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Page 89
"You are displeased, Rosa, my sweet girl, with my loving
flowers."
"I am not displeased with your loving them, Mynheer
Cornelius, only it makes me sad to think that you love them
better than you do me."
"Oh, my dear, dear Rosa! look how my hands tremble; look at
my pale cheek, hear how my heart beats. It is for you, my
love, not for the black tulip. Destroy the bulb, destroy the
germ of that flower, extinguish the gentle light of that
innocent and delightful dream, to which I have accustomed
myself; but love me, Rosa, love me; for I feel deeply that I
love but you."
"Yes, after the black tulip," sighed Rosa, who at last no
longer coyly withdrew her warm hands from the grating, as
Cornelius most affectionately kissed them.
"Above and before everything in this world, Rosa."
"May I believe you?"
"As you believe in your own existence."
"Well, then, be it so; but loving me does not bind you too
much."
"Unfortunately, it does not bind me more than I am bound;
but it binds you, Rosa, you."
"To what?"
"First of all, not to marry."
She smiled.
"That's your way," she said; "you are tyrants all of you.
You worship a certain beauty, you think of nothing but her.
Then you are condemned to death, and whilst walking to the
scaffold, you devote to her your last sigh; and now you
expect poor me to sacrifice to you all my dreams and my
happiness."
"But who is the beauty you are talking of, Rosa?" said
Cornelius, trying in vain to remember a woman to whom Rosa
might possibly be alluding.
"The dark beauty with a slender waist, small feet, and a
noble head; in short, I am speaking of your flower."
Cornelius smiled.
"That is an imaginary lady love, at all events; whereas,
without counting that amorous Jacob, you by your own account
are surrounded with all sorts of swains eager to make love
to you. Do you remember Rosa, what you told me of the
students, officers, and clerks of the Hague? Are there no
clerks, officers, or students at Loewestein?"
"Indeed there are, and lots of them."
"Who write letters?"
"They do write."
"And now, as you know how to read ---- "
Here Cornelius heaved a sigh at the thought, that, poor
captive as he was, to him alone Rosa owed the faculty of
reading the love-letters which she received.
"As to that," said Rosa, "I think that in reading the notes
addressed to me, and passing the different swains in review
who send them to me, I am only following your instructions."
"How so? My instructions?"
"Indeed, your instructions, sir," said Rosa, sighing in her
turn; "have you forgotten the will written by your hand on
the Bible of Cornelius de Witt? I have not forgotten it; for
now, as I know how to read, I read it every day over and
over again. In that will you bid me to love and marry a
handsome young man of twenty-six or eight years. I am on the
look-out for that young man, and as the whole of my day is
taken up with your tulip, you must needs leave me the
evenings to find him."
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