"Yes."
"With her is her physician, Supperville."
"I see he has broken his word—his oath! He has said——?"
"Calm yourself. He has spoken only to me. I do not see, however, why you should be afraid to make known a matter which is so honorable to your character and can hurt no one. The Rudolstadts are extinct, with the exception of an old canoness, who ere long will rejoin her brothers in the tomb. We have, it is true, princes of Rudolstadt in Saxony, who are your near relations, being cousins german, and who are proud of their name. If my brother were to sustain you, they would not dare to protest: unless you prefer to be called Porporina, which is more glorious and more pleasant to the ear."
"That is really my intention," said the singer. "I wish, however, to know how Supperville came to tell you this. When I know it, and when my conscience is no longer bound by my oath, I promise to tell you the details."
"Thus it is," said the princess:—"One of my women was sick, and I sent to ask Supperville, who was, I learned, in the palace, to come to see her. Supperville is a man of mind, and I knew him when he resided here. This made me talk to him. Chance directed the conversation to music, the opera, and, consequently, to yourself. I spoke of you so highly, that, whether to please me or from conviction, he surpassed even me, and extolled you to the clouds. I was pleased, and observed a kind of affectation, which made me entertain a presentiment of some romantic interest in you, and a grandeur of soul superior even to what I had presumed. I urged him strongly, and he seemed to like to be besought, I must say, in justification. Finally, after having made me promise not to betray him, he told me of your marriage on the death bed of the Count of Rudolstadt, and of your generous renunciation of every right and advantage accruing from it. You see, my dear, you may now tell me the rest, for I promised never to betray you."
"This being the case," said Consuelo, after a moment of silence, "though the story will awaken the most painful emotions, especially since my sojourn at Berlin, I will repay the interest of your highness—I mean, my dear Amelia—with confidence."
[CHAPTER VII][6]
"I was born in I know not what part of Spain, and I know not exactly in what year. I must be, however, twenty-three or four years old. I do not know my father's name, and am inclined to think that my mother was as uncertain about her parents as I am. She was called at Venice La Zingara, and I was called La Zingarella. My mother had given me the Christian name of Maria del Consuelo—in French, "Our Lady of Consolation."[7] My childhood was wandering and miserable. We travelled on foot, living by our songs. I have a vague recollection that, in a forest of Bohemia, we received hospitality at a castle, where the son of the lord, a handsome youth named Albert, overwhelmed me with attention and kindness, and gave my mother a guitar. This was the Giants' Castle, to be the mistress of which I was one day to refuse; and the young lord was Albert, Count of Rudolstadt, whose wife I became.