LITMIR.BIZ

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this dimness and silence of the night, Otto’s conscience became suddenly and staringly luminous, like the dial of a city clock. He averted the eyes of his mind, but the finger rapidly travelling, pointed to a series of misdeeds that took his breath away. What was he doing in that place? The money had been wrongly squandered, but that was largely by his own neglect. And he now proposed to embarrass the finances of this country which he had been too idle to govern. And he now proposed to squander the money once again, and this time for a private, if a generous end. And the man whom he had reproved for stealing corn he was now to set stealing treasure. And then there was Madame von Rosen, upon whom he looked down with some of that ill-favoured contempt of the chaste male for the imperfect woman. Because he thought of her as one degraded below scruples, he had picked her out to be still more degraded, and to risk her whole irregular establishment in life by complicity in this dishonourable act. It was uglier than a seduction.

      Otto had to walk very briskly and whistle very busily; and when at last he heard steps in the narrowest and darkest of the alleys, it was with a gush of relief that he sprang to meet the Countess. To wrestle alone with one’s good angel is so hard! and so precious, at the proper time, is a companion certain to be less virtuous than oneself!

      It was a young man who came towards him — a young man of small stature and a peculiar gait, wearing a wide flapping hat, and carrying, with great weariness, a heavy bag. Otto recoiled; but the young man held up his hand by way of signal, and coming up with a panting run, as if with the last of his endurance, laid the bag upon the ground, threw himself upon the bench, and disclosed the features of Madame von Rosen.

      ‘You, Countess!’ cried the Prince.

      ‘No, no,’ she panted, ‘the Count von Rosen — my young brother. A capital fellow. Let him get his breath.’

      ‘Ah, madam. . .’ said he.

      ‘Call me Count,’ she returned, ‘respect my incognito.’

      ‘Count be it, then,’ he replied. ‘And let me implore that gallant gentleman to set forth at once on our enterprise.’

      ‘Sit down beside me here,’ she returned, patting the further corner of the bench. ‘I will follow you in a moment. O, I am so tired — feel how my heart leaps! Where is your thief?’

      ‘At his post,’ replied Otto. ‘Shall I introduce him? He seems an excellent companion.’

      ‘No,’ she said, ‘do not hurry me yet. I must speak to you. Not but I adore your thief; I adore any one who has the spirit to do wrong. I never cared for virtue till I fell in love with my Prince.’ She laughed musically. ‘And even so, it is not for your virtues,’ she added.

      Otto was embarrassed. ‘And now,’ he asked, ‘if you are anyway rested?’

      ‘Presently, presently. Let me breathe,’ she said, panting a little harder than before.

      ‘And what has so wearied you?’ he asked. ‘This bag? And why, in the name of eccentricity, a bag? For an empty one, you might have relied on my own foresight; and this one is very far from being empty. My dear Count, with what trash have you come laden? But the shortest method is to see for myself.’ And he put down his hand.

      She stopped him at once. ‘Otto,’ she said, ‘no — not that way. I will tell, I will make a clean breast. It is done already. I have robbed the treasury single-handed. There are three thousand two hundred crowns. O, I trust it is enough!’

      Her embarrassment was so obvious that the Prince was struck into a muse, gazing in her face, with his hand still outstretched, and she still holding him by the wrist. ‘You!’ he said at last. ‘How?’ And then drawing himself up, ‘O madam,’ he cried, ‘I understand. You must indeed think meanly of the Prince.’

      ‘Well, then, it was a lie!’ she cried. ‘The money is mine, honestly my own — now yours. This was an unworthy act that you proposed. But I love your honour, and I swore to myself that I should save it in your teeth. I beg of you to let me save it’ — with a sudden lovely change of tone. ‘Otto, I beseech you let me save it. Take this dross from your poor friend who loves you!’

      ‘Madam, madam,’ babbled Otto, in the extreme of misery, ‘I cannot — I must go.’

      And he half rose; but she was on the ground before him in an instant, clasping his knees. ‘No,’ she gasped, ‘you shall not go. Do you despise me so entirely? It is dross; I hate it; I should squander it at play and be no richer; it is an investment, it is to save me from ruin. Otto,’ she cried, as he again feebly tried to put her from him, ‘if you leave me alone in this disgrace, I will die here!’ He groaned aloud. ‘O,’ she said, ‘think what I suffer! If you suffer from a piece of delicacy, think what I suffer in my shame! To have my trash refused! You would rather steal, you think of me so basely! You would rather tread my heart in pieces! O, unkind! O my Prince! O Otto! O pity me!’ She was still clasping him; then she found his hand and covered it with kisses, and at this his head began to turn. ‘O,’ she cried again, ‘I see it! O what a horror! It is because I am old, because I am no longer beautiful.’ And she burst into a storm of sobs.

      This was the COUP DE GRACE. Otto had now to comfort and compose her as he could, and before many words, the money was accepted. Between the woman and the weak man such was the inevitable end. Madame von Rosen instantly composed her sobs. She thanked him with a fluttering voice, and resumed her place upon the bench, at the far end from Otto. ‘Now you see,’ she said, ‘why I bade you keep the thief at distance, and why I came alone. How I trembled for my treasure!’

      ‘Madam,’ said Otto, with a tearful whimper in his voice, ‘spare me! You are too good, too noble!’

      ‘I wonder to hear you,’ she returned. ‘You have avoided a great folly. You will be able to meet your good old peasant. You have found an excellent investment for a friend’s money. You have preferred essential kindness to an empty scruple; and now you are ashamed of it! You have made your friend happy; and now you mourn as the dove! Come, cheer up. I know it is depressing to have done exactly right; but you need not make a practice of it. Forgive yourself this virtue; come now, look me in the face and smile!’

      He did look at her. When a man has been embraced by a woman, he sees her in a glamour; and at such a time, in the baffling glimmer of the stars, she will look wildly well. The hair is touched with light; the eyes are constellations; the face sketched in shadows — a sketch, you might say, by passion. Otto became consoled for his defeat; he began to take an interest. ‘No,’ he said, ‘I am no ingrate.’

      ‘You promised me fun,’ she returned, with a laugh. ‘I have given you as good. We have had a stormy SCENA.’

      He laughed in his turn, and the sound of the laughter, in either case, was hardly reassuring.

      ‘Come, what are you going to give me in exchange,’ she continued, ‘for my excellent declamation?’

      ‘What you will,’ he said.

      ‘Whatever I will? Upon your honour? Suppose I asked the crown?’ She was flashing upon him, beautiful in triumph.

      ‘Upon my honour,’ he replied.

      ‘Shall I ask the crown?’ she continued. ‘Nay; what should I do with it? Grunewald is but a petty state; my ambition swells above it. I shall ask — I find I want nothing,’ she concluded. ‘I will give you something instead. I will give you leave to kiss me — once.’

      Otto drew near, and she put up her face; they were both smiling, both on the brink of laughter, all was so innocent and playful; and the Prince, when their lips encountered, was dumbfoundered by the sudden convulsion of his being. Both drew instantly apart, and for an appreciable time sat tongue-tied. Otto was indistinctly conscious of a peril in the silence, but could find no words to utter. Suddenly the Countess seemed to awake. ‘As for your wife —’ she began in a clear and steady voice.

      The word recalled Otto, with a shudder, from his trance. ‘I will hear nothing against my wife,’ he cried wildly; and then, recovering

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