The Vale of Cedars Part 15

Retrospection is not pleasant in a narrative; but, if Marie has indeed excited any interest in our readers, they will forgive the necessity, and look back a few weeks ere they again arrive at the eventful day with which our last chapter closed. All that Don Felix had reported concerning the widow of Morales was correct. The first stunning effects of her dread avowal were recovered, sense was entirely restored, but the short-lived energy had gone. The trial to pa.s.sively endure is far more terrible than that which is called upon to _act_ and _do_. She soon discovered that, though nursed and treated with kindness, she was a prisoner in her own apartments. Wish to leave them she had none, and scarcely the physical strength; but to sit idly down under the pressure of a double dread--the prisoner's fate and her own sentence--to have no call for energy, not a being for whom to rouse herself and live, not one for whose sake she might forget herself and win future happiness by present exertion; the Past, one yearning memory for the husband, who had so soothed and cherished her, when any other would have cast her from his heart as a worthless thing; the Present, fraught with thoughts she dared not think, and words she might not breathe; the very prayer for Stanley's safety checked--for what could he be to her?--the Future shrouded in a pall so dense, she could not read a line of its dark page, for the torch of Hope was extinguished, and it is only by her light we can look forward; Isabella's affection apparently lost for ever; was it marvel energy and hope had so departed, or that a deadening despondency seemed to crush her heart and sap the very springs of life?

But in the midst of that dense gloom one ray there was, feeble indeed at first as if human suffering had deadened even that, but brightening and strengthening with every pa.s.sing day. It was the sincerity of her faith--the dearer, more precious to its followers, from the scorn and condemnation, in which it was held by man.

The fact that the most Catholic kingdom, of Spain, was literally peopled with secret Jews, brands this unhappy people, with a degree of hypocrisy, in addition to the various other evil propensities with which they have been so plentifully charged. Nay, even amongst themselves in modern times, this charge has gained ascendency; and the romance-writer who would make use of this extraordinary truth, to vividly picture the condition of the Spanish Jews, is accused of vilifying the nation, by reporting practices, opposed to the upright dictates of the religion of the Lord. It is well to p.r.o.nounce such judgment _now_, that the liberal position which we occupy in most lands, would render it the height of dissimulation, and hypocrisy, to conceal our faith; but to judge correctly of the secret adherence to Judaism and public profession of Catholicism which characterized our ancestors in Spain, we must transport ourselves not only to the _country_ but to the _time_, and recall the awfully degraded, crus.h.i.+ng, and stagnating position which _acknowledged Judaism_ occupied over the whole known world. As early as 600--as soon, in fact, as the disputes and prosecutions of Arian against Catholic, and Catholic against Arian, had been checked by the whole of Spain being subdued and governed by Catholic kings--intolerance began to work against the Jews, who had been settled in vast numbers in Spain since the reign of the Emperor Adrian; some authorities a.s.sert still earlier.[A] They were, therefore, nearly the original colonists of the country, and regarded it with almost as much attachment as they had felt towards Judea. When persecution began to work, "90,000 Jews were compelled to receive the sacrament of baptism," the bodies of the more obstinate tortured, and their fortunes confiscated; and yet--a remarkable instance of inconsistency--_they were not permitted to leave Spain_; and this species of persecution continued from 600 downwards. Once or twice edicts of expulsion were issued, but speedily recalled; the tyrants being unwilling to dismiss victims whom they delighted to torture, or deprive themselves of industrious slaves over whom they might exercise a lucrative oppression; and a statute was enacted, "that the Jews who had been baptized should be _constrained_, for the honor of the church, to persevere in the _external practice_ of a religion which they _inwardly_ disbelieved and detested."[B]

[Footnote A: Basnage a.s.serts that the Jews were introduced into Spain by the fleet of Soloman, and the arms of Nebuchadnezzar, and that Hadrian transported _forty thousand_ families of the tribe of Judah, and ten thousand of the tribe of Benjamin, etc.]

[Footnote B: "Gibbon's Decline and Fall," vol. 6, chap. x.x.xvii, from which all the previous sentences in inverted commas have been extracted.]

How, then, can compelled obedience to this statute be termed hypocrisy? Persecution, privation, tyranny, may torture and destroy the body, but they cannot force the mind to the adoption of, and belief in tenets, from which the very treatment they commanded must urge it to revolt. Of the 90,000 Jews forcibly baptized by order of Sisebut, and constrained to the external profession of Catholicism, not ten, in all probability, became actually Christians. And yet how would it have availed them to relapse into the public profession of the faith they so obeyed and loved in secret? To leave the country was utterly impossible. It is easy to talk now of such proceedings being their right course of acting, when every land is open to the departure and entrance of every creed; but it was widely different then, and, even if they could have quitted Spain, there was not a spot of ground, in the whole European and Asiatic world, where persecution, extortion, and banishment would not equally have been their doom. Constant relapses into external as well as internal Judaism, there were, but they were but the signal for increased misery to the whole nation; and by degrees they ceased. It was from the forcible baptism of the 90,000 Hebrews, by Sisebut, that we may trace the origin of the secret Jews. From father to son, from mother to daughter, the solemn secret descended, and gradually spread, still in its inviolable nature, through every rank and every profession, from the highest priest to the lowest friar, the general to the common soldier, the n.o.ble to the peasant, over the whole land. There were indeed some few in Spain, before the final edict of expulsion in 1492, who were Hebrews in external profession as well as internal observance; but their condition was so degraded, so scorned, so exposed to constant suffering, that it was not in human nature voluntarily to sink down to them, when, by the mere continuance of external Catholicism--which from its universality, its long existence, and being in fact a rigidly enforced statute of the state, _could_ not be regarded either as hypocrisy or sin--they could take their station amongst the very highest and n.o.blest of the land, and rise to eminence and power in any profession, civil, military, or religious, which they might prefer.

The subject is so full of philosophical inquiry, that in the limits of a romance we cannot possibly do it justice; but to accuse the secret Jews of Spain of hypocrisy, of departing from the pure odinances of their religion, because _compelled_ to simulate Catholicism, is taking indeed but a one-handed, short-sighted view of an extensive and intensely interesting topic. We may often hope for the _present_ by considering the changes of the _past_; but to attempt to p.r.o.nounce judgment on the sentiments of the _past_ by reasoning of the _present_, when the mind is always advancing, is one of the weakest and idlest fallacies that ever entered the human breast.

Digression as this is, it is necessary clearly to comprehend the situation in which Marie's avowal of her religion had placed her, and her reason for so carefully wording her information as to the existence of the secret closet, that no suspicion might attach itself to the religion of her husband. Her confession sent a shock, which vibrated not only through Isabella's immediate court, but through every part of Spain. Suspicion once aroused, none knew where it might end, or on whom fall. In her first impulse to save Arthur, she had only thought of what such confession might bring to herself individually, and that was, comparatively, easy to endure; but as the excitement ceased, as the dread truth dawned upon her, that, if he must die at the expiration of the given month, her avowal had been utterly useless, the dread of its consequences, to the numerous secret members of her faith appalled her, and caused the firm, resolve under no circ.u.mstances to betray the religion of her husband. Him indeed it could not harm; but that one so high in rank, in influence, in favor with sovereigns and people, was only outwardly a Catholic, might have most fatal consequences on all his brethren. That he should have wedded a Jewess might excite surprise, but nothing more; and in the midst of her varied sufferings she could rejoice that all suspicion as to his race and faith had been averted. She felt thankful also at being kept so close a prisoner, for she dreaded the wrath of those whom her avowal might have unwittingly injured. Such an instance had never been known before, and she might justly tremble at the chastis.e.m.e.nt it might bring upon her even from her own people. As long as she was under Isabella's care she was safe from this; all might feel the vibration, but none dared evince that they did, by the adoption of any measures against her, further than would be taken by the Catholics themselves.

Knowing this, her sole prayer, her sole effort was to obtain mental strength sufficient under every temptation, either from severity or kindness, to adhere unshrinkingly to the faith of her fathers--to cling yet closer to the love of her Father in heaven, and endeavor, with all the lowly trust and fervid feelings of her nature, to fill the yearning void within her woman's heart with his image, and so subdue every human love. It seemed to her vivid fancy as if all the misfortunes she had encountered sprung from her first sin--that of loving a Nazarene. Hers was not the age to make allowances for circ.u.mstances in contradistinction to actual deeds. Then, as unhappily but too often now, all were sufferings from a misplaced affection--sprung, not from her fault, but from the mistaken kindness which it exposed her to without due warning of her danger. Educated with the strong belief, that to love or wed, beyond the pale of her own people was the greatest sin she could commit, short of actual apostacy, that impression, though not strong enough, so to conquer human nature, as to arm against love, returned with double force, as sorrow after sorrow gathered round her, and there were none beside her to whisper and strengthen, with the blessed truth that G.o.d afflicts yet more in mercy than in wrath; and that his decrees, however fraught with human anguish, are but blessings in disguise--blessings, sown indeed with tears on earth, to reap their deathless fruit in heaven.

But though firmly believing all her suffering was deserved, aware that when she first loved Arthur, the rebel-thought--"Why am I of a race so apart and hated?" had very frequently entered her heart, tempting her at times with fearful violence to give up all for love of man; yet Marie knew that the G.o.d of her fathers was a G.o.d of love, calling even upon the greatest sinner to return to him repentant and amending, and that even as a little child such should be forgiven. He had indeed proclaimed himself a jealous G.o.d, and would have no idol-wors.h.i.+p, were it by wood or stone, or, far more dangerous, of human love; and she prayed unceasingly for strength to return to Him with an undivided heart, even if to do so demanded not only separation from Stanley--but a trial in her desolate position almost as severe--the loss of Isabella's confidence and love.

Few words pa.s.sed between Marie and her guardians; their manner was kind and gentle, but intercourse between rigid Catholics and a proclaimed Jewess, could not be other wise than restrained. From the time that reason returned, the Queen had not visited her, doing actual violence to her own inclinations from tire mistaken--but in that age and to her character natural--dread that the affection and interest she felt towards Marie personally, would lessen the sentiments of loathing and abhorrence with which it was her duty to regard her faith. Isabella had within herself all the qualifications of a martyr.

Once impressed that it was a religious duty, she would do violence to her most cherished wishes, sacrifice her dearest desires, her best affections, resign her most eagerly pursued plans--not without suffering indeed, but, according to the mistaken tenets of her religion, the greater personal suffering, the more meritorious was the deed believed to be. This spirit would, had she lived in an age when the Catholic faith was the persecuted, not the persecutor, have led her a willing martyr to the stake; as it was, this same spirit led to the establishment of the Inquisition, and expulsion of the Jews--deeds so awful in their consequences, that the actual motive of the woman-heart which prompted them, is utterly forgotten, and herself condemned. We must indeed deplore the mistaken tenets that could obtain such influence--deplore that man could so pervert the service of a G.o.d of love, as to believe and inculcate that such things could be acceptable to Him; but we should pause, and ask, if we ourselves had been influenced by such teaching, could we break from it? ere we condemn.

Isabella's own devoted spirit could so enter into the real reason of Marie's self abnegation for Arthur's sake, that it impelled her to love her more; while at the very same time the knowledge of her being a Jewess, whom she had always been taught and believed must be accursed in the sight of G.o.d, and lost eternally unless brought to believe in Jesus, urged her entirely to conquer that affection, lest its indulgence should interfere with her resolution, if kindness failed, by severity to accomplish her own version. She was too weak in health, and Isabella intuitively felt too terribly anxious as to young Stanley's fate, to attempt any thing till after the expiration of the month; and she pa.s.sed that interval in endeavoring to calm down her own feelings towards her.

So fifteen days elapsed. On the evening of the fifteenth, Marie, feeling unusually exhausted, had sunk down, without disrobing, on her couch, and at length fell into a slumber so deep and calm, that her guardians, fearing to disturb it, and aware that her dress was so loose and light, it could not annoy her, retired softly to their own chamber without arousing her. How many hours this lethargic sleep lasted, Marie knew not, but was at length broken by a dream of terror, and so unusually vivid, that its impression lasted even through the terrible reality which it heralded. She beheld Arthur Stanley on the scaffold about to receive the sentence of the law--the block, the axe, the executioner with his arm raised, and apparently already deluged in blood--the gaping crowds--all the fearful appurtenances of an execution were distinctly traced, and she thought she sprung towards Stanley, who clasped her in his arms, and the executioner, instead of endeavoring to part them, smiled grimly as rejoicing in having two victims instead of one; and as he smiled, the countenance seemed to change from being entirely unknown to the sneering features of the hated Don Luis Garcia. She seemed to cling yet closer to Stanley, and knelt with, him to receive the blow; when, at that moment, the scaffold shook violently, as by the shock of an earthquake, a dark chashm yawned beneath their feet, in the centre of which stood the spectral figure of her husband, his countenance ghastly and stern, and his arm upraised as beckoning her to join him. And then he spoke; but his voice sounded unlike his own:--

"Marie Henriquez Morales! awake, arise, and follow!"

And with such extraordinary clearness did the words fall, that she started up in terror, believing they must have been spoken by her side--and they were! they might have mingled with, perhaps even created her dream. She still lay on her couch; but it seemed to have sunk down through the very floor of the apartment[A] she had occupied, and at its foot stood a figure, who, with upraised arm held before her a wooden cross. His cowl was closely drawn, and a black robe, of the coa.r.s.est serge, was secured round his waist by a hempen cord. Whether he had indeed spoken the words she had heard in her dream Marie could not tell, for they were not repeated. She saw him approach her, and she felt his strong grasp lift her from the couch, which sprung up, by the touch of some secret spring, to the place whence it had descended; and she heard no more.

[Footnote A: I may be accused in this scene, of too closely imitating a somewhat similar occurrence in Anne of Geirstein. Such seeming plagiarism was scarcely possible to be avoided, when the superst.i.tious proceedings of the _vehmic_ tribunal of Germany and the _secret_ Inquisition of Spain are represented by history as so very similar.]

CHAPTER XXIV.

"Isabel.--Ha! little honor to be much believed, And most pernicious purpose--seeming, seeming.

I will proclaim thee, Angelo! look for't; Sign me a present pardon-- Or, with an outstretch'd throat, I'll tell the world Aloud what man thou art.

"Angelo.--Who will believe thee?

My unsoil'd name, th' austereness of my life, My vouch against you, and my place i' the State, Will so your accusation overweigh That you will stifle in your own report The smile of Calumny."

SHAKSPEARE.

When Marie recovered consciousness, she found herself in a scene so strange, so terrific, that it appeared as if she must have been borne many miles from Segovia, so utterly impossible did it seem, that such awful orgies could be enacted within any short distance of the sovereigns' palace, or their subjects' homes. She stood in the centre of a large vaulted subterranean hall, which, from the numerous arched entrances to divers pa.s.sages and smaller chambers that opened on every side, appeared to extend far and wide beneath the very bowels of the earth. It was lighted with torches, but so dimly, that the gloom exaggerated the horrors, which the partial light disclosed.

Instruments of torture of any and every kind--the rack, the wheel, the screw, the cord, and fire--groups of unearthly-looking figures, all clad in the coa.r.s.e black serge and hempen belt; some with their faces concealed by hideous masks, and others enveloped in the cowls, through which only the eyes could be distinguished, the figure of the cross upon the breast, and under that emblem, of divine peace, inflicting such horrible tortures on their fellow-men that the pen shrinks from their delineation. Nor was it the mere instruments of torture Marie beheld: she saw them in actual use; she heard the shrieks and groans of the hapless victims, at times mingled with the brutal leers and jests of their fiendish tormentors; she seemed to take in at one view, every species of torture that could be inflicted, every pain that could be endured; and yet, comparatively, but a few of the actual sufferers were visible. The shrillest sounds of agony came from the gloomy arches, in which no object could be distinguished.

Whatever suffering meets the sight, it does not so exquisitely affect the brain as that which reaches it through the ear. At the former the heart may bleed and turn sick; but at the latter the brain seems, for the moment, wrought into frenzy; and, even though personally in safety, it is scarcely possible to restrain the same sounds from bursting forth. How then must those shrill sounds of human agony have fallen on the hapless Marie, recognizing as she did with the rapidity of thought, in the awful scene around her, the main hall of that mysterious and terrible tribunal, whose existence from her earliest infancy had been impressed upon her mind, as a double incentive to guard the secret of her faith; that very Inquisition, from which her own grandfather, Julien Heuriquez, had fled, and in which the less fortunate grandfather of her slaughtered husband, had been tortured and burnt.

For a second she stood mute and motionless, as turned to stone; then, pressing both hands tightly on her temples, she sunk down at the feet of her conductor, and sought in words to beseech his mercy; but her white lips gave vent to no sound save a shriek, so wild that it seemed, for the moment, to drown all other sorrows, and startle even the human fiends around her. Her conductor himself started back; but quickly recovering--

"Fool!" he muttered, as he rudely raised her. "I have no power to aid thee; come before the Superior--we must all obey--ask him, implore him, for mercy, not me."

He bore her roughly to a recess, divided off at the upper end of the hall, by a thick black drapery, in which sat the Grand Inquisitor and his two colleagues. One or two familiars were behind them, and a secretary sat near a table covered with black cloth, and on which were several writing implements. All wore masks of black c.r.a.pe, so thick that not a feature could be discerned with sufficient clearness for recognition elsewhere; yet, one glance on the stern, motionless figure, designated as the Grand Inquisitor, sufficed to bid every drop of blood recede from the prisoner's heart with human terror, at the very same moment that it endowed the _woman_ with such supernatural fort.i.tude that her very form seemed to dilate, and her large eye and lovely mouth expressed--if it could be, in such a scene and such an hour--unutterable scorn. Antipathy, even as love, will pierce disguise; and that one glance, lit up with almost bewildering light, in the prisoner's mind, link after link of what had before been impenetrable mystery. Her husband's discovery of her former love for Arthur; his murder; the suspicion thrown on Stanley; her own summons as witness against him; her present danger; all, all were traced to one individual, one still working and most guilty pa.s.sion, which she, in her gentle purity and holy strength, had scorned. She could not be deceived--the mystery that surrounded him was solved--antipathy explained; and Marie's earthly fate lay in Don Luis Garcia's hands!

The Grand Inquisitor read in that glance that he was known; and for a brief minute a strange, an incomprehensible sensation, thrilled through him. It could scarcely have been fear, when one gesture of his hand would destine that frail being to torture, imprisonment, and death; and yet never before in his whole life of wickedness, had he experienced such a feeling as he did at that moment beneath a woman's holy gaze. Anger at himself for the sensation, momentary as it was, increased the virulence of other pa.s.sions; but then was not the hour for their betrayal. In low, deep tones, he commenced the mockery of a trial. That her avowal of her faith would elude torture, by at once condemning her to the flames, was disregarded. She was formally accused of blasphemy and heresy, and threatened with the severest vengeance of the church which she had reviled; but that this case of personal guilt would be mercifully laid aside for the present, for still more important considerations. Was her late husband, they demanded, of the same blaspheming creed as herself? And a list of names, comprising some of the highest families of Spain, was read out and laid before her, with the stern command to affix a mark against all who, like herself, had relapsed into the foul heresy of their ancestors--to do this, or the torture should wring it from her.

But the weakness of humanity had pa.s.sed; and so calm, so collected, so firm, was the prisoner's resolute refusal to answer either question, that the familiar to whom she had clung for mercy looked at her with wonder. Again and again she was questioned; instruments of torture were brought before her--one of the first and slightest used--more to terrify than actually to torture, for that was not yet the Grand Inquisitor's design; and still she was firm, calm, unalterable in her resolution to refuse reply. And then Don Luis spoke of mercy, which was to consist of imprisonment in solitude and darkness, to allow time for reflection on her final answer--a concession, he said, in a tone far more terrifying to Marie than even the horrors around her, only granted in consideration of her age and s.e.x. None opposed the sentence; and she was conducted to a close and narrow cell, in which no light could penetrate save through a narrow c.h.i.n.k in the roof.

How many days and nights thus pa.s.sed the hapless prisoner could not have told, for there was nothing to mark the hours. Her food was delivered to her by means of a turn-screw in the wall, so that not even the sight of a fellow-creature could disturb her solitude, or give her the faintest hope of exciting human pity. Her sole hope, her sole refuge was in prayer; and, oh! how blessed was the calm, the confidence it gave.

So scanty was her allowance of food, that more than once the thought, crossed her, whether or not, death by famine would be her allotted doom; and human nature shuddered, but the spirit did not quail! Hour after hour pa.s.sed, she knew not whether it was night or day, when the gloom of her dungeon was suddenly illumined; she knew not at first how or whence, so noiseless was the entrance of the intruder, but gradually she traced the light to a small lamp held in the hand of a shrouded individual, whom she recognized at once. There was one fearful thrill of mortal dread, one voiceless cry for strength from Heaven, and Marie Morales stood before Don Luis erect and calm, and firm as in her hour of pride.

Garcia now attempted no concealment. His mask had been cast aside, and his features gleamed without any effort at hypocritical restraint, in all the unholy pa.s.sions of his soul. We will not pollute our pages with transcribing the fearful words of pa.s.sions contending in their nature, yet united in their object, with which the pure ear of his prisoner was first a.s.sailed--still lingering desire, yet hate, wrath, fury, that she should dare still oppose, and scorn, and loathe him; rage with himself, that, strive as he might, even he was baffled by the angel purity around her; longing to wreak upon her every torture that his h.e.l.lish office gave him unchecked power to inflict, yet fearing that, if he did so, death would release her ere his object was attained; all strove and raged within him, making his bosom a very h.e.l.l, from which there was no retracting, yet whose very flames incited deeper fury towards the being whom he believed their cause.

"And solitude, darkness, privation--have they so little availed that thou wilt tempt far fiercer sufferings?" he at length demanded, struggling to veil his fury in a quiet, concentrated tone. "Thou hast but neared the threshold of the tortures which one look, one gesture of my hand, can gather around thee; tortures which the strongest sinew, the firmest mind, have been unable to sustain--how will that weakened frame endure?"

"It can but die," replied the prisoner, "as n.o.bler and better ones have done before me!"

"Die!" repeated Garcia, and he laughed mockingly. "Thinkest thou we know our trade so little that such release can baffle us? I tell thee, pain of itself has never yet had power to kill; and we have learned the measure of endurance in the human form so well, that we have never yet been checked by death, ere our ends were gained. And so will it be with thee, boldly as now thou speakest. Thou hast but tasted pain!"

"Better the sharpest torture than thy hated presence," calmly rejoined Marie. "My soul thou canst not touch."

"Soul! Has a Jewess a soul? Nay, by my faith, thou talkest bravely! An thou hast, thou hadst best be mine, and so share my salvation; there's none for such as thee."

"Man!" burst indignantly from the prisoner. "Share thy salvation!

Great G.o.d of Israel! that men like these have power to persecute thy children for their faith, and do it in thy name! And speak of mercy! Thou hast but given me another incentive for endurance," she continued, more calmly addressing her tormentor. "If salvation be denied to us, and granted thee, I would refuse it with my dying breath; such faith is not of G.o.d!"

"I came not hither to enter on such idle quibbles," was the rejoinder.

"It matters not to me what thou art after death, but before it mine thou shalt be. What hinders me, at this very moment, from working my will upon thee? Who will hear thy cry? or, hearing, will approach thee? These walls have heard too many sounds of human agony to bear thy voice to those who could have mercy. Tempt me not by thy scorn too far. What holds me from thee now?"

"What holds thee from me? G.o.d!" replied the prisoner, in a tone of such, thrilling, such supernatural energy, that Garcia actually started as if some other voice than hers had spoken, and she saw him glance fearfully round. "Thou darest not touch me! Ay, villain--blackest and basest as thou art--thou darest not do it. The G.o.d thine acts, yet more than thy words blaspheme, withholds thee--and thou knowest it!"

"I defy him!" were the awful words that answered her; and Don Luis sprang forwards.

"Back!" exclaimed the heroic girl. "Advance one step nearer, and thy vengeance, even as thy pa.s.sion, will alike be foiled--and may G.o.d forgive the deed I do."

She shook down the beautiful tresses of her long luxuriant hair, and, parting them with both hands around her delicate throat, stood calmly waiting in Don Luis's movements the signal for her own destruction.

"Fool!" he muttered, as involuntarily he fell back, awed--in spite of his every effort to the contrary--at a firmness as unexpected as it was unwavering. "Fool! Thou knowest not the power it is thy idle pleasure to defy; thou wilt learn it all too soon, and then in vain regret thy scorn of my proffer now. Thou hast added tenfold to my wild yearning for revenge on thy former scorn--tenfold! ay, twice tenfold, to thy own tortures. Yet, once more, I bid thee pause and choose.

Fools there are, who dare all personal physical torment, and yet shrink and quail before the thought of death for a beloved one.

Idiots, who for others, sacrifice themselves; perchance thou wilt be one of them. Listen, and tremble; or, sacrifice, and save! When in thy haughty pride, and zenith of thy power, thou didst scorn me, and bidding me, with galling contempt, go from thy presence as if I were a loathsome reptile, unworthy even of thy tread, I bade thee beware, and to myself swore vengeance. And knowest thou how that was accomplished?

Who led thy doting husband where he might hear thine own lips proclaim thy falsity? Who poisoned the chalice of life, which had been so sweet, ere it was dashed from his lips by death? Who commanded the murderer's blow, and the weapon with which it was accomplished? Who laid the charge of his murder on the foreign minion, and brought thee in evidence against him? Who but I--even I! And if I have done all this, thinkest thou to elude my further vengeance? I tell thee, if thou refuse the grace I proffer, Arthur Stanley dies; accept it, and he lives!"

"And not at such a price would Arthur Stanley wish, to live," replied Marie calmly. "He would spurn existence purchased thus."

"Ay, perchance, if he knew it; but be it as thou wilt, he shall know thou couldst have saved him and refused."

"And thinkest thou he will believe thee? As little as I believed him my husband's murderer. How little knowest thou the trust of love! He will not die," she continued emphatically; "his innocence shall save him--thy crime be known."