Part 10 (1/2)

”Priest, if such thou art,” replied the Hebrew, ”I have already, when first brought to this camp, explained the causes of my detention amongst the troops of the Moor. It was my zeal for the king of Spain that brought me into that peril. Escaping from that peril, incurred in his behalf, is the king of Spain to be my accuser and my judge? If, however, my life now be sought as the grateful return for the proffer of inestimable service, I stand here to yield it. Do thy worst; and tell thy master, that he loses more by my death than he can win by the lives of thirty thousand warriors.”

”Cease this idle babble,” said the monk-inquisitor, contemptuously, ”nor think thou couldst ever deceive, with thy empty words, the mighty intellect of Ferdinand of Spain. Thou hast now to defend thyself against still graver charges than those of treachery to the king whom thou didst profess to serve. Yea, misbeliever as thou art, it is thine to vindicate thyself from blasphemy against the G.o.d thou shouldst adore. Confess the truth: thou art of the tribe and faith of Israel?”

The Hebrew frowned darkly. ”Man,” said he, solemnly, ”is a judge of the deeds of men, but not of their opinions. I will not answer thee.”

”Pause! We have means at hand that the strongest nerves and the stoutest hearts have failed to encounter. Pause--confess!”

”Thy threat awes me not,” said the Hebrew; ”but I am human; and since thou wouldst know the truth, thou mayst learn it without the torture. I am of the same race as the apostles of thy Church--I am a Jew.”

”He confesses--write down the words. Prisoner, thou hast done wisely; and we pray the Lord that, acting thus, thou mayst escape both the torture and the death. And in that faith thy daughter was reared?

Answer.”

”My daughter! there is no charge against her! By the G.o.d of Sinai and h.o.r.eb, you dare not touch a hair of that innocent head!”

”Answer,” repeated the inquisitor, coldly.

”I do answer. She was brought up no renegade to her father's faith.”

”Write down the confession. Prisoner,” resumed the Dominican, after a pause, ”but few more questions remain; answer them truly, and thy life is saved. In thy conspiracy to raise thy brotherhood of Andalusia to power and influence--or, as thou didst craftily term it, to equal laws with the followers of our blessed Lord; in thy conspiracy (by what dark arts I seek not now to know _protege nos, beate Domine_!) to entangle in wanton affections to thy daughter the heart of the Infant of Spain-silence, I say--be still! in this conspiracy, thou wert aided, abetted, or instigated by certain Jews of Andalusia--”

”Hold, priest!” cried Almamen, impetuously, ”thou didst name my child.

Do I hear aright? Placed under the sacred charge of a king, and a belted knight, has she--oh! answer me, I implore thee--been insulted by the licentious addresses of one of that king's own lineage? Answer! I am a Jew--but I am a father and a man.”

”This pretended pa.s.sion deceives us not,” said the Dominican, who, himself cut off from the ties of life, knew nothing of their power.

”Reply to the question put to thee: name thy accomplices.”

”I have told thee all. Thou hast refused to answer one. I scorn and defy thee: my lips are closed.”

The Grand Inquisitor glanced to his brethren, and raised his hand.

His a.s.sistants whispered each other; one of them rose, and disappeared behind the canvas at the back of the tent. Presently the hangings were withdrawn; and the prisoner beheld an interior chamber, hung with various instruments the nature of which was betrayed by their very shape; while by the rack, placed in the centre of that dreary chamber, stood a tall and grisly figure, his arms bare, his eyes bent, as by an instinct, on the prisoner.

Almamen gazed at these dread preparations with an unflinching aspect.

The guards at the entrance of the tent approached: they struck off the fetters from his feet and hands; they led him towards the appointed place of torture.

Suddenly the Israelite paused.

”Priest,” said he, in a more humble accent than he had yet a.s.sumed, ”the tidings that thou didst communicate to me respecting the sole daughter of my house and love bewildered and confused me for the moment. Suffer me but for a single moment to recollect my senses, and I will answer without compulsion all thou mayst ask. Permit thy questions to be repeated.”

The Dominican, whose cruelty to others seemed to himself sanctioned by his own insensibility to fear, and contempt for bodily pain, smiled with bitter scorn at the apparent vacillation and weakness of the prisoner: but, as he delighted not in torture merely for torture's sake, he motioned to the guards to release the Israelite; and replied in a voice unnaturally mild and kindly, considering the circ.u.mstances of the scene,

”Prisoner, could we save thee from pain, even by the anguish of our own flesh and sinews, Heaven is our judge that we would willingly undergo the torture which, with grief and sorrow, we ordained to thee.

Pause--take breath--collect thyself. Three minutes shalt thou have to consider what course to adopt ere we repeat the question. But then beware how thou triflest with our indulgence.”

”It suffices--I thank thee,” said the Hebrew, with a touch of grat.i.tude in his voice. As he spoke he bent his face within his bosom, which he covered, as in profound meditation, with the folds of his long robe.

Scarcely half the brief time allowed him had expired, when he again lifted his countenance and, as he did so, flung back his garment.