Into the picture-gallery The Masque pa.s.sed at the same solemn pace, without apparently looking at the Landgrave. This movement seemed to argue, either that he purposely declined an interview with the prince,--and _that_ might argue fear,--or that he had not been aware of his presence. Either supposition, as implying something of human infirmity, seemed incompatible with supernatural faculties. Partly upon this consideration, and partly, perhaps, because he suddenly recollected that the road taken by The Masque would lead him directly past the apartments of the old seneschal, where a.s.sistance might be summoned, the Landgrave found his spirits at this moment revive. The consciousness of rank and birth also came to his aid, and that sort of disdain of the aggressor, which possesses every man, brave or cowardly alike, within the walls of his own dwelling. Unarmed as he was, he determined to pursue, and perhaps to speak.
The restraints of high breeding, and the ceremonious decorum of his rank, involuntarily checked the Landgrave from pursuing with a hurried pace. He advanced with his habitual gravity of step, so that The Masque was half-way down the gallery before the prince entered it. This gallery, furnished on each side with pictures, of which some were portraits, was of great length. The Masque and the prince continued to advance, preserving a pretty equal distance. It did not appear by any sign or gesture that The Masque was aware of the Landgrave"s pursuit.
Suddenly, however, he paused, drew his sword, halted; the Landgrave also halted; then, turning half round, and waving with his hand to the prince so as to solicit his attention, slowly The Masque elevated the point of his sword to the level of a picture--it was the portrait of a young cavalier in a hunting-dress, blooming with youth and youthful energy. The Landgrave turned pale, trembled, and was ruefully agitated.
The Masque kept his sword in its position for half a minute; then dropping it, shook his head, and raised his hand with a peculiar solemnity of expression. The Landgrave recovered himself, his features swelled with pa.s.sion, he quickened his step, and again followed in pursuit.
The Masque, however, had by this time turned out of the gallery into a pa.s.sage, which, after a single curve, terminated in the private room of the seneschal. Believing that his ignorance of the localities was thus leading him on to certain capture, the Landgrave pursued more leisurely. The pa.s.sage was dimly lighted; every image floated in a cloudy obscurity; and, upon reaching the curve, it seemed to the Landgrave that The Masque was just on the point of entering the seneschal"s room. No other door was heard to open; and he felt a.s.sured that he had seen the lofty figure of The Masque gliding into that apartment. He again quickened his steps; a light burned within, the door stood ajar; quietly the prince pushed it open, and entered with the fullest a.s.surance that he should here at length overtake the object of his pursuit.
Great was his consternation upon finding in a room, which presented no outlet, not a living creature except the elderly seneschal, who lay quietly sleeping in his arm-chair. The first impulse of the prince was to awaken him roughly, that he might summon aid and cooperate in the search. One glance at a paper upon the table arrested his hand. He saw a name written there, interesting to his fears beyond all others in the world. His eye was riveted as by fascination to the paper. He read one instant. That satisfied him that the old seneschal must be overcome by no counterfeit slumbers, when he could thus surrender a secret of capital importance to the gaze of that eye from which, above all others, he must desire to screen it. One moment he deliberated with himself; the old man stirred, and muttered in his dreams; the Landgrave seized the paper, and stood irresolute for an instant whether to await his wakening, and authoritatively to claim what so nearly concerned his own interest, or to retreat with it from the room before the old man should be aware of the prince"s visit, or his own loss.
But the seneschal, wearied perhaps with some unusual exertion, had but moved in his chair; again he composed himself to deep slumber, made deeper by the warmth of a hot fire. The raving of the wind, as it whistled round this angle of the _schloss_, drowned all sounds that could have disturbed him. The Landgrave secreted the paper; nor did any sense of his rank and character interpose to check him in an act so unworthy of an honorable cavalier. Whatever crimes he had hitherto committed or authorized, this was, perhaps, the first instance in which he had offended by an instance of petty knavery. He retired with the stealthy pace of a robber, anxious to evade detection, and stole back to his own apartments with an overpowering interest in the discovery he had made so accidentally, and with an anxiety to investigate it further, which absorbed for the time all other cares, and banished from his thoughts even The Masque himself, whose sudden appearance and retreat had, in fact, thrown into his hands the secret which now so exclusively disturbed him.
CHAPTER XII.
Meantime, The Masque continued to hara.s.s the Landgrave, to baffle many of his wiles, and to neutralize his most politic schemes. In one of the many placards which he affixed to the castle gates, he described the Landgrave as ruling in Klosterheim by day, and himself by night.
Sarcasms such as these, together with the practical insults which The Masque continually offered to the Landgrave, by foiling his avowed designs, embittered the prince"s existence. The injury done to his political schemes of ambition at this particular crisis was irreparable. One after one, all the agents and tools by whom he could hope to work upon the counsels of the Klosterheim authorities had been removed. Losing _their_ influence, he had lost every prop of his own. Nor was this all; he was reproached by the general voice of the city as the original cause of a calamity which he had since shown himself impotent to redress. He it was, and his cause, which had drawn upon the people so fatally trepanned the hostility of the mysterious Masque. But for his highness, all the burgomasters, captains, city- officers, &c., would now be sleeping in their beds; whereas, the best late which could be surmised for the most of them was, that they were sleeping in dungeons; some, perhaps, in their graves. And thus the Landgrave"s cause not merely lost its most efficient partisans, but, through their loss, determined the wavering against him, alienated the few who remained of his own faction, and gave strength and encouragement to the general dissatisfaction which had so long prevailed.
Thus it happened that the conspirators, or suspected conspirators, could not be brought to trial, or to punishment without a trial. Any spark of fresh irritation falling upon the present combustible temper of the populace, would not fail to produce an explosion. Fresh conspirators, and real ones, were thus encouraged to arise. The university, the city, teemed with plots. The government of the prince was exhausted with the growing labor of tracing and counteracting them.
And, by little and little, matters came into such a condition, that the control of the city, though still continuing in the Landgrave"s hands, was maintained by mere martial force, and at the very point of the sword. And, in no long time, it was feared, that with so general a principle of hatred to combine the populace, and so large a body of military students to head them, the balance of power, already approaching to an equipoise, would be turned against the Landgrave"s government. And, in the best event, his highness could now look for nothing from their love. All might be reckoned for lost that could not be extorted by force.
This state of things had been brought about by the dreadful Masque, seconded, no doubt, by those whom he had emboldened and aroused within; and, as the climax and crowning injury of the whole, every day unfolded more and more the vast importance which Klosterheim would soon possess as the centre and key of the movements to be antic.i.p.ated in the coming campaign. An electoral cap would perhaps reward the services of the Landgrave in the general pacification, if he could present himself at the German Diet as the possessor _de facto_ of Klosterheim and her territorial dependences, and with some imperfect possession _de jure_; still more, if he could plead the merit of having brought over this state, so important from local situation, as a willing ally to the Swedish interest. But to this a free vote of the city was an essential preliminary; and from that, through the machinations of The Masque, he was now further than ever.
The temper of the prince began to give way under these acc.u.mulated provocations. An enemy forever aiming his blows with the deadliest effect; forever stabbing in the dark, yet charmed and consecrated from all retaliation; always met with, never to be found! The Landgrave ground his teeth, clenched his fists, with spasms of fury. lie quarrelled with his ministers; swore at the officers; cursed the sentinels; and the story went through Klosterheim that he had kicked Adorni.
Certain it was, under whatever stimulus, that Adorni put forth much more zeal at last for the apprehension of The Masque. Come what would, he publicly avowed that six days more should not elapse without the arrest of this "ruler of Klosterheim by night." He had a scheme for the purpose, a plot baited for snaring him; and he pledged his reputation as a minister and an intriguer upon its entire success.
On the following day, invitations were issued by Adorni, in his highness" name, to a masqued ball on that day week. The fashion of masqued entertainments had been recently introduced from Italy into this sequestered nook of Germany; and here, as there, it had been abused to purposes of criminal intrigue.
Spite of the extreme unpopularity of the Landgrave with the low and middle cla.s.ses of the city, among the highest his little court still continued to furnish a central resort to the rank and high blood converged in such unusual proportion within the walls of Klosterheim.
The _schloss_ was still looked to as the standard and final court of appeal in all matters of taste, elegance, and high breeding. Hence it naturally happened that everybody with any claims to such an honor was anxious to receive a ticket of admission;--it became the test for ascertaining a person"s pretensions to mix in the first circles of society; and with this extraordinary zeal for obtaining an admission naturally increased the minister"s rigor and fastidiousness in pressing the usual investigation of the claimant"s qualifications. Much offence was given on both sides, and many sneers hazarded at the minister himself, whose pretensions were supposed to be of the lowest description. But the result was, that exactly twelve hundred cards were issued; these were regularly numbered, and below the device, engraved upon the card, was impressed a seal, bearing the arms and motto of the Landgraves of X.
Every precaution was taken for carrying into effect the scheme, with all its details, as concerted by Adorni; and the third day of the following week was announced as the day of the expected _fete_.
CHAPTER XIII.
The morning of the important day at length arrived, and all Klosterheim was filled with expectation. Even those who were not amongst the invited shared in the anxiety; for a great scene was looked for, and perhaps some tragical explosion. The undertaking of Adorni was known; it had been published abroad that he was solemnly pledged to effect the arrest of The Masque; and by many it was believed that he would so far succeed, at the least, as to bring on a public collision with that extraordinary personage. As to the issue most people were doubtful, The Masque having hitherto so uniformly defeated the best-laid schemes for his apprehension. But it was hardly questioned that the public challenge offered to him by Adorni would succeed in bringing him before the public eye. This challenge had taken the shape of a public notice, posted up in the places where The Masque had usually affixed his own; and it was to the following effect: "That the n.o.ble strangers now in Klosterheim, and others invited to the Landgrave"s _fete_, who might otherwise feel anxiety in presenting themselves at the _schloss_, from an apprehension of meeting with the criminal disturber of the public peace, known by the appellation of The Masque, were requested by authority to lay aside all apprehensions of that nature, as the most energetic measures had been adopted to prevent or chastise upon the spot any such insufferable intrusion; and for The Masque himself, if he presumed to disturb the company by his presence, he would be seized where he stood, and, without further inquiry, committed to the provost- marshal for instant execution;--on which account, all persons were warned carefully to forbear from intrusions of simple curiosity, since in the hurry of the moment it might be difficult to make the requisite distinctions."
It was antic.i.p.ated that this insulting notice would not long go without an answer from The Masque. Accordingly, on the following morning, a placard, equally conspicuous, was posted up in the same public places, side by side with that to which it replied. It was couched in the following terms: "That he who ruled by night in Klosterheim could not suppose himself to be excluded from a nocturnal _fete_ given by any person in that city. That he must be allowed to believe himself invited by the prince, and would certainly have the honor to accept his highness" obliging summons. With regard to the low personalities addressed to himself, that he could not descend to notice anything of that nature, coming from a man so abject as Adorni, until he should first have cleared himself from the imputation of having been a tailor in Venice at the time of the Spanish conspiracy in 1618, and banished from that city, not for any suspicions that could have settled upon him and his eight journeymen as making up one conspirator, but on account of some professional tricks in making a doublet for the Doge. For the rest, he repeated that he would not fail to meet the Landgrave and his honorable company."
All Klosterheim laughed at this public mortification offered to Adorni"s pride; for that minister had incurred the public dislike as a foreigner, and their hatred on the score of private character. Adorni himself foamed at the mouth with rage, impotent for the present, but which he prepared to give deadly effect to at the proper time. But, whilst it laughed, Klosterheim also trembled. Some persons, indeed, were of opinion that the answer of The Masque was a mere sportive effusion of malice or pleasantry from the students, who had suffered so much by his annoyances. But the majority, amongst whom was Adorni himself, thought otherwise. Apart even from the reply, or the insult which had provoked it, the general impression was, that The Masque would not have failed in attending a festival, which, by the very costume which it imposed, offered so favorable a cloak to his own mysterious purposes. In this persuasion, Adorni took all the precautions which personal vengeance and Venetian subtlety could suggest, for availing himself of the single opportunity that would, perhaps, ever be allowed him for entrapping this public enemy, who had now become a private one to himself.
These various incidents had furnished abundant matter for conversation in Klosterheim, and had carried the public expectation to the highest pitch of anxiety, some time before the great evening arrived. Leisure had been allowed for fear, and every possible antic.i.p.ation of the wildest character, to unfold themselves. Hope, even, amongst many, was a predominant sensation. Ladies were preparing for hysterics.
Cavaliers, besides the swords which they wore as regular articles of dress, were providing themselves with stilettoes against any sudden rencontre hand to hand, or any unexpected surprise. Armorers and furbishers of weapons were as much in request as the more appropriate artists who minister to such festal occasions. These again were summoned to give their professional aid and attendance to an extent so much out of proportion to their numbers and their natural power of exertion, that they were hara.s.sed beyond all physical capacity of endurance, and found their ingenuity more heavily taxed to find personal subst.i.tutes amongst the trades most closely connected with their own, than in any of the contrivances which more properly fell within the business of their own art. Tailors, horse-milliners, shoemakers, friseurs, drapers, mercers, tradesmen of every description, and servants of every cla.s.s and denomination, were summoned to a sleepless activity--each in his several vocation, or in some which he undertook by proxy. Artificers who had escaped on political motives from Nuremburg and other imperial cities, or from the sack of Magdeburg, now showed their ingenuity, and their readiness to earn the bread of industry; and if Klosterheim resembled a hive in the close- packed condition of its inhabitants, it was now seen that the resemblance held good hardly less in the industry which, upon a sufficient excitement, it was able to develop. But, in the midst of all this stir, din, and unprecedented activity, whatever occupation each man found for his thoughts or for his hands in his separate employments, all hearts were mastered by one domineering interest--the approaching collision of the Landgrave, before his a.s.sembled court, with the mysterious agent who had so long troubled his repose.
CHAPTER XIV
The day at length arrived; the guards were posted in unusual strength; the pages of honor, and servants in their state-dresses, were drawn up in long and gorgeous files along the sides of the vast Gothic halls, which ran in continued succession from the front of the _schloss_ to the more modern saloons in the rear; bands of military music, collected from amongst the foreign prisoners of various nations at Vienna, were stationed in their national costume--Italian, Hungarian, Turkish, or Croatian--in the lofty galleries or corridors which ran round the halls; and the deep thunders of the kettle-drums, relieved by cymbals and wind-instruments, began to fill the mazes of the palace as early as seven o"clock in the evening; for at that hour, according to the custom then established in Germany, such entertainments commenced.
Repeated volleys from long lines of musketeers, drawn up in the square, and at the other entrances of the palace, with the deep roar of artillery, announced the arrival of the more distinguished visitors; amongst whom it was rumored that several officers in supreme command from the Swedish camp, already collected in the neighborhood, were this night coming _incognito_--availing themselves of their masques to visit the Landgrave, and improve the terms of their alliance, whilst they declined the risk which they might have brought on themselves by too open a visit, in their own avowed characters and persons, to a town so unsettled in its state of feeling, and so friendly to the emperor, as Klosterheim had notoriously become.
From seven to nine o"clock, in one unbroken line of succession, gorgeous parties streamed along through the halls, a distance of full half a quarter of a mile, until they were checked by the barriers erected at the entrance to the first of the entertaining rooms, as the station for examining the tickets of admission. This duty was fulfilled in a way which, though really rigorous in the extreme, gave no inhospitable annoyance to the visitors; the barriers themselves concealed their jealous purpose of hostility, and in a manner disavowed the secret awe and mysterious terror which brooded over the evening, by the beauty of their external appearance. They presented a triple line of gilt lattice-work, rising to a great alt.i.tude, and connected with the fretted roof by pendent draperies of the most magnificent velvet, intermingled with banners and heraldic trophies suspended from the ceiling, and at intervals slowly agitated in the currents which now and then swept these aerial heights. In the centre of the lattice opened a single gate, on each side of which were stationed a couple of sentinels armed to the teeth; and this arrangement was repeated three times, so rigorous was the vigilance employed. At the second of the gates, where the bearer of a forged ticket would have found himself in a sort of trap, with absolutely no possibility of escape, every individual of each successive party presented his card of admission, and, fortunately for the convenience of the company, in consequence of the particular precaution used, one moment"s inspection sufficed. The cards had been issued to the parties invited not very long before the time of a.s.sembling; consequently, as each was sealed with a private seal of the Landgrave"s, sculptured elaborately with his armorial bearings, forgery would have been next to impossible.
These arrangements, however, were made rather to relieve the company from the too powerful terrors which haunted them, and to possess them from the first with a sense of security, than for the satisfaction of the Landgrave or his minister. They were sensible that The Masque had it in his power to command an access from the interior--and this it seemed next to impossible altogether to prevent; nor was _that_ indeed the wish of Adorni, but rather to facilitate his admission, and afterwards, when satisfied of his actual presence, to bar up all possibility of retreat. Accordingly, the interior arrangements, though perfectly prepared, and ready to close up at the word of command, were for the present but negligently enforced.
Thus stood matters at nine o"clock, by which time upwards of a thousand persons had a.s.sembled; and in ten minutes more an officer reported that the whole twelve hundred were present, without one defaulter.
The Landgrave had not yet appeared, his minister having received the company; nor was he expected to appear for an hour--in reality, he was occupied in political discussion with some of the ill.u.s.trious _incognitos_. But this did not interfere with the progress of the festival; and at this moment nothing could be more impressive than the far-stretching splendors of the spectacle.
In one immense saloon, twelve hundred cavaliers and ladies, attired in the unrivalled pomp of that age, were arranging themselves for one of the magnificent Hungarian dances, which the emperor"s court at Vienna had transplanted to the camp of Wallenstein, and thence to all the great houses of Germany. Bevies of n.o.ble women, in every variety of fanciful costume, but in each considerable group presenting deep ma.s.ses of black or purple velvet, on which, with the most striking advantage of radiant relief, lay the costly pearl ornaments, or the sumptuous jewels, so generally significant in those times of high ancestral pretensions, intermingled with the drooping plumes of martial cavaliers, who presented almost universally the soldierly air of frankness which belongs to active service, mixed with the Castilian _grandezza_ that still breathed through the camps of Germany, emanating originally from the magnificent courts of Brussels, of Madrid, and of Vienna, and propagated to this age by the links of Tilly, the Bavarian commander, and Wallenstein, the more than princely commander for the emperor. Figures and habiliments so commanding were of themselves enough to fill the eye and occupy the imagination; but, beyond all this, feelings of awe and mystery, under more shapes than one, brooded over the whole scene, and diffused a tone of suspense and intense excitement throughout the vast a.s.sembly. It was known that ill.u.s.trious strangers were present _incognito_. There now began to be some reason for antic.i.p.ating a great battle in the neighborhood. The men were now present, perhaps, the very hands were now visibly displayed for the coming dance, which in a few days, or even hours (so rapid were the movements at this period), were to wield the truncheon that might lay the Catholic empire prostrate, or might mould the destiny of Europe for centuries. Even this feeling gave way to one still more enveloped in shades--The Masque! Would he keep his promise, and appear? might he not be there already? might he not even now be moving amongst them? may he not, even at this very moment, thought each person, secretly be near me--or even touching myself--or haunting my own steps?
Yet again thought most people (for at that time hardly anybody affected to be incredulous in matters allied to the supernatural), was this mysterious being liable to touch? Was he not of some impa.s.sive nature, inaudible, invisible, impalpable? Many of his escapes, if truly reported, seemed to argue as much. If, then, connected with the spiritual world, was it with the good or the evil in that inscrutable region? But, then, the bloodshed, the torn dresses, the marks of deadly struggle, which remained behind in some of those cases where mysterious disappearances had occurred,--these seemed undeniable arguments of murder, foul and treacherous murder. Every attempt, in short, to penetrate the mystery of this being"s nature, proved as abortive as the attempts to intercept his person; and all efforts at applying a solution to the difficulties of the case made the mystery even more mysterious.
These thoughts, however, generally as they pervaded the company, would have given way, for a time at least, to the excitement of the scene; for a sudden clapping of hands from some officers of the household, to enforce attention, and as a signal to the orchestra in one of the galleries, at this moment proclaimed that the dances were on the point of commencing in another half-minute, when suddenly a shriek from a female, and then a loud, tumultuous cry from a mult.i.tude of voices, announced some fearful catastrophe; and in the next moment a shout of "Murder!" froze the blood of the timid amongst the company.
CHAPTER XV.
So vast was the saloon, that it had been impossible, through the maze of figures, the confusion of colors, and the mingling of a thousand voices, that anything should be perceived distinctly at the lower end of all that was now pa.s.sing at the upper. Still, so awful is the mystery of life, and so hideous and accursed in man"s imagination is every secret extinction of toat consecrated lamp, that no news thrills so deeply, or travels so rapidly. Hardly could it be seen in what direction, or through whose communication, yet in less than a minute a movement of sympathizing horror, and uplifted hands, announced that the dreadful news had reached them. A murder, it was said, had been committed in the palace. Ladies began to faint; others hastened away in search of friends; others to learn the news more accurately; and some of the gentlemen, who thought themselves sufficiently privileged by rank, hurried off with a stream of agitated inquirers to the interior of the castle, in search of the scene itself. A few only pa.s.sed the guard in the first moments of confusion, and penetrated, with the agitated Adorni, through the long and winding pa.s.sages, into the very scene of the murder. A rumor had prevailed for a moment that the Landgrave was himself the victim; and as the road by which the agitated household conducted them took a direction towards his highness" suite of rooms, at first Adorni had feared that result. Recovering his self- possession, however, at length, he learned that it was the poor old seneschal upon whom the blow had fallen. And he pressed on with more coolness to the dreadful spectacle.
The poor old man was stretched at his length on the floor. It did not seem that he had struggled with the murderer. Indeed, from some appearances, it seemed probable that he had been attacked whilst sleeping; and though he had received three wounds, it was p.r.o.nounced by a surgeon that one of them (and _that_, from circ.u.mstances, the first) had been sufficient to extinguish life. He was discovered by his daughter, a woman who held some respectable place amongst the servants of the castle; and every presumption concurred in fixing the time of the dreadful scene to about one hour before.
"Such, gentlemen, are the acts of this atrocious monster, this Masque, who has so long been the scourge of Klosterheim," said Adorni to the strangers who had accompanied him, as they turned away on their return to the company; "but this very night, I trust, will put a bridle in his mouth."
"G.o.d grant it may be so!" said some. But others thought the whole case too mysterious for conjectures, and too solemn to be decided by presumptions. And in the midst of agitated discussions on the scene they had just witnessed, as well as the whole history of The Masque, the party returned to the saloon.
Under ordinary circ.u.mstances, this dreadful event would have damped the spirits of the company; as it was, it did but deepen the gloomy excitement which already had possession of all present, and raise a more intense expectation of the visit so publicly announced by The Masque. It seemed as though he had perpetrated this recent murder merely by way of reviving the impression of his own dreadful character in Klosterheim, which might have decayed a little of late, in all its original strength and freshness of novelty; or, as though he wished to send immediately before him an act of atrocity that should form an appropriate herald or harbinger of his own entrance upon the scene.
Dreadful, however, as this deed of darkness was, it seemed of too domestic a nature to exercise any continued influence upon so distinguished an a.s.sembly, so numerous, so splendid, and brought together at so distinguished a summons. Again, therefore, the masques prepared to mingle in the dance; again the signal was given; again the obedient orchestra preluded to the coming strains. In a moment more, the full tide of harmony swept along. The vast saloon, and its echoing roof, rang with the storm of music. The masques, with their floating plumes and jewelled caps, glided through the fine mazes of the Hungarian dances. All was one magnificent and tempestuous confusion, overflowing with the luxury of sound and sight, when suddenly, about midnight, a trumpet sounded, the Landgrave entered, and all was hushed.
The glittering crowd arranged themselves in a half-circle at the upper end of the room; his highness went rapidly round, saluting the company, and receiving their homage in return. A signal was again made; the music and the dancing were resumed; and such was the animation and the turbulent delight amongst the gayer part of the company, from the commingling of youthful blood with wine, lights, music, and festal conversation, that, with many, all thoughts of the dreadful Masque, who "reigned by night in Klosterheim," had faded before the exhilaration of the moment. Midnight had come; the dreadful apparition had not yet entered; young ladies began timidly to jest upon the subject, though as yet but faintly, and in a tone somewhat serious for a jest; and young cavaliers, who, to do them justice, had derived most part of their terrors from the superst.i.tious view of the case, protested to their partners that if The Masque, on making his appearance, should conduct himself in a manner unbecoming a cavalier, or offensive to the ladies present, they should feel it their duty to chastise him; "though," said they, "with respect to old Adorni, should The Masque think proper to teach him better manners, or even to cane him, we shall not find it necessary to interfere."
Several of the very young ladies protested that, of all things, they should like to see a battle between old Adorni and The Masque, "such a love of a quiz that old Adorni is!" whilst others debated whether The Masque would turn out a young man or an old one; and a few elderly maidens mooted the point whether he were likely to be a "single"
gentleman, or burdened with a "wife and family." These and similar discussions were increasing in vivacity, and kindling more and more gayety of repartee, when suddenly, with the effect of a funeral knell upon their mirth, a whisper began to circulate that _there was one Masque too many in company_. Persons had been stationed by Adorni in different galleries, with instructions to note accurately the dress of every person in the company; to watch the motions of every one who gave the slightest cause for suspicion, by standing aloof from the rest of the a.s.sembly, or by any other peculiarity of manner; but, above all, to count the numbers of the total a.s.sembly. This last injunction was more easily obeyed than at first sight seemed possible. At this time the Hungarian dances, which required a certain number of partners to execute the movements of the figure, were of themselves a sufficient register of the precise amount of persons engaged in them. And, as these dances continued for a long time undisturbed, this calculation once made, left no further computation necessary, than simply to take the account of all who stood otherwise engaged. This list, being much the smaller one, was soon made; and the reports of several different observers, stationed in different galleries, and checked by each other, all tallied in reporting a total of just _twelve hundred and one persons_, after every allowance was made for the known members of the Landgrave"s suite, who were all unmasqued.
This report was announced with considerable trepidation, in a very audible whisper, to Adorni and the Landgrave. The buzz of agitation attracted instant attention; the whisper was loud enough to catch the ears of several; the news went rapidly kindling through the room that the company was too many by one: all the ladies trembled, their knees shook, their voices failed, they stopped in the very middle of questions, answers halted for their conclusion, and were never more remembered by either party; the very music began to falter, the lights seemed to wane and sicken; for the fact was new too evident that The Masque had kept his appointment, and was at this moment in the room "to meet the Landgrave and his honorable company."
Adorni and the Landgrave now walked apart from the rest of the household, and were obviously consulting together on the next step to be taken, or on the proper moment for executing one which had already been decided on. Some crisis seemed approaching, and the knees of many ladies knocked together, as they antic.i.p.ated some cruel or b.l.o.o.d.y act of vengeance. "O poor Masque!" sighed a young lady, in her tender- hearted concern for one who seemed now at the mercy of his enemies: "do you think, sir," addressing her partner, "they will cut him to pieces?"--"O, that wicked old Adorni!" exclaimed another; "I know he will stick the poor Masque on one side and somebody else will stick him on the other; I know he will, because The Masque called him a tailor; do you think he _was_ a tailor sir?"--"Why, really, madam, he walks like a tailor; but, then he must be a very bad one, considering how ill his own clothes are made; and _that_, you know, is next door to being none at all. But, see, his highness is going to stop the music."
In fact, at that moment the Landgrave made a signal to the orchestra: the music ceased abruptly; and his highness, advancing to the company, who stood eagerly awaiting his words, said: "Ill.u.s.trious and n.o.ble friends! for a very urgent and special cause I will request of you all to take your seats."
The company obeyed, every one sought the chair next to him, or, if a lady, accepted that which was offered by the cavalier at her side. The standers continually diminished. Two hundred were left, one hundred and fifty, eighty, sixty, twenty, till at last they were reduced to two,-- both gentlemen, who had been attending upon ladies. They were suddenly aware of their own situation. One chair only remained out of twelve hundred. Eager to exonerate himself from suspicion, each sprang furiously to this seat; each attained it at the same moment, and each possessed himself of part at the same instant. As they happened to be two elderly, corpulent men, the younger cavaliers, under all the restraints of the moment, the panic of the company, and the Landgraves presence, could not forbear laughing; and the more spirited amongst the young ladies caught the infection.
His highness was little in a temper to brook this levity, and hastened to relieve the joint occupants of the chair from the ridicule of their situation. "Enough!" he exclaimed, "enough! All my friends are requested to resume the situation most agreeable to them; my purpose is answered." The prince was himself standing with all his household, and, as a point of respect, all the company rose. ("_As you were_,"
whispered the young soldiers to their fair companions.)