“That may not be,” answered the Priest; “oaths made to sinners like ourselves, for a wicked purpose, can be annulled by a minister of religion, as the only way of making retribution for the crime.”
“It was a deed of blood, Father, but I sought not to do it of my own accord; another instigated me to it by bribes which my poverty could not resist, and I swore never to reveal it.”
“I have said such oaths are valueless!” exclaimed the Priest eagerly. “Come, haste, for your last moments are approaching, when you will be consigned to the terrible flames of purgatory, for thousands and thousands of years, without a mass said for the repose of your soul, if you do not go at once to the ever-burning and bottomless pit, among infidels and heretics.”
The hair of the man stood on end with horror, at the picture of torment offered to his imagination; his eyeballs rolled wildly, as with clenched hands he for an instant sat upright on the ground, and seemed as if about to rise altogether.
“I will confess, I will confess!” he cried, “though I break my oath. ’Twas the young Conde de San Vincente who hired me by a large bribe to do the deed. There was a lady whose affections he sought to gain, but her husband was—Oh, Father, where are you? I am cold—very cold!” cried the man.
“Who was the husband?—you slew him?” asked the Priest, stooping down over the dying wretch.
“He was the—” but ere he could pronounce the name which hung quivering on his lips, he uttered a loud shriek, and, with a convulsive shudder, fell back a lifeless corpse. The priest, however, had heard enough for his purpose; and uttering, or pretending to utter, a prayer over the body, he rose from the ground, and some of the servants coming up, one of them threw a cloak over the distorted features of the dead man.
While the scene of horror we have described was enacting, Don Luis had been actively employed in restoring order to the scattered cavalcade; his first care being to place Donna Clara in her litter, in which her old gouvernante accompanied her. The fidalgo was too much injured and fatigued to remount his horse, and therefore took his seat in his litter; the two wounded men-servants being placed in the third, while the females mounted the mules of the former; one of the mules of the fourth litter having been wounded, they were unable to support a burden.
These various arrangements having been made; the fidalgo, with many expressions of gratitude, would have bid farewell to his deliverer; but Don Luis, fearful that the brigands might again return, insisted on escorting him and his daughter to Leiria, the nearest town on the road to Lisbon, where, if thought advisable, a guard might be procured. “I should be performing but half my devoir as a knight, if I were to quit you in the middle of the forest,” said Don Luis; “a few hours’ delay can be of slight consequence to me, and I may happily be of some further service to you.”
“I cannot refuse your courteous offer, senhor,” answered the Fidalgo, pointing to his daughter. “For my daughter’s sake, it is most acceptable, as I yet tremble for her safety.”