“Indeed!” said the Duke with astonishment, “now I recollect another very strange incident. I should perhaps not have descended without your interference, for I was seized with an uncommon anxiety, which increased every step I proceeded. I cannot conceive what was the reason of it; however it seemed as if an invisible power pushed me back.”
“This I will explain to you. Don’t you recollect that a thick smoke ascended from the abyss? A stupifying incense which possessed the power of straitening the breast, and creating anxiety, was burning at the bottom of the stair-case.”
“I cannot but confess,” the Duke said, after a short pause, “that the execution was not less cautious than the plan has been artful. I had indeed been impelled, at that time, to believe Hiermanfor was not only possessed of the knowledge of subterraneous treasures, but also of the power and the inclination of affording me a share of them, and that it had been merely my fault to have returned empty handed. His cursory account of the wonderful things I should meet with in the abyss had contributed to set my imagination at work, and I was more desirous to see those miraculous things, than to get possession of the jewels.”
“Your Grace resented it very much that I had interrupted that adventure by the seizure of Hiermanfor.”
“Indeed I did, but what view had you in doing it?”
“It was of great consequence to me, to prove myself to you and your tutor, in an incontestible manner, an implacable enemy of Hiermanfor. How could I have effected it better than by seizing him? the magistrate was an intimate friend of mine, and the whole farce pre-concerted with him.”
“Then the Irishman has not been taken up seriously?”
“The officers of the police had been ordered to set him at liberty as soon as he should be out of your sight.”
“Now I can comprehend why you so obstinately opposed me when I intreated my tutor to make an attempt at delivering Hiermanfor.----But what would you have done, if I had persisted in my resolution of taking that step?”