"Bravo! But what if the lap refuse to receive the luckless engineer?"
"Amigo!" replied the Count—"I thought you knew me better. Under all circumstances, Rosaura remains mine. For myself, I have trained and nurtured this fair and delicate plant, and to me, as the gardener, it belongs."
"She loves you, then?"
"Loves me? What a question! Of course she does. She has grown up with the idea that she is to be my wife. Her heart is pure and unblemished as a diamond: it shall be my care to keep it so."
"You fear rivals."
"Fear!" repeated the Count, a smile flitting over his dark countenance. "But we trifle precious time. What have you to tell me?"
"Something important to our cause," replied the officer, drawing nearer to his companion. "But first, how goes it yonder?"
He pointed with his finger in the direction of the closet. Federico instinctively started back, but again applied his eye to the loophole on hearing the Count's answer. "I have just come thence," he said, "and must soon return. The hand of death is upon him—in vain would he parry the blow. Still the struggle is a hard one; he persists in discrediting his danger, and will abandon none of his habits. But the remorseless tyrant is there, soon to claim him for his own."
"Then we must take our measures without delay," said the officer.
"They are already taken," was his companion's quiet answer.