So she stormed on, till Margaret crept from her presence wondering whether this creed could be right that would force the child to inform against and bring the parent to torment. Where were such things written in the sayings of the Saviour and His Apostles? And if they were not written, who had invented them?
“Save him!—save him!” Margaret had gasped to Peter in despair. “Save him, or I swear to you, however much I may love you, however much we may seem to be married, never shall you be a husband to me.”
“That seems hard,” replied Peter, shaking his head mournfully, “since it was not I who gave him over to these devils, and probably the end of it would be that I should share his fate. Still, I will do what a man can.”
“No, no,” she cried in despair; “do nothing that will bring you into danger.” But he had gone without waiting for her answer.
It was night, and Peter sat in a secret room in a certain baker’s shop in Seville. There were present there besides himself the Fray Henriques—now a secretary to the Holy Inquisition, but disguised as a layman—the woman Inez, the agent Bernaldez, and the old Jew, Israel of Granada.
“I have brought him here, never mind how,” Inez was saying, pointing to Henriques. “A risky and disagreeable business enough. And now what is the use of it?”
“No use at all,” answered the Fray coolly, “except to me who pocket my ten gold pieces.”
“A thousand doubloons if our friend escapes safe and sound,” put in the old Jew Israel. “God in Heaven! think of it, a thousand doubloons.”
The secretary’s eyes gleamed hungrily.
“I could do with them well enough,” he answered, “and hell could spare one filthy Jew for ten years or so, but I see no way. What I do see, is that probably all of you will join him. It is a great crime to try to tamper with a servant of the Holy Office.”