Arivana's success was assured already at the second act. The work was done by artists who belonged to the best on the stage, and they were doing the best playing ever witnessed. Those taking the principal rôles especially acted with the perfection of abandon which only real enthusiasm can give.
The heroine's name was no longer Ada. Another form now bore this name--one who was strangely foreign to this excited picture of passions; one of those tender, half-fairy-like beings with whom the Indian legends inhabit the snow dwellings upon the icy heights of the Himalayas--cold and pure as the eternal snow which shines upon them.
Only in one single instance, in the parting scene, she floated on spirit's wings through the stormy, excited gathering, remonstrating, entreating, warning; and Egon was right. The words which the poet had put into her lips were, perhaps, the most beautiful of the entire drama. It burst suddenly like pure, heavenly light into the flaming glow of a crater; but the scene was as short as beautiful. Quick as a breath the apparition disappeared again into her snow dwelling, and down yonder at the moonlit bank of the river floated the entrancing song of the Hindoo girl--Marietta Volkmar's soft, swelling voice--under the coaxing charm of which the cry of warning from the heights was dispelled and unheeded.
The last act brought the tragic end; the breaking of the doom over the guilty pair; the death in the flames. This death was no atonement, but a triumph--"a shining, divine death," and with the flames there also flared up to heaven the demoniacal doctrine of the unconditional right of the passions.
The curtain sank for the last time, and the applause, which had increased after every act, now grew to a storm. Usually the applause at the court performances was kept within measured bounds, but to-day it broke over the barriers. The flames of Arivana had kindled the enthusiasm with which the whole house demanded the appearance of the author.
Hartmut finally appeared--without embarrassment or timidity--glowing with pride and joy; he bowed acknowledgment to the audience, which today offered him a drink he had never yet tasted in his wildly tossed life. They were intoxicating, these first sips from the cup of fame, and with this intoxicating knowledge, the celebrated poet now looked up to the proscenium box, whose occupants he had long ago recognized. He did not find, however, what he sought. Adelaide was leaning back in her chair, and her face was hidden by her open fan. He saw only the cold, unmoved face of the man who had insulted him so deeply, and who was now a witness of his triumph.
Wallmoden understood only too well what the flash of those dark eyes told him: "Do you dare yet to despise me?"
CHAPTER XXXII.
The following morning at an early hour Willibald von Eschenhagen walked through the park, which he wanted to see--at least so he had told his uncle.
The large, forest-like park which was situated directly before the city, was indeed worth seeing, but Willibald paid no attention to the landscape, which did not look very inviting this bleak November day.