FERDINAND. His only child! Dost thou feel that, murderer? His only one! Murderer, didst thou hear, his only one? The man has nothing in G.o.d"s wide world but his instrument and that only daughter! And wilt thou rob him of her?
Rob him? Rob a beggar of his last pittance? Break the lame man"s crutch, and cast the fragments at his feet? How? Have I the heart to do this? And when he hastens home, impatient to reckon in his daughter"s smiles the whole sum of his happiness; and when he enters the chamber, and there lies the rose--withered--dead--crushed--his last, his only, his sustaining hope. Ha! And when he stands before her, and all nature looks on in breathless horror, while his vacant eye wanders hopelessly through the gloom of futurity, and seeks G.o.d, but finds him nowhere, and then returns disappointed and despairing! Great G.o.d! and has not my father, too, an only son? an only child, but not his only treasure.
(After a pause.) Yet stay! What will the old man lose? She who could wantonly jest with the most sacred feelings of love, will she make a father happy? She cannot! She will not! And I deserve thanks for crushing this viper ere the parent feels its sting.
SCENE V.
MILLER returning, and FERDINAND.
MILLER. You shall be served instantly, baron! The poor thing is sitting without, weeping as though her heart would break! Your drink will be mingled with her tears.
FERDINAND. "Twere well for her were it only with tears! We were speaking of my lessons, Miller. (Taking out a purse.) I remember that I am still in your debt.
MILLER. How? What? Go along with you, baron! What do you take me for?
There is time enough for payment. Do not put such an affront on me; we are not together for the last time, please G.o.d.
FERDINAND. Who can tell? Take your money. It is for life or death.
MILLER (laughing). Oh! for the matter of that, baron! As regards that I don"t think I should run much risk with you!
FERDINAND. You would run the greatest. Have you never heard that youths have died. That damsels and youths have died, the children of hope, the airy castles of their disappointed parents? What is safe from age and worms has often perished by a thunderbolt. Even your Louisa is not immortal.
MILLER. G.o.d gave her to me.
FERDINAND. Hear me! I say to you your Louisa is not immortal. That daughter is the apple of your eye; you hang upon her with your whole heart and soul. Be prudent, Miller! None but a desperate gamester stakes his all upon a single cast. The merchant would be called a madman who embarked his whole fortune in one ship. Think upon this, and remember that I warned you. But why do you not take your money?
MILLER. How, baron, how? All that enormous purse? What can you be thinking of?
FERDINAND. Upon my debt! There! (Throws a heavy purse on the table; some gold drops out.) I cannot hold the dross to eternity.
MILLER (astonished). Mercy on us! what is this? The sound was not of silver! (Goes to the table and cries out in astonishment.) In heaven"s name, baron, what means this? What are you about? You must be out of your mind! (Clasping his hands.) There it lies! or I am bewitched.
"Tis d.a.m.nable! I feel it now; the beauteous, shining, glorious heap of gold! No, Satan, thou shalt not catch my soul with this!
FERDINAND. Have you drunk old wine, or new, Miller?
MILLER (violently). Death and furies! Look yourself, then. It is gold!
FERDINAND. And what of that?
MILLER. Let me implore you, baron! In the name of all the saints in heaven, I entreat you! It is gold!
FERDINAND. An extraordinary thing, it must be admitted.
MILLER (after a pause; addressing him with emotion). n.o.ble sir, I am a plain, straightforward man--do you wish to tempt me to some piece of knavery?--for, heaven knows, that so much gold cannot be got honestly!
FERDINAND (moved). Make yourself quite easy, dear Miller! You have well earned the money. G.o.d forbid that I should use it to the corruption of your conscience!
MILLER (jumping about like a madman). It is mine, then! Mine indeed!
Mine with the knowledge and consent of G.o.d! (Hastening to the door.) Daughter, wife, hurrah, come hither! (Returning.) But, for heaven"s sake, how have I all at once deserved this awful treasure? How am I to earn it? How repay it, eh?
FERDINAND. Not by your music lessons, Miller! With this gold do I pay you for (stops suddenly, and shudders)--I pay you--(after a pause, with emotion)--for my three months" unhappy dream of your daughter!
MILLER (taking his hand and pressing it affectionately). Most gracious sir! were you some poor and low-born citizen, and my daughter refused your love, I would pierce her heart with my own hands. (Returning to the gold in a sorrowful tone.) But then I shall have all, and you nothing-- and I should have to give up all this glorious heap again, eh?
FERDINAND. Let not that thought distress you, friend. I am about to quit this country, and in that to which I am journeying such coin is not current.
MILLER (still fixing his eyes in transport on the money). Mine, then, it remains? Mine? Yet it grieves me that you are going to leave us. Only just wait a little and you shall see how I"ll come out! I"ll hold up my head with the best of them. (Puts on his hat with an air, and struts up and down the room.) I"ll give my lessons in the great concert-room, and won"t I smoke away at the best puyke varinas--and, when you catch me again fiddling at the penny-hop, may the devil take me!
FERDINAND. Stay, Miller! Be silent, and gather up your gold.
(Mysteriously.) Keep silence only for this one evening, and do me the favor henceforward to give no more music lessons.
MILLER (still more vehemently grasping his hand, full of inward joy).
And my daughter, baron! my daughter! (Letting go.) No, no! Money does not make the man--whether I feed on vegetables or on partridges, enough is enough, and this coat will do very well as long as the sunbeams don"t peep in at the elbows. To me money is mere dross. But my girl shall benefit by the blessing; whatever wish I can read in her eyes shall be gratified.
FERDINAND (suddenly interrupting him). Oh! silence! silence!
MILLER (still more warmly). And she shall learn to speak French like a born native, and to dance minuets, and to sing, so that people shall read of her in the newspapers; and she shall wear a cap like the judge"s daughter, and a kidebarri [meaning, no doubt, Cul de Paris, a bustle], as they call it; and the fiddler"s daughter shall be talked of for twenty miles round.
FERDINAND. (seizing his hand in extreme agitation). No more! no more!
For G.o.d"s sake be silent! Be silent but for this one night; "tis the only favor I ask of you.
SCENE VI.
LOUISA with a gla.s.s of lemonade; the former.
LOUISA (her eyes swelled with weeping, and trembling voice, while she presents the gla.s.s to FERDINAND). Tell me, if it be not to your taste.
FERDINAND (takes the gla.s.s, places it on the table, and turns to MILLER).
Oh! I had almost forgotten! Good Miller, I have a request to make. Will you do me a little favor?
MILLER. A thousand with pleasure! What are your commands?
FERDINAND. My father will expect me at table. Unfortunately I am in very ill humor. "Twould be insupportable to me just now to mix in society. Will you go to my father and excuse my absence?
LOUISA (terrified, interrupts him hastily). Oh, let me go!
MILLER. Am I to see the president himself?
FERDINAND. Not himself. Give your message to one of the servants in the ante-chamber. Here is my watch as a credential that I sent you. I shall be here when you return. You will wait for an answer.
LOUISA (very anxiously). Cannot I be the bearer of your message?
FERDINAND (to MILLER, who is going). Stay--one thing more! Here is a letter to my father, which I received this evening enclosed in one to myself. Perhaps on business of importance. You may as well deliver it at the same time.
MILLER (going). Very well, baron!