se pavilion, was not heard
through the silken walls.

It was then that Isabel suddenly felt a strong grasp upon her shoulder,
as she still knelt by the altar. A faint shriek burst from her lips; she
turned, and the broad curved knife of an eastern warrior gleamed close
before her eyes.

"Hush! utter a cry, breathe more loudly than thy wont, and, queen though
thou art, in the centre of swarming thousands, thou diest!"

Such were the words that reached the ear of the royal Castilian,
whispered by a man of stern and commanding, though haggard aspect.

"What is thy purpose? wouldst thou murder me?" said the queen,
trembling, perhaps for the first time, before a mortal presence.

"Thy life is safe, if thou strivest not to delude or to deceive me. Our
time is short--answer me. I am Almamen, the Hebrew. Where is the hostage
rendered to thy hands? I claim my child. She is with thee--I know it. In
what corner of thy camp?"

"Rude stranger!" said Isabel, recovering somewhat from her alarm,--"thy
daughter is removed, I trust for ever, from thine impious reach. She is
not within the camp."

"Lie not, Queen of Castile," said Almamen, raising his knife; "for days
and weeks I have tracked thy steps, followed thy march, haunted even
thy slumbers, though men of mail stood as guards around them; and I
know that my daughter has been with thee. Think not I brave this danger
without resolves the most fierce and dread. Answer me, where is my
child?"

"Many days since," said Isabel, awed, despite herself, by her strange
position,--"thy daughter left the camp for the house of God. It was her
own desire. The Saviour hath received her into His fold."

Had a thousand lances pierced his heart, the vigour and energy of life
could scarce more suddenly have deserted Almamen. The rigid muscles
of his countenance relaxed at once, from resolve and menace, into
unutterable horror, anguish, and despair. He recoiled several steps; his
knees trembled violently; he seemed stunned by a death-blow. Isabel, the
boldest and haughtiest of her sex, seized that moment of reprieve;
she sprang forward, darted through the draperies into the apartments
occupied by her train, and, in a moment, the pavilion resounded with her
cries for aid. The sentinels were aroused; retainers sprang from their
pillows; they heard the cause of the alarm; they made to the spot; when,
ere they reached its partition of silk, a vivid and startling blaze
burst forth upon them. The