"Everything floats before me," she said. "What with the music, and the ma.s.s, and the incense; and the crosses, and banners, and gorgeous robes; and then the taking of the oaths, and the sermon of the faith."

"Still--you kept my charge?"

"I did, brother." She lowered her voice. "Hard as it was, I looked at _her_. If it comforts you to know that, all through that long day, her face was as calm as ever I have seen it listening to Fray Constantino's sermons, you may take that comfort to your heart When her sentence had been read, she was asked to recant; and I heard her answer rise clear and distinct, 'I neither can nor will recant.' Ave Maria Sanctissima!

it is all a great mystery."

There was a silence, then she resumed,--

"And Senor Cristobal Losada--" but the thought of the kind and skilful physician who had watched beside her own sick-bed, and brought back her babe from the gates of the grave, almost overcame her. Turning quickly to other victims, she went on--

"There were four monks of St. Jerome. Think of the White Doctor, that every one believed so good a man, so pious and orthodox! Another of them, Fray Cristobal D'Arellano, was accused in his sentence of some wicked words against Our Lady which, it would seem, he never said. He cried out boldly, before them all, 'It is false! I never advanced such a blasphemy; and I am ready to prove the contrary with the Bible in my hand.' Every one seemed too much amazed even to think of ordering him to be gagged: and, for my part, I am glad the poor wretch had his word for the last time. I cannot help wishing they had equally forgotten to silence Doctor Juan Gonzales; for it does not appear that he was speaking any blasphemy, but merely a word of comfort to a poor pale girl, his sister, as they told me. Two of them are to die with him--G.o.d help them!--Holy Saints forgive me; I forgot we were told not to pray for them," and she crossed herself.

"Does my sister really believe that compa.s.sionate word a sin in G.o.d's sight?"

"How am I to know? I believe whatever the Church says, of course. And surely there is enough in these days to inspire us with a pious horror of heresy. _Pues_," she resumed, "there was that long and terrible ceremony of degrading from the priesthood. And yet that Gonsalez pa.s.sed through it all as calm and unmoved as though he were but putting on his robes to say ma.s.s. His mother and his two brothers are still in prison, it is said, awaiting their doom. Of all the relaxed, I am told that only Don Juan Ponce de Leon showed any sign of penitence. For the sake of his n.o.ble house, one is glad to think he is not so hardened as the rest. Ay de mi! Whether it be right or wrong, I cannot help pitying their unhappy souls."

"Pity your own soul, not theirs," said Gonsalvo. "For I tell you Christ himself, in all his glory and majesty, at the right hand of the Father, will _stand up_ to receive them this night, as he did to welcome St.

Stephen long ago."

"Oh, my poor brother, what dreadful words you speak! It is a mortal sin even to listen to you. Take thought, I implore you, of your own situation."

"I _have_ taken thought," interrupted Gonsalvo, faintly. "But I can bear no more--just now. Leave me, I pray you, alone with G.o.d."

"If you would even try to say an Ave!--But I fear you are ill--suffering. I do not like to leave you thus."

"Do not heed me; I shall be better soon. And a vow is upon me that I must keep to-day." Once more he flung the wasted hand across his face to conceal it.

Irresolute whether to go or stay, she stood for some minutes watching him silently. At length she caught a low murmur, and hoping that he prayed, she bent over him to hear. Only three words reached her ear.

They were these--"Father, forgive them."

After an interval, Gonsalvo looked up again. "I thought you were gone,"

he said. "Go now, I entreat of you. But so soon as you know _the end_, spare not to come and tell me. For I wait for that."

Thus entreated, Dona Inez had no choice but to leave him alone, which she did.

Evening had worn to night, and night was beginning to wear towards daybreak, when at last Don Garcia Ramirez, and those of his servants who had accompanied him to the Prado San Sebastian to see the end, returned home.

Dona Inez sat awaiting her husband in the patio. She looked pale and languid; apparently the great holiday of Seville had been anything but a joyful day to her.

Don Garcia divested himself of his cloak and sword, and dismissed the servants to their beds. But when his wife invited him to partake of the supper she had prepared, he turned upon her with very unusual ill-humour. "It is little like thy wonted wit, senora mia, to bid a man to his breakfast at midnight," he said. Yet he drank deeply of the Xeres wine that stood on the board beside the venison pasty and the manchet bread.

At last, after long patience, Dona Inez won from his lips what she desired to hear. "Oh yes; all is over. Our Lady defend us! I have never seen such obstinacy; nor could I have believed it possible unless I had seen it. The criminals encouraged each other to the very last.

Those girls, the sisters of Gonsalez, repeated their Credo at the stake; whereupon the attendant Brethren entreated them to have so much pity on their own souls as to say, 'I believe in the _Roman_ Catholic Church.'

They answered, 'We will do as our brother does.' So the gag was removed, and Doctor Juan cried aloud, 'Add nothing to the good confession you have made already.' But for all that, order was given to strangle them; and one of the friars told us they died in the true faith. I suppose it is not a sin to hope they did."

After a pause, he continued, in a deeper tone, "Senor Cristobal amazed me as much as any of them. At the very stake, some of the Brethren undertook to argue with him. But seeing that we were all listening, and might hear somewhat to the hurt of our souls, they began to speak in the Latin tongue. Our physician immediately did the same. I am no scholar myself; but there were learned men there who marked every word, and one of them told me afterwards that the doomed man spoke with as much elegance and propriety as if he had been contending for an academic prize, instead of waiting for the lighting of the fire which was to consume him. This unheard-of calmness and composure, whence is it? The devil's own work, or"----he broke off suddenly and resumed in a different tone, "Senora mia, have you thought of the hour? In Heaven's name, let us to our beds!"

"I cannot go to rest until you tell me one thing more. Dona Maria de Bohorques?"

"Vaya, vaya! have we not had enough of it all?"

"Nay; I have made a promise. I must entreat you to tell me how Dona Maria de Bohorques met her doom."

"With unflinching hardihood. Don Juan Ponce tried to urge her to yield somewhat. But she refused, saying it was not now a time for reasoning, and that they ought rather to meditate on the Lord's death and pa.s.sion.

(They believe in _that_, it seems.) When she was bound to the stake, the monks and friars crowded round her, and pressed her only to repeat the Credo. She did so; but began to add some explanations, which, I suppose, were heretical. Then immediately the command was given to strangle her; and so, in one moment, while she was yet speaking, death came to her."

"Then she did not suffer? She escaped the fire! Thank G.o.d!"

Five minutes afterwards, Dona Inez stood by her brother's bed. He lay in the same posture, his face still shaded by his hand.

"Brother," she said gently--"brother, all is over. She did not suffer.

It was done in one moment."

There was no answer.

"Brother, are you not glad she did not feel the fire? Can you not thank G.o.d for it? Speak to me."

Still no answer.

He could not be asleep! Impossible!--"Speak to me, Gonsalvo!--_Brother!_"

She drew close to him; she touched his hand to remove it from his face.

The next moment a cry of horror rang through the house. It brought the servants and Don Garcia himself to the room.

"He is dead! G.o.d and Our Lady have mercy on his soul!" said Don Garcia, after a brief examination.

"If only he had had the Holy Sacrament, I could have borne it!" said Dona Inez; and then, kneeling down beside the couch, she wept bitterly.

So pa.s.sed the beggar with the King's sons, through the golden gate into the King's own presence-chamber. His wrecked and troublous life over, his pa.s.sionate heart at rest for ever, the erring, repentant Gonsalvo found entrance into the same heaven as D'Arellano, and Gonsalez, and Losada, with their radiant martyr-crowns. In the many mansions there was a place for him, as for those heroic and triumphant ones. He wore the same robe as they--a robe washed and made white, not in the blood of martyrs, but in the blood of the Lamb.

x.x.xVIII.

Nuera Again.

"Happy places have grown holy; If ye went where once ye went, Only tears would fall down slowly.

As at solemn Sacrament Household names, that used to flutter Through your laughter unawares, G.o.d's divine one ye can utter With less trembling in your prayers."--E. B. Browning

A chill and dreary torpor stole over Juan's fiery spirit after the Auto.

The settled conviction that his brother was dead took possession of his mind. Moreover, his soul had lost its hold upon the faith which he once embraced so warmly. He had consciously ceased to be true to his best convictions, and those convictions, in turn, had ceased to support him.

His confidence in himself, his trust in his own heart, had been shaken to its foundations. And he was very far from having gained in its stead that strong confidence in G.o.d which would have infinitely more than counter-balanced its loss.

Thus two or three slow and melancholy months wore away. Then, fortunately for him, events happened that forced him, in spite of himself, to the exertion that saves from the deadly slumber of despair.

It became evident, that if he did not wish to see the last earthly treasure that remained to him swept out of his reach for ever, he must rouse himself from his lethargy so far as to grasp and hold it; for now Don Manuel _commanded_ his ward to bestow her hand upon his rival, Senor Luis Rotelo.