"Woman, blaspheme not God!"
"Is then truth blasphemy of God? What is my crime,—that I love you? What then are you in the sight of God, that you are surrounded by such enkindling darts? Are you His archangel—His cherub? Turn not away from me; I am not going to reproach you—not you, nor the saints, nor God. It was not Satan taught me all this. I have read the great book that you call Holy Scriptures through from beginning to end. I have tried to find a place in it which counts the love of woman as a sin, but I have found none such. It was only a human being who could hit upon the unnatural thought that there were human beings who could not love. Let the cowl cover the man who could impose such a covering—whose heart dared not beat under it. Is not such an act a sin against God? Is not this the murder of a human being—this slow killing of one in the likeness of God? Does the poisoner do anything worse when he gives his victims the means of passing away slowly? Have not other men discovered the antidote for it? You do not know this perhaps. See! As easy as it is to put on this sable cowl, this shroud for a living body, just so easy is it to strip it off. Do not flee! Stay here—listen to me. I might have a sin to confess. I promise you I will not kill, but I will call back into life a dead man, and that is indeed a sin heavy enough. You are this dead man. I have mourned you hundreds of times. Allow me to call you forth from your cold tomb by my tears. Listen to me. We will go from here right to Transylvania, where the Hungarian belief flourishes. We will go out to the Protestant church. Many are doing it already, you know. A third of the land is Protestant; I am sure they cannot all go to Hell. Nobody can persecute us there. See! I have two iron chests full of treasure; there we can live like lords in luxury and splendor, such as you were accustomed to before you gave over your lands to the Jesuits. We'll snap our fingers at the world. Or, if it pleases you better to be poor and God-fearing, I am willing. I will go with you to the poorest village, where there is a tower with a weather-vane; there you shall become a Calvinist preacher, a rector, or a Levite; I will be your faithful wife; will wash and weave, spin flax, and endure misery; I will become God-fearing, my lips shall forget to scold and curse, and shall learn to sing psalms. If I should become quarrelsome, you may beat me, shut me up, and make me fast, and I will be always faithful to you; only throw aside this cloak of death."
The temptation was strong. When passion and sorrow blend together in one flame, then perhaps the heart of a dead man may withstand. But the youth was protected by his talisman—that other face on the other side of the Waag. The monk's cowl alone would not have protected his heart against these darts; his ascetic vows, the sacred oil, would have been a weak safeguard against the charm of this Circe. But the loving, suffering face of the maid of Mitosin stood between them like Heaven. The sunbeam smites in vain on the summit of the Alps, for this is already in Heaven, and Heaven is cold. Tihamer had left his heart before the altar in Mitosin,—it was not to be found.
"Return, poor sinner," he said with the gentleness of a confessor, "God will pardon your rebellious thoughts, and will set you free from this evil spirit that has possessed you. Learn to pray."
"I will not learn to pray!" cried the woman excitedly. "When you read the liturgy at mass, I always say to myself: It is not true! It is not true! It is not true! When you sing the hymn of praise to the Holy Mother, I murmur to myself, Love me, and not the Virgin Mother; You are my life! you are my death! you are my devil! you are my idol! if you wish to make me blessed, make me blessed here below, and in the future I will be condemned in your stead."
"Then let your condemnation begin here below," said Father Peter, aroused from his monastic calm. "For if it is true that you can love a man to the extent of despising the whole world and renouncing the blessedness of Heaven, then indeed will it be the torments of Hell for you to see the man you love passing daily before you like the vision of one dead, like a ghost in the clear daylight, like a phantom in a living body—to see him, and to say to yourself, 'You put to death this man, you threw this shroud over him, you closed the grave upon him, and neither violence nor prayer nor the magic of Hell can wake him up again!' It was you who killed me. I am your victim. I am the ghost that pursues you. I am your judgment from God!"
Idalia shuddered convulsively as she lay on the ground, and bit her bare arms.
"When I was sent here to you," continued Father Peter, "I begged the Prior to send me into the desert of Arabia among the wild Druses rather than to your house: he left me only one choice, I might go as servant of the Holy Inquisition in Spain, or come here. I made my choice. I preferred to endure torture rather than to torture others. But believe me, he who endures the touch of hot oil does not suffer such torment as I do when your hot breath touches me; and the Spanish boot does not so crush the bones of the victim, as my heart is crushed under your accursed passion; and yet I came here although I knew that you would pursue me with this frightful love of yours: and I shall stay here, although I know that you will very soon torture me to death with your still more frightful hatred. Your house is my torture-chamber—I am here to suffer to the end."
Idalia fell lifeless upon the cold marble.
"May God pardon you," whispered the youth, "I pardon you. May you be able to pardon yourself."