“It was not from my hand,” Hilo interrupted.
“Heaven be praised, for as all here can witness you are my son and not De Ladron’s.”
At these words, Hilo started and turned pale, but his face was instantly flushed with passion.
“It is a base lie—a lie,” he exclaimed through his teeth, scowling around. “It is a shallow trick to cheat me out of my inheritance at the last gasp.”
“Brother!” sobbed out Viola, deprecatingly.
“Sir—son,” Inique cried, “I cannot disprove your bitter words by leaving you a fortune of my own; for the real son of De Ladron, whom I made an idiot, is the heir of the estate I hold. Forgive what actual wrong I have done you as a parent, remembering how soon the end of us both must be.”
Before he ceased speaking, a figure, coming no one knew whence, in the consternation of the moment, hobbled between, and cast a baneful look on Inique from a pair of ferret eyes sparkling with rage and malice. Her rage was so great that she mouthed and champed with her old toothless jaws, before a word could be emitted. The wounded knight sat bolt upright in bed, gazing at her wildly.
“Where is my boy—speak woman, speak?” he cried, with a sudden return of strength and voice.
“Food for fishes—ah ha! food for fishes!” She mumbled out, pointing with her crooked finger mockingly.
“Oh, heaven be merciful! he is dying—Hermosa—Don Pedro—help!” Viola exclaimed, receiving the cavalier’s weight in her quickly opened arms.