"The blessing of all the saints be upon you, brave, noble Señor Inglesito!" exclaimed old Teresa, while tears streamed down her wrinkled face; "if you were as deep-dyed a heretic as Luther himself, I would bless you a thousand times over! You have saved a noble family from ruin!"
CHAPTER XXXIII.
A TREASURE.
Perhaps the proudest and happiest hour of Teresa's life was that in which she saw the treasure, the family heirlooms, in the hands of Alcala de Aguilera, as they were on the following day. Teresa clasped the steel-clamped box as if it had been a living child. Would she not burnish up the rusted metal till every hinge should shine as brightly as Aguilera's honour! The duenna handled the contents of the case with as much reverence as she might have shown to the hair of Santa Veronica! Every article in that jewel-box had its history for Teresa. That bracelet was a wedding-gift from a duchess to the mother of Alcala and Inez; that ring had been worn by a cavalier who had slain three Moors with his own right hand; that gold snuff-box was a gift from the Empress Catherine to an Aguilera then ambassador at the Russian Court; those medals were, every one of them, tokens of some gallant deed performed by one of the ancestors of Alcala. Teresa counted each pearl in the chaplet, and every link in the massive gold chain.
Alcala and Inez watched with amusement the old duenna's delight.
"Nay, Teresa, lay not down that chain," said De Aguilera; "you have well earned some little acknowledgment of your long and faithful service. The very first use which we make of our newly-recovered property is to show our gratitude to her who in weal or woe has never forsaken our house."
"The chain—for me!" exclaimed the astonished duenna; "what could the like of me do with so costly an ornament as this?"