A historical tale by Werner von Heidenstam
translated from the Swedish and adapted by Sandra Dermark
VII. Eleanor and Christina.
Time after time, a heartbroken Mary Eleanor had the lid of the coffin lifted, just to behold his frozen features. Her hero had fought his sunny battle of victory, and he lay now in front of her, bereft of life, in a long shroud of silver brocade. She would have fit in better in earlier times, when faithful ladies knelt by the candle-lit tombs of their beloved knights. The era that she lived in was down-to-earth, with both feet firmly fixed upon the ground, and kettledrums thundered. How could the mature and harsh Swedish lords, with all of their short and straightforward language, understand and show patience towards such a woman, who could neither rule herself nor others? She was too naive and weak for her voice to be heard when it came to the fate of the young great power. All she could do was love and mourn.
At Nyköpingshus, she had a room completely draped in black velvet. Chairs, tables, ceiling, floor: everything was draped in black. Even the windows were fully draped in black curtains, for not even a ray of daylight to be let in. There she sat, completely dressed in black, by torchlight, and the servants that passed by the door could hear her sobbing. This was the same castle where the Folkungs had starved, and where Charles the Ninth had sighed for nights, pale with heart disease and impending death. Which was the prophecy that the witches had sung at Nyköpingshus, before the massacre, to the old holdfast? "You shall be a home for regrets, and biers, and mourning widows' tears!"
When the coffin was finally earthed in Riddarholmen Church, Mary Eleanor asked, the very next day, if she could get the key to the crypt, for lifting the lid for the last time in forever. But the stern members of the Regency Council threatened her with placing guards at the church door. Still she had, for her keeping, a relic more precious to her than any other: a little gold casket, a keepsake in which she had enclosed the King's embalmed heart. At night, it hung, inside a velveteen purse, from one of her bed-posts. By day, she sat, like she had done before, in her bedchamber draped in black, clutching it on her chest, above her own heart. Persuaded through endless threats, she finally let go of it. Caressing the golden keepsake, she wrapped it in green taffeta, tying it, like a present, with a silken cord. Other hands laid it down on the late King's body, where the heart had been in his life. And there it remains.
Still, she hadn't got through her longing yet. Colourful performers tried to entertain her with songs and jests. A generous soul, she emptied her caskets, scattering jewelry and crown coins into their hands. But her time still was lasting for that long. She talked bitterly about the cold land where she was condemned to stay and mourn, and she decided to leave Sweden for once and for all. Yet the venerable old Chancellor Oxenstierna, the leader of the land, shook his gray head in disapproval.
At her lonely seat of Gripsholm (where the Regent had her confined after claiming Nyköpingshus), a passage through dense woodland led from one of the castle gates to a little bay in Lake Mälaren.
"I will stay in my bedchamber for six or seven days, reading books and saying my prayers", she explained to her servants one evening, and had them bring enough provisions for a week. Thereafter, she locked the door from the inside, and she was left with the sole company of Fru Ebba, her chambermaid.
Night soon fell, and, while everyone else was sleeping, she silently crept into the garden with her chambermaid, then through the passageway, to a rowboat moored in the lake. On the other side, still within the castle park, they were received, with equal stealth, by some accomplices of theirs, who had been waiting, beneath the oak trees, with saddled steeds for the Queen and her maid. Both women got quickly on their horses, and the whole group of riders hasted forth, galloping, down the road to the Baltic coast. Sometimes, during their flight, they had to stay and have a rest for a while in a farmhouse. Then, the riders whispered to the farmers that the fine lady was a wealthy heiress, who had run away from her parents. "Ah! Her folks were so strict, and she couldn't marry the one she had given her heart to!" Upon saying these words, they looked sorrowfully at her blood-shot eyes, and they pointed to a long-haired young rider, dashing enough to be the man she had eloped with.
Over Gripsholm, the sun rose once more that morning. The Court Preacher placed himself before the locked chamber door, reading the morning prayers aloud, like he ever had done during her penance.
"What has happened? The Lord knows", he finally said, when he had to sit and sing through the whole service all alone, without anyone singing on the other side.
Thus, the courtiers had no other choice than breaching the door. Enraged and shocked, they stood on the threshold, looking at the flies that buzzed in the empty bedchamber. In a fit of restlessness, the Great Gustavus Adolphus's widow, whom the whole world still curiously talked about, had fled her country like a female adventurer, without any longer wishing to live there.
But years went by, and the site of his grave was still frequently dwelled upon by her thoughts.
Finally, she returned once more, to finally sleep for eternity by his side. And thus, a celebrated man's elderly, insignificant, and forgotten widow was carried, bereft of life, through the once more opened crypt door. Among the laurels in that crypt, a little wreath of shy forget-me-nots blooms invisibly upon a faithful heart.
When the Queen Dowager was weeping and sobbing in the black mourning chamber at Nyköpingshus, a little six-year-old girl could often be found sitting by her feet. It was her daughter Christina, her only child, who, after the fray at Lützen, had inherited the crown of great Sweden.
The little one was not allowed to play. Not even to whisper. But she couldn't be constantly crying. It was dreadful to sit in the firelight of torches and candles in the light of day, and hours reached the length of eternity. At first, she sat, full of longing, by the window, wondering if ever once at last a ray of daylight, even though it were a thin and pale one, should find a way in there. But the thick, heavy curtains were well fixed to the windowpanes. Then, she grew accustomed to close her eyes, until, in the end, she was all ears. In the meantime, steps grew closer and then faded outside the door.
But she gradually learned to recognize, even in the distance, a pair of creaking shoes, which always announced a moment of liberation. It was when her tutor came to fetch her for the classes. To avoid the black chamber, she kept on reading as long as possible. As soon as she had finished a book, she reached out for another.
She gradually learned to love her books much more than she loved her toys, and she became so learned that she could already write letters in both German and Latin at the age of ten. Then, she learned language after language, even Greek, for pleasure's sake. On the other hand, she would not even dare to touch a needle or a spool of thread. Then, she went rather for a ride on horseback, through woods and fields, leaping over fences and ditches, so that the farmboys who saw her were left breathless.
Axel Oxenstierna, who marvelled at her talents, came himself every day for a while, to teach her about states and their people. He was the one who had presented her before the Estates of the Realm and let them praise her as their Queen. Into her female hands, he would soon hand over the power over the Swedish realm, which was for him the loveliest one on Earth, and for which her father had given his life.
Through the people went a rush of longing to reach a place of honour in the North, and individuals were proud of serving the common good. Hundreds of donations had been given to Uppsala University. At the colleges, boys were learning their Latin declensions, with -us and -um at the end of certain words. The mines were being cared for. Wallonian smiths turned the steel beneath their hammers, letting sparks fly in all directions. At seven o'clock in the morning, Oxenstierna was already sitting in his office, while, in the German lands, the army was still ready to fight in the long struggle for freedom.
There was not a single perfection that Oxenstierna could not have wished for his curious ward to attain, for her to become the likeness of her father. Thus, he separated Christina from her eerie mother. Worried, he realized that the child took after her mother to an unlikely degree, even though she had inherited her father's genius. Then, he took her to the estate of Stegeborg, leaving her in the care of her aunt Catherine, a most uncommonly clever woman. They generally called her the Countess of the Pfalz, for she was married to a German count who had fled his lands and come to Sweden because of the war. And they had a cheerful and good son, about Christina's age, by the name of Charles Gustavus. During the games they played, both children often whispered to each other that they should, one day, walk down the aisle together as bride and groom.
Eventually, Christina grew up, and Charles began to grow wisps of black peach-fuzz on his upper lip.
Disappointed and heartbroken, he realized that she behaved no longer towards him like she had done before. Hunting horns echoed as the party rode through the forests. That evening, she had been sitting in the saddle since sunrise itself. Her modest gray outfit was the most simple of them all, without any decorations. Her plume flickered and fluttered in the wind, to and fro, on her broad-brimmed cavalier hat, and a dark suntan covered her sharp, lively features. No other lady could have dared to follow her on horseback, and she was pleased to be entirely surrounded by men. With them, she could talk of classical poetry and philosophy, instead of needlework or baking. Suddenly, she reined in her large, shining steed, a gelding with a speckled coat. Charles made haste to lift her from the saddle, but she had already landed on the ground with a quick leap. Her spurs clinked under her skirt-like trousers, and she whipped her brown boots with her riding whip. Shaking her strawberry-blond locks back, she looked at him with cold, shifty eyes:
"Why are you in such a sad mood?"
He bent the knees and made a curtsy, which was a custom for men to do in those days as well, and swept the hat he had taken off along the tall grass. But he gave no reply.
"Do you know what I have been thinking of?", she seriously addressed him. "It must be tough, after all, to get married and then always to have to obey another person. Let others get curious and think what they please. But, Charles, could you keep a secret? I'll never, ever, marry any man!"
He bent his head in silence, and a picnic supper was set for them on the green grass. Horns echoed once more, as servants with tableware and pitchers in their hands stumbled upon the trees' roots. The evening twilight made everything turn darker in the clearing, and soon the time came to return home to court.
Charles Gustavus rode on his own amidst the oak trees. The narrow-shouldered and short boy sat on his horse, swinging, distracted, in rhythm as the steed trotted.
"Why I am in such a sad mood?", he repeated maybe too loudly to himself. "And she dares to ask me that?"
His straight raven hair was neatly combed, kept in a middle part hairstyle, and his cheeks were round and ruddy, like those of a cherub. That was nothing to win a young queen's heart, not even that of such a cool one as Christina. He was too clever not to understand it himself.
Anyway, the thorn in his heart wasn't the one that lay deepest, or the one that hurt the most. There was another, far greater problem that troubled him. His mother was, after all, a Vasa. The blood of House Vasa coursed through his veins, but still, he was seen by Sweden as a foreigner, and even as a stranger. In vain had he prayed to receive some duty at his country's service. The mistrustful lords of the Council always answered: "No". A young, unexperienced maiden would soon seize the royal sceptre, and thus, it was not convenient to make some upstart too powerful. That was what the lords thought. But how could she ever lead a people of warriors? He was born in Sweden. This was his motherland. Filled with pride and ambition, he had listened, like the others, to every message of victory that the army brought from the war front. And he could not serve that country! Then, he would live alone, in ennui and idleness.
He puffed up his thick, rosy lips, looking completely manly and dashing, as his clenched fist broke the pathside branches in a fit of rage. Now, he had made his decision. Like a common volunteer, he should go forth into the war. That could, anyway, not be denied to him. He reminded the readers of a young medieval squire, riding out into the wide world in pursuit of adventures to win his golden knight's spurs. And now, you shall read how this adventure came to an end.
Blood was still dripping on the German plains, where Banér was leading the army towards new victories. Honoured like royalty, he lived among moats and cannons, and a tent was his home. In the end, for three nights in a row, the soldiers thought they had heard a voice which called: "Come, Banér! Come! Now the time is here!" They whispered that they recognized the voice, and that it was his late wife's. But Banér's honey eyes sparkled with defiant joie de vivre, and he replied with a hearty laugh:
"Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha! They're calling for me to win victories to come!"
Laughing, he drained his tankard to the dregs, and he let the cannons thunder. After a while, another cannon storm raged from the Swedish camp: it was such a shot that the local smallfolk ran, afraid, into the nearest churches. But it was only Banér, who had his cannons fired to celebrate that his proposal of marriage had been accepted by a sixteen-year-old countess. The soldiers still remembered the calling voice, and the pale face of the warlord betrayed that his last hour was near. At the end of the day, pursued by the enemy and ablaze with fever, he was carried in a stretcher by his men. He shouted, in the middle of his fever dreams, that none other than Torstensson could take over his sword. For a whole month, amidst the marching ranks one could see a coffin, and there, beneath the black cloth that covered it, the deceased leader was slowly carried home to his land.
Though Torstensson was so broken down by the gout he had caught in prison that he was often carried about in a stretcher, he led the army forth all the way to the very walls of Imperial Vienna. It was under his command that Lieutenant Charles Gustavus made his way up through the ranks. During a skirmish, he received bullets through his hat, coat, and shirt, and his dark hair was torn off only on one side of his head, as if it had received a pretty nasty scissor cut. But he puffed up his cheeks and his lips, and he struck back. This turned Charles into a great example to follow and such a manly man, and the soldiers loved him. He was irate, and it was obvious that he thought of flying higher.
For such a fellow, who, to crown it all, had the Queen herself for a fiancée, rising up was a matter of short time. If she couldn't be his, at least she was willing to give him a royal consolation prize. As Commander-in-Chief of the whole Swedish Army, he was allowed, in old Protestant Nuremberg, to host the flamboyant banquet which finally sealed that peace had been reached with the Kaiser, after thirty years of war. On the middle of the table splashed a fountain of rose water, and, from a window, the golden Lion of the North sprayed out showers of wine over the people, who were all drinking and singing and dancing. When night fell, thirty Swedish gunmen entered the banquet hall, aimed for the ceiling with their muskets and shot salute after salute, until the guests at the table could scarcely see each other through the gunsmoke. In such gunsmoke, a whole era had passed, and, in gunsmoke, the last glass was drained to the blessing of peace and to the German Realm where Protestants would now share equal rights with Catholics.
FINIS.
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