"Poor, poor sister!" exclaimed Margaretha, folding her, weeping, in her arms; "and could'st thou endure to hear such hateful words? Were they able to flatter thy vain and childish heart by a glittering title which concealed the bitterest hate and scorn? Poor Ulrica! thy greatest misfortune, after all, is thy soul's blindness--it makes thee even vain and proud of what should be thy grief and shame. Alas! didst thou tremble with me at that tale as at a voice from the bottomless pit I perhaps should know how to comfort and counsel thee; then would I weep with thee, and pray our blessed Lady to give thee the hope she gave me, when at times all the horrors I saw and heard in my childhood seemed like a frightful dream, and it was as though an angel whispered to my soul that the whole was error and illusion.--Ah, mother! mother! how shall I perform that I promised thee, and bring this erring child safe to thine arms?"
"Now thou art growing tiresome again, Margaretha, with all thy love, and thy piety, and thy conscience," interrupted Ulrica, pettishly, "Your mother was only my foster mother; that I can well understand. Who my real mother was thou mightest easily tell, if there was any real sisterly love in thee; but thou art not my sister after all. I would thou wert in a nunnery! there thou mightest mourn over me, and pray for me as much as it pleased thee, without plaguing me with it; yet, no! for then I must part from thee, and that I could not bear," she added, affectionately. "I am still a worldling, dear good Margaretha!" continued Ulrica, with child-like simplicity. "I have told you so a hundred times. All the misfortunes that happened in our childhood, or before I was born, I have neither seen nor shared in; how, then, canst thou require I should grieve over them? And what good would it do were I now to sit down with thee to mourn and weep? What our parents and their kindred have suffered or done amiss our blessed Lady must pray our Lord to make amends for, and forgive them; but that I have just as little to do with as thou. I thank my Lord and Maker, and our blessed Lady, that I have come into this fair world, and that I am not ashamed of my birth, even though I am but half a princess. The sorrow and degradation thou would'st have me despair over I care not to meddle with; either it is altogether idle talk, and then there is nought to mourn for; or it is true, and I must be satisfied with it as my destiny; and then I should still be a kind of princess; and what shame can it be to me that I should be called what I am, and that a knight of royal descent woos me, and would bring me to the station and honour which are mine by right?"
"Alas! for thy honour and thy wooer, poor sister!" answered Margaretha, "there is not a true word in Sir Kaggé; all know he is come of higher birth than he deserves, and it was not till he was outlawed and fled to Norway that he thought of disowning his own kindred, and tracing his pedigree in a disgraceful manner to the royal house of Norway. Such dishonourable fiction would show thee his character, if thou didst not share his perverted hankerings after the greatness which confers not honour."
During this conversation Ulrica had arrayed herself in her richest attire, and it had become quite light. "Now look at me!" she said, contemplating herself in the polished shield on the wall. "Need I really be so terribly ashamed of my own existence, or wish I had never been born? That indeed would be shameful and ungodly. To speak honestly, Margaretha, should I doubt all that Sir Kaggé hath told me of my descent and of my beauty, I ought to doubt my own eyes also, and every mirror I looked into would be just as false a flatterer and traitor as thou deemest him to be."
"Truly the mirror is a false flatterer," answered Margaretha; "it shows us but the fair outside and the smooth skin, but hides the skeleton and the image of death within us. The more pleasure we take in the mimic image it displays to us in our vanity, the more the eyes are blinded and the soul corrupted. Hadst thou heard the exaggerated compliments Sir Kaggé paid me ere he saw thee quite grown up, and found thou hadst a more attentive ear for his fair speeches and bold plans concerning our forfeited goods and rights, he would scarcely have been less the object of thy laughter and ridicule than that foolish Sir Pallé."
"Ah, how terribly unreasonable thou art, thou dear pious Margaretha!" interrupted Ulrica; "that fat stupid Sir Pallé was made to be a laughing stock. I know well enough Kaggé was once a little in love with thee, but I can readily forgive him, since he hath got over it so well.--Thou wert too in some sort my sister, and at the time I was almost a child.--Thou wouldst doubtless have had him sigh himself to death over thy coldness, but that was too much to ask of a handsome young knight. Should he then be deemed a faithless and inconstant lover because he was mistaken in us sisters, ere he could know our hearts and his own? How could he help that thou wert so cold and indifferent, and so insufferably pious? And was it then so unpardonable a sin that at last he found out that I was quite as fair--or perhaps rather more so?"
"Dear deluded child!" sighed Margaretha, patting her sister's cheek, while she parted the fair curled locks from her brow, "must thou ever seek to trace every sentiment thou wouldst rightly understand to a vain and empty source? Kaggé was a loyal and devoted squire to our father, it is true; he was a zealous sharer in that fearful deed of vengeance, the grounds of which thou now thinkest thou hast discovered; but were those grounds not false, and wert thou in truth that thou thinkest thyself to be, how canst thou give thy hand without shuddering to a man who was with the band in Finnerup-barn?" She paused, and folded her hands as if in silent prayer, as she knelt down on the prie-dieu, and rented her lovely head on the breviary.
"Margaretha! dearest Margaretha! thou hast terrified me," exclaimed Ulrica, who had turned quite pale. "A horrible and ghastly form rises before me. Ah! thou art right; I never thought of that. If the story of my birth be true I ought never to hold Sir Kaggé dear, and yet I never saw the noble ill-fated prince who fell in Finnerup-barn. Should I hate all those who willed his death, I must also hate my mother, and thy mother, and father Stig. Alas, Margaretha! we must never think on our lot in this world, if we would be gay and happy among other human beings; we must either forget all that hath chanced to us, or go into a nunnery, and bid the beautiful joyous world good night; but that I cannot do. Dear sister! pray for me. I will forget what it is not good to think upon, but I cannot hate any living soul; and he who loves me with truth and fervour I must love again, whoever he may be, and for what cause soever he may be outlawed and persecuted." She burst into a flood of tears, and held up her long golden tresses before her eyes.
"Dearest Ulrica! weep not. I will pray for thee as long as I live," said Margaretha. She rose hastily from the prie-dieu, and folded her sister tenderly in her arms. "We have not as yet wished each other a happy new year. The Lord and our blessed Lady make thee pious and patient, and blessed, and grant us both that which is most profitable for soul and salvation. Weep not, dearest Ulrica! If I have spoken harshly to thee, and grieved thee, forgive me, for our mother's sake! She bade me admonish thee, and guard thy soul from thoughts of vanity. But I see it is so, thou art good and pious and blessed; only weep not!"
"Yes, if thou wilt never more speak evil of Sir Kaggé, or require I should forget him, and leave off dreaming of him, for that I cannot; that I will not do." So saying, Ulrica dried her eyes with her long hair, and peeped archly at her sister through her fingers.