Chapter XXIII

A few moments afterwards Karl returned with a letter, the writing of which was unknown to Consuelo. It ran as follows:--

"I leave you, perhaps never to see you again. I relinquish three days I might pass with you--three days, the like of which I shall perhaps never see again. I renounce them voluntarily. I should do so. You will one day appreciate the sacrifice I make, and its purity.

"Yes, I love you--I love you madly, though I know no more of you than you do of me. Do not thank me for what I have done. I obeyed supreme instructions, and accomplished the orders with which I am charged. Attribute to me nothing but the love I entertain for you, which I can prove in no other manner than by leaving you. This love is as ardent as it has been respectful. It will be durable as it has been sudden and unexpected. I have scarcely seen your face; I know nothing of your life; yet I felt that my soul belonged to you, and that I can never resume it. Had your past conduct been as sullied as your present seems pure, you would not to me be less respectable and dear. I leave you, with my heart agitated with pride, joy, and bitterness. You love me! How could I support the idea of losing you, if the terrible will which disposes of both of us, so ordained it? I know not. At this moment, in spite of my terror, I cannot be unhappy. I am too much intoxicated with your love and mine to suffer. Were I to seek in vain for you during my whole life, I would not complain because I have seen you and received a kiss from you, condemning me to eternal sorrow. Neither can I lose the hope of meeting you some day; even though it were for a single moment, and though I had no other evidence of your love than the kiss so purely given and returned, I would feel myself a thousand times happier than I ever was before I knew you.

"And now, dear girl, poor, troubled being, recall, without shame and without terror, the brief and heavenly moments in which you felt my love transfused into your heart. You have said love comes to us from God, and we cannot ourselves stifle or enkindle it. Were I unworthy of you the sudden inspiration which forced you to return my embrace would not be less heavenly. The Providence that protects you, would not consent that the treasure of my love should fall on a vain and false heart. Were I ungrateful, as far as you are concerned, it would only be a noble mind led astray, a precious inspiration lost. I adore you; and whatever you may be in other respects, you had nothing to do with the illusion, when you fancied that I loved you. You were not profaned by the beating of my heart--by the support of my arm--by the touch of my lips. Our mutual confidence, and blind faith, have at once exalted us to that sublime _abandon_ justified by long attachment. Why regret you? I am well aware there is something terrible in that fatality which impels us to each other. It is the will of God. Do you see it? We cannot be mistaken. You bear away with you my terrible secret. Keep it wholly to yourself--confide it to no one. _Beppo_, perhaps, will not comprehend it. Whoever that friend may be, I alone venerate your folly and respect your weakness, for this folly and weakness are mine. Adieu! This may be an eternal adieu, yet, as the world says, I am free, and so too are you. I love you alone, and know you do not love another. Our fate is not our own. I am bound by eternal vows, and so too will you be ere long. At least you will be in the power of the Invisibles, and from them there is no appeal. Adieu, then. . . . My bosom is torn, but God will give me power to accomplish my sacrifice, and even a more rigorous one yet, if such there be. Great God! have pity on me."

This unsigned letter was in a painful and counterfeited hand.

"Karl," said Consuelo, pale and trembling; "did the Chevalier give you this?"

"Yes, signora."

"And wrote it himself?"

"Yes, signora; and not without pain. His right hand was wounded."

"Wounded, Karl? Severely?"

"Perhaps. The cut was deep, though he did not seem to mind it."

"Where was it?"

"Last night, when we were changing the horses, just before we came to the frontier, the leading-horse wished to go before the postilion had mounted the saddle-beast. You were in the carriage alone; the postilion and I were four or five paces off. The Chevalier held the horse with immense power, and with a lion's courage, for he was very restive."

"Ah! yes, I felt violent shocks, but you told me it was nothing."

"I did not know the Chevalier was hurt. He had injured his hand with a buckle of the harness."

"And for me? But, tell me, Karl, has the Chevalier gone?"

"Not yet. His horse is now being saddled, and I am come to pack his portmanteau. He says that you have nothing to fear, for the person who is to replace him has arrived. I hope we will see him soon, for I would be sorry for any accident to happen. He, however, would promise nothing, and to all my questions answered '_Perhaps._'"

"Where is the Chevalier, Karl?"

"I do not know, signora, his room is there. Do you wish me to say from you----"

"No; I will write. No; tell him I would see him an instant, to thank him and press his hand. Be quick; I fear he has gone already."

Karl left, and Consuelo soon regretted having sent the message. She said to herself that the stranger had never come near her, except in a case of absolute necessity, and had doubtless an affiliation with the strange and whimsical Invisibles. She resolved to write to him; but she had scarcely written and effaced a few words, when a slight noise made her look up. She saw a panel of the woodwork slide, and discovered there was thus a communication between the room in which she had written and the Chevalier's chamber. The panel was only opened wide enough for a gloved hand to be passed, and which seemed to beckon to Consuelo. She rushed forward, saying, "The other hand--the wounded hand." The stranger then withdrew behind the panel so that she could not see him. He then passed out his right hand, of which Consuelo took possession, and untying the ligature, saw that the cut was severe and deep. She pressed her lips on the linen and taking from her bosom the filagré cross, put it in the blood-stained hand. "Here," said she, "is the most precious thing I possess on earth. It is all I have, and never has been separated from me. I never loved any one before well enough to confide to them this treasure. Keep it till we meet----"

The stranger drew the hand of Consuelo behind the wood-work which concealed him, and covered it with kisses. Then, when he heard Karl's steps coming to deliver his message, he pushed it back, and shut the paneling. Consuelo heard the sound of a bolt: she listened in vain, expecting to catch the sound of the stranger's voice. He either spoke in a low tone or had gone.

A few minutes afterwards, Karl returned to Consuelo. "He has gone," said he, sadly, "without saying farewell, but filling my pockets with I know not how many ducats, for the unexpected expenses of our voyage, our regular ones being provided for, as he said--at the expense of the powers above or below, it matters not. There is a little man in black there, who never opens his mouth, except to give orders in a clear dry tone, and who does not please me at all. He replaces the Chevalier, and I will have the honor of his company on the box, a circumstance which does not promise me a very merry conversation. Poor chevalier! may he be restored to us."

"But are we obliged to go with the little man in black?"

"We could not be more under compulsion, signora. The Chevalier made me swear I would obey the stranger as himself. Well, signora, here is your dinner. You must not slight it, for it looks well. We will start at night, then: henceforth, we may stop only where we please--whether at the behest of the powers above or below, I know not."

Consuelo, downcast and terrified, paid no attention to Karl's gossip. She was uneasy about nothing relating to her voyage or her new guide. All became indifferent from the moment the dear stranger left. A prey to profound sadness, she sought mechanically to please Karl, by tasting some of his dishes. Being, however, more anxious to weep than to eat, she asked for a cup of coffee to give her some physical strength and courage. The coffee was brought her. "See, signora, the little man would prepare it himself, to be sure that it was excellent, he looks like an old valet-de-chambre or steward, and, after all, is not so black as he seems. I think he is not such a bad man, though he does not like to talk. He gave me some brandy, at least a hundred years old, the best I ever tasted. If you try a little, you will find it much better than this coffee."

"Drink, Karl, anything you please, and do not disturb me," said Consuelo, swallowing the coffee, the quality of which she scarcely observed.

Scarcely had she left the table when she felt her head become extremely heavy. When Karl came to say the carriage was ready, he found her asleep in the chair. "Give me your arm," she said, "I cannot sustain myself. I think I have a fever."

She was so crushed, that she saw only confusedly the carriage, her new guide, and the keeper of the house, whom Karl could induce to accept of nothing. As soon as she was _en route_, she fell asleep. The carriage had been filled up with cushions, like a bed, and thenceforward Consuelo was aware of nothing. She did not know the length of her journey or even the hour of the day or night, whether she travelled uninterruptedly or not. Once or twice she saw Karl at the door, and could comprehend neither his questions nor his terror. It seemed to her that the little man felt her pulse, and made her swallow a refreshing drink, saying, "This is nothing; madame is doing very well." She was indisposed and overcome, and could not keep her heavy eyelids open, nor was her mind sufficiently active to enable her to observe what passed around her. The more she slept, the more she seemed to wish to. She did not even seek to ask if she was sick or not, and she could only say to Karl again what she had finished with before. "Let me alone, good Karl."

Finally, she felt both body and mind a little more free, and looking around, saw that she slept in an excellent bed, between four vast curtains of white satin, with gold fringes. The little man, masked as the Chevalier had been, made her inhale the perfume of a _flacon,_ which seemed to dissipate the clouds over her brain, and replaced the mystery which had enwrapped her with noonday clearness.

"Are you a physician, sir?" said she, with an effort.

"Yes, countess, I have that honor," said he, with a voice which did not seem entirely unknown to her.

"Have I been sick?"

"Somewhat indisposed: you are now much better."

"I feel so, and thank you for your care."

"I am glad, and will not appear again before your ladyship, unless you require my services."

"Am I, then, at the conclusion of my journey?"

"Yes, madame."

"Am I free, or am I a prisoner?"

"You are free, madame, in the area reserved for your habitation."

"I understand. I am in a large and comfortable prison," said Consuelo, looking around her broad bright room, hung with white lustre, with gold rays, supported by magnificently carved and sculptured wood-work. "Can I see Karl?"

"I do not know, madame, for this house is not mine. I go: you need my services no longer. I am forbidden to indulge in the luxury of conversing with you."

He left, and Consuelo, yet feeble and listless, attempted to get up. The only dress she found was a long white woollen robe, of a wonderfully soft texture, not unlike the tunic of a Roman lady. She took it up, and observed fall from it the following note, in letters of gold: "_This is the neophyte's spotless robe. If your mind be sullied, this robe of noble innocence will be the devouring tunic of Dejanera._"

Consuelo, accustomed to a quiet conscience, (perhaps too quiet,) smiled, and put on the robe with innocent pleasure. She picked up the letter to read it again, and found it puerilely emphatic. She then went to a rich toilette--a table of white marble sustaining a mirror, in a golden frame, of excellent taste. Her attention was attracted by an inscription on the upper ornament of the mirror. It was: "_If your soul be as pure as yon crystal, you will see yourself in it always--young and beautiful. But if vice has withered your heart, be fearful of reading in me the stern reflection of moral deformity._"

"I have never been either beautiful or vicious," thought Consuelo. "Therefore the mirror in either case must be false."

She looked in it without fear, and did not think herself ugly. The flowing white robe, and her long, floating dark hair, made her look like a priestess of antiquity. Her pallor was extreme, and her eyes were less pure and brilliant than usual. "Can I be growing ugly?" said she, "or does the mirror censure me?"

She opened a drawer of the toilette, and found, amid various articles of luxury, many of them accompanied with devices and sentences, which were at once simple and pedantic. There was a pot of rouge with the following words on the cover: "_Fashion and falsehood. Paint does not restore the freshness of innocence to the cheek, and does not efface the ravages of disorder._" There were exquisite perfumes with this device: "_A soul without faith and an indiscreet lip are like open flacons, the precious contents of which are exhaled and corrupted._" There were also white ribands with these words woven in the silk: "_To a pure brow, the sacred fillets; to a head charged with infamy, the servile punishment of the cord._"

Consuelo did up her hair, tying it complacently in the ancient manner, with the fillets. Then she examined with curiosity the strange abode to which her romantic fate had brought her. She passed through the various rooms of the suite intended for her,--a library, a music-room, filled with admirable instruments, and many and precious musical compositions. She had a delicious boudoir, and a gallery filled with superb and charming pictures and statues. In magnificence her rooms were worthy of a queen, in taste of an artist, and in chastity of a nun. Consuelo, surprised at this sumptuous and delicate hospitality, reserved the detailed examination of the symbols expressed by the books and works of art, until she should be more composed. A desire to know in what part of the world her miraculous home was, made her desert the interior for the exterior. She approached a window, but before she lifted up the silken curtain before it, read: "_If the thought of evil be in your heart, you are unworthy of contemplating the divine spectacle of nature; if your heart be the home of virtue, look up and bless God, who opens to you the door of a terrestrial paradise._" She opened the window, anxious to see if the landscape corresponded with the proud promises of the inscription. It was an earthly paradise, and Consuelo fancied that she dreamed. The garden, planted in the English manner--a rare thing at that time--but with all the minutiæ of German taste, offered pleasant vistas, magnificent shades, fresh lawns, and the expanses of natural scenery; at the same time that exquisite neatness, sweet and fresh flowers, white sand, and crystal waters, betokened that it was carefully attended to. Above the fine trees, the lofty barriers of a vale covered, or rather draped, with flowers, and divided by clear and limpid brooks, arose a sublime horizon of blue mountains, with broken sides and towering brows. In the whole area of her view, Consuelo saw nothing to tell her in what part of Germany was this imposing spectacle. She did not know where she was. The season, however, seemed advanced, and the herbage older than in Prussia, which satisfied her that she had made some progress to the south.

"Dear canon, where are you?" thought Consuelo, as she looked at the thickets of white lilac and hedges of roses, and the ground, strewn with narcissi, hyacinths, and violets. "Oh! Frederick of Prussia, I thank you for having taught me, by long privations and cruel _ennui_, to enjoy, as I should do, the pleasures of such a refuge. And you, all-powerful Invisibles, keep me ever in this captivity. I consent to it with all my heart, especially if the Chevalier--"

Consuelo did not utter her wish. She had not thought of the stranger since she had shaken off her lethargy. This burning wish awoke in her, and made her reflect on the menacing sentences inscribed on all the walls and furniture of the magic palace, and even on the apparel in which she was so strangely decked.