I suffered wrongly, 'tis Christian to
suffer, and Christian to forgive."

"Then forgive me," said Gabriel, mazed by this persistent
masquerading, "for 'twas I who innocently made thee suffer. Rather
would I have torn out my tongue than injured a fellow Jew."

"I am no Jew," cried the physician fiercely.

"But why deny it to me when I tell thee I am one?"

"'In vain is the net spread in the sight of any bird,'" quoted Dom
Diego angrily. "Thou art as good a Christian as I,--and a worse
fowler. A Jew, indeed, who knows not of the herbs! Nay, the bird-lime
is smeared too thick, and there is no cord between the holes of the
net."

"True, I am neither Jew nor Christian," said the young man sadly. "I
was bred a Christian, but my soul is torn with questionings. See, I
trust my life in thy hand."

But Dom Diego remained long obdurate, even when Gabriel made the
candid admission that he was the masked man who had cried "Hypocrite!"
in the torture-vault; 'twas not till, limping from the bed, he had
satisfied himself that the young man had posted no auditors without,
that he said at last: "Well, 'tis my word against thine. Mayhap I am
but feigning so as to draw thee out." Then, winking, he took down the
effigy of the Christ and thrust it into a drawer, and filling two
wine-glasses from a decanter that stood at the bedside, he cried
jovially, "Come! Confusion to the Holy Office!"

A great weight seemed lifted off the young man's breast. He smiled as
he quaffed the rich wine.

"Meseems thou hast already wrought confusion to the Holy Office."

"Ha! ha!" laughed the physician, expanding in the glow of the wine.
"Yea, the fox hath escaped from the trap, but not with a whole skin."

"No, alas! How feel thy wounds?"

"I meant not my corporeal skin," said the physician, though he rubbed
it with rueful recollection. "I meant the skin whereof my purse was
made. To prove my loyalty to Holy Church I offered her half my estate,
and the proof was accepted. 'Twas the surgeon of the Inquisition who
gave me the hint. He is one of us!"

"What! a Jew!" cried Gabriel, thunderstruck.

"Hush! hush! or we shall have him replaced by an enemy. 'Twas his
fellow-feeling to me, both as a brother and a medicus, that made him
declare me on the point of death when I was still as lusty as a false
credo. For the rest, I had sufficient science to hold in my breath
while the clown tied me with cords, else had I been too straitened to
breathe. But t