"And," he continued with the great magnanimity which, for all his despotic haughtiness, lay at the very root of his soul, "do not bear any malice because of ... of the words I used to you, Othomar. I am violent and passionate, as you know. I was fonder of Berengar than of you. But you yourself loved the boy. Bear me no malice, for his sake.... You are my son too and I love you, if only because of the fact that you are my son and the last of my race.... Forgive my candour."
Then he pressed Othomar in his arms. It struck him painfully to feel the frailty of the prince in his firm embrace, so immediately upon his words: "the last of my race...." A strange, bitter despair shot through his soul; yet he clearly divined the mystery of this frailty: an unknown moral spring, which he himself lacked, in the direct simplicity of his nature, but which, to his great surprise, he felt in his son. When the prince was gone and Oscar, left alone, thought of this and sought that spring in what he knew of his son, he did not find it, yet felt that, whatever it might be, it was something to be envied, a strength tougher than muscular strength. He looked about him; his eyes fell upon a portrait of the empress on his writing-table. How often had he not stared at it in irritation because of their successor, who was so wholly her son! But, as though a gleam of light passed before his eyes, he now looked at the delicate features without the old annoyance; and a grateful warmth began to glow within him. Whatever it were, Othomar had derived this mysterious strength from his mother. It saved him and spared him for his country, for his race. And—who knew?—perhaps this mystery was just the element which their race needed, a necessary constituent of its new lease of life.... He did not seek to penetrate any farther; the future—even though it was now emerging more clearly out of its first dimness—had no attraction for him. He loved the past, those iron centuries with their heroes of emperors. But he felt that everything was not lost. In his pious belief in the Almighty, he thought, as did his son, of the hand of God. If it must be so, it was right. God's will was inscrutable.
And grateful to the empress, grateful for the light that shone before him, he bent his knees to the crucifix on the wall and prayed for his two sons. He prayed long for the son who was to bear his crown, but longer for the soul of the child of his own blood, whose loss would be the grief that would always be as wormwood in the depths of his soul, which was now outpoured in gratitude....
9
From the Diary of Alexa Duchess of Yemena, Countess of Vaza.
"—November, 18—.
"The crown-prince has not come with the emperor. Professor Barzia forbade it, because he considered that the big hunting-parties with which the emperor wishes to divert his thoughts from his grief for our little prince would be too fatiguing for my sweet invalid. Still, I hear from Dutri that he is making distinct progress and has already resumed his daily morning rides.
"It is all over with me. Poor sinful heart within me, die! For, after this last flower of passion that blossomed in you, I wish you to die to the world. For the sake of the purity of my imperial flower, I wish you now to die. Nothing after this, nothing but the new life which I see lifting before me....
"And yet I am still young; I look no older in my glass than I did a year ago. I have no need to abdicate my feminine powers unless I wish to. And that is how every one looks at it, for I know that they whisper of the Duke of Mena-Doni, as though he would be happy to replace my adored crown-prince in my affections. But it's not true, it's not true. And I'm so glad of it, that they do not realize me and do not know anything, that they do not understand that I want to let my imperial love fade away in purity and wish to cherish no earthly love after it.
"Dear love of my heart, you have raised me to my new life! You were still a sin, but yet you purified me, because you yourself were purified by the contact of that sacred something which is in majesty. Oh, you were the last sin, but already you were purer than the one before! For I have been a great sinner: I have immolated up all my sinful woman's life to consuming passion; and it has left nothing but ashes in my heart! Great scorching love of my life for him who is now dead—may his soul rest in peace!—I will not deny you, because you have been my most intense earthly pleasure, because through you I first learnt to know that I possessed a soul and because you thus brought me nearer to what I now see before me; but yet, what were you but earthliness? And my chaster imperial love, what were you too but earthliness? Gentle sovereign of my soul, what will God have you be but earthly? An empire awaits you, a crown, a sceptre, an empress. God wills it and therefore it is good, that you are earthly, while your earthliness is at the same time consecrated by your pious faith. But I, I have been less than merely earthly: I was sinful. And now I wish that my heart should wholly die within me, because it is nothing than sin. Then shall my heart be born again, in new life....