as you are, Don Luis de Vargas; the sound of your voice,
your gesture, your gait, and I know not what else besides. I repeat that
you must kill me. Kill me without compassion. No, I am not a Christian;
I am a material idolater."

Here Pepita made a long pause. Don Luis knew not what to say, and was
silent. Tears bathed the cheeks of Pepita, who continued, sobbing:

"I know it; you despise me, and you are right to despise me. With this
just contempt you will kill me more surely than with a dagger, and
without staining either your hands or your conscience with blood.
Farewell! I am about to free you from my odious presence. Farewell
forever!"

Having said this, Pepita rose from her seat, and, without looking at Don
Luis, her face bathed with tears, beside herself, rushed toward the door
that led to the inner apartment. An unconquerable tenderness, a fatal
pity, took possession of Don Luis. He feared Pepita would die. He
started forward to detain her, but it was too late. Pepita had crossed
the threshold. Her form disappeared in the obscurity within. Don Luis,
impelled by a superhuman power, drawn as by an invisible hand, followed
her into the darkened chamber.

* * * * *

The library remained deserted.

The servants' dance must have already terminated, for the only sound to
be heard was the murmur of the fountain in the garden below.

Not even a breath of wind troubled the stillness of the night and the
serenity of the air.

The perfume of the flowers and the light of the moon entered softly
through the open window. After a long interval, Don Luis made his
appearance, emerging from the darkness. Terror was depicted on his
countenance, mingled with despair--such despair as Judas may have felt
after he had betrayed his master.

He dropped into a chair and, burying his face in his hands, with his
elbows resting on his knees, he remained for more than half an hour
plunged in a sea of bitter reflections.

To see him thus, one might have supposed that he had just assassinated
Pepita.

Pepita, nevertheless, at last made her appearance. With slow step, with
an air of the deepest melancholy, with bent head, and glance directed to
the floor, she approached Don Luis and spoke.

"Now, indeed," said she, "though, alas! too late, I know all the
vileness of my heart and the iniquity of my conduct. I have nothing to
say in my own defense, but I would not have you think me more perverse
than