第59章 A WEDDING(1)

The people dispersed. The great returned to their palaces, and also Alexis Razumovsky, who, that he might not excite the anger of the empress, had likewise attended the execution, returned to the imperial palace.

Elizabeth was standing before a large Venetian mirror, scrutinizing a toilet which she had to-day changed for the fourth time.

"Well," she asked of Alexis, as he entered, "was it an interesting spectacle? Was the handsome countess soundly whipped?"And, while so asking, she was smilingly occupied in attaching a purple flower to her hair.

"She was flayed," laconically replied Alexis. "Her blood streamed down a back that was as red as your beautiful lips, Elizabeth."Elizabeth offered him her lips to kiss.

"Now," she jestingly asked, "who is now the handsomest woman in my realm?""You are and always were!" responded Alexis, embracing her.

"And now tell me," said she, with curiosity, "what did this proud countess do? How did she behave, what did she say?"Alexis, seating himself upon a tabouret at her feet, related to her all about the fair Eleonore, and what a terrible curse she uttered.

"Ah, nonsense!" replied Elizabeth, shrugging her shoulders, "How can one make such a stupid prayer to God! I shall never marry, and therefore never have a daughter to be scourged with the knout."But while thus speaking, her eyes suddenly became fixed and her cheek pale. She laid her trembling hand upon her heart--tears gushed from her eyes.

Under her heart she had felt a movement of a new and mysterious life!

Heaven itself seemed to contradict her words! Elizabeth felt that she was a mother, and Eleonore's words now filled her with awe and terror!

Fainting, she sank into Razumovsky's arms.

A few weeks later, a great and magnificent court festival was celebrated at the imperial palace at St. Petersburg. It was not enough that Elizabeth had chosen a successor in the person of Peter, Duke of Holstein, she must also give this successor a wife, that the throne might be fortified and assured by a numerous progeny.

She chose for him the Princess of Anhalt-Zerbst, the young and beautiful Sophia Augusta, who, embracing the Greek religion, received the name of Catharine.

It was the marriage festival of this young German princess with the heir to the Russian throne which was celebrated in the imperial palace at St. Petersburg--a festival of splendor and enthusiasm, as it was attended by two women of the most exciting beauty, Elizabeth the present and Catharine the future empress--the one gorgeous with the splendor of the present, the other irradiated with the glory of the future. People looked at the fair youthful face of Catharine, and sought to read in her majestic high forehead the hopes that Russia might cherish of her! It was, therefore, a festival of the present and future that was there and then celebrated, and the magnates humbly prostrated themselves before this new star, and threw themselves upon the earth before the ever-new sun of imperial majesty which shone upon them in the person of Elizabeth.

Catharine with a joyful spirit and a proud smile laid her hand in that of Peter, and as she stepped with him to the altar she thought: "I do this that I may one day be empress! and as I can reach that position in no other way--well, then, let them call me the wife of this under-aged boy! I will suffer it until the time when I shall no longer suffer, but command."With such thoughts did Catharine become the wife of the Grand-duke Peter, who, as he with a loud and solemn "yes" vowed eternal truth to his young wife, looked at the Countess Woronzow, and both exchanged a stolen smile and a glowing glance of love.

"They may henceforth call this proud Catharine my wife," thought Peter, "but I shall never love her, as my heart will ever belong to my dear Woronzow! But Elizabeth has decided that Catharine shall be my wife. I accommodate myself to her command, and obey now, that I may one day command! But then woe to the wife this day forced upon me!"And when the ceremony was ended, the new-married pair received with smiling faces and radiant glances the congratulations of the court, which in loud and ecstatic exclamations commended the love and happiness of this young princely pair.