She seemed proud that her words should be put to the test; and even proposed that her arms should be pinioned, and her body fastened with stout cords to the iron ring which had been prepared for this purpose.
"Thou shalt soon find which is the strongest," said she, exultingly. "I have broken bonds ere now to which these are but as a thread."
She looked confident of success, and surveyed the whole proceeding with a look of unutterable scorn.
"Now do thy worst, thou wicked one," said Dee, when he had finished.
But lo! a shriek that might have wakened the dead. She was unable to extricate herself, being held in spite of the most desperate efforts to escape. With a loud yell she cried out,—
"Thou hast played me false, demon!"
"'Tis not thy demon," said Dee; "it is I that have circumvented thee. In that iron ring is concealed the charmed one, wrought out by a cunning smith to this intent,—to wit, the deliverance of a persecuted house."
The Red Woman now appeared shorn of her strength. Her charms and her delusions were dispelled. She sank into the condition of a hopeless, wretched maniac, and was for some time closely confined to this chamber.
Buckley, recovering soon after, was united to Grace Ashton, who it is confidently asserted, and perhaps believed, was restored to immediate health when the charm was broken.