Part 20 (1/2)
”If I can bear the loss of thy favor, my Sovereign, I can bear this,”
replied Marie, slowly and painfully. ”There is more suffering in the thought, that your Grace's love is lost for ever; that I shall never see your Highness more; and thou must ever think of me as only a wretched, feelingless ingrate, than in all the bodily and mental anguish such a life may bring.”
”Marie!” exclaimed Isabella, with an irrepressible burst of natural feeling. And Marie had darted forwards, and was kneeling at her feet, and covering her hand with tears and kisses, ere she had power to forcibly subdue the emotion and speak again.
”This must not be,” she said at length; but she did not withdraw the hand which Marie still convulsively clasped, and, half unconsciously it seemed, she put back the long, black tresses, which had fallen over her colorless cheek, looked sadly in that bowed face, and kissed her brow. ”It is the last,” she murmured to herself. ”It may be the effects of sorcery--it may be sin; but if I do penance for the weakness, it must have way.”
”Thou hast heard the one alternative,” she continued aloud; ”now hear the other. We have thought long, and watched well, some means of effectually obliterating the painful memories of the past, and making thy life as happy as it has been sad. We have asked and received permission from our confessor to bring forward a temporal inducement for a spiritual end; that even the affections themselves may be made conducive to turning a benighted spirit from the path of death into that of life; and, therefore, we may proceed more hopefully. Marie! is there not a love thou valuest even more than mine? Nay, attempt not to deny a truth, which we have known from the hour we told thee that Arthur Stanley was thy husband's murderer. What meant those wild words imploring me to save him? For what was the avowal of thy faith, but that thy witness should not endanger him? Why didst thou return to danger when safety was before thee?--peril thine own life but to save his? Answer me truly: thou lovest Stanley, Marie?”
”I have loved him, gracious Sovereign.”
”And thou dost no longer? Marie, methinks there would be less wrong in loving now, than when we first suspected it,” rejoined the Queen, gravely.
”Alas! my liege, who may school the heart? He was its first--first affection! But, oh! my Sovereign, I never wronged my n.o.ble husband. He knew it all ere he was taken from me, and forgave and loved me still; and, oh! had he been but spared, even memory itself would have lost its power to sting. His trust, his love, had made me all--all his own!”
”I believe thee, my poor child; but how came it that, loving Stanley, thy hand was given to Morales?”
For the first time, the dangerous ground on which she stood flashed on the mind of Marie; and her voice faltered as she answered--”My father willed it, Madam.”
”Thy father! And was he of thy faith, yet gave his child to one of us?”
”He was dying, Madam, and there was none to protect his Marie. He loved and admired him to whom he gave me; for Ferdinand had never scorned nor persecuted us. He had done us such good service that my father sought to repay him; but he would accept nothing but my hand, and swore to protect my faith--none other would have made such promise. I was weak, I know, and wrong; but I dared not then confess I loved another. And, once his wife, it was sin even to think of Arthur.
Oh, Madam! night and day I prayed that we might never meet, till all of love was conquered.”
”Poor child,” replied Isabella, kindly. ”But, since thou wert once more free, since Stanley was cleared of even the suspicion of guilt, has no former feeling for him returned! He loves thee, Marie, with such faithful love as in man I have seldom seen equalled; why check affection now?”
”Alas! my liege, what may a Jewess be to him; or his love to me, save as the most terrible temptation to estrange me from my G.o.d?”
”Say rather to gently lure thee to Him, Marie,” replied Isabella, earnestly. ”There is a thick veil between thy heart and thy G.o.d now; let the love thou bearest this young Englishman be the blessed means of removing it, and bringing thee to the sole source of salvation, the Saviour Stanley wors.h.i.+ps. One word--one little word--from thee, and thou shalt be Stanley's wife! His own; dearer than ever from the trials of the past. Oh! speak it, Marie! Let me feel I have saved thee from everlasting torment, and made this life--in its deep, calm joy--a foretaste of the heaven that, as a Christian, will await thee above.
Spare Stanley--aye, and thy Sovereign--the bitter grief of losing thee for ever!”
”Would--would I could!” burst wildly from the heart-stricken Marie; and she wrung her hands in that one moment of intense agony, and looked up in the Queen's face, with an expression of suffering Isabella could not meet. ”Would that obedience, conviction, could come at will! His wife?--Stanley's. To rest this desolate heart on his? To weep upon his bosom?--feel his arm around me?--his love protect me? To be his--all his? And only on condition of speaking one little word?
Oh! why can I not speak it? Why will that dread voice sound within, telling me I dare not--cannot--for I do not believe? How dare I take the Christians's vow, embrace the cross, and in my heart remain a Jewess still?”
”Embrace the cross, and conviction will follow,” replied the Queen.
”This question we have asked of Father Tomas, and been a.s.sured that the vows of baptism once taken, grace will be found from on high; and to the _heart_, as well as _lip_, conversion speedily ensue.
Forswear the blaspheming errors of thy present creed--consent to be baptized--and that very hour sees thee Stanley's wife!”
”No, no, no!--Oh! say not such words again! My liege, my gracious liege, tempt not this weak spirit more!” implored Marie, in fearful agitation. ”Oh! if thou hast ever loved me, in mercy spare me this!”
”In mercy is it that we do thus speak, unhappy girl.” replied Isabella, with returning firmness; for she saw the decisive moment had come. ”We have laid both alternatives before thee; it rests with thee alone to make thine own election. Love on earth and joy in Heaven, depends upon one word: refuse to speak it, and thou knowest thy doom!”
It was well, perhaps, for Marie's firmness, that the Queen's appealing tone had given place to returning severity; it recalled the departing strength--the sinking energy--the power once more to _endure!_ For several minutes there was no sound: Marie had buried her face in her hands, and remained--half kneeling, half crouching--on the cus.h.i.+on at the Queen's feet, motionless as stone; and Isabella--internally as agitated as herself--was, under the veil of unbending sternness, struggling for control. The contending emotions sweeping over that frail woman-heart in that fearful period of indecision we pretend not to describe: again and again the terrible temptation came, to say but the desired word, and happiness was hers--such intense happiness, that her brain reeled beneath its thought of ecstasy; and again and again it was driven back by that thrilling voice--louder than ever in its call--to remain faithful to her G.o.d. It was a fearful contest; and when she did look up, Isabella started; so terribly was its index inscribed on those white and chiselled features.
She rose slowly, and stood before the Sovereign, her hands tightly clasped together, and the veins on her forehead raised like cords across it. Three times she tried to speak; but only unintelligible murmurs came, and her lips shook as with convulsion. ”It is over,”
she said at length, and her usually sweet voice sounded harsh and unnatural. ”The weakness is conquered, gracious Sovereign, condemn, scorn, hate me as thou wilt, thou must: I must endure it till my heart breaks, and death brings release; but the word thou demandest I _cannot_ speak! Thy favor, Arthur's love, I resign them all! 'Tis the bidding of my G.o.d, and he will strengthen me to bear it. Imprison, torture, slay, with the lingering misery of a broken heart, but I cannot deny my faith!”
Disappointed, grieved, as she was at this unexpected reply, Isabella was too much an enthusiast in religion herself not to understand the feeling which dictated it; and much as she still abhorred the faith, the martyr spirit which could thus immolate the most fervid, the most pa.s.sionate emotions of woman's nature at the shrine of her G.o.d, stirred a sympathetic chord in her own heart, and so moved her, that the stern words she had intended to speak were choked within her.
”We must summon those then to whose charge we are pledged to commit thee,” she said with difficulty; and hastily rung a silver bell beside her. ”We had hoped such would not have been needed; but, as it is--”