“Cease this idle babble,” said the monk-inquisitor, contemptuously, “nor think thou couldst ever deceive, with thy empty words, the mighty intellect of Ferdinand of Spain. Thou hast now to defend thyself against still graver charges than those of treachery to the king whom thou didst profess to serve. Yea, misbeliever as thou art, it is thine to vindicate thyself from blasphemy against the God thou shouldst adore. Confess the truth: thou art of the tribe and faith of Israel?”
The Hebrew frowned darkly. “Man,” said he, solemnly, “is a judge of the deeds of men, but not of their opinions. I will not answer thee.”
“Pause! We have means at hand that the strongest nerves and the stoutest hearts have failed to encounter. Pause—confess!”
“Thy threat awes me not,” said the Hebrew; “but I am human; and since thou wouldst know the truth, thou mayst learn it without the torture. I am of the same race as the apostles of thy Church—I am a Jew.”
“He confesses—write down the words. Prisoner, thou hast done wisely; and we pray the Lord that, acting thus, thou mayst escape both the torture and the death. And in that faith thy daughter was reared? Answer.”
“My daughter! there is no charge against her! By the God of Sinai and Horeb, you dare not touch a hair of that innocent head!”
“Answer,” repeated the inquisitor, coldly.
“I do answer. She was brought up no renegade to her father’s faith.”
“Write down the confession. Prisoner,” resumed the Dominican, after a pause, “but few more questions remain; answer them truly, and thy life is saved. In thy conspiracy to raise thy brotherhood of Andalusia to power and influence—or, as thou didst craftily term it, to equal laws with the followers of our blessed Lord; in thy conspiracy (by what dark arts I seek not now to know protege nos, beate Domine!) to entangle in wanton affections to thy daughter the heart of the Infant of Spain-silence, I say—be still! in this conspiracy, thou wert aided, abetted, or instigated by certain Jews of Andalusia—”
“Hold, priest!” cried Almamen, impetuously, “thou didst name my child. Do I hear aright? Placed under the sacred charge of a king, and a belted knight, has she—oh! answer me, I implore thee—been insulted by the licentious addresses of one of that king’s own lineage? Answer! I am a Jew—but I am a father and a man.”