Frederick the Great and His Court Part 22

CHAPTER V.

THE QUEEN'S TAILOR.

A dreary silence had reigned for some time in the usually gay and happy family circle of the worthy court tailor. No one dared to speak or laugh aloud. M. p.r.i.c.ker, the crown and head of the house, was sad and anxious, and the storm-cloud upon his brow threw a dark reflection upon the faces of his wife and two children, the beautiful Anna, and the active, merry Wilhelm, Even the a.s.sistants in the work-room were affected by the general gloom; the gay songs of the apprentices were silenced, and the pretty house-maids looked discontented and dull.

A tempest lowered over the house, and all appeared to tremble at its approach. When Wilhelm, the son and heir of the house, returned from his work, he hastened to his mother's room, and casting a curious glance upon the old woman, who was seated on a sofa, grim-looking, and supporting her head upon her hand, he said, mysteriously--

"Not yet!"

Mother p.r.i.c.ker shook her head, sighed deeply, and replied:

"Not yet!"

The beautiful Anna was generally in her elegant room, painting or singing, and did not allow herself to be disturbed; but now when the bell rang, or a strange step was heard, she hastened to her mother, and said:

"Well, has it come?"

Again Mother p.r.i.c.ker sighed, shook her head, and answered--

"Not yet!"

M. p.r.i.c.ker asked nothing, demanded nothing; silent and proud he sat in the midst of his family circle; stoically listened to the ringing of the bell, and saw strangers enter his counting-room, too proud to show any excitement. He wrapped himself in an Olympian silence, and barricaded himself from the curious questions of his children by the stern reserve of parental authority.

"I see that he suffers," said his wife to her daughter Anna; "I see that he looks paler every day, and eats less and less; if this painful anxiety endures much longer, the poor man will become dangerously ill, and the king will be answerable for the death of one of his n.o.blest and best subjects."

"But why does our father attach such importance to this small affair?"

said Anna, with a lofty shrug of her shoulders.

Mother p.r.i.c.ker looked at her with astonishment.

"You call this a small affair, which concerns not only the honor of your father, but that of your whole family; which affects the position and calling enjoyed by the p.r.i.c.ker family for a hundred years? It is a question whether your father shall be unjustly deprived of his honorable place, or have justice done him, and his great services acknowledged!"

Anna gave a hearty laugh.

"Dear mother, you look at this thing too tragically; you are making a camel of a gnat. The great and exalted things of which you speak have nothing to do with the matter; it is a simple question of t.i.tle. The great point is, will our father receive the t.i.tle of 'court tailor' to the reigning queen, or be only the tailor of the queen-dowager. It seems to me the difference is very small, and I cannot imagine why so much importance is attached to it."

"You do not understand," sighed Mother p.r.i.c.ker; "you do not love your family; you care nothing for the honor of your house!"

"Pshaw! to be the daughter of a tailor is a very poor and doubtful honor," said Anna, drearily, "even if he is the tailor of one or even two queens. Our father is rich enough to live without this contemptible business; yes, to live in style. He has given his children such an education as n.o.bles only receive; I have had my governess and my music-teacher; my brother his tutor; my father has not allowed him to walk through the streets, fearing that he might fall into the hands of the recruiting-officers. We have each our private rooms, beautifully furnished, and are the envy of all our friends. Why, notwithstanding all this, will he condemn us to be and to continue to be the children of a tailor? Why does he not tear down the sign from the door; this sign, which will be ever a humiliation, even though 'court tailor'

should be written upon it! This t.i.tle will never enable us to appear at court, and the n.o.ble cavaliers will never think of marrying the daughter of a tailor, though many would seek to do so if our father would give up his needlework, buy a country seat, and live, as rich and distinguished men do, upon his estate."

"Child, child, what are you saying?" cried Mother p.r.i.c.ker, clasping her hands with anguish. "Thy father give up his stand, his honorable stand, which, for more than a hundred years, has been inherited by the family!

Thy father demean himself to buy with his honorably-earned gold a son-in-law from amongst the poor n.o.bles, who will be ever thinking of the honor done us in accepting thee and thy sixty thousand dollars! Thy father buy a country-seat, and spend in idleness that fortune which his forefathers and himself have been collecting for hundreds of years!

That can never be, and never will your father consent to your marriage with any other man than an honest burgher; and he will never allow Wilhelm to have any other calling than that of his father, his grandfather, and his great-grandfather, a court tailor."

The beautiful Anna stamped involuntarily upon the floor, and a flush of scorn spread itself over her soft cheek. "I will not wed a burgher,"

said she, tossing her head proudly back, "and my brother Wilhelm will never carry on the business of his father."

"Then your father will disinherit you--cast you out amongst strangers to beg your bread," said the old woman, wringing her hands.

"G.o.d be thanked," said Anna proudly, "there is no necessity for begging our bread; we have learned enough to carry us honorably through the world, and when all else fails, I have a capital in my voice which a.s.sures me a glittering future. The king will found an opera-house, and splendid singers are so rare that Prussia will thank G.o.d if I allow myself to be prevailed upon to take the place of prima donna."

"Oh! unhappy, wretched child!" sobbed Mother p.r.i.c.ker, "you will dishonor your family, you will make us miserable, and cover us with shame; you will become an actress, and we must live to see our respectable, yes, celebrated name upon a play-bill, and pasted upon every corner."

"You will have the honor of hearing all the world speak of your daughter, of seeing sweet flowers and wreaths thrown before her whenever she appears, and of seeing her praises in every number of every journal in Berlin. I shall be exalted to the skies, and the parents called blessed who have given me life."

"These are the NEW ideas," gasped out her mother--"the new ideas which are now the mode, and which our new king favors. Alas! wailing and sorrow will come over our whole city; honor and principle will disappear, and destruction like that of Sodom and Gomorrah will fall upon Berlin! These are the alluring temptations with which Baron Pollnitz fills your ear and crushes in your heart the worthy and seemly principles of your family. That,"--suddenly she stopped and listened; it seemed to her the bell rung; truly there was a step upon the stairs, and some one asked for M. and Madame p.r.i.c.ker.

"Pollnitz," whispered Anna, and a glowing blush overspread her face, throat, and neck.

"The Baron Pollnitz, the master of ceremonies," said Madame p.r.i.c.ker, with a mixture of joy and alarm.

The door flew open, and with a gay, frolicsome greeting, Pollnitz danced into the room; Anna had turned to the window, and made no reply to his greeting. Madame p.r.i.c.ker stepped toward him, and greeted him with the most profound reverence, calling him master of ceremonies and master of the bed-chamber.

"Not so," said Pollnitz; "why so much reverence and so many t.i.tles? I am indeed master of ceremonies, but without the t.i.tle. His majesty, the young king, has no special fondness for renewing the t.i.tles lent to us by his blessed father, and every prayer and every representation to that effect has been in vain; he considers t.i.tles ridiculous and superfluous."

Madame p.r.i.c.ker turned pale, and murmured some incomprehensible words.

Anna, however, who had up to this time been turned toward the window, suddenly looked at the two speakers, and fixed her great eyes questioningly upon the baron.

"Ah, at last I have the honor to see you, fair, beautiful Anna!" said Pollnitz; "I knew well some magic was necessary to fix those splendid eyes on me. Allow me to kiss your hand, most honored lady, and forgive me if I have disturbed you." Ho flew with an elegant pirouette to Anna, and took her hand, which she did not extend to him, and, indeed, struggled to withhold; he then turned again to Madame p.r.i.c.ker, and bowing to her, said, with a solemn pathos: "I am not here to-day simply as the friend of the house, but as the amba.s.sador of the king; and I beseech the honored Madame p.r.i.c.ker to announce to her husband that I wish to speak to him, and to deliver a message from the queen."

Madame p.r.i.c.ker uttered a cry of joy, and forgetting all other considerations, hastened to the counting-room of her husband, to make known to him the important information.

Baron Pollnitz watched her till the door closed, then turned to Anna, who still leaned immovable in the window. "Anna, dearest Anna,"

whispered he tenderly, "at last we are alone! How I have pined for you, how happy I am to see you once again!"

He sought to press her fondly to his heart, but the maiden waved him proudly and coldly back. "Have you forgotten our agreement?" said she, earnestly.

"No, I have held your cruelty in good remembrance; only, when I have fulfilled all your commands, will you deign to listen to my glowing wishes; when I have induced your father to employ for you another singing-master, and arranged for your glorious and heavenly voice to be heard by the king and the a.s.sembled court?"

"Yes," cried Anna, with glowing eyes and burning cheeks, "that is my aim, my ambition. Yes, I will be a singer; all Europe shall resound with my fame; all men shall lie at my feet; and princes and queens shall seek to draw me into their circles."

"And I will be the happiest of the happy, when the lovely nightingale has reached the goal. From my hand shall she first wing her flight to fame. But, when I have fulfilled my word, when you have sung in the royal palace before the queen and the court, then will YOU fulfil your promise? Then Pollnitz will be the happiest of mortals."

"I will fulfil my word," she said, as proudly and imperiously as if she were already the celebrated and grace-dispensing prima donna. "On the day in which I sing for the first time before the king--the day in which the tailor's daughter has purified herself from the dishonor of her humble birth, and becomes a free, self-sustaining, distinguished artist--on that day we will have no reason to be ashamed of our love, and we can both, without humiliation, present our hearts to each other.

Baron Pollnitz can take for his wife, without blus.h.i.+ng, the woman enn.o.bled by art, and Prima Donna Anna p.r.i.c.ker need not be humbled by the thought that Baron Pollnitz has forgotten his rank in his choice of a wife."

Baron Pollnitz, courtier as he was, had not his features so completely under control as to conceal wholly the shock conveyed by the words of his beautiful sweetheart. He stared for a moment, speechless, into that lovely face, glowing with enthusiasm, ambition, and love. A mocking, demoniac smile appeared one moment on his lips, then faded quickly, and Pollnitz was again the tender, pa.s.sionate lover of Anna p.r.i.c.ker. "Yes, my dearly-beloved Anna," whispered he, clasping her in his arms, "on that blessed and happy day you will be my wife, and the laurels entwined in your hair will be changed into a myrtle-wreath." He embraced her pa.s.sionately, and she resisted no longer, but listened ever to his words, which, like sweet opium, poisoned both the ear and heart of the young girl. But Pollnitz released her suddenly, and stepped back, colder and more self-possessed than Anna. He had heard a light, approaching step. "Some one comes; be composed, dear one; your face betrays too much of your inward emotion." He danced to the open piano and played a merry strain, while Anna hid her blushes in the branches of a geranium placed in the window, and tried to cool her glowing cheeks on the fresh green leaves.

Madame p.r.i.c.ker opened the door, and bade the master of ceremonies enter the adjoining room, where M. p.r.i.c.ker awaited him.

CHAPTER VI.