*CHAPTER V*
*THE GROTTOS OF EGERIA*
For the following day the Senator of Rome had arranged a Festival ofPan, and the place appointed for the divertissement was one which theSeneschal of the Decameron might have chosen as fit for the reception ofhis luxurious masters, where every object was in harmony with thedelicious and charmed existence which they had devised in defiance ofDeath. Arcades of vines, bright with the gold and russet foliage ofautumn, ascended in winding terraces to a height, on which theyconverged, forming a spacious canopy over an expanse of brightestemerald turf, inlaid with a mosaic of flowers. In the centre there wasa fountain, which sent its spray to a great height in the clear air,refreshing soul and body with the harmony of its waters. Between theinterstices of the vines, magnificent views of the whole surroundingcountry were offered to the eye, to which feature perhaps, or to theeffect of a dazzling variety of late roses, which grew among the vines,and the lofty cypresses which made the elevation a conspicuous object inevery direction, it owes its present designation of Belvedere.
Stephania's spell had worked powerfully on its intended victim.Surrounded by everything which could kindle the fires of Love andstimulate the imagination, exposed to the influence of her marvellousbeauty and the infinite charm of her individuality, Otto was devoured bya passion, which hourly increased, despite the struggle which he putforth to resist it. Stephania's absence had taught him how necessaryshe had become to his existence, and although he was well informed thatshe rarely quitted Castel San Angelo, he was yet tortured by the wildestfancies, entirely oblivious that he had given all his youth, his love,his heart to a beautiful phantom,--the wife of another, who could neverbe his own. And though he endeavoured to reason with his madness,though he questioned himself where it would lead to, in what strangemanner he had absorbed the poison which rioted in his system, it was ofno avail. The dictates of Fate vanquish the paltry laws of mortals.This love had come to him unbidden--uncalled. Why must the soul remainfor ever isolated when the unbounded feast of beauty was spread to allthe senses? And was it not too late to retreat? It was the last trumpof the tempter.
He won.
As he approached the Minotaurus, Otto's hope brightened with the tintsof the rainbow. For the first time since his return from Monte Garganohe had discarded his usual cumbrous habiliments, and though his garb wasstill that prescribed by the court ceremonial, it added much to displayhis princely person to advantage. Confiding much more in the secrecy ofhis movements than in the protection of his attendants, Otto had leftthe palace on the Aventine unobserved and arrived in the vale of Egeriawith a whirl of passion and a rush of recollections, which not only tookfrom him all power, but every wish of resistance,--a far more dangeroussymptom.
Stephania's duenna was in waiting and informed him that the latter haddismissed her ladies to amuse themselves at their pleasure in thegardens, while Stephania herself was wreathing a garland for the eveningin the Egerian Grotto, which formed the centre of the fantasticlabyrinth called the Minotaurus, from an antique statue of the monsterwhich adorned it. Slipping a ring of great value on the old dame'sfinger, as a testimony, he said, of his gratitude, for watching over hermistress, Otto hastened onward. His heart beat so heavily when he camewithin view of the rose-matted arches leading to the ancient grotto,that he was obliged to pause to recover his breath. At that moment avoice fell upon his ear, but it was not the voice of Stephania, and witha feeling almost of suffocation in the intensity of his passion, Ottodrew aside the foliage to ascertain whether or not his senses had beliedhim.
The figure of the Minotaurus was cast in bronze, a monstrous bull,crouched, head to the ground, on the marble pavement of the temple.Passing the statue, Otto made for the grotto indicated by his guide,and, raising the tapestry of ivy, which concealed it, disappearedwithin. Guided by the warm evening light to its entrance, he hesitatedas if apprehending some treachery. Then, with quick determination hegroped his way into the cavern, paused somewhat suddenly and lookedabout.
It was deserted, but a faint glimmer lured him to the background, wherea fountain gleamed in the purple twilight.
"Rash mortal," said a voice, in tones that made his heart jump to histhroat, "I think you are now as near as devout worshippers are wont toapproach to my waves, though, as one of the initiated, the vestal nymphsof these caves bid you very welcome."
"I have kept my faith," Otto replied, pausing before the veiledapparition which sat on the rim of the fountain. "But your veil hidesyou as effectually from my gaze as a mountain."
His agitation betrayed itself in his wavering tones.
"Are you afraid," she asked, noting his hesitancy, "lest I should provethe fiend who tempted Cyprianus?"
"All fears redouble in the darkness. Let me see your face!"
"Why have you come here?"
"Why have you summoned me?"
"Perhaps to test your courage."
"I fear nothing!"
"One word of mine, one gesture,--and you are my prisoner."
Otto remained standing. His face was pale, but no trace of fearappeared thereon.
"I trust you."
"I am a Roman,--and your enemy! I am the enemy of your people!"
"I trust you!"
"Suppose I had lured you hither to end for ever this unbearable state?"
"I trust you!"
Stephania's eyes cowered beneath Otto's gaze. Rising abruptly sheaverted her head, but every trace of colour had left her face as sheraised the veil. Then she turned slowly and extended her hand. Ottograsped it, pressing it to his lips in an ecstasy of joy, then he drewher down to the seat she had abandoned, kneeling by her side.
For a moment she gazed at him thoughtfully.
"What do you want of me?" she then asked abruptly.
"I would have you be my friend," he stammered, idol-worship in his eyes.
"Is a woman's friendship so rare a commodity, that you come to me?" shereplied, drawing her hand from him.
"I have never known woman's love nor friendship,--and it is yours Iwant."
Stephania drew a long breath. Truly,--it required no effort on her partto lead him on. He made her task an easy one. Yet there rose in herheart a spark of pity. The complete trust of this boy-king was to thewife of Crescentius a novel sensation in the atmosphere of doubt andsuspicion in which she had grown up. It was almost a pity to shatterthe temple in which he had placed her as goddess.
The mood held sway but a moment, then with a cry of delirious gayety,she wrote the word "Friendship" rapidly on the water.
"Look," she said, "scarcely a ripple remains! That is the end. Let usbut add another word, 'Farewell'--and let the trace it shall leave tellwhen we shall meet again."
The words died on Otto's lips. He could not fathom the lightning changewhich had come over her. With mingled sadness and passion he gazed uponthe lovely face, so pale and cold.
"Let us not part thus," he stammered.
Stephania had risen abruptly, shaking herself free of his kneeling form.
"What is it all to lead to?" she questioned.
Otto rose slowly to his feet. Reeling as if stunned by a blow, hestaggered after her.
"Do not leave me thus," he begged with outstretched arms.
Stephania started away from him, as if in terror.
"Do not touch me,--as you are a man--"
Otto's hand went to his head. Was he waking? Was he dreaming? Wasthis the same woman who had but a moment ago--
He had not time to think out the thought.
He felt his neck encircled by an airy form and arms, and lips whosesweetness made his senses reel were breathlessly pressed upon his own.
But for an evanescent instant the sensation endured.
A voice whispered low: "Otto!"
When he tried to embrace the mocking phantom he grasped the empty air.
He rushed madly forward, but at this instant there arose a wild uproarand cl
amour around him. The silver moon on the fountain burst into ablaze of whirling light, which illumined the whole grotto. The shrillsummons of a bell was to be heard as from the depths of the fountain,and suddenly the verdant precincts were crowded with a mostextraordinary company, shouting, hooting, laughing, yelling, and wavingtorches. Satyrs, nymphs, fauns, and all varieties of sylvan deitiespoured out of every nook and cranny by which there was an entrance, allshrieking execration on the profaner of the sacred solitudes andbrandishing sundry weapons appropriate to their qualities. The satyrswielded their crooked staves, the fauns their stiff pine-wreaths, thenymphs their branches of oak, and a loud clamour arose. But by far themost formidable personages were a number of shepherds with hugeboar-spears, who made their appearance on every side.
"Pan! Pan!" shouted a hundred voices. "Come and judge the mortal whohas dared to profane thy solitudes. Echo--where is Pan?"
Distant and faint the cry came back:
"Pan! Where is Pan?"
For a moment Otto stood rooted to the spot, believing himself in alltruth surrounded by the rural gods of antiquity. He stared at the scenebefore him as on some strange sorcery. But suddenly a suspicion rushedupon him that he was betrayed, either to be made the jest of a companyof carnival's revellers, or, perhaps, the object of vengeance of theSenator of Rome.
Gazing round with a quick fear in his heart, at finding himself thuscompletely surrounded, and meditating whether to attempt a forcibleescape, he was startled by the shrill shriek of sylvan pipes andattended by a riotous company of satyrs, Pan on his goat-legs hobbledinto the grotto, the satyrs playing a wild march on their oaken reeds.
"Silence! Where is the guilty nymph who has lured the mortal hither?"shouted the sylvan god.
"Egeria! Egeria!" resounded numerous accusing voices.
"At thine old tricks again luring wisdom whither it should least come?"questioned Pan, severely. "Yes, hide thyself in thy blushing waves!But the mortal,--where is he?"
"Here! Here!" exclaimed the nymphs with one voice. "Had it been oldSilenus or one of his satyrs,--we had not wondered."
"The King! the King!" resounded on all sides amidst a general outburstof laughter.
Otto became more and more convinced that the scene had been enacted tomock him, and though he did not understand the drift of their purpose,at which Stephania had doubtlessly connived, a cold hand seemed toclutch his heart.
"In very truth, you have the laughing side of the jest," he turned tothe Sylvan god. "But if you will confront me with the nymph, I willprove that at least we ought to share in equal punishment," Ottoconcluded his defence, endeavouring to make the best of his dangerousposition.
"This shall not be!" exclaimed a nymph near by. "Bring him along andour queen shall judge him."
Ere Otto could give vent to remonstrance, he found himself hemmed in bythe shepherds with their spears. His doubts as to the ultimate purposeof the revellers seemed now to call for some imperative decision, butwhile he remembered the dismal legends of these haunts, his lips stilltingled with the magic fire of Stephania's kiss and it seemed impossibleto him that she could really mean to harm him. Still he had gravemisgivings, when suddenly a mocking voice saluted him and into the cavestrode Johannes Crescentius, Senator of Rome,--apparently from thevalley without, a smiling look of welcome on his face.
"Fear nothing, King Otto," he said jovially. "Your sentence shall notbe too severe. Your forfeit shall be light, if you will but discoverand point out to us the nymph who usurped the part of Egeria, that wemay further address ourselves to her for her reprehensible conduct."
The feelings with which Otto listened to this beguiling and perhapsperfidious statement may be imagined. But he replied with greatpresence of mind.
"It were a vain effort indeed to recognize one nymph from another in thegloom. Lead on then, since it is the Senator of Rome who guarantees myimmunity from the fate of Orpheus."
Marching like a prisoner of war and surrounded by the shepherd spearmen,Otto affected to enter into the spirit of the jest and suffered himselfquietly to be bound with chains of ivy which the least effort could snapasunder. The moment he stepped forth from the grotto his path was besetby a multitude of the most extraordinary phantoms. The surroundingwoods teemed with the wildest excrescences of pagan worship; statuestook life; every tree yielded its sleeping Dryad; strange melodiesresounded in every direction; Nayades rose in the stream and laughinglyshowered their spray upon him. With a cheerful hunting blast Diana andher huntresses appeared on an overhanging rock and darted blunt arrowswith gilded heads at him, until he arrived at an avenue of lofty elms,whose overarching branches, filigreed by the crimson after-glow ofdeparting day, resembled the interior of a Gothic cathedral and formed anatural hall of audience fit for the rural divinities. Bosquets oforange trees, whose ivory tinted blossoms gleamed like huge pearls outof the dark green of the foliage, wafted an inexpressibly sweet perfumeon the air.
The vista terminated in an open, semi-circular court, surrounded byterraces of richest emerald hue, in the midst of which rose animprovised throne. The rising moon shone upon it with a light, likethat of a rayless sun, and Otto discovered that the terraces werethronged with a splendid court, assembled round a woman who occupied thethrone.
As the prisoner approached, environed by his grotesque captors, laughteras inextinguishable as that which shook the ancient gods of Olympus on asimilar occasion, resounded among the occupants of the terrace.Continuing his forced advance, Otto discovered with a strange beating ofthe heart in the splendidly attired queen, Stephania, the wife ofCrescentius.
A bodice of silver-tissue confined her matchless form, which with everyheave of her bosom threw iridescent gleams, and a diadem which shone aswith stars, so bright were its jewels, flashed upon her brow.
She looked a queen indeed, and but for the ivory pallor of her face itwould have been impossible to guess that she was in any way concernedwith the object of the strange pageant, which now approached her throne.
The sphinx-like countenance of the Senator of Rome seemed to evince novery great enthusiasm in the frolic; the invited guests appeared not toknow how to look, and took their cue from the Lord of Castel San Angelo.
When Otto was at last brought face to face with his fair judge, his ownpallor equalled that of Stephania, and both resembled rather two marblestatues than beings of flesh and blood. Stephania's lips were tightlycompressed, and when Pan recited his accusation, complaining of anattempt to profane his solitudes and to misguide one of his chastestnymphs, so far from overwhelming the culprit with the laughing railleryof which she was mistress and an outburst of which all seemed to expect,Stephania was silent and kept her eyes fixed on the ground, as if shefeared to raise them and to meet Otto's burning gaze.
"Answer, King of the Germans," urged Crescentius with a smile, "else youare lost!"
"The charges are too vague," Otto replied. "Let Pan, if he has anywitness, of what has happened, allege particulars--and if he does--byhis crooked staff, even my accusers shall acquit me without denial on mypart."
General mutterings and suppressed laughter followed this singulardefence, during which Stephania's countenance took all the pallid tints,which the return of his consciousness and dignity had chased from Otto'scheeks.
But she did not think it wise to prolong the scene.
"Since the august offender," she said hastily and without lifting herlong silken lashes, "cannot discover among my retinue the nymph whoenticed him into the grotto, I pronounce this sentence upon him: 'Lethis ignorance be perpetual.'"
Then she invited him to a seat in the circle over which she presided andher graciousness obviously caused Otto's spirits to rise, for, startingup, as it were, into new existence at the word, he took his station in amanner which enabled him to see Stephania's face and her glorious eyes.
At the beck of her hand there now approached a band of musicians and theeffect of their harmonies beneath the hushed and now star-resplendentskies was inexpressibly
delicious. The dreams of Elysium seemed to berealized. These indeed seemed to be the happy fields, in the atmosphereof which the delighted spirit was consoled for every woe, and as Ottoalmost unwittingly gazed upon the woman before him, so passionatelyloved and to him lost for ever; as he marked the languor and melancholywhich had stolen over her countenance, he could hardly restrain himselffrom throwing himself and all he called his, at her feet.
Emperor and king though he was,--the one jewel he craved lay beyond theconfines of his dominion.
After the conclusion of the serenade, the nymphs of Stephania's retinueshowered their flowers upon the sylvan gods, who eagerly scrambled overthem, when Stephania started up, as from a dream.
"How is this?" she hurriedly exclaimed, "I still hold my flowers? Andyou are all matched by the chances of the fragrant blossoms? But KingOtto is likewise without his due share, and so it would seem that fatewould have him my companion at the collation awaiting us. Therefore, mylords and ladies, link hands as the flow'ry oracles direct. I shallfollow last with my exalted guest."
Otto did not remark the quick glance which flashed between Crescentiusand his wife. The ladies of Stephania's retinue immediately conformedto the expressed wish of the hostess by taking the arms of the cavalierswho had chanced upon their flowers.
A number of pages, beautiful as cupids, lighted the way with torcheswhich flamed with a perfumed lustre, and the procession moved anewtowards the grotto, where, during their absence, a repast had beenspread. But the last couple had preceded them some twenty paces, ereStephania, without raising her eyes, took Otto's motionless arm.
The memory of all that had passed, a natural feeling of embarrassment onboth sides, prolonged the silence between them. Stephania doubtlesslyfathomed his thoughts, for she smiled with a degree of timidity notunmingled with doubt, as she broke the silence.
The question, though softly spoken, came swift as a dart and equallyunexpected.
"Have you ever loved, King Otto?"
Otto looked up with a start into her radiant face.
He had anticipated some veiled rebuke for his own strange conduct,anything,--not this.
He breathed hard, then he replied:
"Until I came to Rome, I never gazed on beauty that won from me morethan the applause of the eye, which a statue or a painting, equallybeautiful, might have claimed."
She nodded dreamily.
"I have heard it said that the blue-eyed, sunny-haired maidens of yournative North make us Romans appear poor in your sight!"
"Not so! The red rose is not discarded for the white. The contrastonly heightens the beauty."
"I have heard it said," Stephania continued, choosing a circuitous pathinstead of the direct one her guests had taken, "that you Teutons haveideals even, while you starve on bread and water. And I have been toldthat, were you permitted to choose for your life's companion the mostbeautiful woman on earth, you would hie yourselves into the gray ages ofthe world's dawn for the realization of your dreams. Has your idealbeen realized, since you have established your residence in Rome, KingOtto?"
There was a brief pause, then he replied, looking straight ahead:
"Love comes more stealthily than light, of which even the dark cypressesare enamoured in your Italian noondays."
"You evade my question."
"What would you have me say?"
She gave him a quick glance, which set his pulses to throbbing wildlyand sent the hot blood seething through his veins.
"Is your heart free, King Otto?"
A drear sense of desolation and loneliness came over the youth.
"Free," he replied almost inaudibly.
She gave a little, nervous laugh.
"But how know you that, surrounded by such loveliness, as that which youhave this very night witnessed in my circle, your hour may not strike atlast?"
Otto raised his eyes to those of the woman by his side.
"Fair lady, beautiful as Love's oracle itself, my heart is in littledanger even from your fairest satellites. But mistake not my meaning.I am not insusceptible to the fever of the Gods! Love I have soughtunder all forms and guises! And if I found it not, if I have listenedto its richest eloquence as to some song in a foreign tongue, which myheart understood not,--it is not that I have lacked the soul for love.Love I found not, though phantoms I have eagerly chased in this troubleddream of life. What avails it, to contend with one's destiny? And thisis mine!"
Stephania laughed.
"You speak like some hoary anchorite from the Thebaide. Truly, now Ibegin to understand, why your chroniclers call you the 'Wonder-child ofthe World.' Lover, idealist, and cynic in one!"
"Nay--you wrong me! Cynic I am not! My mother was a princess ofGreece. The fairest woman my eyes ever gazed upon--save one! She diedin her youth and beauty, following my father, the emperor, into hisearly grave. I was left alone in the world, alone with the monks, alonein the great gloom of our tall and spectral pines! The monks understoodnot my craving for the sun and the blue skies. The whiter snows ofThuringia chilled my heart and froze my soul! I longed for Rome--Icraved for the South. My dead mother's blood flows in my veins. HitherI came, braving the avalanches and the fever and the wrath of theelectors, I came, once more to challenge the phantoms of the past fromtheir long forgotten tombs, to make Rome--what once she was--the capitalof the earth. Rome's dream is Eternity!"
Stephania listened in silence and with downcast eyes.
Never had the ear of the beautiful Roman heard words like these. Theilliteracy, vileness, and depravity of her own countrymen never perhapspresented itself to her in so glaring a contrast, as when thrown intocomparison with the ideal son of the Empress Theophano and Otto II, ofSaracenic renown. His words were like some strange music, which flattersthe senses, that try in vain to retain their harmonies.
There was a pause during which neither spoke.
Otto thought he felt the soft pressure of Stephania's arm against hisown.
"You spoke of one who alone might challenge the dead empress in point offairness," the woman spoke at last and her voice betrayed an emotionwhich she vainly strove to conceal. "Who is that one?"
"Why do you ask?"
"Theophano's beauty was renowned. Even our poets sing of her."
"I will tell you at some other time."
"Tell me now!"
"We are approaching the grotto. Your guests are waiting."
"Tell me now!"
"Crescentius is expecting us. He will be wondering at our tardiness."
"Tell me now!"
Otto breathed hard.
"Oh, why do you ask, Stephania, why do you ask?"
"Who is the woman?"
The question fell huskily from her lips.
The answer came, soft as a zephyr that dies as it passes:
"Stephania!"
Quickening their steps they reached the grotto, without daring to faceeach other. The woman's heart throbbed as impetuously as that of theyouth, as they found themselves at the entrance of the Grotto of Egeriain a blaze of light, emanating from innumerable torches artfullyarranged among the stalactites, which diffused brilliant irradiations.The sumptuous dresses of the nobles and barons blazed into view; thespray from the fountain leaped up to a great height and descended inshowers of liquid jewels of iridescent hues.
A collation of fruits and wines wooed the appetite of the guests onevery hand. Sweet harmonies floated from the adjoining groves, and,amidst a general buzz of delight and admiration, Stephania took her seatat the festal board between the Senator of Rome and the German king.
The flower of beauty, wit and magnificence of the Senator's Roman courthad been culled to grace this festival, for there was no one present,who was not remarked for at least one of these attributes, some even bythe union of all. The most beautiful women of Rome surrounded theconsort of the Senator, who outshone them all. Even envy could not denyher the crown.
Nevertheless, and for the first time, perhaps, Stephania seemed to
misdoubt the supremacy and power of her great beauty, and while sheaffected being absorbed in other matters, her eye watched with devouringanxiety every glance of her exalted guest, whose feverish vivaciousnessbetrayed to her his inmost thoughts.
The Senator's countenance was that of the Sphinx of the desert. Heappeared neither to see nor to hear.
Otto meanwhile, in order to remove from his path the terrible temptationwhich he felt growing with every instant, in order to divert Eckhardt'sattention, who he instinctively felt was watching his every gesture, andto stifle any possible suspicions, which Crescentius might entertain,affected to be struck with the appearance of one of Stephania's ladies,who resembled her in stature and in the colour of her hair. Heintentionally mistook her for the fairy in the grotto, laughinglychallenging her acquaintance, which she as merrily denied, declaringherself to be the wife of one of the barons present. But Otto would notbe convinced and attached himself to her with a zeal, which brought onboth many pointed jests on the part of the assembled revellers.
Stephania immediately observed the ruse, but as her eye met that of theSenator, an unaccountable terror seized her. She turned away andpretended to join her guests in their merriment. Among those presentwere some of the most imaginative and prolific minds of an age,otherwise dark and illiterate, yet the brilliant play and coruscationsof Stephania's wit, the depth of some of the glittering remarks whichfell from her lips, were not surpassed by any. At times she exhibited atone of recklessness almost bordering on defiance and mockery, thelightning's power to scorch as well as to illumine, but when relapsinginto what appeared her more natural mood, it was scarcely possible toresist the grace and seductiveness of her manner. Even the doctrines,which half in gayety, half in haughty acceptance of the characterassigned to her on this evening, she promulgated, full of poeticalepicureanism, fell with so sweet a harmony from her lips, that saintscould not have wished them mended.
Otto, meanwhile, continued to play his serf-assigned part, but he lostnot a single word or gesture of Stephania and his fervour towards hischosen partner rose in proportion with Stephania's gayety. But he didnot fail to observe that her siren-smile was directed towards himselfand his soul drank in the beams of her beauty, as the palm-tree absorbsthe fervid suns of Africa, motionless with delight.
While gayety and convivial enjoyment seemed at their height, Eckhardtstrode from the grotto, unobserved by the revellers and entered asecluded path leading into the remoter regions of the park. Otto'spredilection for the wife of the Senator of Rome had escaped him aslittle as had her own seeming coquetry, and he had looked on in silence,until, seized with profound disgust, he could bear it no longer.
What he had always feared was coming to pass.
When the Romans could no longer vanquish their foes on the field ofbattle, they destroyed them with their women.
The gardens which Eckhardt traversed resembled the fabled treasure-houseof Aladdin. Every tree glistened with sparkling clusters of red, blueand green lights, every flowerbed was bordered with lines and circles ofiridescent globes, and the fountains tossed up spiral columns of amber,rose and amethyst spray against the transparent azure of the summerskies, in which a lustrous golden moon shone full.
But a madness seemed suddenly to have seized the revellers.
No one knew whither Crescentius had gone.
No one knew who was a dancer, a flute-player, a noble.
Satyrs and fauns fell to chasing nymphs with shouting. Everywherelaughter and shouts were heard, whispers and panting breaths. Darknesscovered certain parts of the groves. Truly it was a long time, sinceanything similar had been seen in Rome.
Roused and intoxicated by the contamination, the fever had at lastseized Otto. Rushing into the forest, he ran with the others. Newflocks of nymphs swarmed round him every moment. Seeing at last a bandof maidens led by one arrayed as Diana, he sprang to it, intending toscrutinize the goddess more closely. They encircled him in a mad whirl,and, evidently bent upon making him follow, rushed away the next momentlike a herd of deer. But he stood rooted to the spot with wildlybeating heart.
A great yearning, such as he had never felt before, seized him at thatmoment and the love for Stephania rushed to his heart as a tremendoustidal wave. Never had she seemed to him so pure, so dear, so beloved,as in that forest of frenzied madness. A moment before he had himselfwished to drink of that cup, which drowned past and present; now he wasseized with repugnance and remorse. He felt stifled in this unholy air;his eyes sought the stars, glimmering through the interstices of theinterwoven branches.
A shadow fell across his path.
He turned. Before him stood Eckhardt, the Margrave.
"I have seen and heard," he spoke in response to Otto's questioninggaze. "King of the Germans, I have enough of Rome, enough of feasts,enough of conquests. I am stifling. I cannot breathe in this accursedair. Command the return beyond the Alps. On these siren rocks yourship will founder! Rome is no place for you!"
Otto stared at the man as if he feared he had lost his senses.
"King of the Germans," Eckhardt continued, "on my knees I entreatyou--at the risk of your displeasure,--return beyond the Alps! See whathas become of you! See what a woman has made of you, you, the son ofthe vanquisher of the Saracens!"
He stretched out his arms entreatingly, as if to lead him away.
Otto covered his face with both hands.
"And I love only her in the wide, wide world," he muttered.
At this juncture a light, elastic step resounded on the gravel path.
Benilo stepped into the clearing.
"Stephania awaits the king in the pavillion."
Eckhardt laid his hands on Otto's shoulders, straining his eyes insilent entreaty into those of the King.
"Do not go!" he begged.
Otto winced, but the presence of Benilo caused him to shake himself freeof the Margrave's restraining hand.
"Stephania is waiting," he stammered.
"Then you will not grant my request?" Eckhardt spoke with quiveringvoice.
"In Rome we live,--in Rome we die!"
Taking Benilo's arm he hastened away, leaving Eckhardt to ponder overhis prophetic words.
For a moment the Margrave remained, straining his gaze after Otto'sretreating form.
His heart was heavy,--heavy to breaking. Dared he enter the arenaagainst the Sorceress of Rome? He laughed aloud.
There are moments when the tragedy of our own life is almost amusing.