"Zoe!" cried the King.
"Yes," returned the page, gasping for breath, and speaking with difficulty; "Zoe! I am indeed that wretch. I loved you, Roderick; I would have died for you. I do die for you; but—but—Elvira—"
"What meant your outrage upon her?"
"What did it mean?" cried Zoe, her eyes flashing fire, and her whole frame supported by a supernatural energy; "did I not see that you loved her, and could I endure to resign you to another? No," continued she, starting from the ground; "I would have killed her, and, had she perished, I should have died contented."
The violence of the action made the blood gush in torrents from her wound; and, pale and feeble, her failing eyes closed. She staggered a few paces, fell, heaved one convulsive struggle, and Zoe was no more!
Sadly did Roderick gaze upon that form which had so lately thrilled with feeling—now cold and inanimate at his feet: the victim of passion lay before him. Her hopes, her fears, her rage, and her love, had passed away, and there her body remained a senseless clod of clay, till it should be resolved into its original elements. By this time, some of the servants of the castle, who had been summoned by Brian, approached; and the old Earl of Warwick, in whose castle the fatal scene had taken place, rushed upon the terrace, calling wildly upon his people to save the Queen.
"Is it the Lady Elvira that ye mane?" asked Brian; "Och an't plase yere honour, and she's safe, every inch of her."
"And what has been the matter?" asked the Earl.
"Och and your lordship may well ask that; but the divil a bit any body can tell you but one, and that's myself. Ye see, my master, his most gracious Majesty, and me were walking in the garden; that is, he was walking and I was watching, for fear any harm should happen to him; for the life of such as he isn't to be trusted to chance in a strange country, and I guess he was thinking of the Queen, though he never said nothing about it. And so when we came near the terrace, it was so dark, ye couldn't see yere hand before you. And then the moon peeped through the clouds, like a pretty face looking through a ground-glass window. And then she came out as bright as a silver mirror; and the Queen looked so pretty as she stood praying, that my master couldn't find it in his heart to interrupt her; and for me, I wasn't the man to be even thinking of such a thing. And then two black-looking spalpeens, bad luck to them! stole out behind her, and there wasn't two, for there were three of them—with never a livin' soul beside, to be seen in respect of being near her: but God never would suffer a rale lady like herself to want a friend to comfort her when she'd be in naad—and my master wouldn't let her be after coming to harm, for he jumped upon the terrace entirely like a hound springing at the deer—and saved her, which nobody but himself could have done like it, for the very life of 'em. And when I came, there was the man lying dead that would have killed the princess, and it turned out he wasn't a man at all, but a woman."
The story of Zoe is soon told. Bred in a warm climate, and naturally enthusiastic in her disposition, she was the child of passion. The misfortunes she had experienced in Greece, by depriving her of all she loved, had thrown her affections back upon her own bosom, and they had preyed upon themselves.