Scene II—Clara`s dwelling

Clara and her Mother

Mother

Such a love as Brackenburg’s I have never seen; I thought it was to be found only in romance books.

Clara (walking up and down the room, humming a song).

With love’s thrilling rapture

What joy can compare!

Mother

He suspects thy attachment to Egmont; and yet, if thou wouldst but treat him a little kindly, I do believe he would marry thee still, if thou wouldst have him.

Clara (sings).

Blissful

And tearful,

With thought-teeming brain;

Hoping And fearing

In passionate pain;

Now shouting in triumph,

Now sunk in despair;—

With love’s thrilling rapture

What joy can compare!

Mother

Have done with such baby-nonsense!

Clara

Nay, do not abuse it; ’tis a song of marvellous virtue. Many a time have I lulled a grown child to sleep with it.

Mother

Ay! Thou canst think of nothing but thy love. If it only did not put everything else out of thy dead. Thou shouldst have more regard for Brackenburg, I tell thee. He may make thee happy yet some day.

Clara

He?

Mother

Oh, yes! A time will come! You children live only in the present, and give no ear to our experience. Youth and happy love, all has an end; and there comes a time when one thanks God if one has any corner to creep into.

Clara (shudders, and after a pause stands up).

Mother, let that time come—like death. To think of it beforehand is horrible! And if it come! If we must—then—we will bear ourselves as we may. Live without thee, Egmont!

(Weeping.)

No! It is impossible.

Enter Egmont (enveloped in a horseman’s cloak, his hat drawn over his face)

Egmont

Clara!

Clara (utters a cry and starts back).

Egmont!

(She hastens towards him.)

Egmont!

(She embraces the leans upon him.)

O thou good, kind, sweet Egmont! Art thou come? Art thou here indeed!

Egmont

Good evening, mother?

Mother

God save you, noble sir! My daughter has well-nigh pined to death, because you have stayed away so long; she talks and sings about you the live-long day.

Egmont

You will give me some supper?

Mother

You do us too much honour. If we only had anything—

Clara

Certainly! Be quite, mother; I have provided everything; there is something prepared. Do not betray me, mother.

Mother

There’s little enough.

Clara

Never mind! And then I think when he is with me I am never hungry; so he cannot, I should think, have any great appetite when I am with him.

Egmont

Do you think so?

(Clara stamps with her foot and turns pettishly away.)

What ails you?

Clara

How could you are to-day! You have not yet offered me a kiss. Why do you keep your arms enveloped in your mantle, like a new-born babe? It becomes neither a soldier nor a lover to keep his arms muffled up.

Egmont

Sometimes, dearest, sometimes. When the soldier stands in ambush and would delude the foe, he collects his thoughts, gathers his mantle around him, and matures his plan and a lover—

Mother

Will you not take a seat, and make yourself comfortable? I must to the kitchen, Clara thinks of nothing when you are here. You must put up with what we have.

Egmont

Your good-will is the best seasoning.

[Exit Mother.

Clara

And what then is my love?

Egmont

Just what thou wilt.

Clara

Liken it to anything, if you have the heart.

Egmont

But first.

(He flings aside his mantle, and appears arrayed in a magnificent dress.)

Clara

Oh heavens!

Egmont

Now my arms are free!

(Embraces her.)

Clara

Don’t! You will spoil your dress.

(She steps back.)

How magnificent! I dare not touch you.

Egmont

Art thou satisfied? I promised to come once arrayed in Spanish fashion.

Clara

I had ceased to remind you of it; I thought you did not like it—ah, and the Golden Fleece!

Egmont

Thou seest it now.

Clara

And did the emperor really hang it round thy neck?

Egmont

He did, my child! And this chain and Order invest the wearer with the noblest privileges. On earth I acknowledged no judge over my actions, except the grand master of the Order, with the assembled chapter of knights.

Clara

Oh, thou mightest let the whole world sit in judgment over thee. The velvet is too splendid! and the braiding! and the embroidery! One knows not where to begin.

Egmont

There, look thy fill.

Clara

And the Golden Fleece! You told me its history, and said it is the symbol of everything great and precious, of everything that can be merited and won by diligence and toil. It is very precious—I may liken it to thy love; even so I wear it next my heart;—and then—

Egmont

What wilt thou say?

Clara

And then again it is not like.

Egmont

How so?

Clara

I have not won it by diligence and toil, I have not deserved it.

Egmont

It is otherwise in love. Thou dost deserve it because thou hast not sought it—and, for the most part, those only obtain love who seek it not.

Clara

Is it from thine own experience that thou hast learned this? Didst thou make that proud remark in reference to thyself? Thou, whom all the people love?

Egmont

Would that I had done something for them! That I could do anything for them! It is their own good pleasure to love me.

Clara

Thou hast doubtless been with the Regent to-day?

Egmont

I have.

Clara

Art thou upon good terms with her?

Egmont

So it would appear. We are kind and serviceable to each other.

Clara

And in thy heart?

Egmont

I like her. True, we have each our own views; but that is nothing to the purpose. She is an excellent woman, knows with whom she has to deal, and would be penetrating enough were she not quite so suspicious. I give her plenty of employment, because she is always suspecting some secret motive in my conduct when, in fact I have none.

Clara

Really none?

Egmont

Well, with one little exception, perhaps. All wine deposits lees in the cask in the course of time. Orange furnishes her still better entertainment, and is a perpetual riddle. He has got the credit of harbouring some secret design; and she studies his brow to discover his thoughts, and his steps, to learn in what direction they are bent.

Clara

Does she dissemble?

Egmont

She is Regent—and do you ask?

Clara

Pardon me; I meant to say, is she false?

Egmont

Neither more nor less than everyone who has his own objects to attain.

Clara

I should never feel at home in the world. But she has a masculine spirit, and is another sort of woman from us housewives and sempstresses. She is great, steadfast, resolute.

Egmont

Yes, when matters are not too much involved. For once, however, she is a little disconcerted.

Clara

How so?

Egmont

She has a moustache, too, on her upper lip, and occasionally an attack of the gout. A regular Amazon.

Clara

A majestic woman! I should dread to appear before her.

Egmont

Yet thou art not wont to be timid! It would not be fear, only maidenly bashfulness.

(Clara casts down her eyes, takes his hand, and leans upon him.)

Egmont

I understand thee, dearest! Thou mayst raise thine eyes.

(He kisses her eyes.)

Clara

Let me be silent! Let me embrace thee! Let me look into thine eyes, and find there everything—hope and comfort, joy and sorrow!

(She embraces and gazes on him.)

Tell me! Oh, tell me! It seems so strange—art thou indeed Egmont! Count Egmont! The great Egmont, who makes so much noise in the world, who figures in the newspapers, who is the support and stay of the provinces?

Egmont

No, Clara, I am not he.

Clara

How?

Egmont

Seest thou, Clara? Let me sit down!

(He seats himself, she kneels on a footstool before him, rests her arms on his knees and looks up in his face.)

That Egmont is a morose, cold, unbending Egmont, obliged to be upon his guard, to assume now this appearance and now that; harassed, misapprehended and perplexed, when the crowd esteem him light-hearted and gay; beloved by a people who do not know their own minds; honoured and extolled by the intractable multitude; surrounded by friends in whom he dares not confide; observed by men who are on the watch to supplant him; toiling and striving, often without an object, generally without a reward. O let me conceal how it fares with him, let me not speak of his feelings! But this Egmont, Clara, is calm, unreserved, happy, beloved and known by the best of hearts, which is also thoroughly known to him, and which he presses to his own with unbounded confidence and love.

(He embraces her.)

This is thy Egmont.

Clara

So let me die! The world has no joy after this!