Every person in the house was standing; every neck was craned; every sound, even to the rustle of breathing, was stilled. A moment passed in tense silence. Then the low voice of the Jesuit continued:
“The Almighty has spoken. We live.”
The people breathed again, audibly. Lonzello, his strength partly returned and his anxiety burning into his very bones, rushed from the pulpit to the post where his daughter was chained, and, falling on his knees, begged piteously:
“Confess, confess, Ambrosia, and end this horrible thing. The father is on his knees to the daughter, begging you to recant.”
“Confess!” cried the girl with scorn. “That is the word you used to send me to slaughter, to be devoured by that beast. Sweet father, you are, to ask a daughter to swear to a lie in order to shield the man who wronged her. I know not what foul plot you have framed here, but I do know in my soul of souls I am as white as dawn and that your soul is black as night from which the dawn is born. As for that creature in the robes of God, neighbors and friends, I say he is a devil. His place is hell—however, not to rule, but to find torment, now and everlasting.”
The Jesuit flushed slightly, but his voice was unruffled as he asked:
“Friends, shall we call the test of God on her?”
“No, no!” Lonzello plead, rushing back to the pulpit, “not on her.”
“A father may be pitied in pleading for a child,” the Jesuit said, quietly and without passion. “I would, if I could, spare him, and her as well. Let me, for his sake, girl, ask you to speak the word that shall save both. Recant, recant.”
“Repent, repent,” returned Ambrosia, facing him fiercely. “The crime is on your head; the crime on me, the crime upon my father, the crime which now I feel you mean to do, are all upon your head. Repent, repent.”