you,although you were, yourself, firmly convinced of your own existence? There are more martyrdoms than yours, Misanthrope of Assens. You may have read the tale of the Emperor’s new clothes, by that brilliant, rising young author, Hans Andersen. But here we have it the other way around: the Emperor is walking along in all his splendor, scepter and orb in hand, and no one in the whole town dares to see him, for they believe that they shall then be thought unfit for their offices, or impossibly dull. This is my little Emperor; the procession a bad man made, about whom I shall tell you; and you, Monsieur Timon, you are the innocent child who cries out: ‘But there
is
an Emperor!’
“The motto of the Nat-og-Dag family,” went on Miss Malin, “runs thus: ‘The sour with the sweet.’ Out of piety to my ancestors I have partaken of many of the mixed dishes of life: the giblet soup of Mr. Swedenborg, the salad of platonic love, even the sauerkraut of the divine Marquis. I have developed the palate of a true Nat-og-Dag; I have come to relish them. But the bitterness of life, that is bad nourishment, particularly to a young heart. Upon the meadows of the Westerlands they raise a sort of mutton which, fed on salt grass, produces an excellent-tasting meat known in the culinary world as
pré-salé
. This girl has been fed on such salt plains and on brine and bitter herbs. Her little heart has had nothing else to eat. She is indeed, spiritually, an
agneau pré-salé
, my salted little ewe lamb.”
The girl, who had all the time sat crouching near her old friend, drew herself up when Miss Malin began to tell her story. She sat up straight then, her amber-colored eyes below their delicate, long-drawn eyebrows that were like the markings on a butterfly’s wings, or themselves like a pair of low extended wings, were fixed on the air, too haughty to turn toward her audience. In spite of her gentle brow she was a dangerous animal, ready to spring. But at what? At life altogether.
“Have you ever heard,” asked Miss Malin, “of Count August Platen-Hallermund?” At the sound of the name the girl shudderedand became pale. A threatening dusk sank over her clear eyes. “Hush,” said Miss Malin, “we shall not name him again. As he is not a man, but an angel, we shall call him the Count Seraphina. We shall sit, tonight, in a lit
de justice
on the Count. The truth must be told about him just this one time. When I was a little girl and was taught French,” the old lady addressed herself, above the heads of the young people, in a sudden little fit of familiarity, to the Cardinal, “the very first phrase in my reading book ran thus:
Le lit est une bonne chose; si l’on n’y dort pas, l’on s’y repose
. Like much else which we were taught as children, it was proved by life to be a complete fallacy. But it may still apply to the bed of justice.”
“Indeed I have read the poetry and philosophy of Count August,” said the Cardinal.
“Not I,” said Miss Malin. “When, on doomsday, I am called to account for many hours spent in the wrong places, I shall still be able to plead: ‘But I have not read the poems of Count August von Platen.’ How many poems has he written, My Lord?”
“Ah, I could not tell,” said the Cardinal. Miss Malin said:
“Cinq ou six milles? C’est beaucoup. Combien en a-t-il de bons? Quinze ou seize. C’est beaucoup, dit Martin
.”
“You have read, My Lord,” she went on, “of the unhappy young man who had been changed into a pug by a witch, and who could not be transformed back unless a pure virgin, who had known no man, should, upon a St. Sylvester’s night, read the poems of Gustav Pfizer without falling asleep? And his sympathetic friend, when he is told all this, answers: ‘Then, alas, I cannot help you. First of all, I am no virgin. Secondly, I never could, reading Gustav Pfizer’s poems, keep from falling into slumber.’ If Count August is turned into a pug, for exactly the same
is
an Emperor!’
“The motto of the Nat-og-Dag family,” went on Miss Malin, “runs thus: ‘The sour with the sweet.’ Out of piety to my ancestors I have partaken of many of the mixed dishes of life: the giblet soup of Mr. Swedenborg, the salad of platonic love, even the sauerkraut of the divine Marquis. I have developed the palate of a true Nat-og-Dag; I have come to relish them. But the bitterness of life, that is bad nourishment, particularly to a young heart. Upon the meadows of the Westerlands they raise a sort of mutton which, fed on salt grass, produces an excellent-tasting meat known in the culinary world as
pré-salé
. This girl has been fed on such salt plains and on brine and bitter herbs. Her little heart has had nothing else to eat. She is indeed, spiritually, an
agneau pré-salé
, my salted little ewe lamb.”
The girl, who had all the time sat crouching near her old friend, drew herself up when Miss Malin began to tell her story. She sat up straight then, her amber-colored eyes below their delicate, long-drawn eyebrows that were like the markings on a butterfly’s wings, or themselves like a pair of low extended wings, were fixed on the air, too haughty to turn toward her audience. In spite of her gentle brow she was a dangerous animal, ready to spring. But at what? At life altogether.
“Have you ever heard,” asked Miss Malin, “of Count August Platen-Hallermund?” At the sound of the name the girl shudderedand became pale. A threatening dusk sank over her clear eyes. “Hush,” said Miss Malin, “we shall not name him again. As he is not a man, but an angel, we shall call him the Count Seraphina. We shall sit, tonight, in a lit
de justice
on the Count. The truth must be told about him just this one time. When I was a little girl and was taught French,” the old lady addressed herself, above the heads of the young people, in a sudden little fit of familiarity, to the Cardinal, “the very first phrase in my reading book ran thus:
Le lit est une bonne chose; si l’on n’y dort pas, l’on s’y repose
. Like much else which we were taught as children, it was proved by life to be a complete fallacy. But it may still apply to the bed of justice.”
“Indeed I have read the poetry and philosophy of Count August,” said the Cardinal.
“Not I,” said Miss Malin. “When, on doomsday, I am called to account for many hours spent in the wrong places, I shall still be able to plead: ‘But I have not read the poems of Count August von Platen.’ How many poems has he written, My Lord?”
“Ah, I could not tell,” said the Cardinal. Miss Malin said:
“Cinq ou six milles? C’est beaucoup. Combien en a-t-il de bons? Quinze ou seize. C’est beaucoup, dit Martin
.”
“You have read, My Lord,” she went on, “of the unhappy young man who had been changed into a pug by a witch, and who could not be transformed back unless a pure virgin, who had known no man, should, upon a St. Sylvester’s night, read the poems of Gustav Pfizer without falling asleep? And his sympathetic friend, when he is told all this, answers: ‘Then, alas, I cannot help you. First of all, I am no virgin. Secondly, I never could, reading Gustav Pfizer’s poems, keep from falling into slumber.’ If Count August is turned into a pug, for exactly the same
Similar Books
