The Daughter of an Empress

"By this you would not say, princess--"

"By this I mean to say," interposed Elizabeth, "that this conspiracy is

brought to a bloodless conclusion, and that, from this hour, there is

but one woman in this great Russian realm who has any claim to the title

of empress, and that woman is the Regent Anna Leopoldowna!"

"You will therefore renounce your sacred and well-grounded claims to the

imperial throne?" asked Lestocq, continuing his scribbling.

"Yes, that will I," responded Elizabeth. "I will no longer be plagued

with your plans and machinations--I will have repose. In the interior of

my palace I will be empress; there will I establish a realm, a realm of

peace and enjoyable happiness; there will I erect the temple of love,

and consecrate myself as its priestess! No, speak no more of revolutions

and conspiracies. I am not made to sit upon a throne as the feared and

thundering goddess of cowardly slaves, causing millions to tremble

at every word and glance! I will not be empress, not the bugbear of a

quaking, kneeling people, I will be a woman, who has nothing to do with

the business and drudgery of men; I will not be plagued with labor and

care, but will enjoy and rejoice in my existence!"

"For that you will be allowed no time!" said Lestocq, with solemnity.

"When you give up your plans and renounce your rights, then, princess,

it will be all over with the days of enjoyment and happiness. It will

then no longer be permitted you to convert your palace into a temple

of pleasure, and thenceforth you will be known only as the priestess of

misfortune and misery!"

"You have again your fever-dreams," said Elizabeth, smiling. "Come, I

will awaken you! I have told you my story; it is now for you to give me

a recipe for my inflamed eyes."

"Here it is," earnestly answered Lestocq, handing to the princess the

paper upon which he had been scribbling.

Elizabeth took it and at first regarded it with smiling curiosity;

but her features gradually assumed a more serious and even terrified

expression, and the roses faded from her cheeks.

"You call this a recipe for eyes reddened with weeping," said she, with

a shudder, "and yet it presents two pictures which make my hair bristle

with terror, and might cause one to weep himself blind!"

"They represent our future!" said Lestocq, with decision. "You see that

man bound upon the wheel--that is myself! Now look at the second. This

young woman who is wringing her hands, and whose head one of these nuns

is shearing, while the other is endeavoring, in spite of her struggling

resistance, to envelope her in that black veil;--that is you, princess.

For you the cloister, for me the wheel! That will be our future,

Princess Elizabeth, if you now hesitate in your forward march in the

path upon which you have once entered.