Exasperated by the thought of his daughter’s dishonour, the King summoned Alarcos to a banquet, and when they were alone broached the subject of his perfidy to the Infanta.
“Is it true, Don Alarcos,” he asked, “that you plighted your troth to my daughter and deceived her? Now hearken: your Countess usurps my daughter’s rightful place. She must die. Nay, start not! It must be reported that sickness has carried her off. Then must you wed the Infanta. You have brought your King to dishonour, and he now demands the only reparation that it is within your power to make.”
“I cannot deny that I deceived the Infanta,” replied Alarcos. “But I pray you, in mercy spare my innocent lady. Visit my sin upon me as heavily as you will, but not upon her.”
“It may not be,” replied the stern old King. “She dies, I say, and that to-night. When the escutcheon of a king is stained, it matters not whether the blood that washes the blot away be guilty or innocent. Away, and do my behest, or your life shall pay the forfeit.”
Terrified at the thought of a traitor’s death, for such an end was more dreaded than any other by the haughty Castilian nobles, Alarcos agreed to abide by the King’s decision, and rode homeward in an agony of remorse and despair. The thought that he must be the executioner of the wife whom he dearly loved, the mother of his three beautiful children, drove him to madness, and when at last he met her at the gate of his castle, accompanied by her infants, and displaying every sign of joy at his return, he shrank from her caresses, and could only mutter that he had bad news, which he would divulge to her in her bower.
Taking her youngest babe, she led him to her apartment, where supper was laid. But the Count Alarcos neither ate nor drank, but laid his head upon the board and wept bitterly out of a breaking heart. Then, recalling his dreadful purpose, he barred the doors, and, standing with folded arms before his lady, confessed his sin.
“Long since I loved a lady,” he said. “I plighted my troth to her, and vowed to love her like a husband. Her father is the King. She claims me for her own, and he demands that I make good the promise. Furthermore, alas that I should say it! the King has spoken your death, and has decreed that you die this very night.”
“What!” cried the Countess, amazed. “Are these then the wages of my loyal love for you, Alarcos? Wherefore must I die? Oh, send me back to my father’s house, where I can live in peace and forgetfulness, and rear my children as those of thy blood should be reared.”
“It may not be,” answered the wretched Count. “I have pledged mine oath.”
“Friendless am I in the land,” cried the miserable lady. “But at least let me kiss my children ere I die.”