Page:Hoffmann's Strange Stories - Hoffman - 1855.djvu/448

 softly opened the door. Great heaven, what did she see!—The old Bohemian woman, dressed in scarlet rags, seated on the floor, her eyes fixed and glassy; a child is struggling in her arms, uttering uneasy cries. The countess Gabrielle immediately recognized her child; she sprang forward with irresistible energy, snatched the child from the old woman, who tried to resist her; but this violence exhausted her remaining strength, and she fell heavily to rise no more. The countess uttered cries of fear; the servants are aroused, and all hasten to the scene, but there no longer remains anything but a corpse to be consigned to the earth. Count Z went to the little house in W to question Angelika concerning the child that had been lost and found again. In the presence of her father, the poor mad woman seems to recover her reason for awhile; but the disease soon regains its empire; Angelika again raves, her features become deformed and bear an odious resemblance to the face of the old Bohemian woman. She weeps, she sobs; then with frenzied accents and savage voice, she orders the attendants to withdraw and leave her alone.

The unfortunate father gives out to the world that the mad woman is shut up in one of his castles; but the truth is that Angelika would not leave her retreat. She still inhabits alone the little house to which count S came to die by her side. The secret of what passed at last between these two beings remained unknown.

Count Z is dead. Gabrielle came to W with Edwine, to make some family arrangements. As for the recluse of the deserted house, she is left to the care of a brutal old servant who has become a maniac through madness and savageness.

Dr. K finished his recital by saying that my unexpected presence in the deserted house had produced on the bewildered senses of Angelika a crisis, the result of which might establish an equilibrium in her faculties. For the rest, the deliciously beautiful image that I had seen reflected in my pocket mirror was that of Edwine, who at the time of my curious contemplation was visiting Angelika's asylum. A few days after these events that had nearly deranged my brain, a feeling of deepest sadness obliged me to quit for a time my residence in W. This strange influence was not entirely dissipated until after the death of the mad woman of the deserted house.