Chaleco took a poniard from his bosom. The Sibyl seized it, and thrust the sharp point through each of my ears, then she locked the rubies into the wounds, while the blood trickled down their antique settings.
“It is your mother’s blood that baptizes them, remember.”
As the Sibyl spoke she staggered to her feet and pressed her cold hands upon my forehead, passing them down my face again and again. At first the touch made me shudder; then a feeling of dull calm came over me. The excitement left my nerves, and I lay like one in a trance. The past was all gone, only a vivid consciousness of the present remained; my eyes were closed, my limbs still as death, but my senses seized upon every motion, every whisper, and locked them up in my memory, creating each instant a new past for that which had left me.
“Now leave her to the destiny that she must surely work out, Papita’s vow is redeemed.”
When the old woman said these words, her voice seemed far off and unreal as the echoes of some forgotten horror. I heard her gasp for breath; moans broke from her lips—a sharp cry, and her limbs fell together in a heap, like a skeleton when its wires give way.
For a moment all was deathly stillness, Chaleco held his breath—some brooding evil seemed to fall upon the tent.
Still I lay bound in that mesmeric trance, conscious, but utterly helpless. I heard Chaleco steal forth, and for a long time the grating of a spade reached me from the depths of a neighboring hollow. Then came the fall of earth, spadeful after spadeful, followed by stealthy footsteps coming toward the tent again.
Chaleco came close to me, stooped down and took the antique rings from my ears. I was numb and could not feel the pain; but consciousness utterly left me after that. The iron thread of my mother’s life was woven into mine that terrible, terrible night.
CHAPTER XXII.
LOST MEMORIES.
I found myself lying in a gipsy’s tent perfectly alone, dizzy, feverish, and so parched with thirst that it seemed to me one drop of water would satisfy every want I could ever have again. An earthen pitcher stood near the fresh hay on which I was lying. I reached forth my feeble hand and slanted it down, till the bottom glistened on my sight. Then I fell back weeping. It was empty, not a drop—not a drop! How terrible was that thirst. I felt the tears rushing down my cheek, and strove to gather them in my hand, thinking, poor thing, to moisten my burning lips with the drops of my own sorrow. The wind blew aside the fall of canvas that concealed the entrance to my tent, and I saw through it a glimpse of the bright morning; clover fields bathed in fragrant mist; soft, green meadow grasses sparkling with dew. Then the whole strength of my being centered in one great wish—water! My wild eyes were turned in every direction where the soft drops seemed flashing, dancing, leaping around me like a whirlwind of diamonds. I closed my eyes and strove to shake the hallucination from my brain. A moment’s rest, and there was another calm glimpse of the dewy morning. I wonder if Paradise ever looks half so beautiful to the angels.