ound a small roll of wood,
and secured by a silken thread. Trembling with eagerness, he detached
the scroll. Upon it were traced a few lines in a woman's delicate
handwriting. "If you are willing," so ran the missive, "to encounter
some risk for an interview with her who writes this, you will repair,
to-morrow evening at nine o'clock, to the western door of the church of
St James. One will meet you there in whom you may confide, if he asks
you what flower you love best."

"And though death were in the path," exclaimed Federico, with vehement
passion--"though a thousand swords opposed me, and King Ferdinand
himself--" He paused at that name, with the habitual caution of a
Manchegan. "I will go," he resumed, in a calmer but equally decided
tone, "I will go; and though certain to be stabbed at her feet, I still
would go."

Lazily, to the impetuous student's thinking, did the long hours loiter
till that of his rendezvous arrived. Tormented by a thousand doubts and
anxieties, not the least of these arose from the probability that the
assignation came not whence he hoped, and was, perhaps, the work of some
mischievous jester, to send him on a fool's errand to the distant church
of St James. Above all things, he wished to see his friend Geronimo; but
although he passed the day in invoking his presence, and heaping curses
on his head, that personage did not appear. Evening came; the sun went
down behind the gardens of Buen Retiro; at last it was quite dark.
Federico wrapped himself in his cloak, pressed his hat over his brows,
concealed in the breast of his coat one of those forbidden knives whose
short strong triangular blade is so terrible a weapon in a Spaniard's
hand, and crossing the Plaza Mayor, glided swiftly through streets and
lanes, until, exactly as the clock of St James's church struck nine, he
stood beneath the massive arches of the western portico. All was still
as the grave. The dark enclosure of a convent arose at a short distance,
and from a small high window a solitary ray of light fell upon the
painted figure of the Virgin that stood in its grated niche on the
church wall.

His back against the stone parapet, in the darkest corner of the
portico, Federico posted himself, silent and motionless. He had not long
waited, when he heard the sound of footsteps upon the rough pavement.
They came nearer; a shadow crossed the front of the arched gateway and
was merged in the gloom, as its owner, muttering indistinct