The Sorceress of Rome

"This shall not be!" exclaimed a nymph near by. "Bring him along and our queen shall judge him."

Ere Otto could give vent to remonstrance, he found himself hemmed in by the shepherds with their spears. His doubts as to the ultimate purpose of the revellers seemed now to call for some imperative decision, but while he remembered the dismal legends of these haunts, his lips still tingled with the magic fire of Stephania's kiss and it seemed impossible to him that she could really mean to harm him. Still he had grave misgivings, when suddenly a mocking voice saluted him and into the cave strode Johannes Crescentius, Senator of Rome, – apparently from the valley without, a smiling look of welcome on his face.

"Fear nothing, King Otto," he said jovially. "Your sentence shall not be too severe. Your forfeit shall be light, if you will but discover and point out to us the nymph who usurped the part of Egeria, that we may further address ourselves to her for her reprehensible conduct."

The feelings with which Otto listened to this beguiling and perhaps perfidious statement may be imagined. But he replied with great presence of mind.

"It were a vain effort indeed to recognize one nymph from another in the gloom. Lead on then, since it is the Senator of Rome who guarantees my immunity 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 himself quietly to be bound with chains of ivy which the least effort could snap asunder. The moment he stepped forth from the grotto his path was beset by a multitude of the most extraordinary phantoms. The surrounding woods teemed with the wildest excrescences of pagan worship; statues took life; every tree yielded its sleeping Dryad; strange melodies resounded in every direction; Nayades rose in the stream and laughingly showered their spray upon him. With a cheerful hunting blast Diana and her huntresses appeared on an overhanging rock and darted blunt arrows with gilded heads at him, until he arrived at an avenue of lofty elms, whose overarching branches, filigreed by the crimson after-glow of departing day, resembled the interior of a Gothic cathedral and formed a natural hall of audience fit for the rural divinities. Bosquets of orange trees, whose ivory tinted blossoms gleamed like huge pearls out of the dark green of the foliage, wafted an inexpressibly sweet perfume on the air.

The vista terminated in an open, semi-circular court, surrounded by terraces of richest emerald hue, in the midst of which rose an improvised throne. The rising moon shone upon it with a light, like that of a rayless sun, and Otto discovered that the terraces were thronged with a splendid court, assembled round a woman who occupied the throne.

As the prisoner approached, environed by his grotesque captors, laughter as inextinguishable as that which shook the ancient gods of Olympus on a similar occasion, resounded among the occupants of the terrace. Continuing his forced advance, Otto discovered with a strange beating of the heart in the splendidly attired queen, Stephania, the wife of Crescentius.

A bodice of silver-tissue confined her matchless form, which with every heave of her bosom threw iridescent gleams, and a diadem which shone as with stars, so bright were its jewels, flashed upon her brow.

She looked a queen indeed, and but for the ivory pallor of her face it would have been impossible to guess that she was in any way concerned with the object of the strange pageant, which now approached her throne.

The sphinx-like countenance of the Senator of Rome seemed to evince no very great enthusiasm in the frolic; the invited guests appeared not to know 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 own pallor equalled that of Stephania, and both resembled rather two marble statues than beings of flesh and blood. Stephania's lips were tightly compressed, and when Pan recited his accusation, complaining of an attempt to profane his solitudes and to misguide one of his chastest nymphs, so far from overwhelming the culprit with the laughing raillery of 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 she feared to raise them and to meet Otto's burning gaze.

"Answer, King of the Germans," urged Crescentius with a smile, "else you are lost!"

"The charges are too vague," Otto replied. "Let Pan, if he has any witness, of what has happened, allege particulars – and if he does – by his crooked staff, even my accusers shall acquit me without denial on my part."

General mutterings and suppressed laughter followed this singular defence, during which Stephania's countenance took all the pallid tints, which the return of his consciousness and dignity had chased from Otto's cheeks.

But she did not think it wise to prolong the scene.

"Since the august offender," she said hastily and without lifting her long silken lashes, "cannot discover among my retinue the nymph who enticed him into the grotto, I pronounce this sentence upon him: 'Let his ignorance be perpetual.'"

Then she invited him to a seat in the circle over which she presided and her graciousness obviously caused Otto's spirits to rise, for, starting up, as it were, into new existence at the word, he took his station in a manner 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 the effect of their harmonies beneath the hushed and now star-resplendent skies was inexpressibly delicious. The dreams of Elysium seemed to be realized. These indeed seemed to be the happy fields, in the atmosphere of which the delighted spirit was consoled for every woe, and as Otto almost unwittingly gazed upon the woman before him, so passionately loved and to him lost for ever; as he marked the languor and melancholy which had stolen over her countenance, he could hardly restrain himself from throwing himself and all he called his, at her feet.

Emperor and king though he was, – the one jewel he craved lay beyond the confines of his dominion.

After the conclusion of the serenade, the nymphs of Stephania's retinue showered their flowers upon the sylvan gods, who eagerly scrambled over them, when Stephania started up, as from a dream.

"How is this?" she hurriedly exclaimed, "I still hold my flowers? And you are all matched by the chances of the fragrant blossoms? But King Otto is likewise without his due share, and so it would seem that fate would have him my companion at the collation awaiting us. Therefore, my lords and ladies, link hands as the flow'ry oracles direct. I shall follow last with my exalted guest."

Otto did not remark the quick glance which flashed between Crescentius and his wife. The ladies of Stephania's retinue immediately conformed to the expressed wish of the hostess by taking the arms of the cavaliers who had chanced upon their flowers.

A number of pages, beautiful as cupids, lighted the way with torches which flamed with a perfumed lustre, and the procession moved anew towards the grotto, where, during their absence, a repast had been spread. But the last couple had preceded them some twenty paces, ere Stephania, without raising her eyes, took Otto's motionless arm.

The memory of all that had passed, a natural feeling of embarrassment on both sides, prolonged the silence between them. Stephania doubtlessly fathomed his thoughts, for she smiled with a degree of timidity not unmingled with doubt, as she broke the silence.

The question, though softly spoken, came swift as a dart and equally unexpected.

"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 more than the applause of the eye, which a statue or a painting, equally beautiful, might have claimed."

She nodded dreamily.

"I have heard it said that the blue-eyed, sunny-haired maidens of your native North make us Romans appear poor in your sight!"

"Not so! The red rose is not discarded for the white. The contrast only heightens the beauty."

"I have heard it said," Stephania continued, choosing a circuitous path instead of the direct one her guests had taken, "that you Teutons have ideals even, while you starve on bread and water. And I have been told that, were you permitted to choose for your life's companion the most beautiful woman on earth, you would hie yourselves into the gray ages of the world's dawn for the realization of your dreams. Has your ideal been realized, since you have established your residence in Rome, King Otto?"

There was a brief pause, then he replied, looking straight ahead:

"Love comes more stealthily than light, of which even the dark cypresses are 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 wildly and 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 you have this very night witnessed in my circle, your hour may not strike at last?"

Otto raised his eyes to those of the woman by his side.

"Fair lady, beautiful as Love's oracle itself, my heart is in little danger even from your fairest satellites. But mistake not my meaning. I am not insusceptible to the fever of the Gods! Love I have sought under all forms and guises! And if I found it not, if I have listened to its richest eloquence as to some song in a foreign tongue, which my heart 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 troubled dream of life. What avails it, to contend with one's destiny? And this is mine!"

Stephania laughed.

"You speak like some hoary anchorite from the Thebaide. Truly, now I begin to understand, why your chroniclers call you the 'Wonder-child of the World.' Lover, idealist, and cynic in one!"

"Nay – you wrong me! Cynic I am not! My mother was a princess of Greece. The fairest woman my eyes ever gazed upon – save one! She died in her youth and beauty, following my father, the emperor, into his early grave. I was left alone in the world, alone with the monks, alone in the great gloom of our tall and spectral pines! The monks understood not my craving for the sun and the blue skies. The whiter snows of Thuringia chilled my heart and froze my soul! I longed for Rome – I craved for the South. My dead mother's blood flows in my veins. Hither I came, braving the avalanches and the fever and the wrath of the electors, I came, once more to challenge the phantoms of the past from their long forgotten tombs, to make Rome – what once she was – the capital of 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. The illiteracy, vileness, and depravity of her own countrymen never perhaps presented itself to her in so glaring a contrast, as when thrown into comparison with the ideal son of the Empress Theophano and Otto II, of Saracenic renown. His words were like some strange music, which flatters the 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 his own.

"You spoke of one who alone might challenge the dead empress in point of fairness," the woman spoke at last and her voice betrayed an emotion which 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 face each other. The woman's heart throbbed as impetuously as that of the youth, as they found themselves at the entrance of the Grotto of Egeria in a blaze of light, emanating from innumerable torches artfully arranged among the stalactites, which diffused brilliant irradiations. The sumptuous dresses of the nobles and barons blazed into view; the spray from the fountain leaped up to a great height and descended in showers of liquid jewels of iridescent hues.

A collation of fruits and wines wooed the appetite of the guests on every hand. Sweet harmonies floated from the adjoining groves, and, amidst a general buzz of delight and admiration, Stephania took her seat at the festal board between the Senator of Rome and the German king.

The flower of beauty, wit and magnificence of the Senator's Roman court had 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 by the union of all. The most beautiful women of Rome surrounded the consort of the Senator, who outshone them all. Even envy could not deny her the crown.

Nevertheless, and for the first time, perhaps, Stephania seemed to misdoubt the supremacy and power of her great beauty, and while she affected being absorbed in other matters, her eye watched with devouring anxiety every glance of her exalted guest, whose feverish vivaciousness betrayed to her his inmost thoughts.

The Senator's countenance was that of the Sphinx of the desert. He appeared neither to see nor to hear.

Otto meanwhile, in order to remove from his path the terrible temptation which he felt growing with every instant, in order to divert Eckhardt's attention, who he instinctively felt was watching his every gesture, and to 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. He intentionally mistook her for the fairy in the grotto, laughingly challenging her acquaintance, which she as merrily denied, declaring herself to be the wife of one of the barons present. But Otto would not be convinced and attached himself to her with a zeal, which brought on both many pointed jests on the part of the assembled revellers.

Stephania immediately observed the ruse, but as her eye met that of the Senator, an unaccountable terror seized her. She turned away and pretended to join her guests in their merriment. Among those present were some of the most imaginative and prolific minds of an age, otherwise dark and illiterate, yet the brilliant play and coruscations of Stephania's wit, the depth of some of the glittering remarks which fell from her lips, were not surpassed by any. At times she exhibited a tone of recklessness almost bordering on defiance and mockery, the lightning's power to scorch as well as to illumine, but when relapsing into what appeared her more natural mood, it was scarcely possible to resist the grace and seductiveness of her manner. Even the doctrines, which half in gayety, half in haughty acceptance of the character assigned to her on this evening, she promulgated, full of poetical epicureanism, fell with so sweet a harmony from her lips, that saints could not have wished them mended.

Otto, meanwhile, continued to play his serf-assigned part, but he lost not a single word or gesture of Stephania and his fervour towards his chosen partner rose in proportion with Stephania's gayety. But he did not fail to observe that her siren-smile was directed towards himself and his soul drank in the beams of her beauty, as the palm-tree absorbs the fervid suns of Africa, motionless with delight.

While gayety and convivial enjoyment seemed at their height, Eckhardt strode from the grotto, unobserved by the revellers and entered a secluded path leading into the remoter regions of the park. Otto's predilection for the wife of the Senator of Rome had escaped him as little 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 of battle, they destroyed them with their women.

The gardens which Eckhardt traversed resembled the fabled treasure-house of Aladdin. Every tree glistened with sparkling clusters of red, blue and green lights, every flowerbed was bordered with lines and circles of iridescent globes, and the fountains tossed up spiral columns of amber, rose and amethyst spray against the transparent azure of the summer skies, 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. Everywhere laughter and shouts were heard, whispers and panting breaths. Darkness covered certain parts of the groves. Truly it was a long time, since anything similar had been seen in Rome.

Roused and intoxicated by the contamination, the fever had at last seized Otto. Rushing into the forest, he ran with the others. New flocks of nymphs swarmed round him every moment. Seeing at last a band of maidens led by one arrayed as Diana, he sprang to it, intending to scrutinize the goddess more closely. They encircled him in a mad whirl, and, evidently bent upon making him follow, rushed away the next moment like a herd of deer. But he stood rooted to the spot with wildly beating heart.

A great yearning, such as he had never felt before, seized him at that moment and the love for Stephania rushed to his heart as a tremendous tidal 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 himself wished to drink of that cup, which drowned past and present; now he was seized with repugnance and remorse. He felt stifled in this unholy air; his eyes sought the stars, glimmering through the interstices of the interwoven 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 questioning gaze. "King of the Germans, I have enough of Rome, enough of feasts, enough of conquests. I am stifling. I cannot breathe in this accursed air. Command the return beyond the Alps. On these siren rocks your ship 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 entreat you – at the risk of your displeasure, – return beyond the Alps! See what has become of you! See what a woman has made of you, you, the son of the 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 in silent entreaty into those of the King.

"Do not go!" he begged.

Otto winced, but the presence of Benilo caused him to shake himself free of the Margrave's restraining hand.

"Stephania is waiting," he stammered.

"Then you will not grant my request?" Eckhardt spoke with quivering voice.

"In Rome we live, – in Rome we die!"

Taking Benilo's arm he hastened away, leaving Eckhardt to ponder over his prophetic words.

For a moment the Margrave remained, straining his gaze after Otto's retreating form.

His heart was heavy, – heavy to breaking. Dared he enter the arena against the Sorceress of Rome? He laughed aloud.

There are moments when the tragedy of our own life is almost amusing.