A happy smile played upon Carlo's blue lips.
"I die," he murmured, "but I die for thee! Thy vapo has kept his word,
he has defended thee until his last breath! How good is God! He lets me
die in thy service!"
"No, no, you must not die!" cried Natalie, her calmness giving way to
the wildest sorrow. "No, Carlo, you must live! Oh, say not that you die!
Ah, you love me, and yet you would leave me alone! Only live, and I also
will love you, Carlo, as warmly and as glowingly as you love me! Do but
remain with me, and my heart, my life shall be yours!"
"Too late! too late!" murmured Carlo, with dying lips. "Remember me,
Natalie--I have dearly loved you. I die happy, for I die in your arms!"
"No, no, you shall live in my arms!" sobbed she. "I will be yours--your
bride!"
"Kiss me, my bride," he falteringly stammered.
She bent over him, and with hers she touched his lips, already
stiffening in death. She laid her warm, glowing cheek to his cold and
marble-pale face; that full, fresh life pressed that which was cold and
expiring to her bosom in an ardent struggle with death! In vain!
Death is inexorable. What he has once touched with his hand, that is
past recovery, it is his.
The blood no longer flowed from Carlo's wound, the breath no longer
rattled in his throat--it was silent; but a blessed smile still lay upon
his lips. With this smile had he died, happy, blessed in the embrace of
her he had so truly loved.
When Marianne, after long and vain efforts to open the door, had finally
managed, by tying her bed-clothes together, to let herself down into the
garden, and had thence hastened into the house, and up into Natalie's
chamber, she found there all silent and still. Nothing stirred. Natalie
lay in a deathlike swoon.
He, Carlo, already stiffened in death, and she, the senseless Natalie,
with her head reclining against the marble face of her friend!
Poor Natalie! Why must Marianne succeed in awakening thee from thy
swoon? Why did you not let her continue in her insensibility, Marianne?
In sleep, she at least would not have realized that she was now left
entirely alone, entirely abandoned, with no one to defend her against
her cruel and artful enemies, of whose existence she never once dreamed!
Chatper 29 Intrigues Count Orloff lay in a comfortable, careless position upon his divan,
leisurely smoking his long Turkish pipe. Before him stood Joseph Ribas,
laughingly relating in his own comic manner the occurrences of the
preceding night.
"You are a wonderful man," said Orloff, when Joseph had finished. "You
have honestly earned your epaulets, and to-day you will for the first
time appear at my dinner-table as a Russian officer. Ah, I prophesy a
great future for you. You have the requisite skill and address to make
your fortune. You are shrewd, daring, and you recoil from no means,
finding them all good and useful when they forward your aims. With such
principles one may go far in this world, and Russia in fact offers you
the best opportunity for bringing all these fine talents into use."