98. CYCLE.
Schoppe had resolved not to trouble himself at all about the Knight,—who divided his evening between the Minister and Wehrfritz in Blumenbühl,—but to betake himself at once to the presence of the Princess Idoine with the great petition. First, however, he would get the Lector as porter or billeteur of the locked court-doors, and as surety for his words. But Augusti was indescribably alarmed; he insisted the thing would not do,—a Princess and a sick young man, and an absolutely ridiculous ghost-scene, &c.; and his own father, indeed, already saw through it. Schoppe upon this became a spouting fire-engine, and left few curses or comparisons unused upon the man-murdering nonsense of courtly and female decorum,—said it was as beautifully shaped as a Greek fury,—it bound up the wound on a man's neck as the cook-women did on a goose's, not till after it had bled to death, so that the feathers might not be stained,—and he was as much of a courtisan, he concluded ambiguously, as Augusti, and knew what decency was. "May I not propose it to the Fürstinn, then, who certainly esteems him so highly?" Augusti said, "That does not alter the case." "Nor yet to Julienne?" "Nor yet to her," said he. "Nor yet to the most satanic Satan?" "There is surely a good angel between," replied Augusti, "whom you can at least with more propriety use as an intercessor, because she is under obligations to the Knight of the Fleece,—the Countess of Romeiro." "O, why not, indeed?" said Schoppe, struck with the idea.
The Lector—who was one of those men that never use their own hands, but love to do everything by a third, sixth, farthest possible one, after a system of handing analogous to the fingering-system—urged upon the reflecting Schoppe his ready willingness to introduce him to Linda, and her ability to do something in this "épineuse affaire."
Schoppe went up and down in a state of unusual distraction between two opinions,—shook his head often and vehemently, and yet stopped suddenly,—fluttered and shook still more violently,—looked at the Lector with a glance of sharper inquiry,—at length he stood fast, struck down with both arms, and said: "Thunder and lightning seize the world! Done, then! So be it! I go right to her. Heavens, why am I then, so to speak, so ridiculous in your eyes—I mean just now?" The courtly Lector had, however, transformed the smile of the lips into a smile of the eyes only. On Schoppe's face stood the warmth and haste of the self-conqueror. As men can be at once hard of hearing amidst the common din of life, and yet open to the finest musical tones,[[65]] so were Schoppe's inner ears hardened against the vulgar noise of ordinary impulse, but drank in thirstily all soft, low melodies of holier souls.
The Lector—loving the Count far more heartily than he was loved by him—was for taking the Librarian by storm at once to the castle, because just now was the most favorable hour, of court-recess, from half past four to half past five. Schoppe said he was on hand. In the castle Augusti commanded a servant, who understood him, to usher Schoppe into the mirror-room. He did so; brought lights immediately after; and Schoppe went slowly up and down, with his annoying retinue of dumb, nimble orang-outangs-of-the-looking-glass, rehearsing his part and calculating the future. Singularly did he feel himself seized now with his young, fresh sense of that former freedom which he was just suspending. He recognized Liberty, held her fast, looked upon her, and said to her, "Go away, only for a little while; save him, and then come back again!"
The multiplication of himself in the mirrors disgusted him. "Must ye torment me, ye I's?" said he, and he now represented to himself how he was standing before the richest, brightest moment and finest gold-balance of his existence, how a grave and a great life lay in this balance, and how his "I" must vanish from him, like the copied glass I's round about him. Suddenly a joy darted through him, not beyond the worth of his resolve, but greater than its occasion.
At last, near doors flew open, and then the nearest. Then entered a tall form, with head still half turned back, all enveloped in long, black silk. Like an enraptured moon on high tops of foliage, there stood before him, on the dark, silken cloud, a luxuriantly blooming, unadorned head, full of life, with black eyes full of lightnings, with dark roses on the dazzling face, and with an enthroning, snowy brow under the brown, overhanging locks. It seemed to Schoppe, when she looked upon him, as if his life lay in full sunshine; and he felt, with embarrassment, that he stood very near the queen of souls. "Herr von Augusti," she began, earnestly, "has told me that you wished to put into my hands a petition for your sick friend. Name it to me clearly and freely. I will give you, with pleasure, a frank and decided answer."
All recollections of his part were sunk to the bottom, and dissolved within him; but the great guardian-genius, who flew along invisible beside his life, plunged with fiery wings into his heart, and he answered, with inspiration, "So, too, will I answer you. My Albano is mortally sick; he has been in a fever since last evening. He loved the departed Fraülein Liana. He lies bound to the condor's-wing of fever, and is swept to and fro. He falls upon his knees at every knell of the clock, and, lying close to the sunny side of fancy, prays more and more fervently, 'Appear to me, and give me peace!' He stands upright and dressed on the high pyre of the fantastic flame-circle, and pants and bakes with thirst, and dries and shrivels up dreadfully, as I can plainly see ..."
"O, finissez donc?" said the Countess, who had bent back with a shudder, and slowly shaken her Venus head. "Frightful! Your petition?"
"Only the Princess Idoine," said he, coming to himself, "can fulfil it, and rescue him, by appearing to him, and whispering him peace, since she is said to be such a near ass-[[66]], cos-[[67]], copy, and mock-sun of the deceased." "Is that your petition?" said the Countess. "My greatest," said Schoppe. "Has his father sent you hither?" said she. "No, I," said he; "his father, to be clear and free and explicit with you, disapproves of it."