e ground to a
cushion by her side. "My poor unhappy child, what is this dark
mystery? Who can have dared to injure thee, and call it justice,
zeal--religion, perchance! Mother of Mercy! pardon the profanation of
the word! Try and collect thy thoughts, and tell me all. Who has dared
thus insult our power?"

"Don Luis!--Don Luis!" repeated Marie, clinging like an infant to the
Queen, and shuddering with terror at the very recollection of a power
which she had faced so calmly. "Oh, save me from him! torture itself I
could bear, but not his words."

"Don Luis!" reiterated the astonished Queen. "What has he to do with
torture? Who is he--what is he, my poor child, that his very name
should thus appal thee? He may indeed have dared speak insulting
words, but what power has he thus fearfully to wreak his vengeance?"

"Who is he--what is he?" repeated Marie, looking with surprise in
the Queen's pitying face. "Does not your highness know--and yet how
shouldst thou?--his very office is as secret as his own black nature?
Has your highness never heard men whisper of a secret Inquisition,
hiding itself even in thy domains? Oh, my Sovereign, it was there they
dragged me! [her voice sunk to a low shuddering whisper] and he was
grand master there; he--even Don Luis! And he will bear me there
again. Oh, save me from those fearful sounds--those horrid sights:
they glare before me now!"

"And I will save thee, my child! ay, and root out these midnight
horrors from my kingdom," exclaimed Isabella, indignation flashing in
her eye, and flushing on her cheek. "Once we have been insulted--once
deceived; but never to us can such occur a second time. Fearfully
shall this deed of infamy recoil upon its perpetrators! Tremble not
thus, my poor girl, no one shall injure thee; no one can touch thee,
for we are warned, and this fearful tale shall be sifted to the
bottom! Child of a reprobate faith, and outcast race as thou art,
thinkest thou that even to thee Isabella would permit injury and
injustice? If we love thee too well, may we be forgiven, but cared for
thou shalt be; ay, so cared for, that there shall be joy on earth, and
in heaven for thee yet!"

At another moment, those words would have been understood in their
real meaning; but Marie could then only feel the consoling conviction
of security and love. It was not merely personal kindness which had
so bound her to her Sovereign; it was the unacknowledged but felt
conviction, that Isabe