me! He has
confided his life of life to my hands. How canst even thou count on my
faith if thou knowest me false to another?"

"False! art thou not false to me? Have I not confided to thee, and dost
thou not desert me--nay, perhaps, betray? How wouldst thou serve this
Fonseca? How liberate the novice?"

"By an order of the court. Your royal mother--"

"Enough!" said the prince, fiercely; "do so. Thou shalt have leisure for
repentance."

As he spoke, Philip strode to the door. Calderon, alarmed and anxious,
sought to detain him; but the prince broke disdainfully away, and
Calderon was again alone.

CHAPTER IV. CIVIL AMBITION, AND ECCLESIASTICAL.

Scarcely had the prince vanished, before the door that led from the
anteroom was opened, and an old man, in the ecclesiastical garb, entered
the secretary's cabinet.

"Do I intrude, my son?" said the churchman.

"No, father, no; I never more desired your presence--your counsel. It is
not often that I stand halting and irresolute between the two magnets of
interest and conscience: this is one of those rare dilemmas."

Here Calderon rapidly narrated the substance of his conversation with
Fonseca, and of the subsequent communication with the prince.

"You see," he said, in conclusion, "how critical is my position. On one
side, my obligations to Fonseca, my promise to a benefactor, a friend
to the boy I assisted to rear. Nor is that all: the prince asks me to
connive at the abstraction of a novice from a consecrated house. What
peril--what hazard! On the other side, if I refuse, the displeasure, the
vengeance of the prince, for whose favour I have already half forfeited
that of the king; and who, were he once to frown upon me, would
encourage all my enemies--in other phrase, the whole court--in one
united attempt at my ruin."

"It is a stern trial," said the monk, gravely; "and one that may well
excite your fear."

"Fear, Aliaga!--ha! ha!--fear!" said Calderon, laughing scornfully. "Did
true ambition ever know fear? Have we not the old Castilian proverb,
that tells us 'He who has climbed the first step to power has left
terror a thousand leagues behind'? No, it is not fear that renders
me irresolute; it is wisdom, and some touch, some remnant of human
nature--philosophers would call it virtue; you priests, religion."

"Son," said the priest, "when, as one of that sublime calling, which
enables us to place our unshodden feet upon the necks of kings, I felt
tha