“I tell you then, leave me—that minute is my own.”
Father Mathias turned away in despair, and the tears coursed down the old man’s cheeks. As Amine said, his misery was extreme.
The head executioner now inquired of the confessors whether the culprits died in the true faith? If answered in the affirmative, a rope was passed round their necks and twisted to the stake, so that they were strangled before the fire was kindled. All the other culprits had died in this manner; and the head executioner inquired of Father Mathias, whether Amine had a claim to so much mercy. The old priest answered not, but shook his head.
The executioner turned away. After a moment’s pause, Father Mathias followed him, and seized him by the arm saying, in a faltering voice, “Let her not suffer long.”
The Grand Inquisitor gave the signal, and the fires were all lighted at the same moment. In compliance with the request of the priest, the executioner had thrown a quantity of wet straw upon Amine’s pile, which threw up a dense smoke before it burst into flames.
“Mother! mother! I come to thee!” were the last words heard from Amine’s lips.
The flames soon raged furiously, ascending high above the top of the stake to which she had been chained. Gradually they sunk down; and only when the burning embers covered the ground, a few fragments of bones hanging on the chain were all that remained of the once peerless and high-minded Amine.