"Our God, the all just,Unto himself reserves this royalty,The secret chastening of the guilty heart;The fiery touch, the scourge that purifies—Leave it with him. Yet make not that thy trust;For that strong heart of thine—oh, listen yet!—Must in its depths o'ercome the very wishOf death or torture to the guilty one,Ere it can sleep again."Hemans.Don Manuel's house had once belonged to a Moorish Cid, or lord. It had been assigned to the first Conde de Nuera, as one of the originalconquistadorsof Seville; and he had bequeathed it to his second son. It had a turret, after the Moorish fashion, and the upper chamber of this had been given to Carlos on his first arrival in the city; from an idea that the theological student would require a solitary place for study and devotion, or, at least, that it would be decorous to suppose so. The room beneath had been occupied by Don Juan, but since his departure it was appropriated by Gonsalvo, who liked solitude, and took advantage of his improved health to escape from the ground-floor, to which his infirmities had long confined him.As Carlos stole noiselessly down the narrow winding stair, he noticed a light in his cousin's room. This in itself did not surprise him. But he certainly felt a little disconcerted when, just as he passed the door, Don Gonsalvo opened it, and met him face to face. He also was fully equipped in sword and cloak, and carried a torch in his hand."Vaya, vaya, Don Carlos," he said reproachfully; "after all, thou couldst not trust me.""Nay, I did trust you."From fear of being overheard, both entered the nearest room—Don Gonsalvo's—and its owner closed the door softly."You are stealing away from fear of me, and thereby throwing yourself into the fire. Do it not, Don Carlos; be advised, and do it not." He spoke earnestly, and without a shadow of the old bitterness and sarcasm."Nay, it is not thus. My flight was planned ere yesterday; and in concert with one who both can and will provide me with the means of safety. It is best I should go.""Enough said then," returned Gonsalvo, more coldly. "Farewell; I seek not to detain you. Farewell; for though we may go forth together, our paths divide, and for ever, at the door.""Your path is perhaps less safe than mine, Don Gonsalvo.""Talk of what you understand, cousin. My path is safety itself. And now that I think of it (if you could be trusted), you might aid me perhaps. Did you know all, I dare not doubt that you would rejoice to do it.""God knows how joyfully I would aid you if I could, Don Gonsalvo. But I fear you are bound on a useless, and worse than useless, errand.""You know not my errand.""But I know to whom you go this night. Oh, my cousin, is it possible you can dream that prayer of yours will soften hearts harder than the nether millstone?""I know the way to one heart; and though it be the hardest of all, I shall reach it.""Were you to pour the wealth of El Dorado at the feet of Gonzales de Munebrãga, he neither would nor could unloose one bolt of that prison."Gonsalvo's wild look changed suddenly into one of wistful earnestness, almost of tenderness. He said, lowering his voice,—"Near as death, the revealer of secrets, may be to me, there are still some questions worth the asking. Perchanceyoucan throw a gleam of light upon this horrible darkness. We are speaking frankly now, and as in God's presence. Tell me,is that charge true?""Frankly, and in the sense in which you ask—it is."The last fatal words Carlos only whispered. Gonsalvo made no answer; but a kind of momentary spasm passed across his face.Carlos at length went on in a low voice: "She knew the Evangel long before I did, though she is so young—not yet one-and-twenty. She was the pupil of Dr. Egidius; but he was wont to say he learned more from her than she did from him. Her keen, bright intellect cut through sophistries, and reached truth so quickly. And God gave her abundantly of his grace; making her willing, for that truth, to endure all things. Oft have I seen her sweet face kindle and glow whilst he who taught us spoke of the joy and strength given to those that suffer for the name of Christ. I am persuaded He is with her now, and will be with her even to the end. Could you gain access to her where she is, I think she would tell you she possesses a treasure of peace of which neither death nor suffering, neither cruelty of fiends nor worse cruelty of fiend-like men, can avail to rob her.""She is a saint—she will be a blessed saint in heaven, let them say what they may," murmured Gonsalvo hoarsely. Then the fierce look returned to his face again. "But I think the old Christians of Castile, the men whose good swords made theinfidels bite the dust, and planted the cross on their painted towers, are no better than curs and dastards.""In that they suffer these things?""Yes; a thousand times, yes. In the name of man's honour and woman's loveliness, are there, in our good city of Seville, neither fathers, nor brothers, nor lovers left alive? No man who thinks the sweetest eyes ever seen worth six inches of steel in five skilful fingers? No one man, save the poor forgotten cripple, Don Gonsalvo Alvarez. But he thanks God this night that he has spared his life, and left strength enough in his feeble limbs to beat him into a murderer's presence.""Don Gonsalvo! what do you mean?" cried Carlos, shrinking from him."Lower thy voice, an' it please thee. But why should I fear to tell thee—thee, who hast good cause to be the death-foe of Inquisitors? If thou art not cur and dastard too, thou wilt applaud and pray for me. For I suppose heretics pray, at least as well as Inquisitors. I said I would reach the heart of Gonzales de Munebrãga this night. Not with gold. There is another metal of keener temper, which enters in where even gold cannot come.""Then you mean—murder?" said Carlos, again drawing near him, and laying his hand on his arm. Gonsalvo sank into a seat, half mechanically, half from an instinct that led him to spare the strength he would need so sorely by-and-by.In the momentary pause that followed, the clock of San Vicente tolled the midnight hour."Yes," replied Gonsalvo steadily; "I mean murder—as the shepherd does who strangles the wolf with his paw on the lamb.""Oh, think—""I have thought of everything. And mark me, Don Carlos, I have but one regret. It is that my weapon deals an instantaneous death. Such revenge is poor and flavourless after all.I have heard of poisons whose least drop, mingling with the blood, ensures a slow agonizing death—time to learn what torture means, and to drain to the dregs the cup filled for others—to curse God and man ere he dies. For a phial of such, wherewith to anoint my blade, I would sell my soul to-night.""O Gonsalvo, this is horrible! They are wild, wicked words you speak. Pray God to pardon you!""I adjure him by his justice to prosper me," said Gonsalvo, raising his head defiantly."He will not prosper you. And do you dream that such a mad achievement (suppose you even succeed in it) will open prison-doors and set captives free? Alas! alas! that we are not at the mercy of a tyrant'swill. For tyrants, the worst of them, sometimes relent; and—they are mortal. That which is crushing us is not a living being, an organism with nerves, and brain, and blood. It is a system, aTHING, a terrible engine, that moves on in its resistless way, cold and lifeless, without will or feeling. Strong as adamant, it kills, tortures, destroys; obeying laws far away out of our sight. Were Valdez and Munebrãga, and all the Board of Inquisitors, dead corpses by the morning light, not a single dungeon in the Triana would open its pitiless gate.""I do not believethat," replied Gonsalvo, rather more quietly. "Surely there must be some confusion, of which advantage may be taken by friends of the prisoners. This, indeed, is the motive which now induces me to confide in you.Youmay know those who, if they had the chance, could strike a shrewd blow to save their dearest on earth from torture and death."But Gonsalvo read no answer in the sorrowful face of Carlos to the searching look of inquiry with which he said this. After a silence he went on,—"Suppose the worst, however. The Holy Office sorely needs a little blood-letting, and will be much the better for it. Whoever succeeds, Munebrãga will have my dagger flashing in his eyes, and will take care how he deals with his prisoners, and whom he arrests.""I implore you to think of yourself," said Carlos.Gonsalvo smiled. "I know I shall pay the forfeit," he said, "even as those who slew the Inquisitor Pedro Arbues before the high altar in Saragossa. But"—here the smile faded, and the stern set look returned to his face—"I shall not pay more, for a man's triumphant vengeance, than those fiends will dare to inflict upon a tender, delicately nurtured girl for the crime of a mystic meditation, or a few words of prayer not properly rounded off with an Ave.""True. But then you will suffer alone. She has God with her.""Icansuffer alone."For that word Carlos envied him.Heshrank in terror from loneliness, from suffering, shuddering at the very thought of the dungeon and the torture-room. And just then the first quarter of his hour of grace chimed from the clock of San Vicente. What if he and Pepe should fail to meet? He would not think of that now. Whatever happened, Gonsalvomustbe saved. He went on,—"Here you can suffer alone and be strong. But how will you endure the loneliness of the long hereafter, away from God's presence, from light and life and hope? Are you content that you, and she for whom you give your life, should be sundered throughout eternity?""Nay; I am casting my lot in with hers. If the Church curses her (pure and holy as she ever was), its anathema shall fall on me too. If only the Church's key opens heaven, she and I will both stand without.""Yet you know she will enter heaven. Shallyou?"Gonsalvo hesitated. "It will not be the blood of a villain that will bar my way," he said."God says, 'Thou shalt not kill.'""Then what will he do with Gonzales de Munebrãga?""He will do that with him of which, if you but dreamed, it would change your fiercest hate into saddest, deepest pity. Have you realized what a span is our life here compared with the countless ages of eternity? Think! For God's chosen a few weeks, or months at most, of solitude and fear and pain, ended perhaps by—but that is as he pleases;ended, at all events. Then add up the million years, fill them with the joy of victory, and the presence and love of Christ himself. Can they not, and we for them, be content with this?""Are you content with it yourself?" Gonsalvo suddenly interrupted. "You seek flight."The glow faded from the face of Carlos, and his eyes sank to the ground. "Christ has not called me yet," he answered in a lower tone. There was a silence; then he resumed: "Turn now to the other side. Would you change, even this hour, with Gonzales de Munebrãga? But take him from his wealth, and his pomp, and his sinful luxuries, all defiled with blood, and what remains for him? Everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels.""Everlasting fire!" Gonsalvo repeated, as if the thought pleased him."Leave him in God's hand. It is a stronger hand than yours, Don Gonsalvo.""Everlasting fire! I would send him there to-night.""And whither would you send your own sinful soul?""God might pardon, though the Church cursed.""Possibly. But to enter God's heaven you need something besides pardon.""What?" asked Gonsalvo, half wearily, half incredulously."'Holiness; without which no man can see the Lord.'""Holiness?" Gonsalvo questioned, as if the word was strange to him, and he attached no meaning to it."Yes," Carlos went on, with intense and ever increasing earnestness; "unless, even from that passionate heart of yours, revenge and hatred are banished, you canneversee God, never come where—""Hold thy peace, trifler!" Gonsalvo interrupted with angry impatience. "Too long have I tarried, listening to thine idle talk. Priests and women are content with words; brave menact. Farewell to thee!""One word more, only one." Carlos drew near and laid his hand on his cousin's arm. "Nay, youshalllisten to me. Seemeth it to you a thing incredible that that heart of yours can be changed and softened to a love like His who prayed on the cross for his murderers? Yet it can be.Hecan do it. He gives pardon, holiness, peace. Peace of which you dream not now, but whichsheknows full well. O Don Gonsalvo, better join her where she is going, than wildly, rashly, and most uselessly peril your soul to avenge her!""Uselessly! Were that true indeed—""Ay de mi! who can doubt it?""Would I had time for thought!""Take it, in God's name, and pray him to keep you from a great crime."For a few moments he sat still—still as the dead. Then he started suddenly. "Already the hour is passing," he exclaimed; "I shall be too late. Fool that I was, to be almost moved from my purpose by the idle words of a—The weakness is past now. Still, ere we part, give me thy hand, Don Carlos, for, on my faith, I never liked thee half so well."Very sorrowfully Carlos extended it, rather wondering as he did so that the energetic Gonsalvo failed to spring from his seat and prepare to be gone.Gonsalvo stirred not, even to take the offered hand. A deathlike paleness overspread his face, and a cry of terror had well nigh broken from his lips. But he choked it back."Something is strangely wrong with me," he faltered. "I cannot move. I feel dead—dead—from the waist down.""God has spoken to you from heaven," said Carlos solemnly. He felt as if a miracle had been wrought in his presence. His Protestantism had not freed him from the superstitions of his age. Had he lived three centuries later, he would have seen nothing miraculous in the disease with which Gonsalvo was stricken, but rather have called it the natural result of intense agitation and excitement, acting upon a frame already weakened.Yet the reckless Gonsalvo was the more superstitious of the two. He was at war with the creed in which he had been nurtured; but that older and deeper kind of superstition which has its root in human nature had, for this very reason, a stronger hold upon him."Dead—dead!" he repeated, the words falling from his lips in broken, awe-struck whispers. "The limbs I misused! The feet that led me into sin! God—God have mercy upon me! It is thy hand!""It is his hand; a sign he has not forsaken thee; that he means to bring thee back to himself. Oh, my cousin, do not despair. Hope yet in his mercy, for it is great."Carlos knelt down beside him, took his passive hand in his, and spoke earnest, loving words of hope and comfort. The last quarter, ere the single stroke that should announce that the hour appointed for his own flight was past, chimed from the clock on the church tower. Yet he did not move—he had forgotten self. At last, however, he said, "But it may be something can be done to relieve you. You ought to have medical aid without delay. I should have thought of this before. I will rouse the household.""No; that would endanger you. Go on your way, and bid the porter do it when you are gone."It was too late, the householdwasroused. A loud authoritative knocking at the outer gate sent the blood back from the hearts of both with sudden and horrible fear.There was a sound of opening gates, followed by footsteps—voices—cries.Gonsalvo was the first to understand all. "The Alguazils of the Holy Office!" he exclaimed."I am lost!" cried Carlos, large drops gathering on his brow."Conceal yourself," said Gonsalvo; but he knew his words were vain. Already his quick ear had caught the sound of his cousin's name; and already footsteps were on the stairs.Carlos glanced round the room. For a moment his eye rested on the window, eighty feet above the ground. Better spring from it and perish! No, that would be self-murder. In God's name he would await them manfully."You will be searched," Gonsalvo whispered hurriedly; "have you aught about your person that may add to your danger?"Carlos drew from its place of concealment the heroic Juliano's treasured gift."I will hide it," said his cousin; and taking it hastily, he slipped it beneath his inner vest, where it lay in strange neighbourhood with a small, exquisitely tempered poniard, destined never to be used.The torch-light within, perhaps the voices, guided the Alguazils to that room. A hand was placed on the door. "They are coming, Don Carlos," cried Gonsalvo; "I am thy murderer.""No—no fault of thine. Always remember that," said Carlos, in his sharpest anguish generous still. Then for one brief moment, that seemed an age, he was deaf to all outward things. Afterwards he was himself again.And something more than himself perhaps. Now, as in other moments of intense excitement, the spirit of his race descendedon him. When the Alguazils entered, it was Don Carlos Alvarez de Santillanos y Meñaya who met them, with folded arms, with steadfast eye, and pale but dauntless forehead.All was quiet, regular, and most orderly. Don Manuel, roused from his slumbers, appeared with the Alguazils, and respectfully requested a sight of the warrant upon which they proceeded.It was produced; and all could see that it was duly signed, and sealed with the famous seal—the sword and olive branch, the dog with the flaming brand, the sorely outraged, "Justitia et misericordia."Had Don Manuel Alvarez been king of all the Spains, and Carlos his heir-apparent, he dared not have offered the least resistance then. He had no wish to resist, however; he bowed obsequiously, and protested his own and his family's devotion to the Faith and the Holy Office. But he added (perhaps merely as a matter of form), that he could bring many witnesses of unimpeachable character to testify to his nephew's orthodoxy, and hoped to succeed in clearing him from whatever odious imputation had induced their Reverences to order his arrest.Meanwhile Gonsalvo gnashed his teeth in impotent rage and despair. He would have bartered his life for two minutes of health and strength in which to rush suddenly on the Alguazils, and give Carlos time to escape, let the consequences of such frantic audacity be what they might. But the bands of disease, stronger than iron, made the body a prison for the indignant, tortured spirit.Carlos spoke for the first time. "I am ready to go with you," he said to the chief of the Alguazils. "Do you wish to examine my apartment? You are welcome. It is the chamber over this."Having gone over every detail of such a scene a thousand times in imagination, he knew that the examination of papers and personal effects usually formed a part of it. And he hadno fears for the result, as, in preparation for his flight, he had carefully destroyed everything that he thought could implicate himself or any one else."Don Carlos—cousin!" cried Gonsalvo suddenly, as surrounded by the officers he was about to leave the room. "Vaya con Dios! A braver man than you have I never seen."Carlos turned on him one long, sorrowful gaze. "Tell Ruy," he said. That was all.Then there was trampling of footsteps overhead, and the sound of voices, not excited or angry, but cool, business-like, even courteous.Then the footsteps descended, passed the door of Gonsalvo's room, sounded along the corridor, grew fainter on the great staircase, died away in the court.Less than an hour afterwards, the great gate of the Triana opened to receive a new victim. The grave familiar held it, bowing low, until the prisoner and his guard had passed through. Then it was swung to again, and barred and bolted, shutting out from Don Carlos Alvarez all help and hope, all charity and all mercy—save only the mercy of God.XXVII.My Brother's Keeper."Since she loved him, he went carefully,Bearing a thing so precious in his hand."George Eliot.About a week afterwards, Don Juan Alvarez dismounted at the door of his uncle's mansion. His shout soon brought the porter, a "pure and ancient Christian," who had spent nearly all his life in the service of the family."God save you, father," said Juan. "Is my brother in the house?""No, señor and your worship,"—the old man hesitated, and looked confused."Where shall I find him, then?" cried Juan; "speak at once, if you know.""May it please your noble Excellency, I—I know nothing. At least—the Saints have mercy on us!" and he trembled from head to foot.Juan thrust him aside, nearly knocking him down in his haste, and dashed breathless into his uncle's private room, on the right hand side of the patio.Don Manuel was there, seated at a table, looking over some papers."Where is my brother?" asked Juan sternly and abruptly, searching his face with his keen dark eyes."Holy Saints defend us!" cried Don Manuel, nearly startled out of his ordinary decorum. "And what madness bringsyouhere?""Where is my brother?" Juan repeated, in the same tone, and without moving a muscle."Be quiet—be reasonable, nephew Don Juan. Do not make a disturbance; it will be worse for all of us. We did all we could—""For Heaven's sake, señor, will you answer me?""Have patience. We did all we could for him, I was about to say; and more than we ought. The Guilt was his own, if he was suspected and taken—""Taken!Then I come too late." Sinking into the nearest seat, he covered his face with both hands, and groaned aloud.Don Manuel Alvarez had never learned to reverence the sacredness of a great sorrow. "Rushing in" where such as he might well fear to tread, he presumed to offer consolation. "Come, then, nephew Don Juan," he said, "you know as well as I do that 'water that has run by will turn no mill,' and that 'there is no good in throwing the rope after the bucket.' No man can alter that which is past. All we can do is to avoid worse mischief in future.""When was it?" asked Juan, without looking up."A week agone.""Seven days and nights!""Thereabouts. Butyou—are you in love with destruction yourself, that, when you were safe and well at Nuera, you must needs comes hither again?""I came to save him.""Unheard of folly! Ifyouhave been meddling with these matters—and it is but too likely, seeing you were always with him (though, the Saints forbid I should suspect an honourablesoldier like you of anything worse than imprudence)—do you not know they will wring the whole truth out ofhimwith very little trouble, and your life is not worth a brass maravedì?"Juan started to his feet, and glared scorn and defiance in his uncle's face. "Whoever dares to hint so vile a slander," he cried, "by my faith he shall repent it, were he my uncle ten times over. Don Carlos Alvarez never did, and never will, betray a trust, let those wretches deal with him as they may. But I know him; he will die, or worse,—they will make him mad." Here Juan's voice failed, and he stood in silent horror, gazing on the dread vision that rose before his mind.Don Manuel was daunted by his vehemence. "You are the best judge yourself of what amount of danger you may be incurring," he said. "But let me tell you, Señor Don Juan, that I hold you rather a dangerous guest to harbour under the circumstances. To have the Alguazils of the Holy Office twice in my house would be enough to cost me all my places, not to mention the disgrace of it.""You shall not lose a real by me or mine," returned Juan proudly."I did not mean, however, to refuse you hospitality," said Don Manuel, relieved, yet a little uneasy, perhaps even remorseful."But I mean to decline it, señor. I have only two favours to ask of you," he continued: "one, to allow me free intercourse with my betrothed; the other, to permit me"—his voice faltered, stopped. With a great effort he resumed—"to permit me to examine my brother's room, and whatever effects he may have left there.""Now you speak more rationally," said his uncle, mistaking the self-control of indignant pride for genuine calmness. "But as to your brother's effects, you may spare your pains; for the Alguazils set the seal of the Holy Office upon them on the night of his arrest, and they have since carried them away. As tothe other matter, what Doña Beatriz may think of the connection, after the infamy in which your branch of the family is involved, I cannot tell."A burning flush mounted to Juan's cheek as he answered, "I trust my betrothed; even as I trust my brother.""You can see the lady herself. She may be better able than I to persuade you to consult for your own safety. For if you are not a madman, you will return at once to Nuera, which you ought never to have quitted; or you will take the earliest opportunity of rejoining the army.""I shall not stir from Seville till I obtain my brother's deliverance; or—" Juan did not name the other alternative. Involuntarily he placed his hand on his belt, in which he had concealed certain old family jewels, which he believed would produce a considerable sum of money; for his last faint hope for Carlos lay in a judicious appeal to the all-powerful "Don Dinero."[17]"You willneverleave it, then," said Don Manuel. "And you must hold me excused from aiding and abetting your folly. Your brother's business has cost me and mine more than enough already. I had rather ten thousand times that a man had died of the plague in my house, were it for the scandal's sake alone! Nor, bad as it is, is the scandal all. Since that miserable night, my unhappy son Gonsalvo, in whose apartment the arrest took place, has been sick unto death, and out of his mind.""Don Gonsalvo! What brought my brother to his room?""The devil, whose servant he is, may know; I do not. He was found there, in his sword and cloak, as if ready to go forth, when the officers came.""Did he leave no message—no word for me?""Not one word. I know not if he spoke at all, save to offer to show the Alguazils his personal effects. To do him justice, nothing suspicious was found amongst them. But the less said on the subject the better. I wash my hands of it, and of him. I thought he would have done honour to the family; but he has proved its sorest disgrace.""Señor, what you say of him you say of me also," said Juan, growing white with anger. "And already I have heard quite enough.""That is as you please, Señor Don Juan.""I shall only trespass upon you for the favour you have promised me—permission to wait upon Doña Beatriz.""I shall apprise her of your presence, and give her leave to act as she sees fit." And glad to put an end to the interview, Don Manuel left the room.Juan sank into a seat once more, and gave himself up to an agony of grief for his brother.So absorbed was he in his sorrow, that a light footstep entered and approached unheard by him. At last a small hand touched his arm. He started and looked up. Whatever his anguish of heart might be, he was still the loyal lover of Doña Beatriz. So the next moment found him on his knees saluting that hand with his lips. And then followed certain ceremonies abundantly interesting to those who enact them, but apt to prove tedious when described."My lady's devoted slave," said Don Juan, using the ordinary language of the time, "bears a breaking heart to-day. We knew neither father nor mother; there were but the two of us.""Did you not receive my letter, praying you to remain at Nuera?" asked the lady."Pardon me, queen of my heart, in that I dared to disregard a wish of yours. But I knewhisdanger, and I came to save him. Alas! too late.""I am not sure that I do pardon you, Don Juan.""Then, I presume so far as to say, that I know Doña Beatriz better than she knows herself. Indeed, had I acted otherwise, she would scarce have pardoned me. How would it have beenpossible for me to consult for my own safety, leaving him, alone and unaided, in such fearful peril?""You acknowledge there is peril—to you?""There may be, señora.""Ay de mi! Why, in Heaven's name, have you thus involved yourself? O Don Juan, you have dealt very cruelly with me!""Light of my eyes, life of my life, what mean you by these words?""Was it not cruel to allow your brother, with his gentle, winning ways, and his soft specious words, to lead you step by step from the faith of our fathers, until he had you entangled in I know not what horrible heresies, and made you put in peril your honour, your liberty, your life—everything?""We only sought Truth.""Truth!" echoed the lady, with a contemptuous stamp of her small foot and twirl of her fan. "What is Truth? What good will Truth do me if those cruel men drag you from your bed at midnight, take you to that dreadful place, stretch you on the rack?" But that last horror was too much to bear; Doña Beatriz hid her face in her hands, and wept and sobbed passionately.Juan soothed her with every tender, lover-like art. "I will be very prudent, dearest lady," he said at last; adding, as he gazed on her beautiful face, "I have too much to live for not to hold life very precious.""Will you promise to fly—to leave the citynow, before suspicions are awakened which may make flight impossible?""My first and my only love, I would die to fulfil your slightest wish. But this thing I cannot do.""And wherefore not, Señor Don Juan?""Can you ask? I must hazard everything, spend everything, in the chance—if there be a chance—of saving him, or, at least, of softening his fate.""Then God help us both," said Doña Beatriz."Amen! Pray to him day and night, señora. Perhaps he may have pity on us.""There is no chance of saving Don Carlos. Know you not that of all the prisoners the Holy House receives, scarce one in a thousand goes forth again to take his place in the world?"Juan shook his head. He knew well that his task was almost hopeless; yet, even by Doña Beatriz, he was not to be moved from his determination.But he thanked her in strong, passionate words for her faith in him and her truth to him. "No sorrow can divide us, my beloved," he said, "nor even what they call shame, falsely as they speak therein. You are my star, that shines on me throughout the darkness.""I have promised.""My uncle's family may seek to divide us, and I think they will. But the lady of my heart will not heed their idle words?"Doña Beatriz smiled. "I am a Lavella," she said. "Do you not know our motto?—'True unto death.'""It is a glorious motto. May it be mine too.""Take heed what you do, Don Juan. If you love me, you will look well to your footsteps, since, wherever they lead, mine are bound to follow." Saying this, she rose, and stood gazing in his face with flushed cheek and kindling eyes.The words were such as might thrill any lover's heart with joy and gratitude. Yet there was something in the look which accompanied them that changed joy and gratitude into vague fear and apprehension. The light in that dark eye seemed borrowed from the fire of some sublime but terrible resolve within. Juan's heart quailed, though he knew not why, as he said, "My queen should never tread except through flowery paths."Doña Beatriz took up a little golden crucifix that, attachedto a rosary of coral beads, hung from her girdle. "You see this cross, Don Juan?""Yes, señora mia.""On that horrible night when they dragged your brother to prison, I swore a sacred oath upon it. You esteemed me a child, Don Juan, when you read me chapters from your book, and talked freely to me about God, and faith, and the soul's salvation. Perchance I was a child in some things. For I supposed them good words; how could they be otherwise, since you spoke them? I listened and believed, after a fashion; half thinking all the time of the pretty fans and trinkets you brought me, or of the pattern of such and such an one's mantilla that I had seen at mass. But your brother tore the veil from my eyes at last, and made me understand that those specious words, with which a child played childishly, were the crime that finds no pardon here or hereafter. Of the hereafter I know not; of the here I know too much, God help me! There be fair ladies, not more deeply involved than I, who have changed their gilded saloons for the dungeons of the Triana. But then it matters not so much about me. For I am not like other girls, who have fathers and mothers, sisters and brothers to care for them. Saving Don Carlos (who was good to me for your sake), no one ever gave me more than the half-sorrowful, half-pitying kindness one might give a pet parrot from the Indies. Therefore, thinking over all things, and knowing well your reckless nature, Señor Don Juan, I swore that night upon this holy cross, that if by evil hapyouwere attainted for heresy,Iwould go next day to the Triana and accuse myself of the same crime."Juan did not for a moment doubt that she would do it; and thus a chain, light as silk but strong as adamant, was flung around him."Doña Beatriz, for my sake—" he began to plead."Formysake, Don Juan will take care of his life andliberty," she interrupted, with a smile that, if it had a little sadness, had very far more of triumph in it. She knew the power her resolve gave her over him: she had bought it dearly, and she meant to use it. "Is itstillyour wish to remain here," she continued; "or will you go abroad, and wait for better times?"Juan paused for a moment."No choice is left me while Carlos pines uncomforted in a dungeon," he said at last, firmly, though very sorrowfully."Then you know what you risk, that is all," answered the lady, whose will was a match for his.In a marvellously short time had love and sorrow transformed the young and childish girl into a passionate, determined woman, with all the fire of her own southern skies in her heart.Ere he departed, Juan pleaded for permission to visit her frequently. But here again she showed a keen-sighted apprehensiveness forhim, which astonished him. She cautioned him against their cousins, Manuel and Balthazar; who, if they thought him in danger of arrest, were quite capable of informing against him themselves, to secure a share of his patrimony. Or they might gain the same end, without the disgrace of such a baseness, by putting him quietly out of the way with their daggers. On all accounts, his frequent presence at the house would be undesirable, and might be dangerous; but she agreed to inform him, by means of certain signals (which they arranged together), when he might pay a visit to her with safety. Then, having bidden her farewell, Don Juan turned his back on his uncle's house with a heavy heart.XXVIII.Reaping the Whirlwind."All is lost, except a little life."Byron.Nearly a fortnight passed away before a tiny lace kerchief, fluttering at nightfall through the jealous grating of one of the few windows of Don Manuel's house that looked towards the street, told Juan that he was at liberty to seek admission the next day. He was permitted to enter; but he explored the patio and all the adjacent corridors and rooms without seeing the face of which he was in search. He did not, indeed, meet any one, not even a domestic; for it was the eve of the Feast of the Ascension, and nearly all the household had gone to see the great tabernacle carried in state to the Cathedral and set up there, in preparation for the solemnities of the following day.He thought this a good opportunity for satisfying his longing to visit the apartment his brother had been wont to occupy. In spite of what his uncle had said to the contrary, and indeed of the dictates of his own reason, he could not relinquish the hope that something which belonged to him—perhaps even some word or line traced by his hand—might reward his careful search.He ascended the stairs; not stealthily, or as if ashamed ofhis errand, for no one had the right to forbid him. He reached the turret without meeting any one, but had hardly placed his foot upon the stair that led to its upper apartment, when a voice called out, not very loudly,—"Chien va?"It was Gonsalvo's. Juan answered,—"It is I—Don Juan.""Come to me, for Heaven's sake!"A private interview with a madman is not generally thought particularly desirable. But Juan was a stranger to fear. He entered the room immediately, and was horror-stricken at the change in his cousin's appearance. A tangled mass of black hair mingled with his beard, and fell neglected over the pillow; while large, wild, melancholy eyes lit up the pallor of his wasted face. He lay, or rather reclined, on a couch, half covered by an embroidered quilt, but wearing a loose doublet, very carelessly thrown on.Of late the cousins had been far from friendly. Still Juan from compassion stretched out his hand. But Gonsalvo would not touch it."Did you know all," he said, "you would stab me where I lie, and thus make an end at once of the most miserable life under God's heaven.""I fear you are very ill, my cousin," said Juan, kindly; for he thought Gonsalvo's words the offspring of his wandering fancy."From the waist downwards I am dead. It is God's hand; and he is just.""Does your physician give hope of your recovery from this seizure?"With something like his old short, bitter laugh, Gonsalvo answered—"I have no physician.""This must be one of his delusions," thought Juan; "or else, since he cannot have Losada, he has refused, with his usual obstinacy, to see any one else."He said aloud,—"That is not right, cousin Don Gonsalvo. You ought not to neglect lawful means of cure. Señor Sylvester Areto is a very skilful physician; you might safely place yourself in his hands.""Only there is one slight objection—my father and my brothers would not permit me to see him."Juan was in no doubt how to regard this statement; but hoping to extract from him some additional information respecting his brother, he turned the conversation."When did this malady seize you?" he asked."Close the door gently, and I will tell you all. And oh! tread softly, lest my mother, who lies asleep in the room beneath, worn out with watching, should wake and separate us. Then must I bear my guilt and my anguish unconfessed to the grave."Juan obeyed, and took a seat beside his cousin's couch."Sit where I can see your face," said Gonsalvo; "I will not shrink even fromthat. Don Juan, I am your brother's murderer."Juan started, and his colour changed rapidly."If I did not think you were mad—""I am no more mad than you are," Gonsalvo interrupted. "Iwasmad, indeed; but that horrible night, when God smote my body, I regained my reason. I see all things clearly now—too late.""Am I to understand, then," said Juan, rising from his seat, and speaking in measured tones, though his eye was like a tiger's—"am I to understand that you—you—denounced my brother? If so, thank God that you are lying helpless there.""I am not quite so vile a thing as that. I did not intend to harm a hair of his head; but I detained him here to his ruin. He had the means of escape provided, and but for me would have been in safety ere the Alguazils came.""Well for both of us your guilt was not greater. Still, you cannot expect me—just yet—to forgive you.""I expect no forgiveness from man," said Gonsalvo, who perhaps disdained to plead in his own exculpation the generous words of Carlos.Juan had by this time changed his tone towards his cousin, and assumed his perfect sanity; though, engrossed by the thought of his brother, he was quite unconscious of the mental process by which he had arrived at this conclusion. He asked,—"But why did you detain him? How did you come to know at all of his intended flight?""He had a safe asylum provided for him by some friend—I know not whom," said Gonsalvo, in reply. "He was going forth at midnight to seek it. At the same hour I also"—(for a moment he hesitated, but quickly went on)—"was going forth—to plunge a dagger in my enemy's heart. We met face to face; and each confided his errand to the other. He sought, by argument and entreaty, to move me from a purpose which seemed to him a great crime. But ere our debate was ended, God laid his hand in judgment upon me; and whilst Don Carlos lingered, speaking words of comfort—brave and kind, though vain—the Alguazils came, and he was taken."Juan listened in gloomy silence."Did he leave no message, not one word, for me?" he asked at last, in a low voice."Yes; one word. Filled with wonder at the calmness with which he met his terrible fate, I cried out, as they led him from the room, 'Vaya con Dios, Don Carlos, a braver man than you have I never seen!' With one long mournful look, that haunts me still, he said, 'Tell Ruy!'"Strong man as he was, Don Juan Alvarez bowed his head and wept. They were the first tears the great sorrow had wrung from him—almost the first that he ever remembered shedding. Gonsalvo saw no shame in them."Weep on," he said—"weep on; and thank God that thy tears are for sorrow only, not for remorse."Hoarse and heavy sobs shook the strong frame. For some time they were the only sounds that broke the stillness. At length Gonsalvo said, slowly,—"He gave me something to keep, which in right should belong to thee."Juan looked up. Gonsalvo half raised himself, and drew a cushion from beneath his head. First he took off its outer cover of fine holland; then he inserted his hand into an opening that seemed like an accidental rip, and, not without some trouble, drew out a small volume. Juan seized it eagerly: well did he know his brother's Spanish Testament."Take it," said Gonsalvo; "but remember it is a dangerous treasure.""Perhaps you are not sorry to part with it?""I deserve that you should say so," answered Gonsalvo, with unwonted gentleness. "But the truth is," he added, with a wan, sickly smile, "nothing can part me from it now, for I have learned almost every word of it by heart.""How could you, in so short a time, accomplish such a task?" asked Juan, in surprise."Easily enough. I was alone long hours of the day, when I could read; and in the silent, sleepless nights I could recall and repeat what I read during the day. But for that I should be in truth what they call me—mad.""Then you love its words?""Ifearthem," cried Gonsalvo, with strange energy, flinging out his wasted arm over the counterpane. "They are words of life—words of fire. They are, to the Church's words, the priest's threatenings, the priest's pardons, what your limbs, throbbing with healthy vigorous life, are to mine—cold, dead, impotent; or what the living champion—steel from head to heel, the Toledo blade in his strong right hand—is to thepainted San Cristofro on the Cathedral door. Because I dare to say so much, my father pretends to think me mad; lest, wrecked as I am in mind and body, I should still find one terrible consolation,—that of flinging the truth for once in the face of the scribes and Pharisees, and then suffering for it—like Don Carlos."He was silent from exhaustion, and lay with closed eyes and deathlike countenance. After a long pause, he resumed, in a low, weak voice,—"Some words are good—perhaps. There was San Pablo, who was a blasphemer, and injurious.""Don Gonsalvo, my brother once said he would give his right hand that you shared his faith.""Oh, did he?" A quick flush overspread the wan face. "But hark! a step on the stairs! My mother's.""I am neither afraid nor ashamed to be found here," said Don Juan."My poor mother! She has shown me more tenderness of late than I deserved at her hands. Do not let us involve her in trouble."Juan greeted his aunt with due courtesy, and even attempted some words of condolence upon his cousin's illness. But he saw that the poor lady was terribly disconcerted, and indeed frightened, by his presence there. And not without cause, since mischief, even to bloodshed, might have followed had Don Manuel or either of his sons found Juan in communication with Gonsalvo. She conjured him to go, adding, by way of inducement,—"Doña Beatriz is taking the air in the garden.""Availing myself of your gracious permission, señora my aunt, I shall offer her my homage there; and so I kiss your feet.—Adiõs, Don Gonsalvo.""Adiõs, my cousin."Doña Katarina followed him out of the room."He is not sane," she whispered anxiously, laying her hand on his arm; "he is out of his mind. You perceive it clearly, Don Juan?""Certainly I shall not dispute it, señora," Juan answered, prudently.XXIX.A Friend at Court.
"Our God, the all just,Unto himself reserves this royalty,The secret chastening of the guilty heart;The fiery touch, the scourge that purifies—Leave it with him. Yet make not that thy trust;For that strong heart of thine—oh, listen yet!—Must in its depths o'ercome the very wishOf death or torture to the guilty one,Ere it can sleep again."Hemans.
"Our God, the all just,Unto himself reserves this royalty,The secret chastening of the guilty heart;The fiery touch, the scourge that purifies—Leave it with him. Yet make not that thy trust;For that strong heart of thine—oh, listen yet!—Must in its depths o'ercome the very wishOf death or torture to the guilty one,Ere it can sleep again."Hemans.
"Our God, the all just,Unto himself reserves this royalty,The secret chastening of the guilty heart;The fiery touch, the scourge that purifies—Leave it with him. Yet make not that thy trust;For that strong heart of thine—oh, listen yet!—Must in its depths o'ercome the very wishOf death or torture to the guilty one,Ere it can sleep again."
"Our God, the all just,
Unto himself reserves this royalty,
The secret chastening of the guilty heart;
The fiery touch, the scourge that purifies—
Leave it with him. Yet make not that thy trust;
For that strong heart of thine—oh, listen yet!—
Must in its depths o'ercome the very wish
Of death or torture to the guilty one,
Ere it can sleep again."
Hemans.
Hemans.
Don Manuel's house had once belonged to a Moorish Cid, or lord. It had been assigned to the first Conde de Nuera, as one of the originalconquistadorsof Seville; and he had bequeathed it to his second son. It had a turret, after the Moorish fashion, and the upper chamber of this had been given to Carlos on his first arrival in the city; from an idea that the theological student would require a solitary place for study and devotion, or, at least, that it would be decorous to suppose so. The room beneath had been occupied by Don Juan, but since his departure it was appropriated by Gonsalvo, who liked solitude, and took advantage of his improved health to escape from the ground-floor, to which his infirmities had long confined him.
As Carlos stole noiselessly down the narrow winding stair, he noticed a light in his cousin's room. This in itself did not surprise him. But he certainly felt a little disconcerted when, just as he passed the door, Don Gonsalvo opened it, and met him face to face. He also was fully equipped in sword and cloak, and carried a torch in his hand.
"Vaya, vaya, Don Carlos," he said reproachfully; "after all, thou couldst not trust me."
"Nay, I did trust you."
From fear of being overheard, both entered the nearest room—Don Gonsalvo's—and its owner closed the door softly.
"You are stealing away from fear of me, and thereby throwing yourself into the fire. Do it not, Don Carlos; be advised, and do it not." He spoke earnestly, and without a shadow of the old bitterness and sarcasm.
"Nay, it is not thus. My flight was planned ere yesterday; and in concert with one who both can and will provide me with the means of safety. It is best I should go."
"Enough said then," returned Gonsalvo, more coldly. "Farewell; I seek not to detain you. Farewell; for though we may go forth together, our paths divide, and for ever, at the door."
"Your path is perhaps less safe than mine, Don Gonsalvo."
"Talk of what you understand, cousin. My path is safety itself. And now that I think of it (if you could be trusted), you might aid me perhaps. Did you know all, I dare not doubt that you would rejoice to do it."
"God knows how joyfully I would aid you if I could, Don Gonsalvo. But I fear you are bound on a useless, and worse than useless, errand."
"You know not my errand."
"But I know to whom you go this night. Oh, my cousin, is it possible you can dream that prayer of yours will soften hearts harder than the nether millstone?"
"I know the way to one heart; and though it be the hardest of all, I shall reach it."
"Were you to pour the wealth of El Dorado at the feet of Gonzales de Munebrãga, he neither would nor could unloose one bolt of that prison."
Gonsalvo's wild look changed suddenly into one of wistful earnestness, almost of tenderness. He said, lowering his voice,—
"Near as death, the revealer of secrets, may be to me, there are still some questions worth the asking. Perchanceyoucan throw a gleam of light upon this horrible darkness. We are speaking frankly now, and as in God's presence. Tell me,is that charge true?"
"Frankly, and in the sense in which you ask—it is."
The last fatal words Carlos only whispered. Gonsalvo made no answer; but a kind of momentary spasm passed across his face.
Carlos at length went on in a low voice: "She knew the Evangel long before I did, though she is so young—not yet one-and-twenty. She was the pupil of Dr. Egidius; but he was wont to say he learned more from her than she did from him. Her keen, bright intellect cut through sophistries, and reached truth so quickly. And God gave her abundantly of his grace; making her willing, for that truth, to endure all things. Oft have I seen her sweet face kindle and glow whilst he who taught us spoke of the joy and strength given to those that suffer for the name of Christ. I am persuaded He is with her now, and will be with her even to the end. Could you gain access to her where she is, I think she would tell you she possesses a treasure of peace of which neither death nor suffering, neither cruelty of fiends nor worse cruelty of fiend-like men, can avail to rob her."
"She is a saint—she will be a blessed saint in heaven, let them say what they may," murmured Gonsalvo hoarsely. Then the fierce look returned to his face again. "But I think the old Christians of Castile, the men whose good swords made theinfidels bite the dust, and planted the cross on their painted towers, are no better than curs and dastards."
"In that they suffer these things?"
"Yes; a thousand times, yes. In the name of man's honour and woman's loveliness, are there, in our good city of Seville, neither fathers, nor brothers, nor lovers left alive? No man who thinks the sweetest eyes ever seen worth six inches of steel in five skilful fingers? No one man, save the poor forgotten cripple, Don Gonsalvo Alvarez. But he thanks God this night that he has spared his life, and left strength enough in his feeble limbs to beat him into a murderer's presence."
"Don Gonsalvo! what do you mean?" cried Carlos, shrinking from him.
"Lower thy voice, an' it please thee. But why should I fear to tell thee—thee, who hast good cause to be the death-foe of Inquisitors? If thou art not cur and dastard too, thou wilt applaud and pray for me. For I suppose heretics pray, at least as well as Inquisitors. I said I would reach the heart of Gonzales de Munebrãga this night. Not with gold. There is another metal of keener temper, which enters in where even gold cannot come."
"Then you mean—murder?" said Carlos, again drawing near him, and laying his hand on his arm. Gonsalvo sank into a seat, half mechanically, half from an instinct that led him to spare the strength he would need so sorely by-and-by.
In the momentary pause that followed, the clock of San Vicente tolled the midnight hour.
"Yes," replied Gonsalvo steadily; "I mean murder—as the shepherd does who strangles the wolf with his paw on the lamb."
"Oh, think—"
"I have thought of everything. And mark me, Don Carlos, I have but one regret. It is that my weapon deals an instantaneous death. Such revenge is poor and flavourless after all.I have heard of poisons whose least drop, mingling with the blood, ensures a slow agonizing death—time to learn what torture means, and to drain to the dregs the cup filled for others—to curse God and man ere he dies. For a phial of such, wherewith to anoint my blade, I would sell my soul to-night."
"O Gonsalvo, this is horrible! They are wild, wicked words you speak. Pray God to pardon you!"
"I adjure him by his justice to prosper me," said Gonsalvo, raising his head defiantly.
"He will not prosper you. And do you dream that such a mad achievement (suppose you even succeed in it) will open prison-doors and set captives free? Alas! alas! that we are not at the mercy of a tyrant'swill. For tyrants, the worst of them, sometimes relent; and—they are mortal. That which is crushing us is not a living being, an organism with nerves, and brain, and blood. It is a system, aTHING, a terrible engine, that moves on in its resistless way, cold and lifeless, without will or feeling. Strong as adamant, it kills, tortures, destroys; obeying laws far away out of our sight. Were Valdez and Munebrãga, and all the Board of Inquisitors, dead corpses by the morning light, not a single dungeon in the Triana would open its pitiless gate."
"I do not believethat," replied Gonsalvo, rather more quietly. "Surely there must be some confusion, of which advantage may be taken by friends of the prisoners. This, indeed, is the motive which now induces me to confide in you.Youmay know those who, if they had the chance, could strike a shrewd blow to save their dearest on earth from torture and death."
But Gonsalvo read no answer in the sorrowful face of Carlos to the searching look of inquiry with which he said this. After a silence he went on,—
"Suppose the worst, however. The Holy Office sorely needs a little blood-letting, and will be much the better for it. Whoever succeeds, Munebrãga will have my dagger flashing in his eyes, and will take care how he deals with his prisoners, and whom he arrests."
"I implore you to think of yourself," said Carlos.
Gonsalvo smiled. "I know I shall pay the forfeit," he said, "even as those who slew the Inquisitor Pedro Arbues before the high altar in Saragossa. But"—here the smile faded, and the stern set look returned to his face—"I shall not pay more, for a man's triumphant vengeance, than those fiends will dare to inflict upon a tender, delicately nurtured girl for the crime of a mystic meditation, or a few words of prayer not properly rounded off with an Ave."
"True. But then you will suffer alone. She has God with her."
"Icansuffer alone."
For that word Carlos envied him.Heshrank in terror from loneliness, from suffering, shuddering at the very thought of the dungeon and the torture-room. And just then the first quarter of his hour of grace chimed from the clock of San Vicente. What if he and Pepe should fail to meet? He would not think of that now. Whatever happened, Gonsalvomustbe saved. He went on,—
"Here you can suffer alone and be strong. But how will you endure the loneliness of the long hereafter, away from God's presence, from light and life and hope? Are you content that you, and she for whom you give your life, should be sundered throughout eternity?"
"Nay; I am casting my lot in with hers. If the Church curses her (pure and holy as she ever was), its anathema shall fall on me too. If only the Church's key opens heaven, she and I will both stand without."
"Yet you know she will enter heaven. Shallyou?"
Gonsalvo hesitated. "It will not be the blood of a villain that will bar my way," he said.
"God says, 'Thou shalt not kill.'"
"Then what will he do with Gonzales de Munebrãga?"
"He will do that with him of which, if you but dreamed, it would change your fiercest hate into saddest, deepest pity. Have you realized what a span is our life here compared with the countless ages of eternity? Think! For God's chosen a few weeks, or months at most, of solitude and fear and pain, ended perhaps by—but that is as he pleases;ended, at all events. Then add up the million years, fill them with the joy of victory, and the presence and love of Christ himself. Can they not, and we for them, be content with this?"
"Are you content with it yourself?" Gonsalvo suddenly interrupted. "You seek flight."
The glow faded from the face of Carlos, and his eyes sank to the ground. "Christ has not called me yet," he answered in a lower tone. There was a silence; then he resumed: "Turn now to the other side. Would you change, even this hour, with Gonzales de Munebrãga? But take him from his wealth, and his pomp, and his sinful luxuries, all defiled with blood, and what remains for him? Everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels."
"Everlasting fire!" Gonsalvo repeated, as if the thought pleased him.
"Leave him in God's hand. It is a stronger hand than yours, Don Gonsalvo."
"Everlasting fire! I would send him there to-night."
"And whither would you send your own sinful soul?"
"God might pardon, though the Church cursed."
"Possibly. But to enter God's heaven you need something besides pardon."
"What?" asked Gonsalvo, half wearily, half incredulously.
"'Holiness; without which no man can see the Lord.'"
"Holiness?" Gonsalvo questioned, as if the word was strange to him, and he attached no meaning to it.
"Yes," Carlos went on, with intense and ever increasing earnestness; "unless, even from that passionate heart of yours, revenge and hatred are banished, you canneversee God, never come where—"
"Hold thy peace, trifler!" Gonsalvo interrupted with angry impatience. "Too long have I tarried, listening to thine idle talk. Priests and women are content with words; brave menact. Farewell to thee!"
"One word more, only one." Carlos drew near and laid his hand on his cousin's arm. "Nay, youshalllisten to me. Seemeth it to you a thing incredible that that heart of yours can be changed and softened to a love like His who prayed on the cross for his murderers? Yet it can be.Hecan do it. He gives pardon, holiness, peace. Peace of which you dream not now, but whichsheknows full well. O Don Gonsalvo, better join her where she is going, than wildly, rashly, and most uselessly peril your soul to avenge her!"
"Uselessly! Were that true indeed—"
"Ay de mi! who can doubt it?"
"Would I had time for thought!"
"Take it, in God's name, and pray him to keep you from a great crime."
For a few moments he sat still—still as the dead. Then he started suddenly. "Already the hour is passing," he exclaimed; "I shall be too late. Fool that I was, to be almost moved from my purpose by the idle words of a—The weakness is past now. Still, ere we part, give me thy hand, Don Carlos, for, on my faith, I never liked thee half so well."
Very sorrowfully Carlos extended it, rather wondering as he did so that the energetic Gonsalvo failed to spring from his seat and prepare to be gone.
Gonsalvo stirred not, even to take the offered hand. A deathlike paleness overspread his face, and a cry of terror had well nigh broken from his lips. But he choked it back."Something is strangely wrong with me," he faltered. "I cannot move. I feel dead—dead—from the waist down."
"God has spoken to you from heaven," said Carlos solemnly. He felt as if a miracle had been wrought in his presence. His Protestantism had not freed him from the superstitions of his age. Had he lived three centuries later, he would have seen nothing miraculous in the disease with which Gonsalvo was stricken, but rather have called it the natural result of intense agitation and excitement, acting upon a frame already weakened.
Yet the reckless Gonsalvo was the more superstitious of the two. He was at war with the creed in which he had been nurtured; but that older and deeper kind of superstition which has its root in human nature had, for this very reason, a stronger hold upon him.
"Dead—dead!" he repeated, the words falling from his lips in broken, awe-struck whispers. "The limbs I misused! The feet that led me into sin! God—God have mercy upon me! It is thy hand!"
"It is his hand; a sign he has not forsaken thee; that he means to bring thee back to himself. Oh, my cousin, do not despair. Hope yet in his mercy, for it is great."
Carlos knelt down beside him, took his passive hand in his, and spoke earnest, loving words of hope and comfort. The last quarter, ere the single stroke that should announce that the hour appointed for his own flight was past, chimed from the clock on the church tower. Yet he did not move—he had forgotten self. At last, however, he said, "But it may be something can be done to relieve you. You ought to have medical aid without delay. I should have thought of this before. I will rouse the household."
"No; that would endanger you. Go on your way, and bid the porter do it when you are gone."
It was too late, the householdwasroused. A loud authoritative knocking at the outer gate sent the blood back from the hearts of both with sudden and horrible fear.
There was a sound of opening gates, followed by footsteps—voices—cries.
Gonsalvo was the first to understand all. "The Alguazils of the Holy Office!" he exclaimed.
"I am lost!" cried Carlos, large drops gathering on his brow.
"Conceal yourself," said Gonsalvo; but he knew his words were vain. Already his quick ear had caught the sound of his cousin's name; and already footsteps were on the stairs.
Carlos glanced round the room. For a moment his eye rested on the window, eighty feet above the ground. Better spring from it and perish! No, that would be self-murder. In God's name he would await them manfully.
"You will be searched," Gonsalvo whispered hurriedly; "have you aught about your person that may add to your danger?"
Carlos drew from its place of concealment the heroic Juliano's treasured gift.
"I will hide it," said his cousin; and taking it hastily, he slipped it beneath his inner vest, where it lay in strange neighbourhood with a small, exquisitely tempered poniard, destined never to be used.
The torch-light within, perhaps the voices, guided the Alguazils to that room. A hand was placed on the door. "They are coming, Don Carlos," cried Gonsalvo; "I am thy murderer."
"No—no fault of thine. Always remember that," said Carlos, in his sharpest anguish generous still. Then for one brief moment, that seemed an age, he was deaf to all outward things. Afterwards he was himself again.
And something more than himself perhaps. Now, as in other moments of intense excitement, the spirit of his race descendedon him. When the Alguazils entered, it was Don Carlos Alvarez de Santillanos y Meñaya who met them, with folded arms, with steadfast eye, and pale but dauntless forehead.
All was quiet, regular, and most orderly. Don Manuel, roused from his slumbers, appeared with the Alguazils, and respectfully requested a sight of the warrant upon which they proceeded.
It was produced; and all could see that it was duly signed, and sealed with the famous seal—the sword and olive branch, the dog with the flaming brand, the sorely outraged, "Justitia et misericordia."
Had Don Manuel Alvarez been king of all the Spains, and Carlos his heir-apparent, he dared not have offered the least resistance then. He had no wish to resist, however; he bowed obsequiously, and protested his own and his family's devotion to the Faith and the Holy Office. But he added (perhaps merely as a matter of form), that he could bring many witnesses of unimpeachable character to testify to his nephew's orthodoxy, and hoped to succeed in clearing him from whatever odious imputation had induced their Reverences to order his arrest.
Meanwhile Gonsalvo gnashed his teeth in impotent rage and despair. He would have bartered his life for two minutes of health and strength in which to rush suddenly on the Alguazils, and give Carlos time to escape, let the consequences of such frantic audacity be what they might. But the bands of disease, stronger than iron, made the body a prison for the indignant, tortured spirit.
Carlos spoke for the first time. "I am ready to go with you," he said to the chief of the Alguazils. "Do you wish to examine my apartment? You are welcome. It is the chamber over this."
Having gone over every detail of such a scene a thousand times in imagination, he knew that the examination of papers and personal effects usually formed a part of it. And he hadno fears for the result, as, in preparation for his flight, he had carefully destroyed everything that he thought could implicate himself or any one else.
"Don Carlos—cousin!" cried Gonsalvo suddenly, as surrounded by the officers he was about to leave the room. "Vaya con Dios! A braver man than you have I never seen."
Carlos turned on him one long, sorrowful gaze. "Tell Ruy," he said. That was all.
Then there was trampling of footsteps overhead, and the sound of voices, not excited or angry, but cool, business-like, even courteous.
Then the footsteps descended, passed the door of Gonsalvo's room, sounded along the corridor, grew fainter on the great staircase, died away in the court.
Less than an hour afterwards, the great gate of the Triana opened to receive a new victim. The grave familiar held it, bowing low, until the prisoner and his guard had passed through. Then it was swung to again, and barred and bolted, shutting out from Don Carlos Alvarez all help and hope, all charity and all mercy—save only the mercy of God.
My Brother's Keeper.
"Since she loved him, he went carefully,Bearing a thing so precious in his hand."George Eliot.
"Since she loved him, he went carefully,Bearing a thing so precious in his hand."George Eliot.
"Since she loved him, he went carefully,Bearing a thing so precious in his hand."
"Since she loved him, he went carefully,
Bearing a thing so precious in his hand."
George Eliot.
George Eliot.
About a week afterwards, Don Juan Alvarez dismounted at the door of his uncle's mansion. His shout soon brought the porter, a "pure and ancient Christian," who had spent nearly all his life in the service of the family.
"God save you, father," said Juan. "Is my brother in the house?"
"No, señor and your worship,"—the old man hesitated, and looked confused.
"Where shall I find him, then?" cried Juan; "speak at once, if you know."
"May it please your noble Excellency, I—I know nothing. At least—the Saints have mercy on us!" and he trembled from head to foot.
Juan thrust him aside, nearly knocking him down in his haste, and dashed breathless into his uncle's private room, on the right hand side of the patio.
Don Manuel was there, seated at a table, looking over some papers.
"Where is my brother?" asked Juan sternly and abruptly, searching his face with his keen dark eyes.
"Holy Saints defend us!" cried Don Manuel, nearly startled out of his ordinary decorum. "And what madness bringsyouhere?"
"Where is my brother?" Juan repeated, in the same tone, and without moving a muscle.
"Be quiet—be reasonable, nephew Don Juan. Do not make a disturbance; it will be worse for all of us. We did all we could—"
"For Heaven's sake, señor, will you answer me?"
"Have patience. We did all we could for him, I was about to say; and more than we ought. The Guilt was his own, if he was suspected and taken—"
"Taken!Then I come too late." Sinking into the nearest seat, he covered his face with both hands, and groaned aloud.
Don Manuel Alvarez had never learned to reverence the sacredness of a great sorrow. "Rushing in" where such as he might well fear to tread, he presumed to offer consolation. "Come, then, nephew Don Juan," he said, "you know as well as I do that 'water that has run by will turn no mill,' and that 'there is no good in throwing the rope after the bucket.' No man can alter that which is past. All we can do is to avoid worse mischief in future."
"When was it?" asked Juan, without looking up.
"A week agone."
"Seven days and nights!"
"Thereabouts. Butyou—are you in love with destruction yourself, that, when you were safe and well at Nuera, you must needs comes hither again?"
"I came to save him."
"Unheard of folly! Ifyouhave been meddling with these matters—and it is but too likely, seeing you were always with him (though, the Saints forbid I should suspect an honourablesoldier like you of anything worse than imprudence)—do you not know they will wring the whole truth out ofhimwith very little trouble, and your life is not worth a brass maravedì?"
Juan started to his feet, and glared scorn and defiance in his uncle's face. "Whoever dares to hint so vile a slander," he cried, "by my faith he shall repent it, were he my uncle ten times over. Don Carlos Alvarez never did, and never will, betray a trust, let those wretches deal with him as they may. But I know him; he will die, or worse,—they will make him mad." Here Juan's voice failed, and he stood in silent horror, gazing on the dread vision that rose before his mind.
Don Manuel was daunted by his vehemence. "You are the best judge yourself of what amount of danger you may be incurring," he said. "But let me tell you, Señor Don Juan, that I hold you rather a dangerous guest to harbour under the circumstances. To have the Alguazils of the Holy Office twice in my house would be enough to cost me all my places, not to mention the disgrace of it."
"You shall not lose a real by me or mine," returned Juan proudly.
"I did not mean, however, to refuse you hospitality," said Don Manuel, relieved, yet a little uneasy, perhaps even remorseful.
"But I mean to decline it, señor. I have only two favours to ask of you," he continued: "one, to allow me free intercourse with my betrothed; the other, to permit me"—his voice faltered, stopped. With a great effort he resumed—"to permit me to examine my brother's room, and whatever effects he may have left there."
"Now you speak more rationally," said his uncle, mistaking the self-control of indignant pride for genuine calmness. "But as to your brother's effects, you may spare your pains; for the Alguazils set the seal of the Holy Office upon them on the night of his arrest, and they have since carried them away. As tothe other matter, what Doña Beatriz may think of the connection, after the infamy in which your branch of the family is involved, I cannot tell."
A burning flush mounted to Juan's cheek as he answered, "I trust my betrothed; even as I trust my brother."
"You can see the lady herself. She may be better able than I to persuade you to consult for your own safety. For if you are not a madman, you will return at once to Nuera, which you ought never to have quitted; or you will take the earliest opportunity of rejoining the army."
"I shall not stir from Seville till I obtain my brother's deliverance; or—" Juan did not name the other alternative. Involuntarily he placed his hand on his belt, in which he had concealed certain old family jewels, which he believed would produce a considerable sum of money; for his last faint hope for Carlos lay in a judicious appeal to the all-powerful "Don Dinero."[17]
"You willneverleave it, then," said Don Manuel. "And you must hold me excused from aiding and abetting your folly. Your brother's business has cost me and mine more than enough already. I had rather ten thousand times that a man had died of the plague in my house, were it for the scandal's sake alone! Nor, bad as it is, is the scandal all. Since that miserable night, my unhappy son Gonsalvo, in whose apartment the arrest took place, has been sick unto death, and out of his mind."
"Don Gonsalvo! What brought my brother to his room?"
"The devil, whose servant he is, may know; I do not. He was found there, in his sword and cloak, as if ready to go forth, when the officers came."
"Did he leave no message—no word for me?"
"Not one word. I know not if he spoke at all, save to offer to show the Alguazils his personal effects. To do him justice, nothing suspicious was found amongst them. But the less said on the subject the better. I wash my hands of it, and of him. I thought he would have done honour to the family; but he has proved its sorest disgrace."
"Señor, what you say of him you say of me also," said Juan, growing white with anger. "And already I have heard quite enough."
"That is as you please, Señor Don Juan."
"I shall only trespass upon you for the favour you have promised me—permission to wait upon Doña Beatriz."
"I shall apprise her of your presence, and give her leave to act as she sees fit." And glad to put an end to the interview, Don Manuel left the room.
Juan sank into a seat once more, and gave himself up to an agony of grief for his brother.
So absorbed was he in his sorrow, that a light footstep entered and approached unheard by him. At last a small hand touched his arm. He started and looked up. Whatever his anguish of heart might be, he was still the loyal lover of Doña Beatriz. So the next moment found him on his knees saluting that hand with his lips. And then followed certain ceremonies abundantly interesting to those who enact them, but apt to prove tedious when described.
"My lady's devoted slave," said Don Juan, using the ordinary language of the time, "bears a breaking heart to-day. We knew neither father nor mother; there were but the two of us."
"Did you not receive my letter, praying you to remain at Nuera?" asked the lady.
"Pardon me, queen of my heart, in that I dared to disregard a wish of yours. But I knewhisdanger, and I came to save him. Alas! too late."
"I am not sure that I do pardon you, Don Juan."
"Then, I presume so far as to say, that I know Doña Beatriz better than she knows herself. Indeed, had I acted otherwise, she would scarce have pardoned me. How would it have beenpossible for me to consult for my own safety, leaving him, alone and unaided, in such fearful peril?"
"You acknowledge there is peril—to you?"
"There may be, señora."
"Ay de mi! Why, in Heaven's name, have you thus involved yourself? O Don Juan, you have dealt very cruelly with me!"
"Light of my eyes, life of my life, what mean you by these words?"
"Was it not cruel to allow your brother, with his gentle, winning ways, and his soft specious words, to lead you step by step from the faith of our fathers, until he had you entangled in I know not what horrible heresies, and made you put in peril your honour, your liberty, your life—everything?"
"We only sought Truth."
"Truth!" echoed the lady, with a contemptuous stamp of her small foot and twirl of her fan. "What is Truth? What good will Truth do me if those cruel men drag you from your bed at midnight, take you to that dreadful place, stretch you on the rack?" But that last horror was too much to bear; Doña Beatriz hid her face in her hands, and wept and sobbed passionately.
Juan soothed her with every tender, lover-like art. "I will be very prudent, dearest lady," he said at last; adding, as he gazed on her beautiful face, "I have too much to live for not to hold life very precious."
"Will you promise to fly—to leave the citynow, before suspicions are awakened which may make flight impossible?"
"My first and my only love, I would die to fulfil your slightest wish. But this thing I cannot do."
"And wherefore not, Señor Don Juan?"
"Can you ask? I must hazard everything, spend everything, in the chance—if there be a chance—of saving him, or, at least, of softening his fate."
"Then God help us both," said Doña Beatriz.
"Amen! Pray to him day and night, señora. Perhaps he may have pity on us."
"There is no chance of saving Don Carlos. Know you not that of all the prisoners the Holy House receives, scarce one in a thousand goes forth again to take his place in the world?"
Juan shook his head. He knew well that his task was almost hopeless; yet, even by Doña Beatriz, he was not to be moved from his determination.
But he thanked her in strong, passionate words for her faith in him and her truth to him. "No sorrow can divide us, my beloved," he said, "nor even what they call shame, falsely as they speak therein. You are my star, that shines on me throughout the darkness."
"I have promised."
"My uncle's family may seek to divide us, and I think they will. But the lady of my heart will not heed their idle words?"
Doña Beatriz smiled. "I am a Lavella," she said. "Do you not know our motto?—'True unto death.'"
"It is a glorious motto. May it be mine too."
"Take heed what you do, Don Juan. If you love me, you will look well to your footsteps, since, wherever they lead, mine are bound to follow." Saying this, she rose, and stood gazing in his face with flushed cheek and kindling eyes.
The words were such as might thrill any lover's heart with joy and gratitude. Yet there was something in the look which accompanied them that changed joy and gratitude into vague fear and apprehension. The light in that dark eye seemed borrowed from the fire of some sublime but terrible resolve within. Juan's heart quailed, though he knew not why, as he said, "My queen should never tread except through flowery paths."
Doña Beatriz took up a little golden crucifix that, attachedto a rosary of coral beads, hung from her girdle. "You see this cross, Don Juan?"
"Yes, señora mia."
"On that horrible night when they dragged your brother to prison, I swore a sacred oath upon it. You esteemed me a child, Don Juan, when you read me chapters from your book, and talked freely to me about God, and faith, and the soul's salvation. Perchance I was a child in some things. For I supposed them good words; how could they be otherwise, since you spoke them? I listened and believed, after a fashion; half thinking all the time of the pretty fans and trinkets you brought me, or of the pattern of such and such an one's mantilla that I had seen at mass. But your brother tore the veil from my eyes at last, and made me understand that those specious words, with which a child played childishly, were the crime that finds no pardon here or hereafter. Of the hereafter I know not; of the here I know too much, God help me! There be fair ladies, not more deeply involved than I, who have changed their gilded saloons for the dungeons of the Triana. But then it matters not so much about me. For I am not like other girls, who have fathers and mothers, sisters and brothers to care for them. Saving Don Carlos (who was good to me for your sake), no one ever gave me more than the half-sorrowful, half-pitying kindness one might give a pet parrot from the Indies. Therefore, thinking over all things, and knowing well your reckless nature, Señor Don Juan, I swore that night upon this holy cross, that if by evil hapyouwere attainted for heresy,Iwould go next day to the Triana and accuse myself of the same crime."
Juan did not for a moment doubt that she would do it; and thus a chain, light as silk but strong as adamant, was flung around him.
"Doña Beatriz, for my sake—" he began to plead.
"Formysake, Don Juan will take care of his life andliberty," she interrupted, with a smile that, if it had a little sadness, had very far more of triumph in it. She knew the power her resolve gave her over him: she had bought it dearly, and she meant to use it. "Is itstillyour wish to remain here," she continued; "or will you go abroad, and wait for better times?"
Juan paused for a moment.
"No choice is left me while Carlos pines uncomforted in a dungeon," he said at last, firmly, though very sorrowfully.
"Then you know what you risk, that is all," answered the lady, whose will was a match for his.
In a marvellously short time had love and sorrow transformed the young and childish girl into a passionate, determined woman, with all the fire of her own southern skies in her heart.
Ere he departed, Juan pleaded for permission to visit her frequently. But here again she showed a keen-sighted apprehensiveness forhim, which astonished him. She cautioned him against their cousins, Manuel and Balthazar; who, if they thought him in danger of arrest, were quite capable of informing against him themselves, to secure a share of his patrimony. Or they might gain the same end, without the disgrace of such a baseness, by putting him quietly out of the way with their daggers. On all accounts, his frequent presence at the house would be undesirable, and might be dangerous; but she agreed to inform him, by means of certain signals (which they arranged together), when he might pay a visit to her with safety. Then, having bidden her farewell, Don Juan turned his back on his uncle's house with a heavy heart.
Reaping the Whirlwind.
"All is lost, except a little life."Byron.
"All is lost, except a little life."Byron.
"All is lost, except a little life."
"All is lost, except a little life."
Byron.
Byron.
Nearly a fortnight passed away before a tiny lace kerchief, fluttering at nightfall through the jealous grating of one of the few windows of Don Manuel's house that looked towards the street, told Juan that he was at liberty to seek admission the next day. He was permitted to enter; but he explored the patio and all the adjacent corridors and rooms without seeing the face of which he was in search. He did not, indeed, meet any one, not even a domestic; for it was the eve of the Feast of the Ascension, and nearly all the household had gone to see the great tabernacle carried in state to the Cathedral and set up there, in preparation for the solemnities of the following day.
He thought this a good opportunity for satisfying his longing to visit the apartment his brother had been wont to occupy. In spite of what his uncle had said to the contrary, and indeed of the dictates of his own reason, he could not relinquish the hope that something which belonged to him—perhaps even some word or line traced by his hand—might reward his careful search.
He ascended the stairs; not stealthily, or as if ashamed ofhis errand, for no one had the right to forbid him. He reached the turret without meeting any one, but had hardly placed his foot upon the stair that led to its upper apartment, when a voice called out, not very loudly,—
"Chien va?"
It was Gonsalvo's. Juan answered,—
"It is I—Don Juan."
"Come to me, for Heaven's sake!"
A private interview with a madman is not generally thought particularly desirable. But Juan was a stranger to fear. He entered the room immediately, and was horror-stricken at the change in his cousin's appearance. A tangled mass of black hair mingled with his beard, and fell neglected over the pillow; while large, wild, melancholy eyes lit up the pallor of his wasted face. He lay, or rather reclined, on a couch, half covered by an embroidered quilt, but wearing a loose doublet, very carelessly thrown on.
Of late the cousins had been far from friendly. Still Juan from compassion stretched out his hand. But Gonsalvo would not touch it.
"Did you know all," he said, "you would stab me where I lie, and thus make an end at once of the most miserable life under God's heaven."
"I fear you are very ill, my cousin," said Juan, kindly; for he thought Gonsalvo's words the offspring of his wandering fancy.
"From the waist downwards I am dead. It is God's hand; and he is just."
"Does your physician give hope of your recovery from this seizure?"
With something like his old short, bitter laugh, Gonsalvo answered—"I have no physician."
"This must be one of his delusions," thought Juan; "or else, since he cannot have Losada, he has refused, with his usual obstinacy, to see any one else."
He said aloud,—"That is not right, cousin Don Gonsalvo. You ought not to neglect lawful means of cure. Señor Sylvester Areto is a very skilful physician; you might safely place yourself in his hands."
"Only there is one slight objection—my father and my brothers would not permit me to see him."
Juan was in no doubt how to regard this statement; but hoping to extract from him some additional information respecting his brother, he turned the conversation.
"When did this malady seize you?" he asked.
"Close the door gently, and I will tell you all. And oh! tread softly, lest my mother, who lies asleep in the room beneath, worn out with watching, should wake and separate us. Then must I bear my guilt and my anguish unconfessed to the grave."
Juan obeyed, and took a seat beside his cousin's couch.
"Sit where I can see your face," said Gonsalvo; "I will not shrink even fromthat. Don Juan, I am your brother's murderer."
Juan started, and his colour changed rapidly.
"If I did not think you were mad—"
"I am no more mad than you are," Gonsalvo interrupted. "Iwasmad, indeed; but that horrible night, when God smote my body, I regained my reason. I see all things clearly now—too late."
"Am I to understand, then," said Juan, rising from his seat, and speaking in measured tones, though his eye was like a tiger's—"am I to understand that you—you—denounced my brother? If so, thank God that you are lying helpless there."
"I am not quite so vile a thing as that. I did not intend to harm a hair of his head; but I detained him here to his ruin. He had the means of escape provided, and but for me would have been in safety ere the Alguazils came."
"Well for both of us your guilt was not greater. Still, you cannot expect me—just yet—to forgive you."
"I expect no forgiveness from man," said Gonsalvo, who perhaps disdained to plead in his own exculpation the generous words of Carlos.
Juan had by this time changed his tone towards his cousin, and assumed his perfect sanity; though, engrossed by the thought of his brother, he was quite unconscious of the mental process by which he had arrived at this conclusion. He asked,—
"But why did you detain him? How did you come to know at all of his intended flight?"
"He had a safe asylum provided for him by some friend—I know not whom," said Gonsalvo, in reply. "He was going forth at midnight to seek it. At the same hour I also"—(for a moment he hesitated, but quickly went on)—"was going forth—to plunge a dagger in my enemy's heart. We met face to face; and each confided his errand to the other. He sought, by argument and entreaty, to move me from a purpose which seemed to him a great crime. But ere our debate was ended, God laid his hand in judgment upon me; and whilst Don Carlos lingered, speaking words of comfort—brave and kind, though vain—the Alguazils came, and he was taken."
Juan listened in gloomy silence.
"Did he leave no message, not one word, for me?" he asked at last, in a low voice.
"Yes; one word. Filled with wonder at the calmness with which he met his terrible fate, I cried out, as they led him from the room, 'Vaya con Dios, Don Carlos, a braver man than you have I never seen!' With one long mournful look, that haunts me still, he said, 'Tell Ruy!'"
Strong man as he was, Don Juan Alvarez bowed his head and wept. They were the first tears the great sorrow had wrung from him—almost the first that he ever remembered shedding. Gonsalvo saw no shame in them.
"Weep on," he said—"weep on; and thank God that thy tears are for sorrow only, not for remorse."
Hoarse and heavy sobs shook the strong frame. For some time they were the only sounds that broke the stillness. At length Gonsalvo said, slowly,—
"He gave me something to keep, which in right should belong to thee."
Juan looked up. Gonsalvo half raised himself, and drew a cushion from beneath his head. First he took off its outer cover of fine holland; then he inserted his hand into an opening that seemed like an accidental rip, and, not without some trouble, drew out a small volume. Juan seized it eagerly: well did he know his brother's Spanish Testament.
"Take it," said Gonsalvo; "but remember it is a dangerous treasure."
"Perhaps you are not sorry to part with it?"
"I deserve that you should say so," answered Gonsalvo, with unwonted gentleness. "But the truth is," he added, with a wan, sickly smile, "nothing can part me from it now, for I have learned almost every word of it by heart."
"How could you, in so short a time, accomplish such a task?" asked Juan, in surprise.
"Easily enough. I was alone long hours of the day, when I could read; and in the silent, sleepless nights I could recall and repeat what I read during the day. But for that I should be in truth what they call me—mad."
"Then you love its words?"
"Ifearthem," cried Gonsalvo, with strange energy, flinging out his wasted arm over the counterpane. "They are words of life—words of fire. They are, to the Church's words, the priest's threatenings, the priest's pardons, what your limbs, throbbing with healthy vigorous life, are to mine—cold, dead, impotent; or what the living champion—steel from head to heel, the Toledo blade in his strong right hand—is to thepainted San Cristofro on the Cathedral door. Because I dare to say so much, my father pretends to think me mad; lest, wrecked as I am in mind and body, I should still find one terrible consolation,—that of flinging the truth for once in the face of the scribes and Pharisees, and then suffering for it—like Don Carlos."
He was silent from exhaustion, and lay with closed eyes and deathlike countenance. After a long pause, he resumed, in a low, weak voice,—
"Some words are good—perhaps. There was San Pablo, who was a blasphemer, and injurious."
"Don Gonsalvo, my brother once said he would give his right hand that you shared his faith."
"Oh, did he?" A quick flush overspread the wan face. "But hark! a step on the stairs! My mother's."
"I am neither afraid nor ashamed to be found here," said Don Juan.
"My poor mother! She has shown me more tenderness of late than I deserved at her hands. Do not let us involve her in trouble."
Juan greeted his aunt with due courtesy, and even attempted some words of condolence upon his cousin's illness. But he saw that the poor lady was terribly disconcerted, and indeed frightened, by his presence there. And not without cause, since mischief, even to bloodshed, might have followed had Don Manuel or either of his sons found Juan in communication with Gonsalvo. She conjured him to go, adding, by way of inducement,—
"Doña Beatriz is taking the air in the garden."
"Availing myself of your gracious permission, señora my aunt, I shall offer her my homage there; and so I kiss your feet.—Adiõs, Don Gonsalvo."
"Adiõs, my cousin."
Doña Katarina followed him out of the room.
"He is not sane," she whispered anxiously, laying her hand on his arm; "he is out of his mind. You perceive it clearly, Don Juan?"
"Certainly I shall not dispute it, señora," Juan answered, prudently.
A Friend at Court.