“That is the only sane argument Viola advances for her love.”
“Humph!” After an interval; “I would like to see the Doña, if only to remove the impression that she is no higher than this chair, as she was when I saw her some years since.”
“You will find her,” rejoined the countess, smiling, “less a child in height and style than her youth would lead you to suppose; for a comparatively self-dependent life in close vicinity to the court, has already converted girlish bashfulness into a becoming modesty enough. But stay here till I find her,” added Doña Hermosa, going out.
“A wretched state of things,” mused our knight, resuming his suspended strides, with hands clasped behind. “It is evident I have but one course left; to track that young knave down, and by dint of soft or hard words, turn him from a career which has already entitled him to a bench in the galleys, if nothing worse. It is a good way, at all events, to pay back the bitter hatred of his father, God forgive him!” and the soldier’s moody brows relaxed at the thought, while his eye ran down the steep road at the foot of which the father of the man he designed saving, had one evening shattered his carbine on the rocks, because its hanging-fire saved Sir Pedro’s life in passing. A quiet smile, called up, perhaps, by a recollection of the solicitude shown by the countess the day succeeding, still lingered about the knight’s mouth when he turned from the window and saw the lady herself approaching, accompanied by her guest, a fair girl, with the light, soft hair and eyes of an Englishwoman, which her mother was. Her beauty appeared less imposing than that of the thoroughly Spanish Hermosa, but much more delicate, and so Sir Pedro seemed to think, for advancing and taking her by both hands, he said, in a tone much more modulated than was common with him,
“Doña Viola—I called you Viola when we last met, and you were no taller than my sword.”
“Call me so now, señor,” put in Viola, gently. “I cannot afford to lose even the wording of friendship.”
The knight looked attentively at the speaker, whose eyes meeting his, swam in tears. He paused thoughtfully, and then with his usual straight-forward kindness, said,
“My child, I have learned your grievances through your cousin here. You are nearly alone in the world, let us both assist you in all we can. You see I am old enough to be your father, think of me as such for the present. Besides, the cavalier whose fiancée you are, is, you know, my half nephew; and the attempt I am about making to draw him from his wicked courses, will be materially assisted by any good traits I may become acquainted with; for while I confess my ignorance of the better side of his character, Doña Viola, I am sure one exists, or you would not have proved so faithful as you are.”
A faint red spot in the girl’s cheek had deepened and spread as Sir Pedro spoke, until at his last words, her whole face was flushed, and stooping quickly, she pressed her lips on his hand before he could withdraw it.
“You are right,” she said, eagerly to Padilh, who stood with something like a blush on his soldierly features at the impulsive action. “Save him from himself, from his temptations, for he has a virtue mated with every vice he practices, and ready to assume its place when the bad is uprooted. I know,” she added, with an impetuous accent which betrayed her Spanish blood, and was singularly impressive in her timid manner of speaking, “he is a professed gambler, yet I have seen him clothe and feed a company of beggars with the lavish generosity of a prince; I know he has repeatedly endeavored to rescind our contract of marriage, but how should this bind his love, since we were infants when it was drawn in our joint name; and I have no reason, surely, to complain that he has employed harsh means to accomplish his end, when I shut my eyes to the growth of his aversion. No, Sir Pedro, the fault has been mine in tempting him on; no one can say how different his life might have been, but for the incumbrance I would not consent to his putting away—and so let me suffer, not him. Save him, I earnestly beseech you, from himself, and if need be,” she added, dropping her voice, and becoming as suddenly pallid as before flushed, “save him from an encounter with my father.”