"

The lady, who at first intended a strange surprise for the commanding
officer, began to fear things were going too far, and that no time
was to be lost in declaring the real fate of the captain. She arose
quickly, and, approaching near to him, spoke with strong emphasis:

"I beseech you, sir, to stay these proceedings; I tell you on my word
of honor the captain is not dead."

"Then you know something of him?" interrupted the commandant. "I
command you, madame, in the name of the King, to tell me of his
whereabouts. If he has, without sufficient cause, absented himself
from military duty, by my sword the rash youth shall be punished.
Besides playing the fool with the people, the inviolable sanctity of
the military constitutions has been violated. Madame, your lover,
perhaps, has forgotten himself over his cups. If secreted within these
walls, produce him, that he may know, for thy sake, and in consideration
of his first fault, the leniency of his sentence for violation of
our military rule."

"Sir," replied the young woman, drawing herself up majestically, and
fearlessly confronting the aged officer, whose inviolable fidelity
to military honor made him warm in his indignation at the supposed
delinquency of his subaltern--"sir, the secret of the captain's absence
and his present abode is committed to me; but I shall not divulge the
information you ask until you promise me that, having shown you
reasonable cause for his seeming fault, you will not only acquit him
of his supposed crime of dereliction of duty, but that his honor shall
be preserved unstained before his fellow-officers and men."

The proposition seemed honorable to the commandant, and he immediately
replied:

"I swear by my sword it shall be so."

"Then, sir, see before you the offender. I am Charles Pimontel!"

Chapter XXVI.

Repentance.

On the road that led the traveller to the ancient village of Torre
del Greco, and about a mile from the populous parts of the city, there
stood a neat little cottage. In the front there was a flower garden,
small but charmingly pretty; the doors and windows were surrounded
with a woodbine creeper that gave an air of comfort to the little
dwelling. The door was ever closed. Few were seen to pass in and
out, and no noise ever betrayed the presence of its inmates.

Here for many years our young penitent Alvira passed a holy and solitary
life. After the stirring scenes of the preceding chapters