第151章 CHAPTER XXXVIII. THE RIVALS.(1)

The baron had no sooner closed the door of the boudoir when the young Prince von Lichtenstein hastened to Fanny, and, impetuously seizing her hand, looked at her with a passionate and angry air.

"You did that for the purpose of giving me pain, I suppose?" he asked, with quivering lips. "You wished to prove to me that you did not confer any special favor upon me; Yesterday you were kind enough to assure me that no man ever had set foot into this room, and that I should be the first to whom it would be opened today; and I was such a conceited fool as to believe your beatifying words, and I rush hither as early as is permitted by decency and respect, and yet I do not find you alone."

"It was my husband who was here," said Fanny, almost deprecatingly.

"It was a man," he ejaculated, impetuously, "and you had given me the solemn assurance that this door had never yet opened to any man.

Oh, I had implored you on my knees, and with tearful eyes, to allow me to see you here to-day; it seemed to me as though the gates of paradise were to be at last opened to me; no sleep came into my eyes all night, the consciousness of my approaching bliss kept me awake; it was over me like a smiling cherub, and I was dreaming with open eyes. And now that the lazy, snail-like time has elapsed, now that I have arrived here, I find in my heaven, at the side of my cherub, a calculating machine, desecrating my paradise by vile accounts--"

"Pray do not go on in this manner," interrupted Fanny, sternly. "You found my husband here, and that, of course, dissolves the whole poetry of your words into plain prose, for she, whom in your enthusiastic strain you styled your cherub, is simply the wife of this noble and excellent man, whom you were free to compare with a calculating machine."

"You are angry with me!" exclaimed the young prince, disconsolately.

"You make no allowance for my grief, my disappointment, yea, my confusion! You have punished me so rudely for my presumption, and will not even permit my heart to bridle up and give utterance to its wrath."

"I did not know that you were presumptuous toward me, and could not think, therefore, of inflicting punishment on you," said Fanny; "but I know that you have no right to insult the man whose name I bear."

"You want to drive me to despair, then!" retorted the prince, wildly stamping on the floor. "It is not sufficient, then, that you let me find your husband here, you must even praise him before me! I will tell you why I was presumptuous. I was presumptuous inasmuch as I believed it to be a favor granted to me exclusively to enter this room, and you have punished me for this presumption by proving to me that this door opens to others, too, although you assured me yesterday that the contrary was the case."

"Then you question my word?" asked Fanny.

"Oh," he said, impetuously, "you do not question what you see with your own eyes."

"And, inasmuch as you have satisfied yourself of my duplicity with your own eyes, as you have seen that every one is at liberty to enter this room, and as you consequently cannot take any interest in prolonging your stay here, I would advise you to leave immediately," said Fanny, gravely.

"You show me the door? You turn me out!" exclaimed the prince, despairingly. "Oh, have mercy on me! No, do not turn away from me!

Look at me, read in my face the despair filling my soul. What, you still avert your head? I beseech you just grant me one glance; only tell me by the faintest smile that you will forgive me, and I will obey your orders, I will go, even if it should be only for the purpose of dying, not here before your eyes, but outside, on the threshold of your door."

"Ah, as if it were so easy to die!" ejaculated Fanny, turning her face toward the prince.

"You look at me--you have forgiven me, then!" exclaimed the young man, and impetuously kneeling down before her, he seized her hands and pressed them to his lips.

"Rise, sir, pray rise," said the baroness; "consider that somebody might come in. You know now that everybody is permitted to enter this room."

"No, no. I know that nobody is permitted to enter here!" he exclaimed, fervently; "I know that this room is a sanctuary which no uninitiated person ever entered; I know that this is the sacred cell in which your virgin heart exhaled its prayers and complaints, and which is only known to God; I know that no man's foot ever crossed this threshold, and I remain on my knees as if before a saint, to whom I confess my sins, and whom I implore to grant me absolution.

Will you forgive me?"

"I will," she said, smilingly, bending over him; "I will, if it were only to induce you to rise from your knees. And as you now perceive and regret your mistake, I will tell you the truth. It was an accident that the baron entered this room to-day, and it was the first time, too, since we were married. Nor did he come here, as he said, in delicate self-derision, for the purpose of settling accounts with me, but in order to fulfil a promise which he gave me five years ago, and which, I confess to my shame, I had forgotten, so that, instead of expecting my husband, I permitted you to come to me."

"I thank you for your kind words, which heal all the wounds of my heart like a soothing balm," replied the prince. "Oh, now I feel well again, and strong enough to conquer you in spite of the resistance of the whole world."

"And do you know, then, whether you will be able to conquer me in spite of my resistance?" asked Fanny, smiling.

"Yes!" he exclaimed, "I know it, for in true love there is a strength that will subdue and surmount all obstacles. And I love you truly; you know it, you are satisfied of it. You know that I love you; every breath, every look, every tremulous note of my voice tells you so. But you? do you love me? Oh, I implore you, at length have mercy on me. Speak one word of pity, of sympathy I Let me read it at least in your eyes, if your lips are too austere to utter it.

I have come to-day with the firm determination to receive at your hands my bliss or my doom. The torment of this incertitude kills me.

Fanny, tell me, do you love me?"