The Swiss damsel did not leave the youthful traveller time to study particularly the exterior of the castle, or to construe the meaning of emblems and mottoes, seemingly of an Oriental character, with which the outside was inscribed, and which expressed in various modes, more or less directly, the attachment of the builders of this extensive pile to the learning of the Eastern sages. Ere he had time to take more than a general survey of the place, the voice of the Swiss maiden called him to an angle of the wall in which there was a projection, whence a long plank extended over a dry moat, and was connected with a window in which Annette was standing.
"You have forgotten your Swiss lessons already," said she, observing that Arthur went rather timidly about crossing the temporary and precarious drawbridge.
The reflection that Anne, her mistress, might make the same observation, recalled the young traveller to the necessary degree of composure. He passed over the plank with the same sang froid with which he had learned to brave the far more terrific bridge beneath the ruinous castle of Geierstein. He had no sooner entered the window than Annette, taking off her mask, bade him welcome to Germany, and to old friends with new names.
"Anne of Geierstein," she said, "is no more; but you will presently see the Lady Baroness of Arnheim, who is extremely like her; and I, who was Annette Veilchen in Switzerland, the servant to a damsel who was not esteemed much greater than myself, am now the young Baroness's waiting-woman, and make everybody of less quality stand back."
"If, in such circumstances," said young Philipson, "you have the influence due to your consequence, let me beseech of you to tell the Baroness, since we must now call her so, that my present intrusion on her is occasioned by my ignorance."
"Away, away!" said the girl, laughing. "I know better what to say in your behalf. You are not the first poor man and pedlar that has got the graces of a great lady; but I warrant you it was not by making humble apologies, and talking of unintentional intrusion. I will tell her of love, which all the Rhine cannot quench, and which has driven you hither, leaving you no other choice than to come or to perish!"
"Nay, but Annette, Annette"
"Fie on you for a fool, make a shorter name of it, cry Anne, Anne! and there will be more prospect of your being answered."
So saying, the wild girl ran out of the room, delighted, as a mountaineer of her description was likely to be, with the thought of having done as she would desire to be done by, in her benevolent exertions to bring two lovers together, when on the eve of inevitable separation.
In this self-approving disposition, Annette sped up a narrow turnpike stair to a closet, or dressing-room, where her young mistress was seated, and exclaimed, with open mouth, "Anne of Gei , I mean my Lady Baroness, they are come they are come!"
"The Philipsons?" said Anne, almost breathless as she asked the question.
"Yes no " answered the girl; "that is, yes, for the best of them is come, and that is Arthur."
"What meanest thou, girl? Is not Seignor Philipson, the father, along with his son?"
"Not he, indeed," answered Veilchen, "nor did I ever think of asking about him. He was no friend of mine, nor of any one else, save the old Landamman; and well met they were for a couple of wiseacres, with eternal proverbs in their mouths, and care upon their brows."
"Unkind, inconsiderate girl, what hast thou done?" said Anne of Geierstein. "Did I not warn and charge thee to bring them both hither? and you have brought the young man alone to a place where we are nearly in solitude! What will he what can he think of me?"
"Why, what should I have done?" said Annette, remaining firm in her argument. "He was alone, and should I have sent him down to the dorf to be murdered by the Rhinegrave's Lanzknechts? All is fish, I trow, that comes to their net; and how is he to get through this country, so beset with wandering soldiers, robber barons (I beg your ladyship's pardon), and roguish Italians, flocking to the Duke of Burgundy's standard? Not to mention the greatest terror of all, that is never in one shape or other absent from one's eye or thought."
"Hush, hush, girl! add not utter madness to the excess of folly; but let us think what is to be done. For our sake, for his own, this unfortunate young man must leave this castle instantly."
"You must take the message yourself, then, Anne I beg pardon, most noble Baroness; it may be very fit for a lady of high birth to send such a message, which, indeed, I have heard the Minne-singers tell in their romances; but I am sure it is not a meet one for me, or any frank-hearted Swiss girl, to carry. No more foolery; but remember, if you were born Baroness of Arnheim, you have been bred and brought up in the bosom of the Swiss hills, and should conduct yourself like an honest and well-meaning damsel."
"And in what does your wisdom reprehend my folly, good Mademoiselle Annette?" replied the Baroness.
"Ay, marry! now our noble blood stirs in our veins. But remember, gentle my lady, that it was a bargain between us, when I left yonder noble mountains, and the free air that blows over them, to coop myself up in this land of prisons and slaves, that I should speak my mind to you as freely as I did when our heads lay on the same pillow."
"Speak, then," said Anne, studiously averting her face as she prepared to listen; "but beware that you say nothing which it is unfit for me to hear."
"I will speak nature and common-sense; and if your noble ears are not made fit to hear and understand these, the fault lies in them, and not in my tongue. Look you, you have saved this youth from two great dangers one at the earth-shoot at Geierstein, the other this very day, when his life was beset. A handsome young man he is, well spoken, and well qualified to gain deservedly a lady's favour. Before you saw him, the Swiss youth were at least not odious to you. You danced with them, you jested with them, you were the general object of their admiration, and, as you well know, you might have had your choice through the Canton Why, I think it possible a little urgency might have brought you to think of Rudolph Donnerhugel as your mate."
"Never, wench, never!" exclaimed Anne.
"Be not so very positive, my lady. Had he recommended himself to the uncle in the first place, I think, in my poor sentiment, he might at some lucky moment have carried the niece. But since we have known this young Englishman, it has been little less than contemning, despising, and something like hating, all the men whom you could endure well enough before."
"Well, well," said Anne, "I will detest and hate thee more than any of them, unless you bring your matters to an end."
"Softly, noble lady, fair and easy go far. All this argues you love the young man, and let those say that you are wrong who think there is anything wonderful in the matter. There is much to justify you, and nothing that I know against it."
"What, foolish girl! Remember my birth forbids me to love a mean man my condition to love a poor man my father's commands to love one whose addresses are without his consent above all, my maidenly pride forbids me fixing my affections on one who cares not for me nay, perhaps, is prejudiced against me by appearances."
"Here is a fine homily!" said Annette; "but I can clear every point of it as easily as Father Francis does his text in a holiday sermon. Your birth is a silly dream, which you have only learned to value within these two or three days, when, having come to German soil, some of the old German weed, usually called family pride, has begun to germinate in your heart. Think of such folly as you thought when you lived at Geierstein that is, during all the rational part of your life, and this great terrible prejudice will sink into nothing. By condition, I conceive you mean estate. But Philipson's father, who is the most free-hearted of men, will surely give his son as many zechins as will stock a mountain farm. You have firewood for the cutting, and land for the occupying, since you are surely entitled to part of Geierstein, and gladly will your uncle put you in possession of it. You can manage the dairy, Arthur can shoot, hunt, fish, plough, harrow, and reap."