Agatha fixed her eyes upon him with a cold piercing gaze of inquiry, and said, "Are you in earnest, Frank? Would you really purchase his life with your own? Well then, call in the jailers; let the judges be requested to suspend awhile the torture: confess yourself the assassin of Netz, and my father is saved."
"And I lost!" exclaimed Francis. "You ask of me more than is reasonable!"
"I was not in earnest," said Agatha contemptuously. "I knew beforehand that your own wretched life was dearer to you than any thing else, and I merely wished to shame the boaster who affected a magnanimity to which his miserable heart can never elevate itself. Father, I cannot save you; this man will not I can do nothing, therefore, but pray for you in the hour of your suffering, that the All-merciful may comfort your soul and preserve it from despair."--And she sank upon her knees; her lips moved softly, and her eyes, turned up to heaven, overflowed with gentle tears, while the cries of agony from below grew fainter and fainter, and at length were silent altogether.
The maiden arose and stood again before the trembling Francis; with awful calmness she said, "A horrid light is beginning to dawn upon me. It seems to me as if my poor father suffered for your crime, the wild vengeance of the nobles absolutely exacting blood in atonement for the blood which has been spilt. It seems, too, as if you were well content to buy yourself free with this expiatory sacrifice. Once again, therefore, I conjure you, Francis, exert yourself for us. If you could not rescue your saviour from the pangs of the rack, at least preserve his life. Save it not merely for me, save it for yourself! For I swear to you, by the agonies of this dreadful hour, if my father perishes, you too are lost! I will bend all the energies of my soul to your destruction; I will steal after you through life as your evil demon, till at last I reach you and hurl the lightnings of vengeance upon your guilty head!"
She rushed out.
"This is a night of hell!" groaned Francis, and dropt back, as if annihilated, into his seat.
* * * * *
It was about the same time of the year, that Althea was sitting in her chamber by the open window, through which played the gentle spring-breezes. Her little Henry drew about the room, on a wheeled platform, a stately knight, proudly mounted, in the full equipments of the tournay, Tausdorf's present to him from Nuremberg. With this he kept up an intolerable clatter, but his mother did not heed him. Before her stood the embroidery frame, in which she had stretched a scarf, but she did not work; and, lost in fairy visions, she listened to the humming of the bees that swarmed in the blossoms of an apple-tree before her window. Then on a sudden echoed the sweet song of the nightingale from the topmost branch, and Althea's bosom swelled in gentle heavings; her eyes became moist, she folded her hands, and with pious looks to heaven, exclaimed mournfully, "Forgive me, Eternal Benevolence! if this feeling be a sin against the memory of my Henry."
"Where now does Herr Tausdorf tarry?" interrupted the child. "He promised to be here early to-day."
"Was the speech of innocence an answer to my prayer?" whispered Althea; and, beckoning the child to her, she took him on her lap, caressed him with fervour, and softly asked him, "Are you then fond of Herr Tausdorf, dear boy?"