“There, see the ungrateful man,” said the princess, with a charming smile—“he was occupying all my thoughts, and yet he dares complain! You are a malefactor deserving punishment. Come here to me, Alexis; kneel, kiss my hand, and beg for pardon, you calumniator!”
“That is a punishment for which angels might be grateful!” responded Alexis Razumovsky, kneeling to the princess and pressing her hand to his burning lips. “Ah, that I might oftener incur such punishment!”
“Do you then prefer punishment to reward?” asked Elizabeth, tenderly bending down to him and looking deep into his eyes.
“She loves him!” whispered Grunstein to the chamberlain Woronzow. “She certainly loves him!”
Elizabeth’s fine ear caught these words, and, slowly turning her head, she slightly nodded. “Yes,” said she, “Grunstein is right—she loves him! Congratulate me, therefore, my friends, that the desert void in my heart is at length filled—congratulate me for loving him. Ah, nothing is sweeter, holier, or more precious than love; and I can tell you that we women are happy only when we are under the influence of that divine passion. Congratulate me, then, my friends, for, thank God, I am in love! Now, Alexis, what have you to say?”
“There are no words to express such a happiness,” cried Alexis, pressing the feet of the princess to his bosom.
“Happiness, then, strikes you dumb,” laughed the princess, “and will not allow you to say that you love me? Such are all you men. You envelope yourselves with a convenient silence, and would make us poor women believe the superabundance of feeling deprives you of utterance.”
At this moment the door was softly opened, and a lackey, who made his appearance at the threshold, beckoned to Woronzow.
“What is it, Woronzow?” asked the princess, while, wholly unembarrassed by the presence of the lackey, she played with the profuse dark locks of the kneeling Razumovsky.
“An invitation from the Regent Anna to a court-ball, which is to take place fourteen days hence,” said Woronzow.