The enraged girl, furious at the repulse, swore by Mahomet to be revenged; accordingly, no sooner was the master returned, than she went to him with every token of distress and indignation, and accused Pedro of abusing his power as steward of the house, and having sought to force her to marry him although she had resisted because he was a Christian, and the law of Mahomet forbade such an union.
The master, highly incensed at the perfidy of the slave he had treated with so much forbearance and indulgence, ordered him to be thrown into a dungeon and starved to death, without hearing any defence.
Such would indeed have been Josefa’s fate, but that one of the slaves who respected her brought her daily the scanty means of subsistence she was able to secure. At the end of several days the master, coming to the dungeon to see what had befallen, was greatly provoked to find her not only alive but comparatively well, and took up a cord to administer summary chastisement.
This indignity was more than Josefa could endure; to avert it, she begged him to listen to her; told him she could easily prove the falsity of the accusation under which she was suffering, seeing she was a woman.
The master was delighted to hear the exculpation of his favourite slave, and immediately had her released and reinstated in her authority, and the shameless accuser consigned to the same prison.
From this time he continued to extend his favour and confidence towards her: of all the people about him who shared his pleasures and his riches, she was the only one to whom he could talk of the absorbing agony of his soul, the remorse for having renounced his religion and become a renegade. The result was that he one day announced to her that he had made arrangements for realizing the greater part of his fortune, which he divided in two parts, one of which he bestowed on her; with the other he had resolved to go to Rome in pilgrimage and endow a shrine, where he would pass the remainder of his days in prayer and penance.
He had found a merchant of his acquaintance who would take them in his ship to Alicante, whence he would start again for Rome, and Josefa would be free either to continue her journey thither or return to Valencia.
Josefa’s desire of once more embracing her parents made her elect the latter course. Their plan was executed to the letter without hindrance.
Arrived once more at Valencia, Josefa was not slow to find her way to her father’s palace. An old servant who had been in the house before she was born, and watched her grow up, opened the door, but did not recognize her, which she took for a presage that she might come unknown into her parents’ presence also.
She found them seated side by side, and bewailing the loss of their only child.