"I cannot stay here, though, now, when my eyes are opened, I cannot! Do not try to force me, else I'll tell Eric this very hour, that I do not love him, never have loved him; that our engagement has been solely your work."
Oscar turned pale. Cecilia had outgrown his power, nothing was to be effected here by commands and threats, so he caught at a last expedient.
"Do so, then," said he suddenly with a cold, resolute look, "destroy yourself and me with you! For, so far as I am concerned the question here is 'to be or not to be.' An hour ago I became engaged to Maia."
"To whom?" Cecilia looked at him, as though she did not comprehend his words.
"To Maia. She loves me, and all left for me to do now, is to obtain Dernburg's consent. If you break with Eric, and tell him the truth, then to me, too, Odensburg will be closed forever and then--I follow the example of our father."
"Oscar!" It was a shriek of horror.
"I'll do it, my word upon it! Think you that it has been easy for me to lead the life of an adventurer, for me, a Wildenrod? Do you know what I suffered before it came to that? How often I sought afterwards to burst my bonds and soar upwards? Always in vain! And now at last deliverance draws near, salvation through the hand of a sweet child, now, at last, I grasp the long-sought, so ardently desired happiness--and at the very moment, when I am about to clasp it in my arms, it is again to be torn from me! Am I to be thrust back and put under the old ban? That is what I cannot endure. Rather the end!"
There was an iron determination upon his features and in his tone; that was no empty threat. Cecilia shuddered.
"No," whispered she, with failing voice. "No, no, anything but that!"
"Is what I require of you anything so dreadful?" asked Wildenrod, more mildly. "You are only to be silent and forget this unhappy hour! I wanted to save you from the life into which I had to lead you, ere your eyes were opened to its nature, and now I save myself with you. I cast behind me the past, and begin a better life. Here at Odensburg a grand new field opens before me, and Dernburg is to find in me what his son could never be to him. You will be Eric's wife; he loves, idolizes you; you can make him happy, and yourself be happy at his side!"