"It is well!" said Wallenstein. "For the rest you are a soldier of fortune, and your greatest desire——"
"Is to become a trusted officer in your Grace's service, whenever it shall please the Emperor to recall you!" said Nigel heartily.
"Then let us read the presage as a fortunate one!" said Wallenstein, "and God speed the fulfilment of your desires! And now, most learned doctor, surely your powers of divination do not end here. You have spoken of some unknown lady or perchance some uncouth beldame, whom the stars have chosen to become a benign power in my life. Does not your art enable you to disclose at least her name? Tell me at least whether she is of a dark and melancholic disposition, or of a sanguine inclination."
Nigel could not tell from the dry passionless utterance of the speaker whether irony lay at the root of his tongue: but he was at least as eager as Wallenstein appeared to be indifferent as to the outcome. It was the difference between youth and maturity. If it had been permitted to look into the mind of that inscrutable man, one might have expected to find that on a stage where strode so many principal and, in their several parts, renowned actors, where war and high policy and ambition were the themes, Wallenstein should count as nothing the staying or speeding of his actions by any woman.
Pietro Bramante turned again to his lamp, which he relighted, and, drawing a curtain aside, the light fell upon a tall mirror of the height of a man set at such an angle that at the present it reflected nothing. At two paces from it he set a chafing-dish wherein burned glowing charcoal, and upon it sprinkled some powder from a little box of ebony; and from the dish rose up a white smoke of a sweet savour. And then Pietro recited some Latin verses, which to Nigel, unversed in such incantations, bore no meaning.
Then, before they were aware, though both gazed intently upon the smoke, the form of a majestic woman appeared to gather substance, and at length her face in all its lineaments became plain to view. The eyes gazed in a kind of ecstasy fixedly, gravely benignant, towards Wallenstein.
Nigel leaped up, spurred by his astonishment, even in opposition to the awe which the moment enjoined upon him, exclaiming "Ottilie von Thüringen!"
And Wallenstein, as if Nigel had not been there, still in his seat, but filled with amaze, exclaimed under his breath—
"Ferdinand's Stephanie!" And then, "Let me have speech of her! Dost hear! Pietro Bramante?"