less for myself than thee. Thou knowest not how madly I adored
thee; and how thy hatred or indifference stung every passion into
torture. Let this pass. When I saw thee again--the forsaker of thy
faith--poor, obscure, and doomed to a peasant's lot--daring hopes shaped
themselves into fierce resolves. Finding that thou wert inexorable, I
turned my arts upon thy husband. I knew his poverty and his ambition: we
Moors have had ample knowledge of the avarice of the Christians'. I
bade one whom I could trust to seek him out at Madrid. Wealth--lavish
wealth--wealth that could open to a Spaniard all the gates of power was
offered to him if he would renounce thee forever. Nay, in order to crush
out all love from his breast, it was told him that mine was the prior
right--that thou hadst yielded to my suit ere thou didst fly with
him--that thou didst use his love as an escape from thine own
dishonour--that thy very child owned another father. I had learned, and
I availed myself of the knowledge, that it was born before its time.
We had miscalculated the effect of this representation, backed and
supported by forged letters: instead of abandoning thee, he thought only
of revenge for his shame. As I left thy house, the last time I gazed
upon thine indignant eyes, I found the avenger, on my path! He had seen
me quit thy roof--he needed no other confirmation of the tale. I fell
into the pit which I had digged for thee. Conscience unnerved my hand
and blunted my sword: our blades scarcely crossed before his weapon
stretched me on the ground. They tell me he has fled from the anger of
the law; let him return without a fear Solemnly, and from the bed of
death, and in the sight of the last tribunal, I proclaim to justice and
the world that we fought fairly, and I perish justly. I have adopted thy
faith, though I cannot comprehend its mysteries. It is enough that it
holds out to me the only hope that we shall meet again. I direct these
lines to be transmitted to thee--an eternal proof of thy innocence and
my guilt. Ah, canst thou forgive me? I knew no sin till I knew thee.

"ARRAEZ FERRARES."

Calderon paused ere he turned to the concluding lines of his wife's
letter; and, though he remained motionless and speechless, never were
agony and despair stamped more terribly on the face of man.

CONCLUSION OF THE LETTER OF INEZ.

"And what avails to me this testimony of my faith? thou art fled; they
can