CHAPTER XV.
I awoke this morning with a sense of horror haunting me,—and then I recalled the scene of yesterday and the dumb appeal in the eyes of the dying hound. The story the Spanish woman had told me of her own past pleaded nothing in excuse. Hatred and cruelty seemed strange fruit for love to bear.
I thought of my own ill fortunes, and I said within me: True Love sits at the door of the heart to guard it from all evil passions. Loss and Pain may enter in, and Sorrow bear them company; but Revenge and Cruelty, Untruth, and all their evil kin, must hide their shamed faces and pass by!
Secure in the thought of the pure affection that reigned in my own bosom, I went forth and met Temptation, and straightway fell from the high path in which I believed my feet to be so surely fixed!
Doña Orosia seemed to be in a strangely gentle mood.
"Child, how pale thy face is! Didst thou not lie awake all night? Deny it not, 'tis writ most plainly in the dark shadows round those great blue eyes. Come, rest here beside me"—and she drew me down upon the couch and slipped a soft pillow under my head.
I was fairly dumfounded at this unwonted courtesy, and could find no words to meet it with. But she appeared unconscious of my silence and continued speaking.
"'Tis the thought of the English lover that robs thee of sleep, Margarita mia! Thou wouldst give thy very life to procure his freedom; is it not so? Would any task be too hard for thee with this end in view?"