"Perilous as your situation is, Helena," Don Abrahan said, "there is a door open to your salvation. You are young, you are under the influence of this man who has had your affairs in his hands since your father's death. He has misled you, he has brought you to this unwittingly, he——"
"No, Don Abrahan," she denied, lifting her head proudly.
There was something in her voice, the ring of it, the proud defiance, that started Roberto out of his pose before the door. His folded arms fell to his sides, his fingers shaped as if to snatch a weapon. He moved a step toward her, his eyes distended in astonishment of the spirit revealed.
"I offer you this door," Don Abrahan said, unheeding her defiance. "I trust in my heart you will accept the exit from this most grave situation. Let this compact between you and my son continue, let us proceed at once to the priest and celebrate the marriage. My son has begged me to offer you this out of the manly love he bears you, Helena, and from no other consideration. Accept, and you will be relieved of this taint of treason. It will be an easy matter in such case to place the burden of guilt where it belongs, on the head of the traitor who involved you in this, innocently, we——"
"Roberto, forgive me!" Helena begged, turning to the young man impulsively, a light in her eyes that he never had seen before. "I have misjudged you. You must have a true, an honorable affection for me to offer me this."
"May God judge between us!" said Roberto, with such feeling that his words trembled on his lips.
"There is something in you better than I knew," she confessed, the honesty of her nature not permitting the covering of one little spark of gratitude. "I thought all the time you were anxious only to have my money and my lands, but this—but this I——"
"The lands? Curse them! The gold? Sink it in hell!" Roberto said, flinging his arms wide, his head thrown back in his dramatic fervor.
"Forgive me if I have wronged you by word or thought, Roberto. There is much in you that is manly, much, I am sure, that is good. I owe you the confession of that much. But the compact cannot be renewed. We stand parted, never to unite. I would not buy my life with the betrayal of a friend."