"To save Don Alcala's life!" replied Teresa, raising her head with angry surprise. "Did you not hear the threats of Father Bonifacio; have you not been told of the warning sent out by our priests against those who 'infest Catholic Seville with Bibles and other pernicious books'?[18] Are you so ignorant, señorita, as to suppose that Scripture readings can be safely carried on in a Christian country like this?" Each question was asked in a tone more loud and shrill than the last. "Every hour I am expecting the alguazils[19] to search this house, this house polluted with heresy. Woe to Don Alcala de Aguilera if that fatal book be found within it! He will be dragged out of his bed, thrust into some loathsome prison which he will never quit till his carcass be thrust forth to be flung like carrion into some ditch! I'll not see it—I'll not see it," continued the old retainer with a gesture of passionate grief; "Teresa's hand shall not be the one to open the gate of this palace to those who come to arrest its master! There's a gran foncion to-day in honour of my patroness, Santa Teresa; I will go and join the procession, and try if my prayers cannot move the saint to save Don Alcala from the ruin which he is bringing on himself and his house!"

Away hurried Teresa, leaving her young lady to do her work and think over her warning.

The first occupation was easy enough: Inez had often prepared her grandmother's meals. But while her slender fingers did their office, the mind of the poor girl was painfully revolving the words of Teresa. Might they not be only too true—might not Alcala have actually placed himself within reach of the grasp of the law? Inez was constantly turning in terror to listen for sounds that might announce the coming of alguazils to seize on her brother, and search the house. The horrors of a Spanish prison to a gentleman of refinement, who had not yet recovered from the effects of a wound, and who was too poor to bribe his jailers, might actually realize the picture drawn by Teresa. The heart of Inez sank within her.

While Donna Benita was partaking of food so delicately prepared by her grand-daughter, that not even the old lady's weak, fretful mind could find in it subject for complaint, Inez was planning a little scheme for Alcala's safety, in case a search-warrant should be issued.

"The Book must not be found in this house, at least not in my brother's possession," thought Inez. "I will not destroy, but I will conceal it. I will carefully wrap up the volume, and then bury it deep, very deep, in the earth under the orange-trees which grow round the fountain; no one will look for it there, and I will take it up again when the danger is over. Alcala will spare it for a few days when I tell him why I have buried the Book. He will miss it the less since he knows, I believe, half of its contents by heart already."

It seemed a long time to Inez before Donna Benita concluded her tedious repast; a long time before her grand-daughter could beat up her pillow, shut out the daylight, and leave the old lady to enjoy the siesta which always followed her morning meal.

Inez then hurriedly proceeded to the patio, and took, from a recess in which she kept her few garden utensils, a spud with which she was wont to weed her parterre. She noticed that her plants looked less flourishing than they had done before her brother's illness; no one had cared to water or tend them, and many a shrivelled leaf showed the lack of a mistress's care. "Alcala must not find them thus," thought Inez; "my chief joy in my garden comes from knowing that it gives pleasure to him."

In haste to accomplish the work of burying the volume during the absence of Teresa, Inez knelt down, and with her imperfect instrument began to dig a hole in the earth which surrounded the fountain. The maiden found the task more difficult than she had expected. The sod was dry and hard; Inez had to bring water to saturate the earth before she could make much impression upon it.

"A little deeper,—it will be safer to make the hole a little deeper," said Inez to herself, when she paused to take breath after labour which the heat of the day made oppressive. The lady took up her garden utensil again, and struck it, not down into deeper earth, but against something hard which returned a metallic clink to the stroke.