Chapter VII: Part 7

Louis could not escape hearing this; nor seeing the quick pressure with which the Countess strained her young charge to her breast; who in some apprehension that she had been overheard, broke away, with a slight blush tinging her lilly complexion.

He was now alone in the music-room, with her, whose presence he felt in every nerve. The parting whisper of the Princess; and the responsive action of the Countess, followed by a fluttering sigh, which now vibrated in his heart, made him tremble for himself. He knew not how to fly, and he felt it was perilous to remain. Hastily closing a music-book, he said with a forced smile, "Since the Arch-duchess declines singing, my duty here terminates!" and with a hurrying bow, he started from the instrument.

Otteline was, now, in a no less agitated state than himself. She read in his averted looks, and haste to leave her, that she was no longer to consider him as her lover; and, not suspecting the real cause, her own ambitious views suggested to her, that his father's higher prospects were the origin of this changed demeanour. Aware that carrying matters with too lofty a hand had lost her the son of the Marquis Santa Cruz, she determined on a different mode with that of Ripperda; and while a large drapery of the curtained arch was yet between him, and the observation of the company in the saloon, she ventured in rapid but suppressed accents, to murmur out--"Oh, Marquis, why are you not the obscure De Phaffenberg?--Then, we should not have met:--or never parted thus!"

Her voice had arrested him. Her words transfixed his heart. He stood, but he did not speak. She resumed.--

"It is as I foresaw. My enemies have prevailed!--Your father objects to my humble birth; and you turn from me, to seek a more illustrious bride?"

"No Madam," returned Louis, believing himself now called upon to pass the final sentence upon his relapsing passions; "my father has not yet spoken to me on the subject. Neither do I seek, or wish, for any other bride:--For--Oh, Otteline," cried he, turning on her a look, in which all the contention of his soul was declared; "Where should I find one so lovely?--One, to whom I could more intensely devote this adoring heart? But yourself has separated us for ever!"

She turned pale as the pearls which bound her forehead.

"Then it is my enemies!" cried she, "But if they have coupled my name with Don Ferdinand d'Osorio's, in any tale of slander; believe it as false as that, which the Electress of Bavaria has published to the ruin of my fame. You know how I am the victim there! And this is invented, to put you from making the only restitution that can redeem me to the envious world!"

The vehemence with which she spoke, and the mention of Don Ferdinand's name, connected with her own, cast a new and an appalling light upon the apprehension of her lover. He recollected that Don Ferdinand had left Vienna, to rid himself from, what his father called, a disgraceful entanglement of his affections; and to find it possible that Otteline might have been its object, confounded all his faculties. The broad appeal to his honour, in the last sentence of her remonstrance, did not the less convince him, that all was not right, in the tenacity with which she urged bonds on him, he had shewn himself determined to break. Braced, therefore, in his resolution, in a collected voice, he briefly answered.

"No, Madam; I have heard no slanderous tales against you. Until this moment, I was not aware that Don Ferdinand d'Osorio was even known to you; and had it been told to me, by any but yourself I should have spurned the information. My heart alone is your accuser."

The renewed emotion, with which the latter words were uttered, and even their import, revived the colour of hope upon the cheek of the Countess. She thought, if his heart alone were her accuser, she had also an advocate there, that would be too powerful for so unassisted an adversary. She smiled bewitchingly, for it was through rushing tears; and laying her hand on his arm, said in a tender and trusting voice,--"And what does it allege against me?"

Louis did not look towards her. Her touch ran like wild-fire through his veins; but the sensations which shook him, only rendered him more desperate to fulfil his resolution; and he exclaimed, "that I did love you--that I adored you!--that I was grateful, for the regard with which you honoured me,--I believe I shall carry the scars on my heart, to my grave:--but, with me, there is a power beyond love--that of virtue! I would sooner have this heart torn from my body, or all it delights in, buried from my sight; than purchase their enjoyment, by admitting one stain on my conscience. When I last saw you, in the conference with the Chancellor and the Empress, you declared, and proved yourself of an opposite opinion! You violated the sacredness of a seal; and you defended that breach of honour, on principles which destroy me to remember!"

Louis stopped, and covered his bloodless face with his hand.--The Countess, though paralyzed to the heart, by so unexpected a disclosure, gathered hope from the pale statue that uttered it. "His frozen virtue, will relent!" thought she; and clasping his arm, with the warm pressure of doubting agitation, she tremblingly said, "Oh, de Montemar, is such the reward of my self-sacrifice. What am I to expect from this exacting virtue?"

"That I may die,"--replied Louis, with a strong effort; "but that we meet no more."

This was the axe to the ambitious Otteline; and with a shriek, she could not restrain, she staggered, and fell prostrate on the floor.

The convulsive cry, and the confused noise of her fall, were heard in the same moment, in the adjoining saloon. Elizabeth, whose thoughts were on what was passing between her favourite and the son of her friend, sprang from her seat, behind the Emperor's chair. Charles was at quadrille with Ripperda, the Princess de Waradin, and another lady. Every body started from their respective positions: but no one, except the young Arch-duchess, durst follow Her Majesty, as she had not commanded the attendance of any.

The Emperor laid down his cards, and asked what had happened. Ripperda was not aware that his son was engaged in it, and with perfect indifference followed the example of the Sovereign, in rising from his chair. But the Princess de Waradin, who had observed Louis having been left with the favourite, rather sarcastically replied to the Emperor's question.

"If Your Majesty will do the Marquis de Montemar the honour of enquiring of him, he can give every information; as he has been _tête à tête_ with Countess Altheim, in that room, for some time."

Ripperda knew the character of the favourite; and recollecting his son's admiration of her; with an alarm he did not allow to be visible, he requested the Emperor's commands, to assist the Empress's interference in whatever accident might have happened.

"Certainly," replied he, "and let any body who may be of service, go with you."

This license sent every-body into the room.

Elizabeth had found Louis, on one knee, by the side of the insensible Otteline. He was pale, and speechless. And fearing that he might soon be in the same state with her he ineffectually attempted to raise, while the young Archduchess clung, weeping, to her lifeless friend, the Empress turned round at the approaching steps; and the first that was near her, being Sinzendorff, in a hurrying, but suppressed voice, she said,--"Chancellor, take care of de Montemar, take him from these people's eyes."

Almost without consciousness, Louis obeyed the impulse of Sinzendorff's arm, and soon found himself withdrawn from the gaze of strangers. The Chancellor had led him, without speaking, across a passage that opened from the music-room, into the Imperial library. When he saw his agitated companion throw himself into a seat, and cover his face with his clasped hands, the worthy statesman laid his hand on his shoulder while he broke silence.

"Marquis, will you tell me frankly? Do you love the Countess Altheim?"

The friendly tone in which this was asked, recalled Louis in some measure to himself; and without altering his position, for he shrunk from shewing the weakness that might be discovered in his countenance, he answered. "I do love her, more than I could have thought it possible, after a full conviction that she can no longer be conducive to my happiness! Oh, my lord, you were present at the scene which decided my fate. What she then avowed, convinced me that she and I must never be united: I have just dared to tell her so.--But the situation to which it reduced her, severs my soul from my body."

"Virtuous young man," cried Sinzendorff, "let it not sever your principle from your soul! You are formed for better things than an intriguing woman's slave. Hear what I am now going to say to you! But as you are worthy the confidence I place in you; and as a breach of it would ruin me with the Imperial family; you must not discover, even to your father, that the facts I am going to state have been learnt from me. When I have told them, examine into their truth, and act on the result. Know then, that the woman, who causes you this emotion, is unworthy of a single regret from a mind like yours. Could you be satisfied with beauty alone, I acknowledge it is there in amplest perfection; but she is without one feminine feeling, wholly abandoned to ambition, and careless by what means she raises herself to the point of her hopes. At the age of sixteen she married one of the worst characters in the Imperial court, to be elevated to the rank of nobility. When a widow, she attempted the affections of several noble strangers, who, however, were too wary to be taken in her toils; but at last she entangled the passions of my sister's son, Don Ferdinand d'Osorio; and wrought him to the most extravagant excesses, while her own selfish aim was only to perpetuate her rank. This, his father told me; but he interfered, and the young man recovered his senses. Her next trial was on yourself! And I solemnly assure you, that from the first of your appearance in this palace, she knew that you were not the Chevalier de Phaffenberg. And, though I doubt not, she prefers your youth and graces, to the age and decrepitude of the dotard to whom she first sold her duty as a wife; I know her well, and can aver, that she has no value for the superiority of your mental qualities. Do not mislead yourself, de Montemar, by investing her with your own feelings. It is not the loss of yourself that caused the situation in which you left her; but the loss of an illustrious husband:--the loss of one, who would have re-introduced her to the circle which her pride insulted, and the members of which, dread, while they despise her. My dear Marquis, excepting the infatuated Empress, she has not one friend in Vienna!"

"She warned me, that she had enemies," replied Louis, in an interrupted voice, "but with me, her worst enemy is herself. Chancellor, I am grateful for what you have said, and you shall find by my fidelity, that I am so. But not even all these charges could have weighed against the pleadings of my heart in her favour, had I not been present that fatal evening in the _boudoir_."

"A man of your principles," replied Sinzendorf, "ought rather to regard it as a providential evening!--If they be principles, you will abide by them; and I shall see you free, honoured, and happy. If they be no more than sentiment, (which is common with youth!) they will evaporate in her first sighs, and I shall soon have to congratulate her as Marchioness de Montemar. In that case, I will forget all that I have said, since I cannot disbelieve it."

Louis felt the force, and the friendship, of this admonition.

"Your Excellency shall never have reason to forget the generous interest you have taken in my happiness. And, in apology for this emotion, you must accept the excuse of one, young as myself, (but, oh, on how enviable an occasion!) _my body trembles at the purpose of my soul_."

"Could I believe, that she did not love me, my task would have less of torture!" This last thought, was in his mind, though he did not utter it; and before the Chancellor could proceed with the commendation this resolution merited, a page appeared at the door, to inform them the Emperor had dismissed the company; and that the Duke de Ripperda awaited the Marquis in the vestibule.

CHAP. XIV.

Not a word passed between Louis and his father, while they drove home. Count de Patinos was in the carriage; and would have sat mute also, had not the Duke, with his usual power over all tempers, brought the sullen youth to converse freely on the entertainments of the evening.

As soon as they alighted, Ripperda desired his son to accompany him to his cabinet. Louis was in such heavy internal distress, he hailed the command as a summons to unburthen his unloaded bosom; and to receive that advice, or rather support, in the fulfilment of his resolution, he found he so woefully required. He followed his father with alacrity. When the Duke had closed the door, and saw that his son had thrown himself into a seat, he took a place near him.

"Now," said he, "the time is come, when you are to give the confidence you promised me. I no longer consider myself the arbiter of your conduct. That responsibility I leave to yourself. The extensive duties of my own destiny are sufficient for me. I, therefore, shall advise, but I command no more. You must rise or fall by your own resolves; and, if I guess right, you stand now, on a point of no insignificant decision. Tell me, what has passed between the Countess Altheim and you, to give rise to the extraordinary scene of this evening; and to sanction the request which the Empress made to me at parting, that I would go to her to-morrow, _to decide on the fate of one, who was dear to her, as her own life_!--Have you pledged yourself to the Countess?"

"I hope not," earnestly replied Louis. "I do not understand you!" returned his father, "by what has just occurred, she has shewn to the whole court, what she wishes people to suppose has passed between you; and you must be aware that the favorite of Elizabeth is not to be treated with idle gallantry. What grounds, then, have you to hope, that you have not pledged yourself beyond recall? Or, did the warning voice of the Sieur Ignatius come to late?"

"It came too late," replied Louis, "to save me from the intoxication of her beauties; and no prudence on my part, could counteract the effects of that luckless rencontre with the Electress of Bavaria. Yet, in the wildest tumults of my heart, I still wrestled with myself; in the very moment of my greatest weakness, I recollected the Sieur's admonition, and, re-awakened to filial duty, checked the vow on my lips; and, telling her I was not my own, I trust, I saved my honour." Ripperda shook his head, "Louis, did I not warn you against the power of beauty?"

"You did!" vehemently replied he, "and, from this hour, I forswear it for ever!"

Being ignorant of the real cause of this abjuration, it surprised the Duke. He had supposed that Louis's disorder had arisen from a consciousness of having transgressed the spirit, if not the letter, of the Sieur's injunctions, and that Otteline's emotion was to be dated from fear that his father would not sanction the romantic passion of her lover. For many reasons, the Duke had no wish to sanction it; and while he regretted that woman was fair, and youth susceptible, he was pleased to hear the unexpected exclamation from his son. He did not remark on it, but required a recital of particulars, word for word, of all that had passed between him and the Countess, that he might be an impartial judge of Louis's freedom, or his bonds.

He obeyed ingenuously, till he came to the parts where her conduct might be translated into a direct wooing of himself. Ripperda saw him hesitate, and the generous colour that mounted to his down-cast eyes.

"Proceed," said he, "I can divine what your honour, or your delicacy inclines you to conceal. She played upon your open nature, to make you believe she loved you so passionately, she could not await your time of drawing the secret from her! I know the sex, Louis. For more than thirty years, I have been an object of their various practices. And, once for all, you may receive it as an unerring rule, that, when a woman runs before a man in the profession of her love, her love is nothing more than profession. Her views are something baser." Ripperda pursued the subject; and Louis was, at last, brought to acknowledge, that the Countess had given him reason to believe that she loved him devotedly,--too devotedly; and then, without with-holding a circumstance, he related the whole affair, from the commencement of their acquaintance, till the moment when he wished to close it for ever. But, he confessed that what had happened in the music-room, had roused all within him to rebellion, though his judgement was as stern as ever against the pleadings of his infatuated senses.

"Oh, Sir!" cried he, "I love, and I despise her. And yet, when I stood over her insensible form, which had become so, from the wound I had inflicted, I could not but ask myself,--Am I a god, that I should thus ruthlessly condemn human error, and break the heart that loves me?"

The Duke was a long time silent, after his son had ceased speaking. Then looking up, he abruptly said, "Louis de Montemar, you are the first man of your sort, with whom I ever came in contact. I see of what spirit you are; but it will not do in the station you fill, or in the times in which we live. The world is always changing, and you must go with it, or it will leave you. I ought not to have left you so long at Lindisfarne!"

Louis turned his eye on his father.

"I do not blame your instructor for educating you like himself. But the style is obsolete, Louis. Had you been intended for a desert island, it might have been well; but a citizen of the world requires other maxims. The fault is mine, that I did not bring you to me before. Now, you come into society, like an unarmed man into the midst of his enemies; and, instead of hastening to shelter, you expose yourself to their weapons, by acts of impotent hostility. You must content yourself in maintaining your own principles; to stretch another's virtue to your standard, you will always find a vain work of supererogation. In all that you have described, the Countess Altheim has only acted as any ambitious woman would have done; and ambition is not less rooted in the sex, than in ourselves. She must not, therefore, be contemned for that. Neither do I object to her, on account of her obscure birth. The blood of your family is too essentially illustrious, not to raise to its own elevation, whatever we mingle with its stream. But I wish to strengthen our hands in Spain, by a marriage between my heir and one of its native daughters. Besides, the Countess Altheim is dangerous in herself. Her haughty spirit would embroil you with this, and every court, to which you might conduct her; and persons might be inclined to disrespect the man who could suffer the weakness of passion to subject him to an union so universally despised."

During this discourse, the confidential warning of the Chancellor seemed to sound again in the ear of Louis. He recollected the hints which Wharton had dropped on the same subject; and, with sickening attention, listened to his father, who, in less reserved language, related every leading event of the life of the beautiful favourite. No word glanced at her honour, as a chaste woman; but, every sentence completed the portrait of mean-spirited, insatiable ambition. Shocked to the soul, by the description of Count Altheim, whose character was of such grossness, that it seemed impossible for a virtuous woman to consent to be his wife; Louis hastily exclaimed, as the Duke rose to depart. "I will never see her more! I will never trust myself again, with any of her betraying sex! Henceforth, my dearest father," cried he, with a feverish smile, "I will have no mistress but glory! Why, why, did I ever withdraw my eyes from her divine face?" "She always suffers, when woman disputes her rights," returned the Duke.

Louis kissed his father's hand, and retired to his own apartments. His spirit felt beaten and bruised. It cowered under a sense of self-degradation; and throwing himself on his bed, he passed a night of painful retrospection, on all that he had seen and heard of her, who was so lately the object of his untameable wishes.

"Cold, calculating, and unprincipled!" cried he, "and to such a woman, did I give the first flames of my heart! Did I light up the sacred altar to a fiend, in the form of the Queen of Heaven!--Wretch that I am, to have so debased what was most noble within me! To sigh for a piece of painted clay; to adore--and, even now, to weep over a creature, whose soul, if I could behold it divested of its beautiful garments, would disgust me by its sordid, earthward visage!" The morning found his agitated spirits subsided to a calm. The intemperance of passion was extinguished in his breast, and as he relinquished the desire of possessing her, who had now lost every grace in his eyes, he strengthened in the hope, that the killing words he had last pronounced to her, were final to her views on him.

Noon brought several animated visitors, to interrupt the studies which were his usual morning occupation, and generally, unfailing tranquillizers. These young Austrians came to invite him to share in various sorts of diversions for the day and the evening; and an hour passed gaily on, in the vivid conversations of versatile youth. A few of the Spaniards made their entrance, and disappeared again. De Patinos was not among them; he had reproached those who had shewn a wish to cultivate the kindness of Louis, with a mean submission to the minion of temporary fortune; they, therefore, merely made their bow, and without joining in the discourse, soon took their leave.

Louis found an amusing diversity of character in the Austrian group. Most of them held commissions in the Imperial service, and were full of the campaign against Turkey, which the valour of Prince Eugene had just brought to a close. Others, were merely jocund spirits, "hot with the fires of youth, and high in blood." And a few, had a philosophic turn; some in the strait, but most in the crooked path: and these latter, were the least agreeable of the set; as they united an ostentatious assumption of purity of intellect, with a systematic corruption of morals. Louis soon comprehended them, and treated them with marked avoidance. The military young men were decidedly his favourites, their profession was that of his own secret preference, and their manners were most congenial to his taste. There was a brave ardour in their deportment, and a careless enunciation of their sentiments, which, whether wrong or right, had no aim but the utterance of the moment; and, commonly, could as easily be turned from the wrong to the right, as from the right to wrong. The faction was in their blood, not in their understanding; and when the one was cooled, the other might soon be recalled to order.

While Louis was attending to Count Koninseg's account of the tremendous battle of Belgrade, a messenger arrived from the Duke de Ripperda. He brought a letter for the Marquis de Montemar. With a blanched cheek, he broke the seal; but the contents were a reprieve. The Duke told him, he had not yet seen the Empress. She was gone to the Baths at Baden, with Maria Theresa, who had sustained a relapse; and Countess Altheim was their companion. The Emperor, had retired with his Council, for a few days to the Luxemburg, to avoid the persecution of the foreign ministers; and thither, by his command, Ripperda had accompanied him.

Louis closed the letter with a renovated countenance. He was left to do the honours of the Embassador's table, not only to its usual guests, but to a party of noble Austrians, whom Ripperda had invited. The Duke being absent, the Spaniards were haughty and reserved at dinner, as they affected to be, when they encountered Louis apart; and, as soon as the desert was placed, de Patinos, and another of the name of Orendayn, rose from their seats; and, with cold bows to the young secretary of legation and his guests, quitted the room, to join societies more agreeable to their humour.

Till the opera hour, the time passed merrily with the Austrian group; and forgetful of his bosom's care, by their animated host. The ring-leader of the Spaniards' discontent being gone, in the person of de Patinos, the rest of the young grandees fell in with the cheerfulness of the company. Subjects of taste, war, and beauty, ruled the glowing hours; but on the latter subject, Louis discoursed uneasily, and he was glad to see Koninseg look at his watch, and point to it as a signal for adjourning to the theatre.

"My aunt, will be impatient," cried he, "she is determined, that he who danced with Amelia at her first ball, shall conduct her to her first opera."

It was also the first opera to Louis. He had never seen any in England; and until now, he had no opportunity of visiting that at Vienna. The _Palais de Espagne_ soon poured forth its gay inmates; and Louis and Count Koninseg turned towards the mansion of the Princess de Waradin. It was lit up in the fullest splendor, although no other visitors were expected but de Montemar, and her nephew. The artless Amelia smiled and blushed, and smiled again, when her mother, putting her arm into Koninseg's, requested Louis to take charge of her daughter. He politely obeyed, and led her to the carriage, while she prattled all the way with the volubility of a giddy child, delighted at being treated like a woman.

The opera-house presented but a gloomy appearance, from the extreme scarcity of light, till the curtain drew up, and discovered a brilliant chandelier, which hung directly over the actors. The illumination of the stage cast the audience into deeper obscurity; therefore, of the company in the boxes Louis had very little cognizance, while the dresses and decorations of the opera, and the exquisite singing, might have filled him with admiration, had not the style of the music, reminded him of the first time he had heard the like, when the fair Italian sung in his uncle's castle. He recollected his consequent feelings that night; and humiliated in the remembrance, compared those hours of infatuation, with his admiration of Otteline, and exclaimed to himself--"What a slave have I been, to my eye and ear! Music, I shall never like again; and beauty I shall abhor!"

As there was little of the latter, excepting youth and a blooming complexion, in the smiling Amelia, to warn him of his abjuration; her incessant questions and remarks on what was going forward on the stage, amused him; and his attention to what she said, gratified the views of her mother.

Apostola Zero, the father of the regular Italian Opera, had been invited to Vienna by the Emperor; and to reward his acquiescence, Charles invested him with two dissimilar, but productive employments--Imperial historiographer, and poet of the court opera. The grateful Italian dedicated his comprehensive genius solely to his munificent patron; and the present performance was the first night of a new composition he had formed on the story of Proserpine. The last act was a representation of the infernal kingdom; laying bare the foundations of Ætna, and exhibiting all the terrors of the subterranean world. The curtain had hardly dropped, which it did in some confusion, when an extraordinary bustle was heard behind the scenes. Soon after, the theatre filled with smoke, and cries of fire were distinctly heard from behind. Persons from the boxes jumped on the stage, while the curtain was rent down by those before and behind it; and the scene of horror that was discovered to those, who were not so entirely absorbed in their fears but they could look around them, is not to be described. The fire was seen bursting in several directions; men were mounted aloft on the burning rafters, breaking down with their hatchets the combustible apparatus in the way. Water was dashing and streaming everywhere. The terrible light which filled the stage, too well pourtrayed the inside of a raging volcano; sheets of flame, like forked tongues, threw themselves forward from a thousand gaping mouths, licking the ceiling, and entering the boxes. Shrieks, and groans, and dismal cries, mingled with the iron clang of hammers, the fall of timber, and the rush of fire and of people, assailed the ear in one horrid moment of time.

At the first alarm, the ladies in the box with Louis, had been hurried out by him, and some other gentlemen who had joined them in the course of the evening. The poor little Amelia, true to nature, no sooner thought herself in danger, than breaking from the protecting arms of Louis, (who had caught her in them to hurry her through the pressing crowd), she threw herself upon the bosom of her mother, and fainted away. The Princess had more fortitude; and, assisted by hey nephew, bore out the insensible girl, while Louis and the other gentleman made a passage for them to the great door.

In passing the entrance of an obscure gallery, that led to an upper range of boxes, he distinguished, in the midst of the uproar, shrieks of peculiar distress. It was the very cry of agony and despair. Looking round for a moment, he saw that his present charges were well enough protected, and that he might safely leave them, to see and to succour this terrific appeal. But even in the instant he was turning to obey the impulse, he heard a fearful crash behind him; and a rush of people followed, who bore him and his party, like a flood, into the square before the theatre. All, then, was secure with them. But for the poor suppliant, whose cries had pierced his heart, she was either lost, or abandoned to the flames! At least, he would attempt to hear if her voice yet sounded. Struggling his way back through the last crowds who were making their escape, some, who felt him push by them in so destructive a direction, cried aloud,--"Whoever you seek must have perished. The top of the stage has fallen in, and the theatre is full of fire."

But Louis, still fancying he heard the voice, pressed more determinately forward, and soon found himself surrounded by smoke alone. No sounds were distinct, but the raging of the flames in the interior of the building, which roared in their work of destruction, like the temple of Eolus, with all its winds. The heat was so intense, that perspiration burst from all his pores; and the air around him was a burning vapour. He hesitated to advance; and while his lungs filled to suffocation, and the black smoke gleamed with horrid light, he was stepping back, when the shriek burst forth again. Louis flew to the sound. He rushed up a few steps into a narrow passage, answering the cries as he advanced, in a loud voice, promising help. At the extremity of the passage, which was short, he was interrupted by a closed door, on the other side of which was the terrified suppliant, shaking it with frantic violence. "I cannot open it!" cried she, in answer to his demand.

"Stand from it, then," said he.

He was obeyed; and dashing his foot against it, it flew from its hinges, and a lady instantly precipitated herself into his arms. Another started from her knees, and with a hardly articulate cry of joy, threw herself towards him. Louis clasped his almost insensible burthen firmly to his breast, and bade her trembling companion cling closely to him, as they must move swiftly, to have any chance of escape. He turned round, and the lady, winding her arm in his mantle, flew by his side, till they plunged at once into the dreadful smoke, now red with advancing flames. He dashed impetuously forward; and his almost stifled companion, partaking the desperate exertion, in a moment afterwards they found themselves, with the issuing volumes, on the platform of the portico.

He ran forward into the middle of the square, with his motionless load. Dangers of a different kind, now menaced them. The flying rafters from the consuming building, the pressure of people, with the throng of carriages, and every confusion attendant on so tremendous a scene. In an agitated voice, his companion asked him, whether he had strength to bear his insensible burthen to the opposite side of the quadrangle. Louis replied in the affirmative. She told him to go strait onwards to the convent of Saint Magdalen; and, as he obeyed, she clung closely to his arm.

When they arrived at the back of the convent, she let go her hold, and taking a key from her bosom, opened a little low door in the building, and whispered Louis to enter. When he was in, she locked the door again, and bid him follow her in silence. She walked hastily along a narrow stone passage, faintly lit by a few glimmering lamps. Opening an iron-grating at the end, she issued into a garden, which she as swiftly crossed; Louis still following, while the lady he carried, appeared to be reviving under the influence of the fresh air. A high dark structure rose on the other side, the top of which was illumined by the reflected flames, which now rose in spires from the burning theatre. In the side of this building was an arched door, surmounted by a cross. The lady opened it, and Louis followed her into a little chapel; thence, through several winding passages; till they brought him to a superb room, where he laid his charge, now warm with returning animation, on a sofa.

His fair guide instantly applied essences to the recovering senses of the lady, and in a few minutes she opened her eyes. He could only see this happy change, by the gleam which fell on them, as the lids slowly raised; for the apartment was immense, and only one wax-light stood on a distant table. A moment after, she spoke in a low, inarticulate voice; and looking round on the chamber, and then on Louis, who stood by her, she caught the hand of her anxious companion, and exclaimed with a cry of joy, "We are saved!--and, by whom!"

Her head dropped on the arm she had seized, and tears followed this burst of feeling. Her friend bent only her head, and whispered something in her ear, which Louis could not hear. The agitated lady replied, "No, no;" then raising herself from her weeping position, and sitting up on the couch, she said to Louis,--"I have no words in which to thank my preserver, and, I will not seek any to deceive him. Even by this light, I can see that I owe my life to the intrepid humanity of the Marquis de Montemar."

The other lady obeyed the motion of her friend's hand, and set the solitary candle on a stand near them. In the full light, Louis recognized the face of the Electress of Bavaria, in the person he had carried from the flames. He had no thought in the recognition, but satisfaction at having rescued female helplessness from so direful a death; and his reply was in unison with his feelings. It was not the Princess he saw before him, nor the enemy of himself and his father; but a woman, agitated from past terror, and grateful to him for having averted its horrid consummation.

She explained the dreadful state of despair, in which he had found her. For, hastening with her only attendant, Madame de Altenstein, through the box to the inner passage door, while attempting to open it, in the confusion of alarm she turned the key wrong, and having strained the lock by the violence of her first application, no effort could move it. She had then no resource, but cries for help, but they passed unnoticed. And when the terrible crash, at the outcry of the fallen roof, assailed her ear, in aimless phrenzy she would have rushed back into the box, and leaped over into the flames, had not her friend prevented her, by clinging to her knees. Again she flew to the door;--again she rent the air with her unavailing shrieks,--"till you came," continued she, "like a good angel, to my rescue!"

How different did the Electress appear now in the eyes of Louis, from what she had seemed in the two former times of his seeing her. In the boudoir of Countess Altheim, she looked, and expressed herself, with the proud acknowledgement of a superior, to the vassals who had done her service. At the fête in _la Favorita_, she gazed around in haughty carelessness, and remarked with contemptuous sarcasm, on every object. But now, she leaned on the sofa, conversing with him, with the frankness of one who felt that danger and obligation had rendered them equal; and her fine black eyes, large and luminous, as those of the wild gazel, shone on him with eloquent gratitude. In all she said, the force of her character appeared, in the strength of her understanding, and the energy of her feelings.

She explained the nature of the whisper which her confidential attendant had made in her ear, while she lay on her arm. It told her the Marquis de Montemar was her preserver; and it asked permission to dismiss him without farther discovery, "But," continued the Electress, "would I not trust with my fortune, he who has preserved my life?"

She then said, that should it be known to her enemies, that she had been at the Opera, they would blazon it abroad, as a decisive blow to her hold on the affections of the people. The year of mourning for her husband, was not yet expired; and should it be reported that she had been at any public place, before that stated period, the superstitious populace of Vienna, regarding it as a sacrilegious irreverence to the memory of the dead; would consider her, who had committed the act, as deserving excommunication from the Church,--repudiation from the Imperial family; and a declaration from the Empire, that she had forfeited all claims to her birthright.

"It is mere prejudice, that is against me;" said she, "but a prejudice, having nothing to do with reason, is inaccessible to argument; hence, I can only avoid its sentence by concealment."

In excuse for the rashness of having incurred so great a risk, for so trifling a gratification, she pleaded her attachment to music, the innocence of the amusement, and the frequency with which she had enjoyed its stolen pleasures without discovery. By the indulgence of the abbess of Saint Magdalen, who was the aunt of Madame de Altenstein, she passed through the convent garden, which joined the Bavarian palace; and thence, gliding along by remote passages in the sacred dwelling, always reached the Opera-house in security. No other person than Madame de Altenstein was ever her companion; and therefore, when danger came, as no one knew she was there, she had none to watch her safety, or to seek her preservation.

Louis listened to her animated discourse with admiration; but at times, saw a _fierté_ in her manner, that recalled to his recollection her who had sanctioned the several attempts on his father's life and his own.

She rose from the sofa, with a countenance full of noble sensibility; "come with me," said she, "and I will shew you the heir of my gratitude."

He obeyed the motion of her hand, as she passed before him with a light step into an adjoining room. It was a bed-chamber, and in the bed lay a boy in profound sleep. She approached him, and drew Louis to her side. She turned her eyes, brimming in radiant tears, from the child, to her preserver; and putting the hand of the little sleeper, into that of Louis, she gently pressed them together.

"This is my son," said she, in a suppressed voice, "and thus I commit him to the honour of a generous enemy."

Louis bent his lip to the cherubic hand that lay in his; and without a word, glided back with the Electress into the apartment they had left.

She then told him, that as the fortunes of herself and her son, depended on maintaining the affections of the major part of the citizens of Vienna; her fate was now in the power of his lips. In such a crisis, what was she to expect from his honour to her, or his devotedness to the Empress?

"My silence, on what has passed," replied Louis.

"Then I am your friend for ever!" cried the Electress, her eyes flashing a triumphant fire, and her lips parting with the smile of conscious power; "you, and you alone, shall share my confidence, with a man worthy to have been the adviser of Augustus. Come to me to-morrow night at this hour, and I will bind you, heart to heart, with the glory of manhood, undaunted Wharton!"

Louis started back.--She laid her hand on his arm.

"I know your bonds to the Empress, my ambitious, and unjust rival! Your father's views, and her glozing tongue, have fastened you there, beyond recall. It is not, then, your services as a partizan that I invoke; but to give your society to my private circle. You are my preserver! I repay you with my friendship; and that sentiment alone, I require in return."

She now held his hand. He felt there was no deception in this demand; no covert device; and the noble frankness of the speaker, so reminded him of the beloved friend whose heart she had offered him, that with irrepressible emotion he sunk upon his knee, and clasping the gracious hand he held, earnestly yet respectfully between his, he replied.

"My veneration, illustrious Princess, must ever be yours. But I am born to withstand my heart!--and while, in reverence to you, I keep an eternal silence on what has happened; in fidelity to myself, I must never venture again into this gracious presence!"

The Electress was not aware that the agitation which rendered his voice and his looks so touching, as he remained at her feet, was excited by tender remembrances of the friend he again abjured, in rejecting her society. She was pleased with what she regarded as proofs of sensibility to herself and her cause; and urged him, that if he feared to make his visits openly, they might be paid in secret. With brevity, and ingenuous freedom, he showed how impossible it was for the son of Ripperda, in his present notorious situation, (as the great promoter of all that concerned the pragmatic sanction;) to visit the adversary of such a decree, either openly or in secret. If openly, he must assign a reason for such apparent contradiction in conduct; and the only adequate reason, could not be given without injury to the Electress. Secret visits could not be made without a chance of detection; and that incurred, the ruin of his own honour must be the consequence.

"I see the cogency of your arguments," returned she, "but I grieve to allow them unanswerable. Fortune may yet favour us. You have twice assisted me in distress. If it happens a third time," added she, smiling impressively, "take care of your destiny!--At present I grant your release.--Silence must be our mutual bond, till we can meet in open day!"

"Silence, inviolable silence!" returned Louis, as he put her hand to his lips, and rose to withdraw.

"Altenstein," cried she, "give me that casket."

The lady obeyed; and the Electress, pressing a spring, opened it. She took out a small miniature of herself, set in plain gold.

"I intended this for the bosom of my best counsellor;" said she, "but he will not object the transfer to him who has preserved my life. Take it de Montemar. It will not, by word or action, betray your esteem for Maria of Bavaria."

"I need not the picture, since the image is stamped on my heart!" said Louis, pressing it to his breast, and then laying it back into the open casket; "I must not be the possessor of so dangerous a treasure."

A vivid colour kindled on the cheek of the Electress; and with a little elevation of her head, she closed the lid of the box upon the portrait, and said, "For a brave man, Marquis, you are a very coward!--But it shall be as you say.--Farewell, till more propitious hours."

Louis bowed.

"Altenstein," continued she, "shall conduct you out by a private door; and then----Farewell!"

She stretched her hand to him. He again put it to his lips; and as she instantly withdrew, he mechanically obeyed the summons of Madame, to follow her.

As the faithful _Lady of the Key_, (who certainly did not appear to have her name for nothing,) dismissed Louis from a little obscure door, into a back street, he observed three men approaching; at sight of him, they evidently drew back into the shadow; and as he passed them, the gleam of the lamps attached to this part of the Bavarian residence, fell on his face. Of this he was unconscious, and thinking no more of the eves-droppers, (on whom his absorbed attention had not cast a second look,) he walked swiftly along.

The observers were no other than Duke Wharton, and the two Spaniards, de Patinos and Orendayn. As soon as he had passed, de Patinos exclaimed; "surely, that is de Montemar!"

"And from the Bavarian palace by stealth!" remarked Orendayn, "what can it mean?"

Wharton was not less surprised than his companions, at a rencontre with Louis at so incredible a place; and the more so, to see him issue from a portal, which, to this instant, was sacred to his own regress at hours of untimely counsel. But surprise did not appear in him, by look, start, or exclamation.

"No;" replied he, with perfect indifference, "it is one Phaffenberg, who, I believe, has been thought like the Spanish secretary."

"By heaven," said the Count, "I never was so deceived in my life! The air of his figure, and the turn of his profile, I could have sworn to; but I now recollect, de Montemar went out a gay coxcomb, in embroidery and plumage, and this person is rather in dingy apparel."

"A poor scrivener!" replied Wharton, "so I know not how he could be otherwise."

With this observation they proceeded down the street, towards the consuming theatre. De Patinos believed he had been mistaken, and dismissed the subject of the hated de Montemar. But Orendayn, not less vindictive than his countryman, was more crafty; and suspecting the manner of Wharton, (his eyesight not being sufficiently clear to give him conviction,) walked on in silence, ruminating on future observation. For the Duke himself, though he discoursed on a thousand subjects, he thought of none but Louis, till he could hear his appearance at that door accounted for by the Electress herself.

END OF THE SECOND VOLUME.

Printed by A. Strahan,
New-Street-Square, London.

Transcriber's Notes

page 65 added period to (letter addressed to, The Chevalier de
Phaffenberg.)
page 94 seperate changed to separate (but in separate cells)
page 163 glimpes changed to glimpse (and the glimpse of the moon)
page 189 extra quote mark removed (to noble sacrifice! But,)
page 230 Impereal changed to Imperial (to the Imperial _boudoir_;)
page 231 Issabella changed to Isabella (had rendered Isabella)
page 253 Added missing " before stratagems
page 270 devested changed to divested (she proved herself divested
of any)
page 280 bossom changed to bosom (cherished in his bosom for his
father)
page 283 arroused changed to aroused (Louis aroused)
page 308 m changed to my (honours of my race)
page 319 removed duplicate "as" from (gorgeous as were these
ornaments)
page 376 vissage changed to visage (earthward visage!)

List of Archaic and Variable Spelling (not an exhaustive list)

achievement is spelled atchievement
portray is spelled pourtray
gulf is spelled gulph
eavesdroppers is spelled eves-droppers
harassed is spelled harrassed
ante-room is spelled anti-room
fabric is spelled fabrick
group is spelled groupe or group
burden is burthen
negotiator/negotiation are negociator/negociation
frenzy is spelled phrenzy