"Oh, you are Don Edgar; there can be no doubt about it." And then Edgar clearly remembered the face and figure of the little fellow, who was Don Rafaele's faithful servant, the same who had displayed the lion courage of despair in trying to save his master's daughter.
"In the name of all the saints!" Edgar cried, "you must be Don Rafaele's faithful servant! I recognise you. Where is he? My strange presentiment is going to come true."
The little man implored Edgar to go with him at once.
He took him to one of the most distant suburbs, climbed with him to the garret of a miserable house, and--what a spectacle! Sick, worn to a shadow, with all the traces of the most mortal suffering upon his deathlike face, Don Rafaele Marchez was lying upon a bed of straw, with a girl praying by his side. When Edgar came in, the girl rushed up to him, and drew him to the side of the old man, crying in a tone of the warmest delight--
"Father, father! this is he, is it not?"
"Yes," said the old man, his dim eyes brightening as he raised his folded hands to heaven, "it is he--our preserver. Ah, Don Edgar, who would have believed that the fire which burned within me for my country and freedom would have turned upon me for my destruction."
After the first outpourings of mingled delight and regret, Edgar learned that Don Rafaele's enemies had managed, after the establishment of peace, to bring charges against him causing him to be regarded with suspicion by the government. He was sentenced to be banished, and his property was confiscated. He fell into the deepest poverty. His devoted daughter and his faithful servant supported him by dancing and playing.
"Emanuela and Biagio Cubas, of course!" Ludwig cried out. And all the others repeated after him, "Of course, of course--Emanuela and Biagio Cubas!"
The hostess enjoined silence on the ground that, although there might be many things which could be gradually explained, the narrator ought not to be interrupted until he had come to the end of his story. Moreover she felt no doubt that as soon as Edgar saw the lovely Emanuela he must, of course, have fallen desperately in love with her.
"That, of course, is exactly what he did do," said Euchar, a slight redness overspreading his cheeks. Even before this particular meeting with her, on other occasions of his seeing that marvellously beautifully child, he had felt the most distinct presentiments of what would follow, and a sense of the deepest affection, like nothing which he had ever experienced before. He immediately set to remedy the condition of affairs. He took away Don Rafaele, Emanuela, and the trusty Cubas, to a country estate belonging to his uncle. And in arranging this I was of some assistance to him. It seemed as if Don Rafaele's lucky star was going to rise again; for soon after this there came a letter from good Father Eusebio to say that the brethren, well acquainted with the secret corners of his house, had hidden away the very considerable property (in the shape of gold and jewels) which he possessed (and which he had walled up before his flight) in their own convent; so that all that was necessary was to send some trustworthy person to fetch them. Edgar set out at once for Valenzia with the faithful Cubas. He saw his kind old nurse, Father Eusebio, again, and Don Rafaele's treasure was handed over to him. But he knew that Don Rafaele prized honour above everything, and he succeeded in Madrid in completely re-establishing his innocence. The decree of banishment was cancelled.