Marianne, however, paid no attention to him, but approached the remains of her husband. With inimitable grace she knelt down on one side of the catafalque. The priest who had entered with her knelt down on the other.
Both of them muttered fervent prayers for the deceased. Marianne then arose, and, bending over the corpse, imprinted a long kiss upon the forehead of her departed husband.
“Farewell, my husband!” she said, in her full, melodious voice, and then turned around and stepped toward the table. “Without deigning to glance at the prince, she sat down in the arm-chair.”
“I request the officers of the law now to open the strong box,” she said, in an almost imperious voice.
One of the officers handed the key to Baron Werdern; the latter opened the strong box, and took from it a sealed paper, which he gave to the officer.
“Do you recognize the paper as the same yourself locked in this strong box?” she asked. “Is it the same which his highness the late Prince von Reuss, Henry XIV., handed to you?”
“Yes, it is the same,” said the two officers; “it is the will of the late prince.”
“And you know that his highness ordered us to open it immediately after his death, and to promulgate its contents. Proceed, therefore, according to the instructions of the deceased.”
One of the officers broke the seal, and now that he unfolded the paper, Marianne turned her head toward the prince, and fixed her burning eyes piercingly upon his countenance.
The officer commenced reading the will. First came the preamble, to be found in every will, and then the officer read in a louder voice, as follows: