CHAPTER XLVI
A WOMAN SCORNED
At nine I was at the door of the dark, silent house by the Weiss Thor. Isounded the knocker loudly, and with the end of the reverberations Iheard a foot come through the long passages. The panel behind slidnoiselessly in its grooves, and I was conscious that a pair of eyeslooked out at me.
"You are the servant of the strange Doctor?" said the voice of theservitor, Sir Respectable.
"That I am, as by this time you may have seen!" answered I, for I wasin no mood of mere politeness. I was venturing my life in the house ofmine enemy, and, at least, it would be no harm if I put a bold face onthe matter.
He opened the door, and again the same curious perfume was wafted downthe passages--something that I had never felt either in the Wolfsberg noryet even in the women's chambers of the Palace of Plassenburg.
At the door of the little room in which she had first received me so longago, the Lady Ysolinde was waiting for me.
She did not shut the door till Sir Respectable had betaken him down againto his own place. Then quite frankly and undisguisedly she took my hand,like one who had come to the end of make-believe.
"I knew you to-day in your disguise," she said; "it is an excellent one,and might deceive all save a woman who loves. Ah, you start. It mightdeceive the woman you love, but not the woman that loves you. I am notthe Princess to-night; I am Ysolinde, the Woman. I have no restraints, noconventions, no laws, no religions to-night--save the law of a woman'sneed and the religion of a woman's passion."
I stood before her, scarce knowing what to say.
"Sit down," she said; "it is a long story, and yet I will not weary you,Hugo--so much I promise you."
I made answer to her, still standing up.
"To-night, my lady, after what you know, you will not be surprised that Ican think of only one thing. You know that to-day--"
"I know," she said, cutting me short, as if she did not wish tolisten to that which I might say next; "I know--I was present in theJudgment Hall."
"Then, being Master Gerard's daughter, you knew also the sentence beforeit was pronounced!" I said, bitterly, being certain as that I lived thatthe paper from which the Duke Otho read had been penned at this veryhouse of the Weiss Thor in which I now sat.
Ysolinde reached a slender hand to me, as was often her wont insteadof speech.
"Be patient to-night," she said; "I am trying hard to do that which isbest--for myself first, as a woman must in a woman's affairs. But, as Godsees me, for others also! You are a man, but I pray you think withfairness of the fight I, a lonely, unloved woman, have to fight."
"Will they carry out the terrible sentence?" said I, eagerly. For Ijudged that she must be in her father's counsels.
"Be patient," she said; "we will come to that presently."
Ysolinde sat silent a while, and when I would have spoken furthershe moved her hand a little impatiently aside, in sign that I wasnot to interrupt. Yet even this was not done in her old imperiousmanner, but rather sadly and with a certain wistful gentleness whichwent to my heart.
When she spoke again it was in the same even voice with which she hadformerly told my fortune in that very room.
"That which I have to say to you is a thing strange--as it may seemunwomanly. But then, I did not ask God to make me a woman, andcertainly he did not make me as other women. I have never had a truemate, never won the love which God owes to every man and woman Hebrings into the world.
"Then I mot you, not by any seeking of mine. Next, equally against mywill, I loved you. Nay, do not start to-night. It is as well to put thematter plainly."
"You did not _love_ me," said I; "you were but kind to me, the unworthyson of the Executioner of Thorn. Out of your good heart you did it."
I acknowledge that I spoke like a paltering knave, but in truth knew notwhat to say.
"I loved you--yes, and I love you!" she said, serenely, as though mywords had been the twittering of a bird on the roof. "And I am notashamed. There was indeed no reason for my folly--no beauty, nodesirableness in you. But--I loved you. Pass! Let it be. We will beginfrom there. You loved, or thought you loved, a maid--your LittlePlaymate. Pshaw, you loved her not! Or not as I count love. I was proud,accustomed to command, and, besides, a Prince's wife. The last,doubtless, should have held me apart. Yet my Princessdom was but as strawbands cast into the fire to bind the flame. As for you, Hugo Gottfried,you were in love with your success, your future, and, most of all, withyour confident, insolently dullard self."
She smiled bitterly, and, because the thing she spoke was partly true, Ihad still nothing to answer her.
"Hugo Gottfried," she said, "try to remember if, when we rode toPlassenburg in the pleasant weather of that old spring, you loved thisgirl whom now you love?"
"Aye," said I, "loved her then, even as I love her now."
"You lie," she answered, calmly, not like one in anger, but as one whomakes a necessary correction, "you loved her not. You were ready to loveme--glad, too, that I should love you. And since you knew not then of myrank, it was not done for the sake of any advancement in Plassenburg."
I felt again the great disadvantage I was under in speaking to the LadyYsolinde. I never had a word to say but she could put three to it. Mybest speeches sounded empty, selfish, vain beside hers. And so was itever. By deeds alone could I vanquish her, and perhaps by a certaindogged masculine persistence.
"Princess," I said to her, "you have asked me to meet you here. It is notof the past, nor yet of likings, imaginings, recriminations that I mustspeak. My love, my sister, my playmate, bound to me by a thousand ancienttendernesses, lies in prison in this city of Thorn, under sentence of acruel death. Will you help me to release her? I think that with yourfather, and therefore with you, is the power to open her prison doors!"
"And what is there then for me?" cried the Lady Ysolinde, instantly,bending her head forward, her emerald eyes so great and clear that theirshining seemed to cover all her face as a wave covers a rock atflood-tide.
"What for me?" she repeated, in the silence which followed.
"For you," said I, "the gladness to have saved an innocent life."
"Tush!" she cried, with a gesture of extravagant contempt. "You mistake;I am no good-deeds monger, to give my bread and butter to the nextbeggar-lass. I tell you I am the woman who came first out of the womb ofMother-earth. I will yield only that which is snatched from me. What ismine is more mine than another's, because I would suffer, dare, sin, defya world of men and women in order to keep it, to possess it, to have itall alone to myself!"
"But," I answered, "who am I, that so great a lady should love me? Whatam I to you, Princess, more than another?"
"_That_ I know not!" she answered, swiftly. "Only God knows that. Perhapsmy curse, my punishment. My husband is a far better, truer, nobler manthan you, Hugo. I know it; but what of that, when I love him not? Lovegoes not by the rungs in a ladder, stands not with the most noble on thehighest step, is not bestowed, like the rewards in a child's school, tothe most deserving. I love you, Hugo Gottfried, it is true. But I wish athousand times that I did not. Nevertheless--I do! Therefore make yourreckoning with that, and put aside puling shams and whimperingsubterfuges."
This set me all on edge, and I asked a question.
"What, then, do you propose? Where, shall this comedy end?"
"End!" she said--"end! Aye, of course, men must ever look to an end.Women are content with a continuance. That you should love me and keep onloving me, that is all I want!"
"But," I began, "I love--"
"Ah, do not say it!" she cried, pitifully, clasping her hands with acertain swift appeal in her voice--"do not say it! For God's sake, forthe sake of innocent blood, do not say that you love me not!"
She paused a moment, and grew more pensive as she looked stilly andsolemnly at me.
"I will tell you the end that I see; only be patient and answer notbefore I have done. I have seen a vision--thrice have I seen it. Karl ofPlassenburg, m
y husband, shall die. I have seen the Black Cloak thriceenvelop him. It is the sign. No man hath ever escaped that omen--aye, andif I choose, it shall wrap him about speedily. More, I have seen you siton the throne of Plassenburg and of the Mark, with a Princess by yourside. It is _not_ only my fancy. Even as in the old time I read yourpresent fortune, so, for good or ill, this thing also is coming to you."
She never took her eyes from my face.
"Now listen well and be slow to speak. The Princedom and the power shallboth fall to me when my husband dies. There are none other hands capable.So also is it arranged in his will. Here"--she broke off suddenly, aswith a gesture of infinite surrender she thrust out her white handstowards me--"here is my kingdom and me. Take us both, for we areyours--yours--yours!"
I took her hands gently in mine and kissed them.
"Lady, Lady Ysolinde," I said, "you honor me, you overwhelm me, I knownot what to say. But think! The Prince is well, full of health and thehope of years. This thought of yours is but a vision, a delusion--how canwe speak of the thing that is not?"
"I wait your answer," she said, leaving her hands still in mine, but now,as it were, on sufferance. Then, indeed, I was torn between the love thatI had in my heart for my dear and the need of pleasing the LadyYsolinde--between the truth and my desire to save Helene. Almost it wasin my heart to declare that I loved the Lady Ysolinde, and to promisethat I should do all she asked. But though, when need hath been, I havelied back and forth in my time, and thought no shame, something stuck inmy throat now; and I felt that if I denied my love, who lay prison-boundthat night, I should never come within the mercy of God, but be foreveralien and outcast from any commonwealth of honorable men.
"I cannot, Lady Ysolinde," I answered, at last. "The love of the maidhath so grown into my heart that I cannot root it out at a word. It ishere, and it fills all my life!"
Again she interrupted me.
"See," she said, speaking quickly and eagerly, "they tell me this yourHelene is an angel of mercy to the sick. If she is spared she will becontent to give her life to works of good intent among the poor. Thiscannot be life and death to her as it is to me. Her love is not as thelove of a woman like Ysolinde. It is not for any one man to possess inmonopoly. Though you may deceive yourself and think that it will be fixedand centred on you. But she will never love you as I love you. See, Iwould knee to you, pray to you on my knees, make myself a suppliant--I,Ysolinde that am a princess! With you, Hugo, I have no pride, no shame. Iwould take your love by violence, as a strong man surpriseth and takeththe heart of a maid."
She was now all trembling and distract, her lips red, her eyes bright,her hands clasped and trembling as they were strained palm to palm.
"Lady Ysolinde, I would that this were not so," I began.
A new quick spasm passed over her face. I think it came across her thatmy heart was wavering. "God knows that I, Hugo Gottfried, am not worthall this!"
"Nay," she said, with a kind of joy in her voice and in her eyes, "thatmatters not. Ysolinde of Plassenburg is as a child that must have its toyor die. Worthiness has no more to do with love than creeds and dogmas.Love me--Hugo--love me even a little. Put me not away. I will be so true,so willing. I will run your errands, wait on you, stand behind you inbattle, in council lead you to fame and great glory. For you, Hugo, Iwill watch the faces of others, detect your enemies, unite yourwell-wishers, mark the failing favor of your friends. What heart sostrong, what eye so keen as mine--for the greater the love the sharperthe eye to mark, prevent, countermine. And this maid, so cold and icy, sofull of good works and the abounding fame of saintliness, let her livefor the healing of the people, for the love of God and man both, and itliketh her. She shall be abbess of our greatest convent. She shall indeedbe the Saint Helena of the North. Even now I will save her from death andgive her refuge. I promise it. I have the power in my hands. Only do you,Hugo Gottfried, give me your love, your life, yourself!"
She was standing before me now, and had her arms about my neck. I feltthem quiver upon my shoulders. Her eyes looked directly up into mine, andwhether they were the eyes of an angel or of a tempting fiend I could nottell. Very lovely, at any rate, they were, and might have tempted evenSaint Anthony to sin.
"Ysolinde," I said, at last, "it is small wonder that I am stronglymoved; you have offered me great things to-night. I feel my heart veryhumble and unworthy. I deserve not your love. I am but a man, a soldier,dull and slow. Were it not for one man and one woman it should be as yousay. But Karl of Plassenburg is my good master, my loyal friend. Heleneis my true love. I beseech you put this thought from you, dear lady, andbe once more my true Princess, I your liege subject--faithful, full ofreverence and devotion till life shall end!"
As I spoke she drew herself away from me. My hand had unconsciouslyrested on her hair, for at first she had leaned her head towards me. WhenI had finished she took my hand by the wrist and gripped it as if shewould choke a snake ere she dropped it at arm's-length. I knew that ourinterview was at an end.
"Go!" she commanded, pointing to the door. "One day you shall know howprecious is the love you have so lightly cast aside. In a dark, dreadhour, you, Hugo Gottfried, shall sue as a suppliant. And I shall denyyou. There shall come a day when you shall abase yourself--even as youhave seen Ysolinde the Princess abase herself to Hugo, the son of the RedAxe of the Wolf mark. Go, I tell you! Go--ere I slay you with my knife!"
And she flashed a keen double-edged blade from some recess of her silkenserpentine dress.
"My lady, hear me," I pleaded. "Out of the depths of my heart Iprotest to you--"
"Bah!" she cried, with a sudden uprising of tigerish fierceness in hereyes, quick and chill as the glitter of her steel. "Go, I tell you, ere Ibe tempted to strike! _Your heart!_ Why, man, there is nothing in yourheart but empty words out of monks' copy-books and proverbs dry androtten as last year's leaves. Ye have seen me abased. By the lords ofhell, I will abase you, Executioner's son! Aye, and you yourself, HugoGottfried, shall work out in flowing blood and bitter tears the doom ofthe pale trembling girl for whom you have rejected and despised Ysolinde,Princess of Plassenburg!"