"Isabel.--Ha! little honor to be much believed,
And most pernicious purpose--seeming, seeming.
I will proclaim thee, Angelo! look for't;
Sign me a present pardon--
Or, with an outstretch'd throat, I'll tell the world
Aloud what man thou art.
"Angelo.--Who will believe thee?
My unsoil'd name, th' austereness of my life,
My vouch against you, and my place i' the State,
Will so your accusation overweigh
That you will stifle in your own report
The smile of Calumny."
SHAKSPEARE.
When Marie recovered consciousness, she found herself in a scene so
strange, so terrific, that it appeared as if she must have been borne
many miles from Segovia, so utterly impossible did it seem, that
such awful orgies could be enacted within any short distance of the
sovereigns' palace, or their subjects' homes. She stood in the centre
of a large vaulted subterranean hall, which, from the numerous arched
entrances to divers passages and smaller chambers that opened on every
side, appeared to extend far and wide beneath the very bowels of the
earth. It was lighted with torches, but so dimly, that the gloom
exaggerated the horrors, which the partial light disclosed.
Instruments of torture of any and every kind--the rack, the wheel, the
screw, the cord, and fire--groups of unearthly-looking figures, all
clad in the coarse black serge and hempen belt; some with their faces
concealed by hideous masks, and others enveloped in the cowls, through
which only the eyes could be distinguished, the figure of the cross
upon the breast, and under that emblem, of divine peace, inflicting
such horrible tortures on their fellow-men that the pen shrinks from
their delineation. Nor was it the mere instruments of torture Marie
beheld: she saw them in actual use; she heard the shrieks and groans
of the hapless victims, at times mingled with the brutal leers and
jests of their fiendish tormentors; she seemed to take in at one view,
every species of torture that could be inflicted, every pain that
could be endured; and yet, comparatively, but a few of the actual
sufferers were visible. The shrillest sounds of agony came from the
gloomy arches, in which no object could be distinguished.
Whatever suffering meets the sight, it does not so exquisitely affect
the brain as that which reaches it through the ear. At the former the
heart may bleed and turn sick; but at the latter the brain seems,
for the moment, wrought into frenzy; and, even though personally in
safety, it is scarcely possible to restrain the same sounds from
bursting forth. How then must those shrill sounds of human agony have
fallen on the hapless Marie, recognizing as she did with the rapidity
of thought, in the awful scene around her, the main hall of that
mysterious and terrible tribunal, whose existence from her earliest
infancy had been impressed upon her mind, as a double incentive to
guard the secret of her faith; that very Inquisition, from which her
own grandfather, Julien Heuriquez, had fled, and in which the less
fortunate grandfather of her slaughtered husband, had been tortured
and burnt.
For a second she stood mute and motionless, as turned to stone; then,
pressing both hands tightly on her temples, she sunk down at the feet
of her conductor, and sought in words to beseech his mercy; but her
white lips gave vent to no sound save a shriek, so wild that it
seemed, for the moment, to drown all other sorrows, and startle even
the human fiends around her. Her conductor himself started back; but
quickly recovering--
"Fool!" he muttered, as he rudely raised her. "I have no power to aid
thee; come before the Superior--we must all obey--ask him, implore
him, for mercy, not me."
He bore her roughly to a recess, divided off at the upper end of the
hall, by a thick black drapery, in which sat the Grand Inquisitor
and his two colleagues. One or two familiars were behind them, and a
secretary sat near a table covered with black cloth, and on which were
several writing implements. All wore masks of black crape, so thick
that not a feature could be discerned with sufficient clearness for
recognition elsewhere; yet, one glance on the stern, motionless
figure, designated as the Grand Inquisitor, sufficed to bid every drop
of blood recede from the prisoner's heart with human terror, at the
very same moment that it endowed the _woman_ with such supernatural
fortitude that her very form seemed to dilate, and her large eye and
lovely mouth expressed--if it could be, in such a scene and such
an hour--unutterable scorn. Antipathy, even as love, will pierce
disguise; and that one glance, lit up with almost bewildering light,
in the prisoner's mind, link after link of what had before been
impenetrable mystery. Her husband's discovery of her former love for
Arthur; his murder; the suspicion thrown on Stanley; her own summons
as witness against him; her present danger; all, all were traced to
one individual, one still working and most guilty passion, which she,
in her gentle purity and holy strength, had scorned. She could not
be deceived--the mystery that surrounded him was solved--antipathy
explained; and Marie's earthly fate lay in Don Luis Garcia's hands!
The Grand Inquisitor read in that glance that he was known; and for
a brief minute a strange, an incomprehensible sensation, thrilled
through him. It could scarcely have been fear, when one gesture of
his hand would destine that frail being to torture, imprisonment, and
death; and yet never before in his whole life of wickedness, had he
experienced such a feeling as he did at that moment beneath a woman's
holy gaze. Anger at himself for the sensation, momentary as it was,
increased the virulence of other passions; but then was not the hour
for their betrayal. In low, deep tones, he commenced the mockery of a
trial. That her avowal of her faith would elude torture, by at once
condemning her to the flames, was disregarded. She was formally
accused of blasphemy and heresy, and threatened with the severest
vengeance of the church which she had reviled; but that this case of
personal guilt would be mercifully laid aside for the present, for
still more important considerations. Was her late husband, they
demanded, of the same blaspheming creed as herself? And a list of
names, comprising some of the highest families of Spain, was read out
and laid before her, with the stern command to affix a mark against
all who, like herself, had relapsed into the foul heresy of their
ancestors--to do this, or the torture should wring it from her.
But the weakness of humanity had passed; and so calm, so collected, so
firm, was the prisoner's resolute refusal to answer either question,
that the familiar to whom she had clung for mercy looked at her with
wonder. Again and again she was questioned; instruments of torture
were brought before her--one of the first and slightest used--more
to terrify than actually to torture, for that was not yet the Grand
Inquisitor's design; and still she was firm, calm, unalterable in her
resolution to refuse reply. And then Don Luis spoke of mercy, which
was to consist of imprisonment in solitude and darkness, to allow time
for reflection on her final answer--a concession, he said, in a tone
far more terrifying to Marie than even the horrors around her,
only granted in consideration of her age and sex. None opposed the
sentence; and she was conducted to a close and narrow cell, in which
no light could penetrate save through a narrow chink in the roof.
How many days and nights thus passed the hapless prisoner could not
have told, for there was nothing to mark the hours. Her food was
delivered to her by means of a turn-screw in the wall, so that not
even the sight of a fellow-creature could disturb her solitude, or
give her the faintest hope of exciting human pity. Her sole hope, her
sole refuge was in prayer; and, oh! how blessed was the calm, the
confidence it gave.
So scanty was her allowance of food, that more than once the thought,
crossed her, whether or not, death by famine would be her allotted
doom; and human nature shuddered, but the spirit did not quail! Hour
after hour passed, she knew not whether it was night or day, when the
gloom of her dungeon was suddenly illumined; she knew not at first
how or whence, so noiseless was the entrance of the intruder, but
gradually she traced the light to a small lamp held in the hand of
a shrouded individual, whom she recognized at once. There was one
fearful thrill of mortal dread, one voiceless cry for strength from
Heaven, and Marie Morales stood before Don Luis erect and calm, and
firm as in her hour of pride.
Garcia now attempted no concealment. His mask had been cast aside, and
his features gleamed without any effort at hypocritical restraint, in
all the unholy passions of his soul. We will not pollute our pages
with transcribing the fearful words of passions contending in their
nature, yet united in their object, with which the pure ear of his
prisoner was first assailed--still lingering desire, yet hate, wrath,
fury, that she should dare still oppose, and scorn, and loathe him;
rage with himself, that, strive as he might, even he was baffled by
the angel purity around her; longing to wreak upon her every torture
that his hellish office gave him unchecked power to inflict, yet
fearing that, if he did so, death would release her ere his object was
attained; all strove and raged within him, making his bosom a very
hell, from which there was no retracting, yet whose very flames
incited deeper fury towards the being whom he believed their cause.
"And solitude, darkness, privation--have they so little availed that
thou wilt tempt far fiercer sufferings?" he at length demanded,
struggling to veil his fury in a quiet, concentrated tone. "Thou hast
but neared the threshold of the tortures which one look, one gesture
of my hand, can gather around thee; tortures which the strongest
sinew, the firmest mind, have been unable to sustain--how will that
weakened frame endure?"
"It can but die," replied the prisoner, "as nobler and better ones
have done before me!"
"Die!" repeated Garcia, and he laughed mockingly. "Thinkest thou we
know our trade so little that such release can baffle us? I tell thee,
pain of itself has never yet had power to kill; and we have learned
the measure of endurance in the human form so well, that we have never
yet been checked by death, ere our ends were gained. And so will it be
with thee, boldly as now thou speakest. Thou hast but tasted pain!"
"Better the sharpest torture than thy hated presence," calmly rejoined
Marie. "My soul thou canst not touch."
"Soul! Has a Jewess a soul? Nay, by my faith, thou talkest bravely! An
thou hast, thou hadst best be mine, and so share my salvation; there's
none for such as thee."
"Man!" burst indignantly from the prisoner. "Share thy salvation!
Great God of Israel! that men like these have power to persecute thy
children for their faith, and do it in thy name! And speak of
mercy! Thou hast but given me another incentive for endurance," she
continued, more calmly addressing her tormentor. "If salvation be
denied to us, and granted thee, I would refuse it with my dying
breath; such faith is not of God!"
"I came not hither to enter on such idle quibbles," was the rejoinder.
"It matters not to me what thou art after death, but before it mine
thou shalt be. What hinders me, at this very moment, from working my
will upon thee? Who will hear thy cry? or, hearing, will approach
thee? These walls have heard too many sounds of human agony to bear
thy voice to those who could have mercy. Tempt me not by thy scorn too
far. What holds me from thee now?"
"What holds thee from me? GOD!" replied the prisoner, in a tone of
such, thrilling, such supernatural energy, that Garcia actually
started as if some other voice than hers had spoken, and she saw
him glance fearfully round. "Thou darest not touch me! Ay,
villain--blackest and basest as thou art--thou darest not do it. The
God thine acts, yet more than thy words blaspheme, withholds thee--and
thou knowest it!"
"I defy him!" were the awful words that answered her; and Don Luis
sprang forwards.
"Back!" exclaimed the heroic girl. "Advance one step nearer, and thy
vengeance, even as thy passion, will alike be foiled--and may God
forgive the deed I do."
She shook down the beautiful tresses of her long luxuriant hair, and,
parting them with both hands around her delicate throat, stood calmly
waiting in Don Luis's movements the signal for her own destruction.
"Fool!" he muttered, as involuntarily he fell back, awed--in spite of
his every effort to the contrary--at a firmness as unexpected as it
was unwavering. "Fool! Thou knowest not the power it is thy idle
pleasure to defy; thou wilt learn it all too soon, and then in vain
regret thy scorn of my proffer now. Thou hast added tenfold to my wild
yearning for revenge on thy former scorn--tenfold! ay, twice tenfold,
to thy own tortures. Yet, once more, I bid thee pause and choose.
Fools there are, who dare all personal physical torment, and yet
shrink and quail before the thought of death for a beloved one.
Idiots, who for others, sacrifice themselves; perchance thou wilt be
one of them. Listen, and tremble; or, sacrifice, and save! When in
thy haughty pride, and zenith of thy power, thou didst scorn me, and
bidding me, with galling contempt, go from thy presence as if I were a
loathsome reptile, unworthy even of thy tread, I bade thee beware, and
to myself swore vengeance. And knowest thou how that was accomplished?
Who led thy doting husband where he might hear thine own lips proclaim
thy falsity? Who poisoned the chalice of life, which had been so
sweet, ere it was dashed from his lips by death? Who commanded the
murderer's blow, and the weapon with which it was accomplished? Who
laid the charge of his murder on the foreign minion, and brought thee
in evidence against him? Who but I--even I! And if I have done all
this, thinkest thou to elude my further vengeance? I tell thee, if
thou refuse the grace I proffer, Arthur Stanley dies; accept it, and
he lives!"
"And not at such a price would Arthur Stanley wish, to live," replied
Marie calmly. "He would spurn existence purchased thus."
"Ay, perchance, if he knew it; but be it as thou wilt, he shall know
thou couldst have saved him and refused."
"And thinkest thou he will believe thee? As little as I believed him
my husband's murderer. How little knowest thou the trust of love! He
will not die," she continued emphatically; "his innocence shall save
him--thy crime be known."
"Ay!" replied Garcia, with a sneering laugh. "Give thyself wings as a
bird, and still stone walls will encircle thee; dwindle into thin air,
and gain the outer world, and tell thy tale, and charge Don Luis Garcia
with the deed, and who will believe thee? Thinkest thou I would have
boasted of my triumphant vengeance to aught who could betray me? Why my
very tool, the willing minister of my vengeance--who slew Morales merely
because I bade him--might not live, lest he should be tempted to betray
me; I slew him with my own hand. What sayest thou now--shall Stanley
live, if I say Let him die?"
There was no reply, but he looked in vain for any diminution in the
undaunted resolution which still sustained her.
"I go," he continued, after a pause. "Yet, once more, I charge thee
choose; accept the terms I proffer--be mine--and thou art saved from
all further torture thyself, and Stanley lives. Refuse, and the
English minion dies; and when thou and I next meet, it will be where
torture and executioners wait but my nod to inflict such suffering
that thou wilt die a thousand deaths in every pang. And,
Jewess--unbeliever as thou art--who will dare believe it more than
public justice, or accuse me of other than the zeal, which the service
of Christ demands? Choose, and quickly--wilt thou accept my proffers,
and be mine? Thou must, at last. What avails this idle folly of
tempting torture first?"
"Thou mayest kill my body, but thou canst not pollute my soul," was
the instant reply, and its tones were unchanged. "And as for Stanley,
his life or death is not in thine hands; but if it were, I could
not--nay, thus I _would_ not--save him. I reject thy proffers, as I
scorn thyself. Now leave me--I have chosen!"
Don Luis did not reply, but Marie beheld his cheek grow livid, and the
foam actually gather on his lip; but the calm and holy gaze she had
fixed upon him, as he spoke, quailed not, nor changed. The invisible
door of her cell closed with a deep, sullen sound, as if her tormentor
had thus, in some measure, given vent to the unutterable fury shaking
his soul to its centre; and Marie was alone. She stood for many, many
minutes, in the fearful dread of his return; and then she raised her
hand to her brow, and her lip blanched and quivered, and, with a long,
gasping breath, she sunk down upon the cold floor--all the heroine
lost in an agonized burst of tears.