SCENE VIII
LADY MILFORD alone, in extreme agitation, gazing on the door by
which LOUISA left. At length she recovers from her stupor.
LADY MILFORD. What was that? What preys so on my heart? What said the unhappy one? Still, O heaven, the dreadful, damning words ring in my ears! "Take him! Take him!" What should I take, unfortunate? the bequest of your dying groan – the fearful legacy of your despair? Gracious heaven! am I then fallen so low? Am I so suddenly hurled from the towering throne of my pride that I greedily await what a beggar's generosity may throw me in the last struggle of death? "Take him! Take him!" And with what a tone was it uttered! – with what a look! What! Amelia! is it for this thou hast overleaped the bounds of thy sex? For this didst thou vaunt the glorious title of a free-born Briton, that thy boasted edifice of honor might sink before the nobler soul of a despised and lowly maiden? No, proud unfortunate! No! Amelia Milford may blush for shame, – but shall never be despised. I, too, have courage to resign. (She walks a few paces with a majestic gait.) Hide thyself, weak, suffering woman! Hence, ye sweet and golden dreams of love! Magnanimity alone be now my guide. These lovers are lost, or Amelia must withdraw her claim, and renounce the prince's heart. (After a pause, with animation.) It is determined! The dreadful obstacle is removed – broken are the bonds which bound me to the duke – torn from my bosom this raging passion. Virtue, into thy arms I throw myself. Receive thy repentant daughter. Ha! how happy do I feel! How suddenly relieved my heart, and how exalted! Glorious as the setting sun, will I this day descend from the pinnacle of my greatness; my grandeur shall expire with my love, and my own heart be the only sharer of my proud exile! (Going to her writing-table with a determined air.) It must be done at once – now, on the spot – before the recollection of Ferdinand renews the cruel conflict in my bosom! (She seats herself, and begins to write).
SCENE IX
LADY MILFORD, an ATTENDANT, SOPHIA, afterwards the MARSHAL,
and then SERVANTS.
SERVANT. Marshal von Kalb is in the ante-chamber, and brings a message from his highness.
LADY MILFORD (not hearing him in the eagerness of writing). How the illustrious puppet will stare! The idea is singular enough, I own, the presuming to astonish his serene numskull. In what confusion will his court be thrown! The whole country will be in a ferment.
SERVANT and SOPHIA. Marshal von Kalb, my lady!
LADY MILFORD (turning round). Who? the marshal? So much the better! Such creatures were designed by nature to carry the ass' panniers.
[Exit SERVANT.
SOPHIA (approaching anxiously). If I were not fearful, my lady, that you would think it presumption. (LADY MILFORD continuing to write eagerly.) Louisa Miller rushed madly to the hall – you are agitated – you speak to yourself. (LADY MILFORD continues writing.) I am quite alarmed. What can have happened? (The MARSHAL enters, making repeated bows at LADY MILFORD'S back; as she takes no notice of him, he comes nearer, stands behind her chair, touches the hem of her dress, and imprints a kiss on it, saying in a tremulous voice.) His serene highness —
LADY MILFORD (while she peruses hastily what she has written). He will tax me with black ingratitude! "I was poor and forsaken! He raised me from misery! From misery." Detestable exchange! Annul my bond, seducer! The blush of my eternal shame repays my debt with interest.
MARSHAL (after endeavoring in vain to catch her eye). Your ladyship seems somewhat absent. I take the liberty of permitting myself the boldness (very loud) – his serene highness, my lady, has sent me to inquire whether you mean to honor this evening's gala with your presence, or the theatre?
LADY MILFORD (rising, with a laugh). One or the other, sweet sir. In the meantime take this paper to your duke for his dessert. (To SOPHIA.) Do you, Sophia, give directions to have my carriage brought to the door without delay, and call my whole household together in this saloon.
SOPHIA (goes out in great astonishment). Heavens! What do I forebode? What will this end in?
MARSHAL. You seem excited, my lady!
LADY MILFORD. The greater the chance of my letting you into a little truth. Rejoice, my Lord Marshal! There is a place vacant at court. A fine time for panders. (As the MARSHAL throws a look of suspicion upon the paper.) Read it, read it! 'Tis my desire that the contents should be made public. (While he reads it, the domestics enter, and range themselves in the background.)
MARSHAL (reading). "Your highness – an engagement, broken by you so lightly, can no longer be binding on me. The happiness of your subjects was the condition of my love. For three years the deception has lasted. The veil at length falls from my eyes! I look with disgust on favors which are stained with the tears of your subjects. Bestow the love which I can no longer accept upon your weeping country, and learn from a British princess compassion to your German people. Within an hour I shall have quitted your dominions. JOANNA NORFOLK"
SERVANTS (exclaiming to each other in astonishment). Quitted the dominions!
MARSHAL (replaces the letter upon the table in terror). God forbid, my dear and most excellent lady! The bearer of such a letter would be as mad as the writer!
LADY MILFORD. That is your concern, you pink of a courtier! Alas! I am sorry to know that you, and such as you, would choke even in the utterance of what others dare to do. My advice is that you bake the letter in a venison pasty, so that his most serene highness may find it on his plate!
MARSHAL. God preserve me! What presumption! Ponder well, I entreat you. Reflect on the disgrace which you will bring down upon yourself, my lady!
LADY MILFORD (turning to the assembled domestics, and addressing them in the deepest emotion). You seem amazed, good people; and anxiously awaiting the solution of this riddle? Draw nearer, my friends! You have served me truly and affectionately; have looked into my eyes rather than my purse. My pleasure was your study, my approbation your pride! Woe is me, that the remembrance of your fidelity must be the record of my unworthiness! Unhappy fate, that the darkest season of my life should have been the brightest of yours! (Her eyes suffused with tears.) We must part, my children. Lady Milford has ceased to exist, and Joanna of Norfolk is too poor to repay your love. What little wealth I have my treasurer will share among you. This palace belongs to the duke. The poorest of you will quit it far richer than his mistress! Farewell, my children! (She extends her hand, which they all in turn kiss, with marks of sorrow and affection.) I understand you, my good people! Farewell! forever farewell! (Struggling with her feelings.) I hear the carriage at the door. (She tears herself away, and is hurrying out when the MARSHAL arrests her progress.) How, now? Pitiful creature, art thou still there?
MARSHAL (who all this while has been gazing in vacant astonishment at the letter). And must I be the person to put this letter into the most august hands of his most serene highness?
LADY MILFORD. Pitiful creature, even thou! Thou must deliver into his most august hands, and convey to his most august ears, that, as I cannot go barefoot to Loretto, I will support myself by the labor of my hands, that I may be purified from the disgrace of having condescended to rule him. (She hurries off – the rest silently disperse.)
ACT V
SCENE I. – Twilight; a room in MILLER'S house
LOUISA sits silent and motionless in a dark corner of the room,
her head reclining upon her hand. After a long pause, MILLER
enters with a lantern, the light of which he casts anxiously
round the chamber, without observing LOUISA, he then puts his
hat on the table, and sets down the lantern.
LOUISA, MILLER.
MILLER. She is not here either. No, she is not here! I have wandered through every street; I have sought her with every acquaintance; I have inquired at every door! No one has seen my child! (A silence of some moments.) Patience, poor unhappy father! Patience till morning; then perhaps the corpse of your only one may come floating to shore. Oh, God in heaven! What though my heart has hung too idolatrously upon this daughter, yet surely the punishment is severe! Heavenly Father! Surely it is severe! I will not murmur, Heavenly Father; but the punishment is indeed severe! (Throws himself sorrowfully into a chair.)
LOUISA (without moving from her seat). Thou dost well, wretched old man! Learn betimes to lose.
MILLER (starts up eagerly). Ah! art thou there, my child? Art thou there? But wherefore thus alone, and without a light?
LOUISA. Yet am I not alone. When all things around me are dark and gloomy then have I the companionship which most I love.
MILLER. God defend thee, my child! The worm of conscience alone wakes and watches with the owl; none shun the light but criminals and evil spirits.
LOUISA. And eternity, father, which speaks to the soul in solitude!
MILLER. Louisa, my child! What words are these?
LOUISA (rises, and comes forward). I have fought a hard fight – you know it, father! but God gave me the strength! The fight is over! Father, our sex is called timid and weak; believe it no more! We tremble at a spider, but the black monster, corruption, we hug to our arms in sport! This for your edification, father. Your Louisa is merry.
MILLER. I had rather you wept. It would, please me better.
LOUISA. How I will outwit him, father! How I shall cheat the tyrant! Love is more crafty than malice, and bolder – he knew not that, the man of the unlucky star! Oh! they are cunning so long as they have but to do with the head; but when they have to grapple with the heart the villains are at fault. He thought to seal his treachery with an oath! Oaths, father, may bind the living, but death dissolves even the iron bonds of the sacrament! Ferdinand will learn to know his Louisa. Father, will you deliver this letter for me? Will you do me the kindness?
MILLER. To whom, my child?
LOUISA. Strange question! Infinitude and my heart together had not space enough for a single thought but of him. To whom else should I write?
MILLER (anxiously). Hear me, Louisa! I must read this letter!
LOUISA. As you please, father! but you will not understand it. The characters lie there like inanimate corpses, and live but for the eye of love.
MILLER (reading). "You are betrayed, Ferdinand! An unparalleled piece of villany has dissolved the union of our hearts; but a dreadful vow binds my tongue, and your father has spies stationed upon every side. But, if thou hast courage, my beloved, I know a place where oaths no longer bind, and where spies cannot enter." (MILLER stops short, and gazes upon her steadfastly.)
LOUISA. Why that earnest look, father? Read what follows.
MILLER. "But thou must be fearless enough to wander through a gloomy path with no other guides than God and thy Louisa. Thou must have no companion but love; leave behind all thy hopes, all thy tumultuous wishes – thou wilt need nothing on this journey but thy heart. Darest thou come; then set out as the bell tolls twelve from the Carmelite Tower. Dost thou fear; then erase from the vocabulary of thy sex's virtues the word courage, for a maiden will have put thee to shame." (MILLER lays down the letter and fixes his eyes upon the ground in deep sorrow. At length he turns to LOUISA, and says, in a low, broken voice) Daughter, where is that place?
LOUISA. Don't you know it, father? Do you really not know it? 'Tis strange! I have described it unmistakably! Ferdinand will not fail to find it.
MILLER. Pray speak plainer!
LOUISA. I can think of no pleasing name for it just now! You must not be alarmed, father, if the name I give it has a terrible sound. That place, – Oh! why has no lover invented a name for it! He would have chosen the softest, the sweetest – that place, my dear father – but you must not interrupt me – that place is – the grave!
MILLER (staggering to a seat). Oh, God!
LOUISA (hastens to him, and supports him). Nay, father, be not alarmed! These are but terrors which hover round an empty word! Take away the name and the grave will seem to be a bridal-bed over which Aurora spreads her golden canopy and spring strews her fairest flowers. None but a groaning sinner pictures death as a skeleton; to others he is a gentle, smiling boy, blooming as the god of love, but not so false – a silent, ministering spirit who guides the exhausted pilgrim through the desert of eternity, unlocks for him the fairy palace of everlasting joy, invites him in with friendly smiles, and vanishes forever!
MILLER. What meanest thou, my child? Surely, thou wilt not lay guilty hands on thine own life?
LOUISA. Speak not thus, father! To quit a community from which I am already rejected, to fly voluntarily to a place from which I cannot much longer be absent, is that a sin?
MILLER. Suicide is the most horrible of sins, my child. 'Tis the only one that can never he repented, since death arrives at the moment the crime is committed.
LOUISA (stands motionless with horror). That is dreadful! But my death will not be so sudden, father. I will spring into the river, and while the waters are closing over me, cry to the Almighty for mercy and forgiveness!
MILLER. That is to say, you will repent the theft as soon as the treasure is secure! Daughter! Daughter! beware how you mock your God when you most need his help! Oh! you have gone far, far astray! You have forgotten the worship of your Creator, and he has withdrawn his protecting hand from you!
LOUISA. Is it, then, a crime to love, father?
MILLER. So long as thou lovest God thou wilt never love man to idolatry. Thou hast bowed me down low, my only one! low! very low! perhaps to the grave! Yet will I not increase the sadness of thy heart. Daughter! I gave vent to my feelings as I entered. I thought myself alone! Thou hast overheard me! and why should I longer conceal the truth. Thou wert my idol! Hear me, Louisa, if there is yet room in thy heart for a father's feelings. Thou wert my all! Of thine own thou hast nothing more to lose, but I have my all at stake! My life depends on thee! My hairs are turning gray, Louisa; they show that the time is drawing nigh with me when fathers look for a return of the capital invested in the hearts of their children. Wilt thou defraud me of this, Louisa? Wilt thou away and bear with thee all the wealth of thy father?
LOUISA (kissing his hand in the deepest emotion). No, father, no! I go from this world deeply in your debt, and will repay you with usury in the world to come.
MILLER. Beware, my child, lest thy reckoning should be false! (very earnestly and solemnly). Art thou certain that we shall meet in that world to come? Lo! how the color fades from thy cheek! My child must feel that I can scarcely overtake her in that other world if she hurries there before me. (LOUISA throws herself shuddering into his arms, he clasps her warmly to his bosom, and continues in a tone of fervent adjuration.) Oh! Louisa! Louisa! Fallen, perhaps already lost, daughter! Treasure in thy heart the solemn counsels of a father! I cannot eternally watch over thee! I may snatch the dagger from thy hands; but thou canst let out life with a bodkin. I may remove poison from thy reach; but thou canst strangle thyself with a necklace. Louisa! Louisa! I can only warn thee. Wilt thou rush boldly forward till the perfidious phantom which lured thee on vanishes at the awful brink of eternity? Wilt thou dare approach the throne of the Omniscient with the lie on thy lips? "At thy call am I here, Creator!" while thy guilty eyes are in search only of their mortal idol! And when thou shalt see this perishable god of thine own creation, a worm like thee, writhing at the Almighty's feet; when thou shalt hear him in the awful moment give the lie to thy guilty daring, and blast thy delusive hopes of eternal mercy, which the wretch implores in vain for himself; what then! (Louder and more fervently), What, then, unhappy one? (He clasps her still closer to his bosom, and gazes upon her with wild and piercing looks; then suddenly disengages himself.) I can do no more! (Raising his right hand towards heaven.) Immortal Judge, I can do no more to save this soul from ruin! Louisa, do what thou wilt. Offer up a sacrifice at the altar of this idolized youth that shall make thy evil genius howl for transport and thy good angels forsake thee in despair. Go on! Heap sin upon sin, – add to them this, the last, the heaviest, – and, if the scale be still too light throw in my curse to complete the measure. Here is a knife; pierce thy own heart, and (weeping aloud and rushing away), and with it, thy father's!
LOUISA (following and detaining him). Stay! stay! Oh! father, father! – to think that affection should wound more cruelly than a tyrant's rage! What shall I? – I cannot! – what must I do?
MILLER. If thy lover's kisses burn hotter than thy father's tears – then die!
LOUISA (after a violent internal struggle, firmly). Father! Here is my hand! I will – God! God! what am I doing! What would I? – father, I swear. Woe is me! Criminal that I am where'er I turn! Father, be it so! Ferdinand. God, look down upon the act! Thus I destroy the last memorial of him. (Tearing the letter.)
MILLER (throwing himself in ecstasy upon her neck). There spoke my daughter! Look up, my child! Thou hast lost a lover, but thou hast made a father happy. (Embracing her, and alternately laughing and crying.) My child! my child! I was not worthy to live so blest a moment! God knows how I, poor miserable sinner, became possessed of such an angel! My Louisa! My paradise! Oh! I know but little of love; but that to rend its bonds must be a bitter grief I can well believe!
LOUISA. But let us hasten from this place, my father! Let us fly from the city, where my companions scoff at me, and my good name is lost forever – let us away, far away, from a spot where every object tells of my ruined happiness, – let us fly if it be possible!
MILLER. Whither thou wilt, my daughter! The bread of the Lord grows everywhere, and He will grant ears to listen to my music. Yes! we will fly and leave all behind. I will set the story of your sorrows to the lute, and sing of the daughter who rent her own heart to preserve her father's. We will beg with the ballad from door to door, and sweet will be the alms bestowed by the hand of weeping sympathy!
SCENE II
The former; FERDINAND.
LOUISA (who perceives him first, throws herself shrieking into MILLER'S arms). God! There he is! I am lost!
MILLER. Who? Where?
LOUISA (points, with averted face, to the MAJOR, and presses closer to her father). 'Tis he! 'Tis he! himself! Look round, father, look round! – he comes to murder me!
MILLER (perceives him and starts back). How, baron? You here?
FERDINAND (approaches slowly, stands opposite to LOUISA, and fixes a stern and piercing look upon her. After a pause, he says). Stricken conscience, I thank thee! Thy confession is dreadful, but swift and true, and spares me the torment of an explanation! Good evening, Miller!
MILLER. For God's sake! baron, what seek you? What brings you hither? What means this surprise?
FERDINAND. I knew a time when the day was divided into seconds, when eagerness for my presence hung upon the weights of the tardy clock, and when every pulse-throb was counted until the moment of my coming. How is it that I now surprise?
MILLER. Oh, leave us, leave us, baron! If but one spark of humanity still linger in your bosom; – if you seek not utterly to destroy her whom you profess to love, fly from this house, stay not one moment longer. The blessing of God deserted us when your foot first crossed its threshold. You have brought misery under a roof where all before was joy and happiness. Are you not yet content? Do you seek to deepen the wound which your fatal passion has planted in the heart of my only child?
FERDINAND. Strange father, I have come to bring joyful tidings to your daughter.
MILLER. Perchance fresh hopes, to add to her despair. Away, away, thou messenger of ill! Thy looks belie thy words.
FERDINAND. At length the goal of my hopes appears in view! Lady Milford, the most fearful obstacle to our love, has this moment fled the land. My father sanctions my choice. Fate grows weary of persecuting us, and our propitious stars now blaze in the ascendant – I am come to fulfil my plighted troth, and to lead my bride to the altar.
MILLER. Dost thou hear him, my child? Dost thou hear him mock at thy cheated hopes? Oh, truly, baron! It is so worthy of the deceiver to make a jest of his own crime!
FERDINAND. You think I am jesting? By my honor I am not! My protestations are as true as the love of my Louisa, and I will keep them as sacred as she has kept her oaths. Nothing to me is more sacred. Can you still doubt? Still no joyful blush upon the cheek of my fair bride? 'Tis strange! Falsehood must needs be here the current coin, since truth finds so little credit. You mistrust my words, it seems? Then read this written testimony. (He throws LOUISA her letter to the MARSHAL. She opens it, and sinks upon the floor pale as death.)
MILLER (not observing this). What can this mean, baron? I do not understand you.
FERDINAND. (leads him to LOUISA). But your daughter has understood me well.
MILLER (throws himself on his knees beside her). Oh, God! my child!
FERDINAND. Pale as a corpse! 'Tis thus your daughter pleases me the best. Your demure and virtuous daughter was never half so lovely as with that deathlike paleness. The blast of the day of judgment, which strips the varnish from every lie, has wafted the painted colors from her cheek, or the juggler might have cheated even the angels of light. This is her fairest countenance. Now for the first time do I see it in its truth. Let me kiss it. (He approaches her.)
MILLER. Back! Away, boy! Trifle not with a father's feelings. I could not defend her from your caresses, but I can from your insults.
FERDINAND. What wouldst thou, old man? With thee I have naught to do. Engage not in a game so irrevocably lost. Or hast thou, too, been wiser than I thought? Hast thou employed the wisdom of thy sixty years in pandering to thy daughter's amours, and disgraced those hoary locks with the office of a pimp? Oh! if it be not so, wretched old man, then lay thyself down and die. There is still time. Thou mayest breathe by last in the sweet delusion, "I was a happy father!" Wait but a moment longer and thine own hand will dash to her infernal home this poisonous viper; thou wilt curse the gift, and him who gave it, and sink to the grave in blasphemy and despair. (To LOUISA.) Speak, wretched one, speak! Didst thou write this letter?
MILLER (to LOUISA, impressively). For God's sake, daughter, forget not! forget not!
LOUISA. Oh, father – that letter!
FERDINAND. Oh! that it should have fallen into the wrong hands. Now blessed be the accident! It has effected more than the most consummate prudence, and will at the day of judgment avail more than the united wisdom of sages. Accident, did I say? Oh! Providence directs, when a sparrow falls, why not when a devil is unmasked? But I will be answered! Didst thou write that letter?
MILLER (to LOUISA, in a tone of entreaty). Be firm, my child, be firm! But a single "Yes," and all will be over.
FERDINAND. Excellent! excellent! The father, too, is deceived! All, all are deceived by her! Look, how the perfidious one stands there; even her tongue refuses participation in her last lie. I adjure thee by that God so terrible and true – didst thou write that letter?
LOUISA (after a painful struggle, with firmness and decision). I did!
FERDINAND (stands aghast). No! As my soul liveth, thou hast lied. Even innocence itself, when extended on the rack, confesses crime which it never committed – I ask too passionately. Is it not so, Louisa? Thou didst but confess, because I asked passionately?
LOUISA. I confessed the truth!
FERDINAND. No, I tell thee! No! no! Thou didst not write that letter! It is not like thy hand! And, even though it were, why should it be more difficult to counterfeit a writing than to undo a heart? Tell me truly, Louisa! Yet no, no, do not! Thou mightest say yes again, and then I were lost forever. A lie, Louisa! A lie! Oh! if thou didst but know one now – if thou wouldst utter it with that open angelic mien – if thou wouldst but persuade mine ear and eye, though it should deceive my heart ever so monstrously! Oh, Louisa! Then might truth depart in the same breath – depart from our creation, and the sacred cause itself henceforth bow her stiff neck to the courtly arts of deception.
LOUISA. By the Almighty God! by Him who is so terrible and true! I did!
FERDINAND (after a pause, with the expression of the most heartfelt sorrow). Woman! Woman! With what a face thou standest now before me! Offer Paradise with that look, and even in the regions of the damned thou wilt find no purchaser. Didst thou know what thou wert to me, Louisa? Impossible! No! thou knewest not that thou wert my all – all! 'Tis a poor insignificant word! but eternity itself can scarcely circumscribe it. Within it systems of worlds can roll their mighty orbs. All! and to sport with it so wickedly. Oh, 'tis horrible.
LOUISA. Baron von Walter, you have heard my confession! I have pronounced my own condemnation! Now go! Fly from a house where you have been so unhappy.
FERDINAND. 'Tis well! 'tis well! You see I am calm; calm, too, they say, is the shuddering land through which the plague has swept. I am calm. Yet ere I go, Louisa, one more request! It shall be my last. My brain burns with fever! I need refreshment! Will you make me some lemonade?
[Exit LOUISA.