, for his figure, seven feet in height, towered
like a statue of Roland above all who surrounded him. But when, after
the Austrian duchess, his daughter-in-law, who was scarcely beyond
childhood, and the Burgrave von Zollern, his sister, had graciously
greeted her, and Eva with modest thanks had also bowed low before the
Emperor Rudolph, a smile, spite of her timidity, flitted over her lips,
for as she bent the knee her head barely reached above his belt. The
Burgravine, a vivacious matron, must have noticed it, for she beckoned to
her, and with a few kind words mentioned the name of the young knight who
stood behind her, between her own seat and that of the young Duchess
Agnes of Austria, and recommended him as an excellent dancer. Heinz
Schorlin, the master of the true and steadfast Biberli, had bowed
courteously, and answered respectfully that he hoped he should not
prove himself unworthy of praise from such lips.
Meanwhile his glance met Eva's, and the Burgravine probably perceived
with what, ardent admiration the knight's gaze rested on the young
Nuremberg beauty, for she had scarcely stepped back after the farewell
greeting when the noble lady said in a low tone, but loud enough for
Eva's quick ear to catch the words, "Methinks yonder maiden will do well
to guard her little heart this evening against you, you unruly fellow!
What a sweet, angelic face!"
Eva's cheeks crimsoned with mingled shame and pleasure at such words from
such lips, and she would have been only too glad to hear what the knight
whispered to the noble lady.
The attention of the young Duchess Agnes, daughter of King Ottocar of
Bohemia and wife of the Emperor's third son, who also bore the name of
Rudolph, had been claimed during this incident by the Duke of Nassau, who
had presented his ladies to her, but they had scarcely retired when she
beckoned to Heinz Schorlin, and while talking with him gazed into his
eyes with such warm, childlike pleasure that Eva was incensed; she
thought it unseemly for a wife and a duchess to be on such familiar terms
with a simple knight. Nay, her disapproval of the princess's conduct
must have been very deep, for during the whole time of her conversation
with the knight there was a loud singing in the young girl's ears. The
Bohemian's face might be considered pretty; her dark eyes sparkled
brightly, animating the immature features, now slightly sunburnt; and
although four years younger than Eva, her figure, though not above middle
height, was well developed and, in spite of its flexibility, aristocratic
in bearing. While conversing with Heinz Schorlin she seemed joyously
excited, unrestrainedly cordial, but her manner expressed disappointment
and royal hauteur as another group of ladies and gentlemen came forward
to be presented, compelling her to turn her back upon the young Swiss
with a regretful shrug of her shoulders.
The counts and countesses, knights and ladies who thronged around her
concealed her from Eva's eyes, who, now that Heinz Schorlin had left the
Bohemian, again turned her attention to the Emperor, and even ventured to
approach him. What paternal gentleness Rudolph's deep tones expressed!
How much his face attracted her!
True, it could make no pretensions to beauty--the thin, hooked nose was
far too large and long; the corners of the mouth drooped downward too
much; perhaps it was this latter peculiarity which gave the whole face so
sorrowful an aspect. Eva thought she knew its source. The wound dealt a
few months before by the death of his faithful wife, the love of his
youth, still ached. His eyes could not be called either large or bright;
but how kindly, how earnest, shrewd and, when an amusing thought passed
through his mind, how mischievous they could look! His light-brown hair
had not yet turned very grey, spite of his sixty-three years, but the
locks had lost their luxuriance and fell straight, except for a slight
curl at the lower ends, below his neck.
Eva's father, when a young man, had met Frederic II, of the Hohenstaufen
line, in Italy, and was wont to call this a special boon of fate. True,
her aunt, the abbess, said she did not envy him the honour of meeting the
Antichrist; yet that very day after mass she had counselled Eva to
impress the Emperor Rudolph's appearance on her memory. To meet noble
great men elevates our hearts and makes us better, because in their
presence we become conscious of our own insignificance and the duty of
emulating them. She would willingly have given more than a year of her
life to be permitted to gaze into the pure, loving countenance of St.
Francis, who had closed his eyes seven years after her birth.
So Eva, who was accustomed to render strict obedience to her honoured
aunt, honestly strove to watch every movement of the Emperor; but her
attention had been continually diverted, mainly by the young knight, from
whom--the Emperor's sister, Burgravine Elizabeth, had said so herself--
danger threatened her heart.
But the young Countess Cordula von Montfort, the inmate of her home,
also compelled her to gaze after her, for Heinz Schorlin had approached
the vivacious native of the Vorarlberg, and the freedom with which she
treated him--allowing herself to go so far as to tap him on the arm with
her fan--vexed and offended her like an insult offered to her whole sex.
To think that a girl of high station should venture upon such conduct
before the eyes of the Emperor and his sister!
Not for the world would she have permitted any man to talk and laugh with
her in such a way. But the young knight whom she saw do this was again
the Swiss. Yet his bright eyes had just rested upon her with such devout
admiration that lack of respect for a lady was certainly not in his
nature, and he merely found himself compelled, contrary to his wish, to
defend himself against the countess and her audacity.
Eva had already heard much praise of the great valour of the young knight
Heinz Schorlin. When Katterle, whose friend and countryman was in his
service, spoke of him--and that happened by no means rarely--she had
always called him a devout knight, and that he was so, in truth, he
showed her plainly enough; for there was fervent devotion in the eyes
which now again sought hers like an humble penitent.
The musicians had just struck up the Polish dance, and probably the
knight, whom the Emperor's sister had recommended to her for a partner,
wished by this glance to apologise for inviting Countess Cordula von
Montfort instead. Therefore she did not need to avoid the look, and
might obey the impulse of her heart to give him a warning in the language
of the eyes which, though mute, is yet so easily understood. Hitherto
she had been unable to answer him, even by a word, yet she believed that
she was destined to become better acquainted, if only to show him that
his power, of which the Burgravine had spoken, was baffled when directed
against the heart of a pious maiden.
And something must also attract him to her, for while she had the honour
of being escorted up and down the hall by one of the handsome sons of the
Burgrave von Zollern to the music of the march performed by the city
pipers, Heinz Schorlin, it is true, did the same with his lady, but he
looked away from her and at Eva whenever she passed him.
Her partner was talkative enough, and his description of the German order
which he expected to enter, as his two brothers had already done, would
have seemed to her well worthy of attention at any other time, but now
she listened with but partial interest.
When the dance was over and Sir Heinz approached, her heart beat so
loudly that she fancied her neighbours must hear it; but ere he had
spoken a single word old Burgrave Frederick himself greeted her, inquired
about her invalid mother, her blithe sister, and her aunt, the abbess,
who in her youth had been the queen of every dance, and asked if she
found his son a satisfactory partner.
It was an unusual distinction to be engaged in conversation by this
distinguished gentleman, yet Eva would fain have sent him far away, and
her replies must have sounded monosyllabic enough; but the sweet shyness
that overpowered her so well suited the modest young girl, who had
scarcely passed beyond childhood, that he did not leave her until the
'Rai' began, and then quitted her with the entreaty that she would remove
the cap which had hitherto rendered her invisible, to the injury of
knights and gentlemen, and be present at the dance which he should soon
give at the castle.
The pleasant old nobleman had scarcely left her when she turned towards
the young man who had just approached with the evident intention of
leading her to the dance, but he was again standing beside Cordula von
Montfort, and a feeling of keen resentment overpowered her.
The young countess was challenging his attention still more boldly,
tossing her head back so impetuously that the turban-like roll on her
hair, spite of the broad ribbon that fastened it under her chin, almost
fell on the floor. But her advances not only produced no effect, but
seemed to annoy the knight. What charm could he find in a girl who, in a
costume which displayed the greatest extreme of fashion, resembled a Turk
rather than a Christian woman? True, she had an aristocratic bearing,
and perhaps Els was right in saying that her strongly marked features
revealed a certain degree of kindliness, but she wholly lacked the spell
of feminine modesty. Her pleasant grey eyes and full red lips seemed
created only for laughter, and the plump outlines of her figure were
better suited to a matron than a maiden in her early girlhood. Not the
slightest defect escaped Eva during this inspection. Meanwhile she
remembered her own image in the mirror, and a smile of satisfaction
hovered round her red lips.
Now the knight bowed.
Was he inviting the countess to dance again? No, he turned his back to
her and approached Eva, whose lovely, childlike face brightened as if a
sun beam had shone upon it. The possibility of refusing her hand for the
'Rai' never entered her head, but he told her voluntarily that he had
invited Countess Cordula for the Polish dance solely in consequence of
the Burgravine's command, but now that he was permitted to linger at her
side he meant to make up for lost time.
He kept his word, and was by no means content with the 'Rai'; for, after
the young Duchess Agnes had summoned him to a 'Zauner', and during its
continuance again talked with him far more confidentially than the modest
Nuremberg maiden could approve, he persuaded Eva to try the 'Schwabeln'
with him also; and though she had always disliked such dances she
yielded, and her natural grace, as well as her quick ear for time, helped
her to catch the unfamiliar steps without difficulty. While doing so he
whispered that even the angels in heaven could have no greater bliss than
it afforded him to float thus through the hall, clasping her in his arm,
while she glanced up at him with a happy look and bent her little head in
assent. She would gladly have exclaimed warmly: "Yes, indeed! Yet the
Burgravine says that danger threatens me from you, you dear, kind fellow,
and I should do well to avoid you."
Besides, she felt indebted to him. What would have befallen her here in
his absence! Moreover, it gave her a strange sense of pleasure to gaze
into his eyes, allow herself to be borne through the wide hall by his
strong arm, and while pressed closely to his side imagine that his
swiftly throbbing heart felt the pulsing of her own. Instead of injuring
her, wishing her evil, and asking her to do anything wrong, he certainly
had only good intentions. He had cared for her as if he occupied the
place of her own brother who fell in the battle of Marchfield. It would
have given him most pleasure--he had said so himself--to dance everything
with her, but decorum and the royal dames who kept him in attendance
would not permit it. However, he came to her in every pause to exchange
at least a few brief words and a glance. During the longest one, which
lasted more than an hour and was devoted to the refreshment of the
guests, he led her into a side room which had been transformed into a
blossoming garden.
Seats were placed behind the green birch trees--amid whose boughs hung
gay lamps--and the rose bushes which surrounded a fountain of perfumed
water, and Eva had already followed the Swiss knight across the threshold
when she saw among the branches at the end of the room the Countess
Cordula, at whose feet several young nobles knelt or reclined, among them
Seitz Siebenburg, the brother-in-law of Wolff Eysvogel, her sister's
betrothed bridegroom.
The manner of the husband and father whose wife, only six weeks before,
had become the mother of twin babies--beautiful boys--and who for
Cordula's sake so shamefully forgot his duties, crimsoned her cheeks with
a flush of anger, while the half-disapproving, half-troubled look that
Sir Boemund Altrosen cast, sometimes at the countess, sometimes at
Siebenburg, showed her that she herself was on the eve of doing something
which the best persons could not approve; for Altrosen, who leaned
silently against the wall beside the countess, ever and anon pushing back
the coal-black hair from his pale face, had been mentioned by her
godfather as the noblest of the younger knights gathered in Nuremberg.
A voice in her own heart, too, cried out that this was no fitting place
for her.
If Els had been with her, Eva said to herself, she certainly would not
have permitted her to enter this room, where such careless mirth
prevailed, alone with a knight, and the thought roused her for a short
time from the joyous intoxication in which she had hitherto revelled, and
awakened a suspicion that there might be peril in trusting herself to
Heinz Schorlin without reserve.
"Not here," she entreated, and he instantly obeyed her wish, though the
Countess Cordula, as if he were alone, instead of with a lady, loudly and
gaily bade him stay where pleasure had built a hut under roses.
Eva was pleased that her new friend did not even vouchsafe the young
countess an answer. His obedience led her also to believe that her
anxiety had been in vain. Yet she imposed greater reserve of manner upon
herself so rigidly that Heinz noticed it, and asked what cloud had dimmed
the pure radiance of her gracious sunshine.
Eva lowered her eyes and answered gently: "You ought not to have taken
me where the diffidence due to modesty is forgotten." Heinz Schorlin
understood her and rejoiced to hear the answer. In his eyes, also,
Countess Cordula this evening had exceeded the limits even of the liberty
which by common consent she was permitted above others. He believed that
he had found in Eva the embodiment of pure and beautiful womanhood.
He had given her his heart from the first moment that their eyes met.
To find her in every respect exactly what he had imagined, ere he heard a
single word from her lips, enhanced the pleasure he felt to the deepest
happiness which he had ever experienced.
He had already been fired with a fleeting fancy for many a maiden, but
not one had appeared to him, even in a remote degree, so lovable as this
graceful young creature who trusted him with such childlike confidence,
and whose innocent security by the side of the dreaded heart-breaker
touched him.
Never before had it entered his mind concerning any girl to ask himself
the question how she would please his mother at home. The thought that
she whom he so deeply honoured might possess a magic mirror which showed
her her reckless son as he dallied with the complaisant beauties whose
graciousness, next to dice-playing, most inflamed his blood, had
sometimes disturbed his peace of mind when Biberli suggested it. But
when Eva looked joyously up at him with the credulous confidence of a
trusting child, he could imagine no greater bliss than to hear his
mother, clasping the lovely creature in her arms, call her her dear
little daughter.
His reckless nature was subdued, and an emotion of tenderness which he
had never experienced before thrilled him as she whispered, "Take me to
a place where everybody can see us, but where we need not notice anyone
else."
How significant was that little word "we"! It showed that already she
united herself and him in her thoughts. To her pure nature nothing could
be acceptable which must be concealed from the light of the sun and the
eyes of man. And her wish could be fulfilled.
The place where Biberli had discovered them, and where refreshments had
just been served to the Emperor and the ladies and gentlemen nearest to
his person, who had been joined by several princes of the Church, was
shut off by the bannerets, thus preventing the entrance of any uninvited
person; but Heinz Schorlin belonged to the sovereign's suite and had
admittance everywhere.
So he led Eva behind the black and yellow rope to two vacant chairs at
the end of the enclosed space where the banquet had been swiftly arranged
for the Emperor and the other illustrious guests of Nuremberg.
These seats were in view of the whole company, yet it would have been as
difficult to interrupt him and his lady as any of the table companions of
the imperial pair. Eva followed the knight without anxiety, and took her
place beside him in the well-chosen seat.
A young cup-bearer of noble birth, with whom Heinz was well acquainted,
brought unasked to him and his companion sparkling Malvoisie in
Venetian glasses, and Heinz began the conversation by inviting Eva to
drink to the many days brightened by her favour which, if the saints
heard his prayer, should follow this, the most delightful evening of his
life. He omitted to ask her to pour the wine for him, knowing that many
of the guests in the ballroom were watching them; besides the saucy
little count came again and again to fill his goblet, and he wished to
avoid everything which might elicit sarcastic comment. The young cup-
bearer desisted as soon as he noticed the respectful reserve with which
Heinz treated his lady, and the youth was soon obliged to leave the hall
with his liege lord, Duke Rudolph of Austria, who was to set out for
Carinthia early the following morning, and withdrew with his wife without
sharing the banquet. The latter accompanied her husband to the castle,
but she was to remain in Nuremberg during the session of the Reichstag
with the lonely widowed Emperor, who was especially fond of the young
Bohemian princess. Before and during the dance with Heinz the latter had
requested him to use the noble Arabian steed, a gift from the Sultan
Kalaun to the Emperor, who had bestowed it upon her, and also expressed
the hope of meeting the knight frequently.
In the conversation which Heinz began with Eva he was at first obliged to
defend himself, for she had admitted that she had heard the Burgravine's
warning to beware of him.
At the same time she had found opportunity to tell him that her heart
yearned for something different from worldly love, and that she felt safe
from every one because St. Clare was constantly watching over her.
He replied that he had been reared in piety, that he knew the close
relations existing between her patron saint and the holy Francis of
Assisi, and that he, too, had experienced many things from this man of
God. Eva, with warm interest, asked when and where, and he willingly
told her.
On the way from Augsburg to Nuremberg, while riding in advance of the
imperial court, he had met an old barefooted man who, exhausted by the
heat of the day, had sunk down by the side of the road as if lifeless,
with his head resting against the trunk of a tree. Moved with
compassion, he dismounted, to try to do something for the greybeard.
A few sips of wine had restored him to consciousness, but his weary,
wounded feet would carry him no farther. Yet it would have grieved the
old man sorely to be forced to interrupt his journey, for the Chapter
General in Portiuncula, in Italy, had sent him with an important message
to the brothers of his order in Germany, and especially in Nuremberg.
The old Minorite monk was especially dignified in aspect, and when he
chanced to mention that he had known St. Francis well and was one of
those who had nursed him during his last illness, a dispute had arisen
between Heinz Schorlin, the armor bearer, and his servant Walther
Biberli, for each desired to give up his saddle to the old man and pursue
his journey on foot for his sake and the praise of God.
But the Minorite could not be persuaded to break his vow never again to
mount a knight's charger and, even had it not been evident from his
words, Heinz asserted that the aristocratic dignity of his bearing would
have shown that he belonged to a noble race.
Biberli's eloquence gained the victory in this case also, and though the
groom led by the bridle another young stallion which the ex-schoolmaster
might have mounted, he had walked cheerily beside the old monk, sweeping
up the dust with his long robe. At the tavern the knight and his
attendants had been abundantly repaid for their kindness to the Minorite,
for his conversation was both entertaining and edifying; and Heinz
repeated to his lady, who listened attentively, much that the monk had
related about St. Francis.
Eva, too, was also on the ground dearest and most familiar to her. Her
little tongue ran fast enough, and her large blue eyes sparkled with an
unusually bright and happy lustre as she completed and corrected what the
young knight told her about the saint.
How much that was lovable, benevolent, and wonderful there was to relate
concerning this prophet of peace and good-will, this apostle of poverty
and toil who, in every movement of nature, perceived and felt a summons
to recognise the omnipotence and goodness of God, an invitation to devout
submission to the Most High!
How many amusing, yet edifying and touching anecdotes, the Abbess
Kunigunde had narrated of him and the most beloved of his followers!
Much of this conversation Eva repeated to the knight, and her pleasure in
the subject of the conversation increased the vivacity of her active
mind, and soon led her to talk with eager eloquence. Heinz Schorlin
fairly hung on her lips, and his eyes, which betrayed how deeply all that
he was hearing moved him, rested on hers until a flourish of trumpets
announced that the interval between the dances was over.
He had listened in delight and, he felt, was forever bound to her. When
duty summoned him to attend the Emperor he asked himself whether such a
conversation had ever been held in the midst of a merry dance; whether
God, in his goodness, had ever created a being so perfect in soul and
body as this fair saint, who could transform a ballroom into a church.
Aye, Eva had done so; for, ardent as was the knight's love, something
akin to religious devotion blended with his yearning desire. The last
words which he addressed to her before leading her back to the others
contained the promise to make her patron saint, St. Clare, his own.
The Princess of Nassau had invited him for the next dance, but she found
Heinz Schorlin, whom the young Duchess Agnes had just said was merry
enough to bring the dead to life, a very quiet partner; while young Herr
Schurstab, who danced with Eva and, like all the members of the
Honourable Council, knew that she desired to take the veil, afterwards
told his friends that the younger beautiful E would suit a Carthusian
convent, where speech is prohibited, much better than a ballroom.
But after this "Zauner" Heinz Schorlin again loosed her tongue. When he
had told her how he came to the court, and she had learned that he had
joined the Emperor Rudolph at Lausanne just as he took the vow to take
part in the crusade, there was no end to her questions concerning the
reason that the German army had not already marched against the infidels,
and whether he himself did not long to make them feel his sword.
Then she asked still further particulars concerning Brother Benedictus,
the old Minorite whom he had treated so kindly. Heinz told her what he
knew, and when he at last enquired whether she still regretted having met
him whom she feared, she gazed frankly into his eyes and, smiling
faintly, shook her head.
This increased his ardour, and he warmly entreated her to tell him where
he could meet her again, and permit him to call her his lady. But she
hesitated to reply, and ere he could win from her even the faintest
shadow of consent, Ernst Ortlieb, who had been talking with other members
of the council in the room where the wine was served, interrupted him to
take his daughter home.
She went reluctantly. The clasp of the knight's hand was felt all the
way to the house, and it would have been impossible and certainly
ungracious not to return it.
Heinz Schorlin had obtained no assent, yet the last glance from her eyes
had been more eloquent than many a verbal promise, and he gazed after her
enraptured.
It seemed like desecration to give the hand in which hers had rested to
lead any one else to the dance, and when the rotund Duke of Pomerania
invited him to a drinking bout at his quarters at the Green Shield he
accepted; for without Eva the hall seemed deserted, the light robbed of
its brilliancy, and the gay music transformed to a melancholy dirge.
But when at the Green Shield the ducal wine sparkled in the beakers, the
gold shone and glistened on the tables, and the rattle of the dice
invited the bystanders to the game, he thought that whatever he undertook
on such a day of good fortune must have a lucky end.
The Emperor had filled his purse again, but the friendly gift did not
cover his debts, and he wanted to be rid of them before he told his
mother that he had found a dear, devout daughter for her, and intended to
return home to settle in the ancestral castle, his heritage, and share
with his uncle the maintenance of his rights and the management of fields
and forests.
Besides, he must test for the first time the power of his new patroness,
St. Clare, instead of his old one, St. Leodegar. But the former served
him ill enough--she denied him her aid, at any rate in gambling. The
full purse was drained to its last 'zecchin' only too soon, and Heinz,
laughing, turned it inside out before the eyes of his comrades. But
though the kind-hearted Duke of Pomerania, with whom Heinz was a special
favourite, pushed a little heap of gold towards him with his fat hands,
that the Swiss might try his luck again with borrowed money, which brings
good fortune, he remained steadfast for Eva's sake.
On his way to the Green Shield he had confessed to Biberli--who, torch in
hand, led the way--that he intended very shortly to turn his back on the
court and ride home, because this time he had found the right chatelaine
for his castle.
"That means the last one," the ex-schoolmaster answered quietly,
carefully avoiding fanning the flame of his young master's desire by
contradiction. Only he could not refrain from entreating him not to
burn his fingers with the dice, and, to confirm it, added that luck in
gambling was apt to be scanty where fortune was so lavish in the gifts
of love.
Heinz now remembered this warning. It had been predicted to his darling
that meeting him would bring her misfortune, but he was animated by the
sincere determination to force the jewel of his heart to remember Heinz
Schorlin with anything but sorrow and regret.
What would have seemed impossible to him a few hours before, he now
realised. With a steady hand he pushed back the gold to the duke, who
pressed it upon him with friendly glances from his kind little eyes and
an urgent whispered entreaty, and took his leave, saying that to-night
the dice and he were at odds.
With these words he left the room, though the host tried to detain him
almost by force, and the guests also earnestly endeavoured to keep the
pleasant, jovial fellow. The loss, over which Biberli shook his head
angrily, did, not trouble him. Even on his couch Heinz found but a short
time to think of his empty purse and the lovely maid who was to make the
old castle among his beloved Swiss mountains an earthly paradise, for
sleep soon closed his eyes.
The next morning the events of the evening seemed like a dream. Would
that they had been one! Only he would not have missed, at any cost, the
sweet memories associated with Eva. But could she really become his own?
He feared not; for the higher the sun rose the more impracticable his
intentions of the night before appeared. At last he even thought of the
religious conversation in the dancing hall with a superior smile, as if
it had been carried on by some one else. The resolve to ask from her
father the hand of the girl he loved he now rejected. No, he was not yet
fit for a husband and the quiet life in the old castle. Yet Eva should
be the lady of his heart, her patron saint should be his, and he would
never sue for the love of any other maiden. Hers he must secure. To
press even one kiss on her scarlet lips seemed to him worth the risk of
life. When he had stilled this fervent longing he could ride with her
colour on helm and shield from tourney to tourney, and break a lance for
her in every land through which he passed with the Emperor. What would
happen afterwards let the saints decide. As usual, Biberli was his
confidant, and declared himself ready to use Katterle's services in his
master's behalf.
He had his own designs in doing this. He could rely upon the waiting
maid's assistance, and if there were secret meetings between Eva Ortlieb
and his lord, which would appease the knight's ardour, even in a small
degree, the task of disgusting Heinz with his luckless idea of an early
marriage would not prove too difficult.