Look at me, Natalie! I stand
before you a traitor to this empress, to whom I have sworn faith and
obedience; she has heaped favors upon me, and at one time I was
even passionately devoted to her! But Count Paulo awoke me from that
intoxication; he roused me from the condition of a favorite of the
empress; he taught me to see the cruel, bloodthirsty empress in her true
form; he spoke to me of your sacred rights, and when I recognized
and comprehended them, I collected myself, vowed myself your knight,
devoting myself to the defence of your rights, and swore to leave no
artifices, no dissimulation, nor even treason itself, unessayed for the
promotion of this great, this sublime object! Princess Natalie, for your
sake I have become a traitor! The admiral of the Russian fleet, he whom
the world calls the favorite of the empress, Count Alexis Orloff, lies
at your feet and swears to you eternal faith, devotion, and adoration!"
"Alexis Orloff!" she joyfully exclaimed, "at length, then, I have a name
by which I can call you! Alexis, was not that the name of my father? Oh,
that is a good omen! You bear the name of my father, whom my mother so
dearly loved!"
"And whom the empress, impelled by love, raised to the position of her
husband," whispered Orloff, bending nearer to her and pressing her hand
to his bosom.
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