Part 39 (1/2)

”Out upon thee, woman!” interrupted the page; ”and the foul fiend take thee and thy only son together.”

”Hush, Don Alonzo!” Fray Sebastian interposed, coming forward towards the spot; and perhaps for the first time in his life there was something like dignity in his tone and manner. ”You must be aware, senora,” he said, turning to the woman, ”that the right of using this landing-place is restricted to my lord's household. You will be admitted at the gate of the Triana, if you present yourself at a proper hour.”

”Alas! good father, once and again have I sought admission to my lord's presence. I am the unhappy mother of Luis D'Abrego, he who used to paint and illuminate the church missals so beautifully. More than a year agone they tore him from me, and carried him away to yonder tower, and since then, so help me the good G.o.d, never a word of him have I heard. Whether he is living or dead, this day I know not.”

”Oh, a Lutheran dog! Serve him right,” cried the page. ”I hope they have put him on the pulley.”

Fray Sebastian turned suddenly, and dealt the lad a stinging blow on the side of his face. To the latest hour of his life this act of pa.s.sion remained incomprehensible to himself. He could only ascribe it to the direct agency of the evil one. ”I was tempted by the Devil,” he would say with a sigh. ”Vade retro me, Satana.”

Crimson to the roots of his perfumed hair, the boy sought his dagger.

”Vile caitiff! beggarly trencher-sc.r.a.ping Franciscan!” he cried, ”you shall repent of this.”

But apparently changing his mind the next moment, he allowed the dagger to drop from his hand, and s.n.a.t.c.hing up his jerkin, ran at full speed towards the house.

Fray Sebastian crossed himself, and gazed after him bewildered; his unwonted pa.s.sion dying as suddenly as it had flamed up, and giving place to fear.

Meanwhile the mother of Abrego, to whom it did not occur that the buffet bestowed on the page could have any serious consequences, resumed her pleadings. ”Your reverence seems to have a heart that can feel for the unhappy,” she said. ”For Heaven's sake refuse not the prayer of the most unhappy woman in the world. Only let me see his lords.h.i.+p--let me throw myself at his feet and tell him the whole truth. My poor lad had nothing at all to do with the Lutherans; he was a good, true Christian, and an old one, like all his family.”

”Nay, nay, my good woman; I fear I can do nothing to help you. And I entreat of you to leave this place, else some of my lord's household are sure to come and compel you. Ay, there they are.”

It was true enough. Don Alonzo, as he ran through the porch, shouted to the numerous idle attendants who were lounging about, and some of them immediately rushed out into the garden.

In justice to Fray Sebastian, it must be recorded, that before he consulted for his personal safety, he led the poor woman back to the barge, and saw her depart in it. Then he made good his own retreat, going straight to the lodging of Don Juan Alvarez.

He found Juan lying asleep on a settle. The day was hot; he had nothing to do; and, moreover, the fiery energy of his southern blood was dashed by the southern taint of occasional torpor. Starting up suddenly, and seeing Fray Sebastian standing before him with a look of terror, he asked in alarm, ”Any tidings, Fray? Speak--tell me quickly.”

”None, Senor Don Juan. But I must leave this place at once.” And the friar briefly narrated the scene that had just taken place, adding mournfully, ”Ay de mi! I cannot tell what came over me--_me_, the mildest-tempered man in all the Spains!”

”And what of all that?” asked Juan rather contemptuously. ”I see nothing to regret, save that you did not give the insolent lad what he deserved, a sound beating.”

”But, Senor Don Juan, you don't understand,” gasped the poor friar. ”I must fly immediately. If I stay here over to-night I shall find myself before the morning--_there_.” And with a significant gesture he pointed to the grim fortress that loomed above them.

”Nonsense. They cannot suspect a man of heresy, even _de levi_,[#] for boxing the ear of an impudent serving-lad.”

[#] Lightly.

”Ay, and can they not, your wors.h.i.+p? Do you not know that the gardener of the Triana has lain for many a weary month in one of those dismal cells; and all for the grave offence of s.n.a.t.c.hing a reed out of the hand of one of my lord's lackeys so roughly as to make it bleed?”[#]

[#] A fact.

”Truly! Now are things come to a strange pa.s.s in our free and royal land of Spain! A beggarly upstart, such as this Munebrga, who could not, to save himself from the rack, tell you the name of his own great-grandfather, drags the sons and brothers--ay, and G.o.d help us! the wives and daughters--of our knights and n.o.bles to the dungeon and the stake before our eyes. And it is not enough for him to set his own heel on our necks. His minions--his very grooms and pages--must lord it over us, and woe to him who dares to chastise their insolence. Nathless, I would feel it a comfort to make every bone in that urchin's body ache soundly. I have a mind--but this is folly. I believe you are right, Fray. You should go.”

”Moreover,” said the friar mournfully, ”I am doing no good here.”

”No one can do good now,” returned Juan, in a tone of deep dejection.

”And to-day the last blow has fallen. The poor woman who showed him kindness, and sometimes told us how he fared, is herself a prisoner.”

”What! she has been discovered?”