Volume III Part 42 (1/2)
”You think so, sir.”
”I am sure of it.”
”I thought so at first; but the a.s.sertions of her ladys.h.i.+p.”
”Her head, doubtless, has been weakened by illness, and visionaries always believe in their visions.”
”I ought to tell you also, sir, that at the moment when I left the chamber of the countess, one of her women, entered precipitately, saying, 'His highness will be here in an hour!'”
”It is the prince!” thought Polidori. ”He at the house of the Countess Sarah, whom he was never to see again! I do not know wherefore, but I do not like this meeting; it may make our position worse.” Then, turning to the clerk, he said, ”Once more I repeat that this is nothing. I will, however, inform M. Ferrand of what you have just related to me.”
CHAPTER XIV.
RUDOLPH AND SARAH.
We will conduct the reader to the countess's, whom a salutary crisis had s.n.a.t.c.hed from the delirium and sufferings which, during several days, had caused the most serious fears for her life. The day began to close. Sarah, seated in a large arm-chair, and supported by her brother, Thomas Seyton, was attentively surveying herself in a mirror, which was held by one of her women kneeling before her. This scene pa.s.sed in the saloon where La Chouette had made her murderous attempt. The countess was as pale as marble, which gave a bolder relief to her dark eyes and hair; an ample white muslin wrapper completely concealed her form.
”Give me the coral coronet,” she said to one of her women, in a weak but imperious voice.
”Betty will fasten it,” said Thomas Seyton; ”you will fatigue yourself; you are already so imprudent.”
”The coral!” repeated she, impatiently, as she took the jewel and placed it on her brow. ”Now fasten it, and leave me,” she added, to her women.
As they were retiring, she said,
”Let them show M. Ferrand into the little blue saloon; and,” she continued, with an expression of ill-concealed pride, ”as soon as his Serene Highness the Grand Duke of Gerolstein arrives, he must be ushered in here. At length,” said Sarah, throwing herself back in her chair as soon as she was alone with her brother, ”at length I touch this crown--the dream of my life! The prediction is about to be accomplished!”
”Sarah, calm your emotion,” said her brother, earnestly. ”Yesterday they still despaired of your life; disappointment now might cause a relapse.”
”You are right, Tom. The fall would be dreadful, for my hopes have never been nearer being realized than now! I am certain that what has prevented me from sinking under my sufferings has been my constant hope to profit by the important revelation which this woman made me at the moment when she stabbed me.”
”Even during your delirium you constantly referred to this idea.”
”Because this idea alone sustained my flickering life. What a hope!
Sovereign princess! almost a queen,” she added, with rapture.
”Once more, Sarah; no mad dreams; the awakening will be terrible!”
”Mad dreams? How! when Rudolph shall know that this young girl, now a prisoner at Saint Lazare, is our child, do you think that---”
Seyton interrupted his sister.
”I believe,” he replied, with bitterness, ”that princes place reasons of state and political proprieties before natural ties.”
”Do you count so little on my address?”
”The prince is not the same fond and enamored youth whom you seduced in days gone by.”
”Do you know why I have wished to ornament my hair with this band of coral?