hich
are implanted in every human breast, the nobility of your extraction,
the honour of your _hidalguidad_, and that inextinguishable courage
which, as by the unwearied mercy of God, distinguishes the sons of
your fortunate and unhappy nation." His bass voice, deepened in solemn
utterance, vibrated huskily. There was a rustic dignity in his uncouth
form, in his broad face, in the gesture of the raised hand. "You
shall promise to respect the dictates of our conscience, guided by the
authority of our faith; to defer to our scruples, and to the procedure
of our Church in matters which we believe touch the welfare of our
souls.... You promise?"

He waited. Carlos' eyes burned darkly on my face. What were they asking
of me? This was nothing. Of course I would respect her scruples--her
scruples--if my heart should break. I felt her living intensely by my
side; she could be brought no nearer to me by anything they could do, or
I could promise. She had already all the devotion of my love and youth,
the unreasoning and potent devotion, without a thought or hope of
reward. I was almost ashamed to pronounce the two words they expected.
"I promise."

And suddenly the meaning pervading this scene, something that was in my
mind already, and that I had hardly dared to look at till now, became
clear to me in its awful futility against the dangers, in all its remote
consequences. It was a betrothal. The priest--Carlos, too--must have
known that it had no binding power. To Carlos it was symbolic of his
wishes. Father Antonio was thinking of the papal dispensation. I was a
heretic. What if it were refused? But what was that risk to me, who had
never dared to hope? Moreover, they had brought her there, had persuaded
her; she had been influenced by her fears, impressed by Carlos. What
could she care for me? And I repeated:

"I promise. I promise, even at the cost of suffering and unhappiness,
never to demand anything from her against her conscience."

Carlos' voice sounded weak. "I answer for him, good father." Then
he seemed to wander in a whisper, which we two caught faintly, "He
resembles his sister, O Divine------"

And on this ghostly sigh, on this breath, with the feeble click of beads
in the nun's hands, a silence fell upon the room, vast as the stillness
of a world of unknown faiths, loves, beliefs, of silent illusions, of
unexpressed passions and secret motives that live in our unfathomable
hearts.

Seraphina had given me