"Sir," said Nora, "have you not noticed for some time past her want of appetite and her general languor without apparent cause? She does not believe it, and will not be convinced, but I who have more experience am sure."
"Nora, it is false!" exclaimed Ismena, appalled.
"Time will show," replied Nora, with perfect composure.
"Time!" repeated Ismena indignantly.
At this moment they were interrupted by six deep measured strokes of the clock.
"That fixes the time for the event," said Nora, with an affected laugh; "six months from now, it says."
Chapter IV.
Six months after these scenes the general, in an affectionate letter to his wife, announced his return from Havana, whither he had been upon important business. Ismena went to Cadiz to meet him, accompanied by a nurse who carried in her arms the supposed heir.
This child had been brought from the Iocluso, [Footnote 53] and the secret of the deception was known only to Ismena, to Nora, and to Lázaro; the latter being the person selected by Nora to obtain the infant from the asylum. How she had been able to persuade the good young man to bend himself to her wicked plot can be understood only when it is known that he believed it to have been sanctioned and arranged by his master. Lázaro doubted until Nora, who had foreseen his opposition, and was prepared to meet it, showed him the following passages in the last letter the general had written to his wife: