Part 19 (1/2)
”How is his----, I mean--you said he had a daughter?”
”No,” answered the hostess, whilst her cheerful face became clouded of a sudden, ”I certainly said nothing about her, that I am aware of. But he has a daughter, the good old man; and it had been much better for him that he went childless to the grave, rather than depart in sorrow on account of his only child.”
Albert could scarcely believe his ears at these words: what reason could the landlady have to throw out this allusion? ”What has happened to the young lady?” he asked, whilst he in vain sought to appear indifferent: ”you have excited my curiosity; or is it a secret you dare not divulge?”
The woman of the Golden Stag mysteriously looked around on all sides, to see that no one was listening; the burghers were quietly taken up with their own conversation, and paid no attention to them, and there was no one else in the room who could overhear them. ”You, I perceive, are a stranger,” she said, after her scrutiny; ”you are travelling further, and have nothing to do in this neighbourhood, so that I can communicate to you what I would not confide to every one. The lady who lives there on the Lichtenstein rock, is a----, a----yes; what the citizens with us would call, a wicked girl, a----”
”Landlady!” cried Albert.
”Don't speak so loud, worthy sir; the people will notice it. Do you suppose I would venture to say what I do not know to be certain truth?
Only think, every night as the clock strikes eleven, she lets her lover into the castle. Is not that wicked enough for a well-bred young lady?”
”Mind what you say! Her lover?”
”Yes, alas! at eleven o'clock in the night, her lover. Is it not a shame, a disgrace! He is a tall man, and comes to the gate enveloped in a grey cloak. She has so well arranged it, that all the servants are out of the way at that hour except the old porter of the gate, who has a.s.sisted her in all her wicked tricks from her childhood. When the clock strikes eleven in the village, she always comes herself down into the court, cold as it may be, and brings the keys of the drawbridge, which she beforehand steals from her father's bed; the old sinner, the porter, then opens the lock, lets down the bridge, when the man in the grey cloak hastens to the presence of the young lady.”
”And then?” asked Albert, who scarcely had any more breath in his breast, scarcely any more blood in his cheeks,--”and then?”
”Then she brings food, bread and wine: so much is certain, that the nightly lover must have an uncommon appet.i.te, for many nights running he has demolished half a haunch of roebuck, and drank three or four pints of wine; what else they do, I know not; I guess nothing, I say nothing; but I suppose,” she added, with an upward look to heaven, ”they don't pray.”
Albert was angry with himself, after a moment's reflection, for having doubted for an instant the falsehood of this narration, spun from some gossipping head; or, should there be any truth in it, it was impossible that Bertha could act with dishonour to herself. We are told that, though the pa.s.sion of love in the young men of the good old times was not less ardent than in our days, it bore more the character of idolized respect. It was the custom, in those days, for the lady wooed to think herself not only not upon an equality, but far superior to her suitor.
If we look to the romantic tales and love stories in old chronicles, we shall find many descriptions of enamoured knights allowing themselves to be cut to pieces on the spot, rather than doubt the faith and purity of their mistresses. Judging therefore from this fact, it is not surprising that Albert von Sturmfeder could not bring his mind to think ill of Bertha, and however puzzling these nocturnal visits appeared to him, he clearly perceived it had not been proved that her father was ignorant of the transaction, or that the mysterious man was her lover.
He mentioned these doubts to his hostess.
”Really! you suppose that her father is acquainted with it?” said she; ”not at all--I know it for a certainty, because old Rosel, the young lady's nurse----”
”Old Rosel said so?” cried Albert, involuntarily: the nurse, being the sister of the fifer of Hardt, was well known to him. If she had really said so, the case was no longer to be doubted, for he knew that she was a pious woman, and devoted to her charge.
”Do you know old Rosel?” she asked, wondering at the warmth with which her guest inquired after that woman.
”I know her? you forget that I come for the first time to-day in your neighbourhood; it was only the name of Rosel which struck me.”
Albert parried this question, being desirous the woman should not suspect he was acquainted with the Knight of Lichtenstein or his family.
”Don't they call her so in your country? Rosel means Rosina with us, and the old nurse in Lichtenstein goes by that name. But observe, she is a particular friend of mine, and comes now and then to see me, when I give her a gla.s.s of hot sweet wine, which she loves dearly, and out of grat.i.tude tells me all the news. What I have told you comes from her mouth. Old Lichtenstein knows nothing of the nocturnal visits, because he goes to bed regularly at eight o'clock; and his daughter sends her nurse every evening at eight o'clock also to her apartment. It struck the good Rosel, however, a few nights ago, that there must be some mysterious cause for this conduct. She pretended to go to bed,--and only think what happened? Scarcely was everything quiet in the castle, when the young lady, who otherwise never touches a chip of wood, laid heavy logs on the hearth with her own delicate hands, made a fire, cooked and roasted the best way she could, got wine out of the cellar, and bread out of the cupboard, and spread the table in the dining room.
She then opened the window and looked out in the cold dark night, when, just as the village clock struck eleven, the drawbridge rattled down on its chains, the nocturnal visitor entered, and went into the dining room with the young lady. Rosel has often listened in vain to hear the conversation between them, but the oak doors are very thick, and she peeped also once through the keyhole, but could only perceive the head of the stranger.”
”Well, is he an old man? What does he look like?”
”Old, indeed? what are you thinking about? She does not look like one who would put up with an old lover. Rosel told me he was young and handsome, with a dark beard on his chin and lip, beautiful smooth hair on his head, and looked very kind and gracious.”
”May Satan pluck hair for hair out of his beard!” muttered Albert, as he pa.s.sed his hand over his own chin, which was tolerably smooth.
”Woman! are you sure you have really heard all this from old Rosel?
Have you not added more than she told you?”
”G.o.d forbid that I should calumniate any one! You don't know me, sir knight! Rosel told me every word of it, and she suspects a great deal more, and whispered in my ear things which it does not become a respectable woman to relate to a young man. And only think how very wicked the young lady must be; she has had also another lover, to whom she is unfaithful.”
”Another?” asked Albert, to whom the narration appeared to gain more and more the semblance of truth.