"Cuerpo de Cristo!" cried Roque, "and is that all your wise head can devise? Well, I hope you are not overpowered after such an effort of imagination; but really I cannot give you credit for the contrivance."
They were now entering Alhaurin, where Cañeri had preceded them two or three days before, and they halted at the entrance of a large mansion, which appeared, by the guards patrolling in front, to be the abode of the chief. Meantime the renegade helped Theodora out of her conveyance, and led her to the apartments allotted to her use. She was no longer a prey to the frenzied passions that had so long stormed her breast. The keen intensity of affliction, insulted and indignant pride, were now lost in the gloomy resignation and cold apathy to which they had given place. The severe trials she had undergone had impaired the beauties of her person, and poisoned her warm and generous feelings, but still Theodora was lovely and interesting. She had lost the brilliant beauty of a girl blooming with youth and happiness, but she had acquired the chaste graces and loveliness of sorrow. Alas! even in those sad memorials of fading beauty, enough yet remained to make her an object of interest, and keep alive the passion which Cañeri had conceived. The load of grief and despair which had weighed her down at the last proof of her lover's treachery, was succeeded by a mood of deadened resignation. This calm, however, appeared presageful of some dire intent, and accordingly, for the first two or three days, she had not been left a moment alone, and every instrument of death had been carefully removed from her reach. The attentive services of Roque partly reconciled her to her dreadful situation; for it is consoling, even in the lowest depths of affliction, to meet with one sympathising being, however humble his station, however weak and limited his means to afford comfort and redress. In the midst of her barbarous enemies, she was permitted the attendance of a Christian, and this circumstance, trifling as it was, imparted some solace to her oppressed spirit. Besides, Cañeri had abstained from importuning her with his loathsome protestations of love. This forbearance of the Moor arose from the renegade having stipulated, that in engaging the affections of Theodora, he should resort to no violence in her present sorrowful condition.
Thus Cañeri had limited his addresses to a bare manifestation of respectful regard, foreign indeed to his nature, and borrowed only from the necessity of acquiescing with the wishes of the renegade, who had boldly declared he would oppose any violence employed against Theodora. This favorable disposition of the renegade was a source of astonishment to the object of his solicitude, for she could not forget that he had been the principal agent in the completion of her misery. Did Bermudo intend by these seeming kind offices to secure the prey to himself? or was it really a sentiment of pity that impelled him to the manifestation of this solicitude? Could heavenly pity dwell in that darksome abode, where the most fiendish passions kept a constant habitation? How were such opposite guests to be reconciled?
These surmises kept the mind of Theodora in a state of continual excitement, but as day after day passed, and the renegade, instead of exhibiting the least mark of enamoured sentiments, seemed to grow more respectful in his attention, those doubts began to wear away, and Theodora concluded that some mystery enveloped his proceedings, which she was unable to unravel, and which time alone could clear up.
In pursuance of the injunctions of El Feri, his brother chief, Cañeri, had established his head quarters at Alhaurin, where his party was daily increasing by the Moors who came to join his standard. Cañeri himself had arrived three days before, having left to the renegade the charge of Theodora, who could not be supposed to travel with equal expedition.
Bermudo, therefore, with a few resolute Moors of his band, and the other personages of whom mention has been made in the former part of this chapter, constituted the cavalcade that now entered the busy and thronged streets of Alhaurin, where the ferment occasioned by fresh and numerous arrivals, plainly manifested the rapid progress of the insurrection.
CHAPTER IV.
Some good I mean to do,
Despight of my own nature.
Shakespeare.
Ser. No hay quien socorra, quien valga
A una muger infelice?
Fel. Si, que decir muger basta,
Quando infeliz no dixera.
Calderon.