“The Queen has not performed one of her promises,” subjoined Dr. Hardman; “and her caprice and cruelty are beyond endurance.”
“Her extravagance is unbounded,” said Lord Maysworth.
“And her arrogance extreme,” rejoined Lord Gustavus.
The satellites shook their heads in chorus.
“In my opinion,” said Lord Maysworth, “we had better seek Elvira and try to propitiate her. She was used to be mild and gentle.”
“But will she not be too much exasperated with our former desertion, to listen to us?” asked Dr. Hardman.
“I think not,” said Lord Gustavus pompously.
The result of this conference may be easily imagined. Rosabella found herself deserted; many who would not have had courage to abandon her cause, had they not found precedents for their conduct, fled in the suite of the rebel lords. Roderick rapidly advanced, and his army was every day augmented by the discontented English.
“I am lost, Marianne!” cried the Queen, when she found the enemy was within a day’s march of her capital: “I am ruined past redemption.”
“Do not desert yourself,” said Marianne, “and you may yet be saved. If you despair, it is a virtual acknowledgment of the weakness of your cause.”
“What will become of me?” continued Rosabella, wringing her hands; “no earthly help can save me.”
“But courage may,” said the deep voice of Cheops, who had entered the room unobserved.
“Ah!” screamed Rosabella; “it is the fiend!”
Cheops laughed, and the unearthly sound rang hoarsely in the ears of his auditors.
“Speak, demon! or whatever thou art,” cried Marianne; “shall we perish?”
“You shall meet with your reward!” said the Mummy calmly: “Are you satisfied?”
“Oh, Rosabella!” screamed Father Morris, rushing into the room in an agony of despair; “save her! save my child!”
“Your child?” cried Rosabella; “can it be possible that you are my father?”
“I am—I am;—but fly—fly—and I forgive everything; only let us fly!”
“Alas!” cried Marianne; “he has but too much reason for his agony. The enemy have entered the city.”
“What will become of us!” ejaculated the friar. “Fiend! monster! barbarian!” cried he, addressing Cheops, and seizing him roughly by the arm; “deliver us! It was thy accursed counsels which involved us in ruin. Save us!”
“My counsels that led you to ruin!” returned Cheops, with one of his bitter laughs; “say rather, your own passions. Did I urge you to murder Claudia? Nay, did I not save Elvira? Did I not warn you that the throne and misery were inseparably connected? And have not all my promises been fulfilled to the very letter?”
“Yes, yes; to the letter,” returned Father Morris; “but not in spirit.”
“By the sacred hawks of Osiris kept at Edfou! I swore Rosabella should be Queen, and you her favourite minister.”
“Talk not of what is past,” cried the priest impatiently; “tell me how to act. The foe is at the gates of the palace.”
“Did you not say there was a secret passage, leading from this chamber?”
“There is! there is!” cried Father Morris, with rapture; “we will there lie concealed, and may surprise them.”
Cheops laughed:—“Am I still your foe?” asked he, with his usual bitterness.
“Name it not, name it not!” cried Father Morris; “we have not an instant to lose. Hurry into the subterranean passage. I hear the horses of the enemy in the court of the palace!”
“Thebes was perforated with passages, yet she has fallen,” muttered Cheops, as he followed the friar and Rosabella through the opening into the secret chamber; Marianne joined them, and the spring panel closed.
Nothing could be more flattering than the reception Elvira met with from her people. Roderick had placed her at the head of his army, and the people hailed her appearance with rapture. Not a blow had been struck, for the army of Rosabella had joined her banners; and Elvira advanced to London without opposition. Too mild and forgiving to indulge a single feeling of revenge, she felt rejoiced that her rival had escaped, and wished no pursuit to be instituted.
Edric, however, was not so quiescent. A thousand circumstances flashed upon his mind, to prove that the accession of Rosabella had been long planned by Father Morris, and he felt convinced he had been the dupe of the plans they had laid to induce him to quit the kingdom.
“I will find him,” said he, “and expose his infamy. He shall not escape me thus.”
Vain, however, was his search, and he returned to the room so lately occupied by Rosabella restless and dispirited. Elvira was now in this splendid chamber, surrounded by her friends; and, trembling with agitation, was awaiting the expected arrival of her father.
“Oh, Heavens!” exclaimed she, as the poor old man was led in; “Roderick! my beloved Roderick! can we not save him!”
“Alas!” returned Roderick, “I fear—but compose yourself, my dearest girl; all may yet go well.”
“Where is Elvira? my child, my darling Elvira!” cried the old man: “I did not kill her! No,” whispered he, drawing near to Roderick; “I killed him, it is true, but it was for her sake. He slandered my child, and I could not bear that.”
“O God! O God!” cried Elvira! “have mercy upon him! It breaks my heart to see him thus. Leave us, I implore you,” she continued, addressing her friends; “I cannot bear that even you should see the extent of his malady. Leave him with me, and perhaps my presence may recall his lost recollection.”
Finding opposition only increased her anxiety, her friends at length consented: and Elvira was left alone with her father. Kneeling by his side as he lay stretched upon a sofa, the Queen endeavoured to console him; but he knew her not, and wrung her heart by calling vehemently upon Elvira? “If I could see my child,” said he, “I should die contented. Call my child! where is Elvira? Yes, yes, I know she is a Queen, and cannot come to me! Yet I think even a Queen might look at her poor old father: I only want her to look at me!”
Whilst this scene
