Instead of naming it she turned silently away. But presently turning again, she asked, "Will your Excellency please to tell me, is it that book that is driving you into exile?"
"It is. I am bound to confess the truth before men; and that is impossible here."
"But are you sure then that it is the truth?"
"Sure. I have read God's message both in the darkness and in the light I have seen it traced in characters of blood--and fire."
"But--forgive the question, señor--does it make you happy?"
"Why do you ask?"
"Because, Señor Don Juan"--she spoke with an effort, but firmly, and fixing her eyes on his face--"he who gave you yon book found therein that which made him happy. I know it; he was here, and I watched him. When he came first, he was ill, or else very sorrowful, I know not why. But he learned from that book that God Almighty loved him, and that the Lord and Saviour Christ was his friend; and then his sorrow passed away, and his heart grew full of joy, so full that he must needs be telling me--ay, and even that poor dolt of a cura down there in the village--about the good news. And I think"--but here she stopped, frightened at her own boldness.
"What think you?" asked Juan, with difficulty restraining his emotion.
"Well, Señor Don Juan, I think that if that good news be true, it would not be so hard to suffer for it. Blessed Virgin! Could it be aught but joy to me, for instance, to lie in a dark dungeon, or even to be hanged or burned, if that could work out his deliverance? There be worse things in the world than pain or prisons. For where there's love, señor---- Moreover, it comes upon me sometimes that the Lords Inquisitors may have mistaken his case. Wise and learned they may be, and good and holy they are, of course--'twere sin to doubt it--yet they may mistake sometimes. 'Twas but the other day, my old eyes growing dim apace, that I took a blessed gleam of sunlight that had fallen on yon oak table for a stain, and set to work to rub it off; the Lord forgive me for meddling with one of the best of his works! And, for aught we know, just so may they be doing, mistaking God's light upon the soul for the devil's stain of heresy. But the sunlight is stronger than they, after all."
"Dolores, you are half a Lutheran already yourself," answered Juan in surprise.