Two enormous wax torches in iron stands flamed and guttered at the door; a black cloth draped the emblazoned shields; and the wind from the sea, blowing through the open casement, inclined all together the flames of a hundred candles, pale in the sunlight, extremely ardent in the night. The murmur of prayers for these souls went on incessantly; I have it in my ears now. There would be always some figure of the household kneeling in prayer at the door; or the old major-domo would come in to stand at the foot, motionless for a time; or, through the open door, I would see the cassock of Father Antonio, flung on his knees, with his forehead resting on the edge of the bed, his hands clasped above his tonsure.
Apart from what was necessary for defence, all the life of the house seemed stopped. Not a woman appeared; all the doors were closed; and the numbing desolation of a great bereavement was symbolized by Don Bal-thasar's chair in the
And Seraphina. It seems not fitting that I should write of her in these days. I hardly dared let my thoughts approach her, but I had to think of her all the time. Her sorrow was the very soul of the house.
Shortly after I had thrown O'Brien out the bishop had left, and then I learned from Father Antonio that Seraphina had been carried away to her own apartments in a fainting condition. The excellent man was almost incoherent with distress and trouble of mind, and walked up and down, his big head drooping on his capacious chest, the joints of his entwined fingers cracking. I had met him in the gallery, as I was making my way back to Carlos' room in anxiety and fear, and we had stepped aside into a large saloon, seldom used, above the gateway. I shall never forget the restless, swift pacing of that burly figure, while, feeling utterly crushed, now the excitement was over, I leaned against a console. Three long bands of moonlight fell, chilly bluish, into the vast room, with its French Empire furniture stiffly arranged about the white walls.
'And that man?' he asked me at last.
'I could have killed him with my own hands,' I said. 'I was the stronger. He had his pistols on him, I am certain, only I could not be a party to an assassination....'
'Oh, my son, it would have been no sin to have exerted the strength which God had blessed you with,' he interrupted. 'We are allowed to kill venomous snakes, wild beasts; we are given our strength for that, our intelligence....' And all the time he walked about, wringing his hands.
'Yes, your reverence,' I said, feeling the most miserable and helpless of lovers on earth; 'but there was no time. If I had not thrown him out, Castro would have stabbed him in the back in my very hands. And that would have been———' Words failed me.
I had been obliged not only to desist myself, but to save his life from Castro. I had been obliged! There had been no option. Murderous enemy as he was, it seemed to me I should never have slept a wink all the rest of my life.
'Yes, it is just, it is just. What else? Alas!' Father Antonio repeated disconnectedly. 'Those feelings implanted in your breast——I have served my king, as you know, in my sacred calling, but in the midst of war, which is the outcome of the wickedness natural to our fallen state. I understand; I understand. It may be that God, in his mercy, did not wish the death of that evil man—not yet, perhaps. Let us submit. He may repent.' He snuffled aloud. 'I think of that poor child,' he said through his handkerchief. Then, pressing my arm with his vigorous fingers, he murmured, 'I fear for her reason.'
It may be imagined in what state I spent the rest of that sleepless night. At times, the thought that I was the cause of her bereavement nearly drove me mad.
And there was the danger, too.
But what else could I have done? My whole soul had recoiled from the horrible help Castro was bringing us at the point of his blade. No love could demand from me such a sacrifice.
Next day Father Antonio was calmer. To my trembling inquiries he said something consolatory as to the blessed relief of tears. When not praying fervently in the mortuary chamber, he could be seen pacing the gallery in a severe aloofness of meditation. In the evening he took me by the arm, and, without a word, led me up a narrow and winding staircase. He pushed a small door, and we stepped out on a flat part of the roof, flooded in moonlight.
The points of land dark with the shadows of trees and broken ground clasped the waters of the bay, with a body of shining white mists in the centre; and, beyond, the vast level of the open sea, touched with glitter, appeared infinitely sombre under the luminous sky.
We stood back from the parapet, and Father Antonio threw out a thick arm at the splendid trail of the moon upon the dark water.
'This is the only way,' he said.
He had a warm heart under his black robe, a simple and courageous comprehension of life, this priest who was very much of a man; a certain grandeur of resolution when it was a matter of what he regarded as his principal office.
'This is the way,' he repeated.
Never before had I been struck so much by the gloom, the vastness, the emptiness of the open sea, as on that moonlight night. And Father Antonio's deep voice went on:
'My son, since God has made use of the nobility of your heart to save that sinner from an unshriven death ———'
He paused to mutter, 'Inscrutable! inscrutable!' to himself, sighed, and then:
'Let us rejoice,' he continued, with a completely unconcealed resignation, 'that you have been the chosen instrument to afford him an opportunity to repent.'
His tone changed suddenly.
'He will never repent,' he said with great force. 'He has sold his soul and body to the devil, like those magicians of old of whom we have records.'
He clicked his tongue with compunction, and regretted his want of charity. It was proper for me, however, as a man having to deal with a world of wickedness and error, to act as though I did not believe in his repentance.
