“And do you dare, sir,” cried she, “accuse my mistress of these things—you, whom she loved? You knew her as your wife for four weeks, and yet you know her so little as to believe her plotting your death! Those letters, sir, you speak of, she never received, nor did I, nor did she nor I ever hear of your presence in this land. ’Tis true that after you had left,—for you left her first, remember,—after well-nigh a year without tidings of you, she did herself send to you to request the annulment of the marriage. It was to free you because she believed you repented of it, and she felt she had entrapped you into it. And when, sir, you refused, she had hope again in her heart, for she loved you. And she suffered persecution on your account, and was kept and watched like a state prisoner—she that had always lived for the free air, and for her own way. They were cruel to her, and put dreadful pressure upon her that she should make her appeal alone to the Pope. But she held firm, and bore it all in silence, and lived surrounded by spies, her old friends and old servants banished from her sight, until the news came that you were dead. Then ... ah, then, she mourned as never a woman mourned yet for her first and only love! As to marriage—what dreadful things have you been saying? Her Highness will never marry again. She will be faithful as long as she lives to you, whom she believes dead. And God forbid it should be otherwise, for Prince Eugen would wed her from no love, I believe, but solely to punish her for resisting him so long, to break her to his will at last, and triumph over her. Oh, no, she would never wed again! You must believe me, for I have been with her through it all, and though she would mock me and laugh at me once, she turned to me afterwards as to her only friend——Get up, M. de Jennico, get up! Ach Gott! what a coil this is! My good sir, get up; think if the doctor were to come in! Ach Gott! what is that you say? Nay, I have been a fool, and this is the worst of all. My poor friend, there is no room for happiness here!”
For I had fallen at her feet again, and was covering her hand with kisses, blessing her with tears, I believe, for the happiness of this moment.
She ended, good soul, by weeping with me, or rather, over the pity of the joy that was doomed, as she thought, to such brief duration.
“Oh, you are mad, you are mad!” she said, as I poured forth I know not what extravagant plans. Ottilie loved me, cried I in the depths of my exultant soul: what could be difficult now? “You are mad! Have you not yet learned your lesson? Do you not understand that they will never, never let you have her? Go back to your home, sir, and if you love her never let her know you are still alive, for if they heard it here, God knows what she would be put to bear; and if she knew they had tried to murder you, it would kill her. I tell you, sir, a Court is a dreadful place, and Prince Eugen, you know what he is, and his Serene Highness himself, he is hard as the stones of the street. You have seen what they have done—no law can reach them! They will not fail again. And if a second scandal——” she paused, hesitated, shuddered, then bending over to me she whispered, half inarticulately, “if a second scandal came to pass, who knows what forfeit she might not have to pay!”
But I rose, clasped her two hands, and looked into her eyes with all the bold joy that filled my heart.
“My kind friend,” I said, “you cannot frighten me now. Keep you but our secret, and you will yet see your mistress happy.” I wrung her hands, and hurried to the door, as eager now to be gone as I had been to enter. I must act, and act at once, and there was much to do.
She followed me, lamenting and entreating, to the steps, where stood faithful Trude, with garments blown about in the cold wind. But, as I turned to take a last farewell, my hostess caught me by the sleeve.
“Keep close,” she said, “keep close; and if you are hurt, if you are ill——” she hesitated a second, then leaned forward and breathed into my ear, “do not send for the Court doctor.”