CHAPTER XXXIII.
"I will have vengeance!
I'll crush thy swelling pride! I'll still thy vaunting!
I'll do a deed of blood!
Now all idle forms are over—
Now open villany, now open hate—
Defend thy life!"
JOANNA BAILLIE.
"Let me but look upon 'her' face once more—
Let me but say farewell, my soul's beloved,
And I will bless thee still."
MRS. HEMANS.
Some time had elapsed since King Ferdinand and his splendid army had quitted Saragossa. He himself had not as yet headed any important expedition, but fixing his head-quarters at Seville, dispatched thence various detachments under experienced officers, to make sallies on the Moors, who had already enraged the Christian camp by the capture of Zahara. Arthur Stanley was with the Marquis of Cadiz, when this insult was ably avenged by the taking of Albania, a most important post, situated within thirty miles of the capital. The Spaniards took possession of the city, massacred many of the inhabitants, placed strong restrictions on those who surrendered, and strongly garrisoned every tower and fort. Nor were they long inactive: the Moors resolved to retake what they considered the very threshold of their capital; hastily assembled their forces, and regularly entered upon the siege.
While at Seville, the camp of Ferdinand had been joined by several foreign chevaliers, amongst whom was an Italian knight, who had excited the attention and curiosity of many of the younger Spaniards from the mystery environing him. He was never seen without his armor. His helmet always closed, keeping surlily aloof, he never mingled in the brilliant jousts and tournaments of the camp, except when Arthur Stanley chanced to be one of the combatants: he was then sure to be found in the lists, and always selected the young Englishman as his opponent. At first this strange pertinacity was regarded more as a curious coincidence than actual design; but it occurred so often, that at length it excited remark. Arthur himself laughed it off, suggesting that the Italian had perhaps some grudge against England, and wished to prove the mettle of her sons. The Italian deigned no explanation, merely saying that he supposed the Spanish jousts were governed by the same laws as others, and he was therefore at liberty to choose his own opponent. But Arthur was convinced that some cause existed for this mysterious hostility. Not wishing to create public confusion, he contended himself by keeping a watch upon his movements. He found, however, that he did not watch more carefully than he was watched, and incensed at length, he resolved on calling his enemy publicly to account for his dishonorable conduct. This, however, he found much easier in theory than practice. The wily Italian, as if aware of his intentions, skilfully eluded them; and as weeks passed without any recurrence of their secret attacks. Stanley, guided by his own frank and honorable feelings, believed his suspicions groundless, and dismissed them altogether. On the tumultuary entrance of the Spaniards, however, these suspicions were re-excited. Separated by the press of contending warriors from the main body of his men, Stanley plunged headlong into the thickest battalion of Moors, intending to cut his way through them to the Marquis of Cadiz, who was at that moment entering the town. His unerring arm and lightness of movement bore him successfully onward. A very brief space divided him from his friends: the spirited charger on which he rode, cheered by his hand and voice, with one successful bound cleared the remaining impediments in his way, but at that moment, with a piercing cry of suffering, sprung high in the air and fell dead, nearly crushing his astonished master with his weight. Happily for Stanley, the despairing anguish of the Moors at that moment at its height, from the triumphant entry of the Spaniards into their beloved Albania, aggravated by the shrieks of the victims in the unsparing slaughter, effectually turned the attention of those around him from his fall. He sprung up, utterly unable to account for the death of his steed: the dastard blow had been dealt from behind, and no Moor had been near but those in front. He looked hastily round him: a tall figure was retreating through the thickening melée, whose dull, red armor, and deep, black plume, discovered on the instant his identity. Arthur's blood tingled with just indignation, and it was with difficulty that he restrained himself from following, and demanding on the instant, and at the sword's point, the meaning of the deed.
The sudden start, and muttered execration of the Italian, as Stanley joined the victorious group around the Marquis, convinced him that his reappearance, and unhurt, was quite contrary to his mysterious enemy's intention. The exciting events of the siege which followed, the alternate hope and fear of the Spaniards, reduced to great distress by the Moors having succeeded in turning the course of a river which supplied the city with water, and finally, the timely arrival of succors under the Duke of Medina Sidonia, which compelled the Moors to raise the siege and disperse—the rejoicing attendant on so great and almost unexpected a triumph, all combined to prevent any attention to individual concerns. The Italian had not crossed Arthur's path again, except in the general attack or defence; and Stanley found the best means of conquering his own irritation towards such secret machinations, was to treat them with indifference and contempt.
The halls of Alhama were of course kept strongly manned; and a guard, under an experienced officer, constantly occupied the summit of a lofty tower, situated on a precipitous height which commanded a view of the open country for miles, and overlooked the most distant approach of the Moors. As was usual to Moorish architecture, the tower had been erected on a rock, which on one side shelved down so straight and smooth, as to appear a continuance of the tower-wall, but forming from the battlements a precipice some thousand feet in depth. The strongest nerve turned sick and giddy to look beneath, and the side of the tower overlooking it was almost always kept unguarded.
It was near midnight when Stanley, who was that night on command, after completing his rounds, and perceiving every sentinel on duty, found himself unconsciously on the part of the tower we have named. So pre-occupied was his mind, that he looked beneath him without shrinking; and then retracing his steps some twenty or thirty yards from the immediate and unprotected edge, wrapped his mantle closely round him, and lying down, rested his head on his arm, and permitted the full dominion of thought. He was in that dreamy mood, when the silence and holiness of nature is so much more soothing than even the dearest sympathy of man; when every passing cloud and distant star, and moaning wind, speaks with a hundred tongues, and the immaterial spirit holds unconscious commune with beings invisible, and immaterial as itself. Above his head, heavy clouds floated over the dark azure of the heavens, sometimes totally obscuring the mild light of the full moon; at others merely shrouding her beams in a transparent veil, from which she would burst resplendently, sailing majestically along, seeming the more light and lovely from the previous shade. One brilliant planet followed closely on her track, and as the dark masses of clouds would rend asunder, portions of the heavens, studded with glittering stars, were visible, seeming like the gemmed dome of some mighty temple, whose walls and pillars, shrouded in black drapery, were lost in the distance on either side. Gradually, Stanley's thoughts became indistinct; the stars seemed to lose their radiance, as covered by a light mist; a dark cloud appearing, in his half dormant fancy, to take the gigantic proportions of a man, hovered on the battlement. It became smaller and smaller, but still it seemed a cloud, through which the moonlight gleamed; but a thrill passed through him, as if telling of some impalpable and indefinable object of dread. With a sudden effort he shook off the lethargy of half sleep, and sprung to his feet, at the very moment a gleaming sword was pointed at his throat. "Ha, villain! at thy murderous work again!" he exclaimed, and another moment beheld him closed in deadly conflict with his mysterious foe. A deep and terrible oath, and then a mocking laugh, escaped his adversary; and something in those sounds, nerved Stanley's arms with resistless power: he was sure he could not be mistaken, and he fought, not with the unguarded desire of one eager to obtain satisfaction for personal injury—but he was calm, cool, collected, as threefold an avenger. For once, the demon-like caution of the supposed Italian deserted him: discovery was inevitable, and his sole aim was to compass the death of the hated foreigner with his own. He tried gradually to retreat to the very edge of the precipice, and Stanley's calm and cautious avoidance of the design lashed him into yet fiercer desperation. Thick and fast, fell those tremendous blows. The Italian had the advantage in height and size, Stanley in steady coolness and prudent guard; the Italian sought only to slay his adversary, caring not to defend himself; Arthur evidently endeavored merely to unhelm the traitor, and bring him but slightly wounded to the ground. For several minutes there was no cessation in that fearful clash of steel; the strokes were so rapid, so continued, a hundred combatants might have seemed engaged. A moment they drew back, as if to breathe; the Italian, with a despairing effort, raised his weapon and sprung forwards; Arthur lightly leaped aside, and the murderous stroke clove but the yielding earth. Another second, and ere the Italian had regained his equilibrium, Arthur's sword had descended with so true and sure a stroke that the clasp of the helmet gave way, the dark blood bubbled up from the cloven brow, he reeled and fell; and a long, loud shout from the officers and soldiers, who, at the sound of arms, had flocked round, proclaimed some stronger feeling than simply admiration of Stanley's well-known prowess.
"Seize him! seize him! or by Heaven he will escape us yet!" were among the few words intelligible. "The daring villain, to come amongst us! Did he think for ever to elude Heaven's vengeance? Bind, fetter, hold him; or his assistant fiends will release him still!"
Fiercely the fallen man had striven to extricate himself; but Stanley's knee moved not from his breast, nor his sword from his throat, until a strong guard had raised and surrounded him: "but the horrible passions imprinted on those lived features were such, that his very captors turned away shuddering.
"Hadst thou not had enough of blood and crime, thou human monster, that thou wouldst stain thy already blackened soul with, another midnight murder?" demanded Stanley, as he sternly confronted his baffled foe. "Don Luis Garcia, as men have termed thee, what claim have I on thy pursuing and unchanging hate? With what dost thou charge me? What wrong?"
"Wrong!" hoarsely and fiercely repeated Don Louis. "The wrong of baffled hate; of success, when I planned thy downfall; of escape, when I had sworn thy death! Did the drivelling idiots, who haunted, persecuted, excommunicated me from these realms, as some loathed reptile, dream that I would draw back from my sworn vengeance for such as they? Poor, miserable fools, whom the first scent of danger would turn aside from the pursuit of hate! I staked my life on thine, and the stake is lost; but what care I? My hate shall follow thee; wither thy bones with its curse; poison every joy; blight every hope; rankle in thy life blood! Bid thee seek health, and bite the dust for anguish because it flies thee! And for me. Ha, ha! Men may think to judge me—torture, triumph, slay! Well, let them." And with a movement so sudden and so desperate, that to avert it was impossible, he burst from the grasp of his guards; and with one spring, stood firm and triumphant on the farthest edge of the battlement. "Now follow me who dares!" he exclaimed; and, with a fearful mocking laugh; flung himself headlong down, ere the soldiers had recovered his first sudden movement. Stanley alone retained presence of mind sufficient to dart forward, regardless of his own imminent danger, in the vain hope of arresting the leap; but quick as were his movements, he only reached the brink in time to see the wretched man, one moment quivering in air, and lost the next in a dark abyss of shade.
A cry of mingled disappointment, horror, and execration, burst from all around; and several of the soldiers hastened from the battlements to the base of the rock, determined on fighting the arch-fiend himself, if, as many of them firmly believed, he had rendered Don Luis invulnerable to air, and would wait there to receive him. But even this heroic resolution was disappointed: the height was so tremendous, and the velocity of the fall so frightful, that the action of the air had not only deprived him of life, but actually loosed the limbs from the trunk, and a fearfully mangled corpse was all that remained to glut the vengeance of the infuriated soldiers.
The confusion and excitement attending this important event, spread like wildfire; not only over Albania, but reaching to the Duke's camp without the city. To send off the momentous information to the King, was instantly decided upon; and young Stanley, as the person principally concerned, selected for the mission.
Ferdinand was astonished and indignant, and greatly disappointed that justice had been so eluded; but that such a monster, whose machinations seemed, in their subtlety and secrecy, to prevent all defeat, no longer cumbered Spain, was in itself a relief so great both to monarch and people, as after the first burst of indignation to cause universal rejoicings.
It so happened that Ferdinand had been desirous of Stanley's presence for some weeks; letters from Isabella, some little time previous, had expressed an earnest desire for the young man's return to Saragossa, if only for a visit of a few days. This was then impossible. Three months had elapsed since Isabella's first communication; within the last two she had not again reverted to Stanley; but the King, thinking she had merely refrained from doing so, because of its present impossibility, gladly seized the opportunity of his appearance at Seville, to dispatch him, as envoy extraordinary, on both public and private business, to the court of Arragon.
Isabella was surrounded by her ministers and nobles when Stanley was conducted to her presence; she received him with cordiality and graciousness, asked many and eager questions concerning her husband and the progress of his arms, entered minutely into the affair of Don Luis, congratulated him on his having been the hand destined to unmask the traitor and bring him low; gave her full attention on the instant to the communications from the King, with which he was charged; occupied some hours in earnest and thoughtful deliberation with her counsel, which, on perusal of the King's papers, she had summoned directly. And yet, through all this, Arthur fancied there was an even unusual degree of sympathy and kindliness in the tone and look with which she addressed him individually; but he felt intuitively it was sympathy with sorrow, not with joy. He was convinced that his unexpected presence had startled and almost grieved her; and why should this be, if she had still the hope with which she had so infused his spirit, when they had parted. His heart, so full of elasticity a few hours previous, sunk chilled and pained within him, and it was with an effort impossible to have been denied, had it not been for the Queen's unspoken but real sympathy; he roused himself sufficiently to execute his mission.
But Isabella was too much the true and feeling woman, to permit the day to close without the private interview she saw Stanley needed; reality, sad as it was, she felt would be better than harrowing suspense; and, in a few kindly words, the tale was told.
"I should have known it!" he exclaimed, when the first shock of bitter disappointment permitted words. "My own true, precious Marie! How dared I dream that for me thou wouldst sacrifice thy faith; all, all else—joy, hope, strength; aye, life itself—but not thy God! Oh, Madam," he continued, turning passionately to the Queen, "thou hast not condemned her to misery for this! Thou hast not revoked thy former heavenly mercy, and delivered her over to the stern fathers of our holy church? No, no! Isabella could not have done this!"
"Nor have we," replied the Queen, so mildly that Arthur flung himself at her feet, conjuring her to pardon his disrespectful words. "Give her to thee, without retracting her fearful misbelief, indeed we dared not, but further misery has not been inflicted. We have indeed done penance for our weakness, severe penance; for Father Tomas asserts that we have most grievously sinned; and more, have pledged ourselves most solemnly, that what he may counsel for the entire uprooting of this horrible heresy, and accursed race, shall be followed, cost what it may, politically or privately; but to refuse the last boon of the unhappy girl, who had so strangely, perchance so bewilderingly, wound herself about my heart—Stanley, I must have changed my nature first!"
"Her last boon! Gracious Sovereign—"
"Nay, her last to her Sovereign, my friend. It may be that even yet her errors may be abjured, and grace be granted in her solitude, to become in this world as the next, what we have prayed for; but we dare not hope it; nor must thou. She besought permission to return to the home of her childhood, pledging herself never to leave it, or mingle with her people or ours more."
"And she is there! God in Heaven bless, reward your Highness for the mercy!" burst impetuously from Arthur. "I trust she is, nay, I believe it; for Jewess as she is, she would not pledge me false. In the garb of the novice, as she saved thee, Father Denis conducted her to the frontiers of Castile. More we know not, for we asked not the site of her home."
There was a few minutes' pause, and then, with beseeching eloquence, Arthur conjured the Sovereign to let him see her once, but once again. He asked no more, but he felt as if he could not sustain the agony of eternal separation, without one last, last interview. He pledged his honor, that no temptation of a secret union should interfere with the sentence of the Queen; that both would submit; only to permit them once more to meet again.
Isabella hesitated, but not for long. Perhaps the secret hope arose that Stanley's presence would effect that for which all else had failed; or that she really could not resist his passionate pleadings.
"One word of retraction, and even now she is thine.—And I will bless thee that thou gavest her to me again," she said in parting; but her own spirit told her the hope was vain.
Half an hour after this agitating interview Arthur Stanley was again on horseback, a deep hectic on either cheek; his eye bloodshot and strained, traversing with the speed of lightning the open country, in the direction of Castile.