Part 26 (1/2)

She hastily extended her hand, upon which he pressed a kiss of friends.h.i.+p and grat.i.tude. ”G.o.d bless you, my cousin,” he said.

”Vaya con Dios,” she responded. ”For it is our last meeting,” she added mentally.

She stood and watched the retreating figure with tears in her bright eyes, and in her heart a memory that went back to old times, when she used to intercede with her rough brothers for the delicate shrinking child, who was younger, as well as frailer, than all the rest. ”He was ever gentle and good, and fit to be a holy priest,” she thought. ”Ay de mi, for the strange, sad change! Yet, after all, I cannot see that he is so greatly changed. Playing with the child, talking with me, he is just the same Carlos as of old. But the devil is very cunning. G.o.d and Our Lady keep us from his wiles!”

XXV.

Waiting.

”Our night is dreary, and dim our day, And if thou turn thy face away, We are sinful, feeble, and helpless dust, And have none to look to and none to trust.”--Hogg

Thus was Carlos roused from the dull apathy of forced inaction. With the courage and energy that are born of hope, he made the few and simple preparations for his flight that were in his power. He also visited as many as he could of his afflicted friends, feeling that his ministry among them was now drawing to a close.

He rejoined his uncle's family as usual at the evening meal. Don Balthazar, the empleado, was not present at its commencement, but soon came in, looking so much disturbed that his father asked, ”What is amiss?”

”There is nothing amiss, senor and my father,” answered the young man, as he raised a large cup of Manzanilla to his lips.

”Is there any news in the city?” asked his brother Don Manuel.

Don Balthazar set down the empty cup. ”No great news,” he answered. ”A curse upon those Lutheran dogs that are setting the place in an uproar.”

”What! more arrests,” said Don Manuel the elder. ”It is awful. The number reached eight hundred yesterday. Who is taken now?”

”A priest from the country, Doctor Juan Gonzalez, and a friar named Olmedo. But that is nothing. They might take all the Churchmen in all the Spains, and fling them into the lowest dungeons of the Triana for me. It is a different matter when we come to speak of ladies--ladies, too, of the first families and highest consideration.”

A slight shudder, and a kind of forward movement, as if to catch what was coming, pa.s.sed round the table. But Don Balthazar seemed reluctant to say more.

”Is it any of our acquaintances?” asked the sharp, high-pitched voice of Dona Sancha at last.

”Every one is acquainted with Don Pedro Garcia de Xeres y Bohorques. It is--I tremble to tell you--his daughter.”

”_Which?_” cried Gonsalvo, in tones that turned the gaze of all on his livid face and fierce eager eyes.

”St. Iago, brother! You need not look thus at me. Is it my fault?--It is the learned one, of course, Dona Maria. Poor lady, she may well wish now that she had never meddled with anything beyond her Breviary.”

”Our Lady and all the saints defend us! Dona Maria in prison for heresy--horrible! Who will be safe now?” the ladies exclaimed, crossing themselves shudderingly.

But the men used stronger language. Fierce and bitter were the anathemas they heaped upon heresy and heretics. Yet it is only just to say that, had they dared, they might have spoken differently. Probably in their secret hearts they meant the curses less for the victims than for their oppressors; and had Spain been a land in which men might speak what they thought, Gonzales de Munebrga would have been devoted to a lower place in h.e.l.l than Luther or Calvin.

Only two were silent. Before the eye of Carlos rose the sweet thoughtful face of the young girl, as he had seen it last, radiant with the faith and hope kindled by the sublime words of heavenly promise spoken by Losada. But the sight of another face--still, rigid, death-like--drove that vision away. Gonsalvo sat opposite to him at the table. And had he never heard the strange story Dona Inez told him, that look would have revealed it all.

Neither curse nor prayer pa.s.sed the white lips of Gonsalvo. Not one of all the bitter words, found so readily on slighter occasions, came now to his aid. The fiercest outburst of pa.s.sion would have seemed less terrible to Carlos than this unnatural silence.

Yet none of the others, after the first moment, appeared to notice it.

Or if they did observe anything strange in the look and manner of Gonsalvo, it was imputed to physical pain, from which he often suffered, but for which he rejected, and even resented, sympathy, until at last it ceased to be offered him. Having given what expression they dared to their outraged feelings, they once more turned their attention to the unfinished repast. It was not at all a cheerful meal, yet it was duly partaken of, except by Gonsalvo and Carlos, both of whom left the table as soon as they could without attracting attention.

Willingly would Carlos have endeavoured to console his cousin; but he did not dare to speak to him, or even to allow him to guess that he saw the anguish of his soul.