"Yes," he said; "and I thank you. Will you add to your kindness by bidding him immediately procure for us fresh horses, the best and fleetest that can be had?" He sought his purse; but, remembering in a moment what had become of it, drew a ring from his finger to supply its loss. It was the diamond ring that the Sieur de Ramenais had given him. A keen pang shot through his heart. "No, not that; I cannot part with it." He took two others instead--old family jewels. "Bid him bring these," he said, "to Isaac Ozorio, who dwells in La Juderia[#]--any man there will show him the house; take for them whatever he will give him, and therewith hire fresh horses--the best he can--from the posada where he rested, leaving our own in pledge. Let him also buy provisions for the way; for my business requires haste. I will explain all to you anon."
[#] The Jewish Quarter of Seville.
While the monk did the errand, Don Juan sat still, gazing at the diamond ring. Slowly there came back upon his memory the words spoken by Carlos on the day when the sharp facets cut his hand, unfelt by him: "If He calls me to suffer for him, he may give me such blessed assurance of his love, that in the joy of it pain and fear will vanish."
Could it be possible He had done this? Oh, for some token, to relieve his breaking heart by the assurance that thus it had been! And yet, wherefore seek a sign? Was not the heroic courage, the calm patience, given to that young brother, once so frail and timid, as plain a token of the sunlight of God's peace and presence as is the bow in the cloud of the sun shining in the heavens? True; but not the less was his soul filled with passionate longing for one word--only one word--from the lips that were dust and ashes now. "If God would give me that," he moaned, "I think I could weep for him."
It occurred to him then that he might examine the book more carefully than he had done before. Don Juan, of late, had been no great reader, except of the Spanish Testament. Instead of glancing rapidly through the volume with a practised eye, he carefully began at the beginning and perused several pages with diligence, and with a kind of compelled and painful attention.
The writer of the diary with which the book seemed filled had not prefixed his name. Consequently Juan, who was without a clue to the authorship, saw in it merely the effusions of a penitent, with whose feelings he had but little sympathy. Still, he reflected that if the writer had been his brother's fellow prisoner, some mention of his brother would probably reward his persevering search. So he read on; but he was not greatly interested, until at length he came to one passage which ran thus:--
"Christ and Our Lady forgive me, if it be a sin. Ofttimes, even by prayer and fasting, I cannot prevent my thoughts from wandering to the past. Not to the life I lived, and the part I acted in the great world, for that is dead to me and I to it; but to the dear faces my eyes shall never see again. My Costanza!"--("Costanza!" thought Juan with a start, "that was my mother's name!")--"my wife! my babe! O God, in thy great mercy, still this hungering and thirsting of the heart!"
Immediately beneath this entry was another. "May 21. My Costanza, my beloved wife, is in heaven. It is more than a year ago, but they did not tell me till to-day. Does death only visit the free?"
Yet another entry caught the eye of Juan. "Burning heat to-day. It would be cool enough in the halls of Nuera, on the breezy slope of the Sierra Morena. What does my orphaned Juan Rodrigo there, I wonder?"
"Nuera! Sierra Morena! Juan Rodrigo!" reiterated the astonished reader. What did it all mean? He was stunned and bewildered, so that he had scarcely power left even to form a conjecture. At last it occurred to him to turn to the other end of the book, if perchance some name, affording a clue to the mystery, might be inscribed there.