"How?"
"The order has determined to give up the papers to you at the price of your conversion to Catholicism. The order feels itself justified in resigning the pursuit of this faithless man; if it can thereby win for the good cause another soul, which will be pleasing to God."
"Indeed!" cried Cornelia, fixing a piercing glance upon Severinus. "Is it thus you advance your work of conversion?"
"We leave you the choice between the only church which can save souls and your lover's prosperity, or his destruction and our hostility. Can you hesitate?"
Cornelia stood before him with noble dignity. "And do you believe you can win me over to a religion which sanctions such means? Do you think to bribe me by any advantage--even the welfare of the man I love--to deny that which is highest and most sacred to me: the knowledge of the truth? No, Severinus; I feel I possess the power to make the man of my heart happy without being compelled to save him from your persecution by abjuring my own faith!"
"May you not trust to yourself too much? He whom we wish to ruin is not so easily saved by any one, even the bold spirit of Cornelia Erwing!"
"Severinus, you frighten me! I never saw you in this mood before. I feel as if in my sleep I had wandered into a tiger's den, and on awakening found myself shut up alone with the terrible enemy!" She paused and looked at Severinus; then growing calmer, shook her head: "No, no, Severinus; that is a bad comparison; forgive me for it! Those pure eyes give the lie to your threats; the dignity enthroned upon your brow cannot suffer you to become the tool of a base revenge."
"Cornelia, you will never learn to understand the nature of Jesuitism. I am no blind tool who mechanically performs what is imposed upon him, but a living part of the whole, who abhors what injures the order, and labors for its advantage. Our obedience is no mere form which we can outwardly satisfy without real sympathy: it is an allegiance in spirit and in truth, which makes the will it serves its own. Thus I hate Ottmar, since he became faithless to his obligations towards us, as the order hates him, and will destroy him as the order commands, if you do not comply with the condition upon which we will spare him."
He watched Cornelia for a moment, then drew out some papers and spread them upon the table before her. "Here are the documents which are to serve us as weapons against Ottmar; read them, and convince yourself whether they will be destructive enough to him to outweigh the sacrifice you must make to secure his safety."
Cornelia looked over the papers, the very ones with which years before Severinus had succeeded in intimidating Ottmar, and binding upon him the chains he now wished to strip off. When she had finished, she gazed sorrowfully into vacancy.