"Pardon me, rather, dear Marguerita—for so you must let me call you—that I permit you thus to wait on one, who is so far in every way beneath you. Except," she added, with a winning smile, "that in all times and countries the character of a suppliant has been invested with a sort of mournful dignity."
"Is it so, lady?—is it so, indeed?" cried Marguerita, half eagerly, half-sorrowfully.
"Julia! Julia!" she cried, imploringly, "will you call me Julia? I called you Marguerita, dear, dear Marguerita."
"Julia—dear Julia, then," replied the Spanish girl, soothingly; "believe me, I thought not to wound you, but my heart bleeds, my heart burns when I think of my country and her wrongs. Hark!" she exclaimed in a low whisper, "heard you that?"
"Heard I what?" cried Julia, terrified beyond expression at the sudden change in her tone, manner, and countenance; "I hear nothing but the wind, the birds, the water!"
"There—there again!" said the other, standing erect and motionless, with her finger upraised, her head thrown a little backward, her lips apart, her nostrils dilated, her eyes fixed on vacancy. "There—there it is again—they are coming!"
An instant afterwards the jingling of spurs and the clang of a steel scabbard on the stone pavement of the outer room was heard approaching the door quickly.
Then Marguerita's face lightened for a moment as she sprang to meet the new comer.
"It is Juan!" she cried, "it is my brother, and thanks be to God, alone!"