The Historical Nights' Entertainment: First Series Read online

  III. THE NIGHT OF BETRAYAL--Antonio Perez and Philip II of Spain

  "You a Spaniard of Spain?" had been her taunt, dry and contemptuous. "Ido not believe it."

  And upon that she had put spur to the great black horse that bore herand had ridden off along the precipitous road by the river.

  After her he had flung his answer on a note of laughter, bitter andcynical as the laughter of the damned, laughter that expressed allthings but mirth.

  "Oh, a Spaniard of Spain, indeed, Madame la Marquise. Very much aSpaniard of Spain, I assure you."

  The great black horse and the woman in red flashed round a bend ofthe rocky road and were eclipsed by a clump of larches. The man leanedheavily upon his ebony cane, sighed wearily, and grew thoughtful. Then,with a laugh and a shrug, he sat down in the shade of the firs thatbordered the road. Behind him, crowning the heights, loomed the browncastle built by Gaston Phoebus, Count of Foix, two hundred years ago,and the Tower of Montauzet, its walls scarred by the shots of therebellious Biscayans. Below him, nourished by the snows that weredissolving under the sunshine of early spring, sped the tumbling river;beyond this spread pasture and arable land to the distant hills, andbeyond those stood the gigantic sharp-summited wall of the Pyrenees, itslong ridge dominated by the cloven cone of the snow clad Pic du Midi.There was in the sight of that great barrier, at once natural andpolitical, a sense of security for this fugitive from the perils andthe hatreds that lurked in Spain beyond. Here in Bearn he was a king'sguest, enjoying the hospitality of the great Castle of Pau, safe fromthe vindictive persecution of the mean tyrant who ruled in Spain. Andhere, at last, he was at peace, or would have been but for the thoughtof this woman--this Marquise de Chantenac--who had gone to such lengthsin her endeavours to soften his exile that her ultimate object couldnever have been in doubt to a coxcomb, though it was in some doubt toAntonio Perez, who had been cured for all time of Coxcombry by sufferingand misfortune, to say nothing of increasing age. It was when hebethought him of that age of his that he was chiefly intrigued by theamazing ardour of this great lady of Bearn. A dozen years ago--beforemisfortune overtook him--he would have accepted her flagrant wooing asa proper tribute. For then he had been the handsome, wealthy, witty,profligate Secretary of State to His Catholic Majesty King Philip II,with a power in Spain second only to the King's, and sometimes evengreater. In those days he would have welcomed her as her endowmentsmerited. She was radiantly lovely, in the very noontide of herresplendent youth, the well-born widow of a gentleman of Bearn. Andit would not have lain within the strength or inclinations of AntonioPerez, as he once had been, to have resisted the temptation that sheoffered. Ever avid of pleasure, he had denied himself no single cup ofit that favouring Fortune had proffered him. It was, indeed, becauseof this that he was fallen from his high estate; it was a woman who hadpulled him down in ruin, tumbling with him to her doom. She, poor soul,was dead at last, which was the best that any lover could have wishedher. But he lived on, embittered, vengeful, with gall in his veinsinstead of blood. He was the pale, faded shadow of that arrogant,reckless, joyous Antonio Perez beloved of Fortune. He was fifty, gaunt,hollow-eyed, and grey, half crippled by torture, sickly from long yearsof incarceration.

  What, he asked himself, sitting there, his eyes upon the eternal snowsof the barrier that shut out his past, was there left in him toawaken love in such a woman as Madame de Chantenac? Was it that histribulations stirred her pity, or that the fame of him which rangthrough Europe shed upon his withering frame some of the transfiguringradiance of romance?

  It marked, indeed, the change in him that he should pause to question,whose erstwhile habit had been blindly to accept the good things tossedby Fortune into his lap. But question he did, pondering thatparting taunt of hers to which, for emphasis, she had given an oddredundancy--"You a Spaniard of Spain!" Could her meaning have beenplainer? Was not a Spaniard proverbially as quick to love as tojealousy? Was not Spain, that scented land of warmth and colour, ofcruelty and blood, of throbbing lutes under lattices ajar, of mitredsinners doing public penance, that land where lust and piety went handin hand, where passion and penitence lay down together--was not Spainthe land of love's most fruitful growth? And was not a Spaniard the veryhierophant of love?

  His thoughts swung with sudden yearning to his wife Juana and theirchildren, held in brutal captivity by Philip, who sought to slake uponthem some of the vindictiveness from which their husband and father hadat last escaped. Not that Antonio Perez observed marital fidelity moreclosely than any other Spaniard of his time, or of any time. But AntonioPerez was growing old, older than he thought, older than his years. Heknew it. Madame de Chantenac had proved it to him.

  She had reproached him with never coming to see her at Chantenac,neglecting to return the too assiduous visits that she paid him here atPau.

  "You are very beautiful, madame, and the world is very foul," he hadexcused himself. "Believe one who knows the world, to his bitter cost.Tongues will wag."

  "And your Spanish pride will not suffer that clods may talk of you?"

  "I am thinking of you, madame."

  "Of me?" she had answered. "Why, of me they talk already--talk theirfill. I must pretend blindness to the leering eyes that watch me eachtime I come to Pau; feign unconsciousness of the impertinent glances ofthe captain of the castle there as I ride in."

  "Then why do you come?" he had asked point-blank. But before her suddenchange of countenance he had been quick to add: "Oh, madame, I amfull conscious of the charity that brings you, and I am deeply, deeplygrateful; but--"

  "Charity?" she had interrupted sharply, on a laugh that wasself-mocking. "Charity?"

  "What else, madame?"

  "Ask yourself," she had answered, reddening and averting her face fromhis questioning eyes.

  "Madame," he had faltered, "I dare not."

  "Dare not?"

  "Madame, how should I? I am an old man, broken by sickness, disheartenedby misfortune, daunted by tribulation--a mere husk cast aside byFortune, whilst you are lovely as one of the angels about the Throne ofHeaven."

  She had looked into the haggard face, into the scars of suffering thatseared it, and she had answered gently: "Tomorrow you shall come to meat Chantenac, my friend."

  "I am a Spaniard, for whom to-morrow never comes."

  "But it will this time. To-morrow I shall expect you."

  He looked up at her sitting her great black horse beside which he hadbeen pacing.

  "Better not, madame! Better not!" he had said.

  And then he saw the eyes that had been tender grow charged with scorn;then came her angry taunt:

  "You a Spaniard of Spain! I do not believe it!"

  Oh, there was no doubt that he had angered her. Women of her temperamentare quick to anger as to every emotion. But he had not wished to angerher. God knows it was never the way of Antonio Perez to anger lovelywomen--at least not in this fashion. And it was an ill return for hergentleness and attention to himself. Considering this as he sat therenow, he resolved that he must make amends--the only amends it waspossible to make.

  An hour later, in one of the regal rooms of the castle, where he enjoyedthe hospitality of King Henri IV of France and Navarre, he announcedto that most faithful equerry, Gil de Mesa, his intention of riding toChantenac to-morrow.

  "Is it prudent?" quoth Mesa, frowning.

  "Most imprudent," answered Don Antonio. "That is why I go."

  And on the morrow he went, escorted by a single groom. Gil de Mesa hadbegged at first to be allowed to accompany him. But for Gil he had otherwork, of which the instructions he left were very full. The distance wasshort--three miles along the Gave de Pau--and Don Antonio covered it ona gently ambling mule, such as might have been bred to bear some ageddignitary of Holy Church.

  The lords of Chantenac were as noble, as proud, and as poor as mostgreat lords of Bearn. Their lineage was long, their rent-rolls short.And the last marquis had suffered more from this dual complaint thanany of his forbears, and he had n
ot at all improved matters by a certainhabit of gaming contracted in youth. The chateau bore abundant signs ofit. It was a burnt red pile standing four-square on a little eminence,about the base of which the river went winding turbulently; it wasturreted at each of its four angles, imposing in its way, but in a sadstate of dilapidation and disrepair.

  The interior, when Don Antonio reached it, was rather better; thefurnishings, though sparse, were massive and imposing; the tapestries onthe walls, if old, were rich and choice. But everywhere the ill-assortedmarriage of pretentiousness and neediness was apparent. The floors ofhall and living-room were strewn with fresh-cut rushes, an obsolescentcustom which served here alike to save the heavy cost of carpets and tolend the place an ancient baronial dignity. Whilst pretence was made ofkeeping state, the servitors were all old, and insufficient in numberto warrant the retention of the infirm seneschal by whom Don Antonio wasceremoniously received. A single groom, aged and without livery, tookcharge at once of Don Antonio's mule, his servant's horse, and theservant himself.

  The seneschal, hobbling before him, conducted our Spaniard across thegreat hall, gloomy and half denuded, through the main living-room of thechateau into a smaller, more intimate apartment, holding some trace ofluxury, which he announced as madame's own room. And there he left himto await the coming of the chatelaine.

  She, at least, showed none of the outward disrepair of her surroundings.She came to him sheathed in a gown of shimmering silk that was of thegolden brown of autumn tints, caught to her waist by a slender girdle ofhammered gold. Eyes of deepest blue pondered him questioningly, whilstred lips smiled their welcome. "So you have come in spite of all?" shegreeted him. "Be very welcome to my poor house, Don Antonio."

  And regally she proffered her hand to his homage.

  He took it, observing the shapely, pointed fingers, the delicatelycurving nails. Reluctantly, almost, he admitted to himself how completewas her beauty, how absolute her charm. He sighed--a sigh for that lostyouth of his, perhaps--as he bowed from his fine, lean height to presscold lips of formal duty on that hand.

  "Your will, madame, was stronger than my prudence," said he.

  "Prudence?" quoth she, and almost sneered. "Since when has Antonio Perezstooped to prudence?"

  "Since paying the bitter price of imprudence. You know my story?"

  "A little. I know, for instance, that you murdered Escovedo--all theworld knows that. Is that the imprudence of which you speak? I haveheard it said that it was for love of a woman that you did it."

  "You have heard that, too?" he said. He had paled a little. "You haveheard a deal, Marquise. I wonder would it amuse you to hear more, tohear from my own lips this story of mine which all Europe garbles? Wouldit?"

  There was a faint note of anxiety in his voice, a look faintly anxiousin his eyes.

  She scanned him a moment gravely, almost inscrutably. "What purposecan it serve?" she asked; and her tone was forbidding--almost a tone offear.

  "It will explain," he insisted.

  "Explain what?"

  "How it comes that I am not this moment prostrate at your feet; how ithappens that I am not on my knees to worship your heavenly beauty; how Ihave contrived to remain insensible before a loveliness that in happiertimes would have made me mad."

  "Vive Dieu!" she murmured, half ironical. "Perhaps that needsexplaining."

  "How it became necessary," he pursued, never heeding the interruption,"that yesterday you should proclaim your disbelief that I could be, asyou said, a Spaniard of Spain. How it happens that Antonio Perez hasbecome incapable of any emotion but hate. Will you hear the story--allof it?"

  He was leaning towards her, his white face held close to her own, asmouldering fire in the dark, sunken eyes that now devoured her.

  She shivered, and her own cheeks turned very pale. Her lips were faintlytwisted as if in an effort to smile.

  "My friend--if you insist," she consented.

  "It is the purpose for which I came," he announced.

  For a long moment each looked into the other's eyes with a singularintentness that nothing here would seem to warrant.

  At length she spoke.

  "Come," she said, "you shall tell me."

  And she waved him to a chair set in the embrasure of the mullionedwindow that looked out over a tract of meadowland sweeping gently downto the river.

  Don Antonio sank into the chair, placing his hat and whip upon the floorbeside him. The Marquise faced him, occupying the padded window-seat,her back to the light, her countenance in shadow.

  And here, in his own words, follows the story that he told her as sheherself set it down soon after. Whilst more elaborate and intimatein parts, it yet so closely agrees throughout with his own famous"Relacion," that I do not hesitate to accept the assurance she hasleft us that every word he uttered was burnt as if by an acid upon hermemory.

  THE STORY OF ANTONIO PEREZ

  As a love-story this is, I think, the saddest that ever was invented bya romancer intent upon wringing tears from sympathetic hearts. How sadit is you will realize when I tell you that daily I thank God on myknees--for I still believe in God, despite what was alleged against meby the inquisitors of Aragon--that she who inspired this love of whichI am to tell you is now in the peace of death. She died in exile atPastrana a year ago. Anne de Mendoza was what you call in France a greatparti. She came of one of the most illustrious families in Spain, andshe was a great heiress. So much all the world knew. What the worldforgot was that she was a woman, with a woman's heart and mind, awoman's natural instincts to select her mate. There are fools who envythe noble and the wealthy. They are little to be envied, those poorpawns in the game of statecraft, moved hither and thither at the willof players who are themselves no better. The human nature of them is anegligible appendage to the names and rent-rolls that predetermine theirplace upon the board of worldly ambition, a board befouled by blood, byslobberings from the evil mouth of greed, and by infamy of every kind.

  So, because Anne was a daughter of the House of Mendoza, because herendowments were great, they plucked her from her convent at the age ofthirteen years, knowing little more of life than the merest babe, andthey flung her into the arms of Ruy Gomez, Prince of Eboli, who wasold enough to have been her father. But Eboli was a great man in Spain,perhaps the greatest; he was, first Minister to Philip II, and betweenhis House and that of Mendoza an alliance was desired. To establish itthat tender child was sacrificed without ruth. She discovered that lifeheld nothing of all that her maiden dreamings had foreseen; that it wasa thing of horror and greed and lovelessness and worse. For there wasmuch worse to come.

  Eboli brought his child-princess to Court. He wore her lightly asa ribbon or a glove, the insignificant appendage to the wealth andpowerful alliance he had acquired with her. And at Court she cameunder the eye of that pious satyr Philip. The Catholic King is verydevout--perfervidly devout. He prays, he fasts, he approaches thesacraments, he does penance, all in proper season as prescribed byMother Church; he abominates sin and lack of faith--particularly inothers; he has drenched Flanders in blood that he might wash it cleanof the heresy of thinking differently from himself in spiritual matters,and he would have done the same by England but that God--Who cannot,after all, be quite of Philip's way of thinking--willed otherwise. Allthis he has done for the greater honour and glory of his Maker, but hewill not tolerate his Maker's interference with his own minor pleasuresof the flesh. He is, as you would say, a Spaniard of Spain.

  This satyr's protruding eyes fell upon the lovely Princess of Eboli--forlovely she was, a very pearl among women. I spare you details. Eboli wasmost loyal and submissive where his King was concerned, most complacentand accommodating. That was but logical, and need not shock you at all.To advance his worldly ambitions had he taken Anne to wife; why shouldhe scruple, then, to yield her again that thus he might advance thoseambitions further?

  If poor Anne argued at all, she must have argued thus. For the rest,she was told that to be loved by the King was an
overwhelming honour,a matter for nightly prayers of thankfulness. Philip was something veryexalted, hardly human in fact; almost, if not quite, divine. Who andwhat was Anne that she should dispute with those who knew the world, andwho placed these facts before her? Never in all her little life had shebelonged to herself. Always had she been the property of somebody else,to be dealt with as her owner might consider best. If about the Courtshe saw some men more nearly of her own age--though there were not many,for Philip's Court was ever a gloomy, sparsely peopled place--she tookit for granted that such men were not for her. This until I taught herotherwise, which, however, was not yet a while. Had I been at Court inthose days, I think I should have found the means, at whatever cost, ofpreventing that infamy; for I know that I loved her from the day I sawher. But I was of no more than her own age, and I had not yet been drawninto that whirlpool.

  So she went to the arms of that rachitic prince, and she bore him ason--for, as all the world knows, the Duke of Prastana owns Philip forhis father. And Eboli increased in power and prosperity and the favourof his master, and also, no doubt, in the contempt of posterity. Thereare times when the thought of posterity and its vengeances is of greatsolace.

  It would be some six years later when first I came to Court, broughtthither by my father, to enter the service of the Prince of Eboli as oneof his secretaries. As I have told you, I loved the Princess from themoment I beheld her. From the gossip of the Court I pieced togetherher story, and pitied her, and, pitying her, I loved her the more. Herbeauty dazzled me, her charm enmeshed me, and she had grown by now inworldly wisdom and mental attainments. Yet I set a mask upon my passion,and walked very circumspectly, for all that by nature I was as recklessand profligate as all the world could ever call me. She was the wife ofthe puissant Secretary of State, the mistress of the King. Who was I todispute their property to those exalted ones?

  And another consideration stayed me. She seemed to love the King. Youngand lacking in wisdom, this amazed me. In age he compared favourablywith her husband he was but thirteen years older than herself--but innothing else. He was a weedy, unhealthy-looking man, weakly of frame,rachitic, undersized, with spindle-shanks, and a countenance that wasalmost grotesque, with its protruding jaw, gaping mouth, great, doglikeeyes, and yellow tuft of beard. A great king, perhaps, this Philip,having so been born; but a ridiculous man and an unspeakable lover. Andyet this incomparable woman seemed to love him.

  Let me pass on. For ten years I nursed that love of mine in secret.I was helped, perhaps, by the fact that in the mean time I hadmarried--oh, just as Eboli himself had married, an arrangement dictatedby worldly considerations--and no better, truer mate did ever a man findthan I in Juana Coello. We had children and we were happy, and for aseason--for years, indeed--I began to think that my unspoken passion forthe Princess of Eboli was dead and done with. I saw her rarely now, andmy activities increased with increasing duties. At twenty-six I was oneof the Ministers of the Crown, and one of the chief supporters ofthat party of which Eboli was the leader in Spanish politics. I satin Philip's Council, and I came under the spell of that taciturn,suspicious man, who, utterly unlovable as he was, had yet an uncannypower of inspiring devotion. From the spell of it I never quite escapeduntil after long years of persecution. Yet the discovery that one bynature so entirely antipathetic to me should have obtained such swayover my mind helped me to understand Anne's attachment to him.

  When Eboli died, in 1573, I had so advanced in ability and Royal favourthat I took his place as Secretary of State, thus becoming all but thesupreme ruler of Spain. I do not believe that there was ever in Spaina Minister so highly favoured by the reigning Prince, so powerful asI became. Not Eboli himself in his halcyon days had been so deeplyesteemed of Philip, or had wielded such power as I now made my own.All Europe knows it--for it was to me all Europe addressed itself foraffairs that concerned the Catholic King.

  And with my power came wealth--abundant, prodigious wealth. I was housedlike a Prince of the blood, and no Prince of the blood ever kept greaterstate than I, was ever more courted, fawned upon, or flattered. Andremember I was young, little more than thirty, with all the strength andzest to enjoy my intoxicating eminence. I was to my party what Eboli hadbeen, though the nominal leader of it remained Quiroga, Archbishop ofToledo. On the other side was the Duke of Alva with his following.

  You must know that it was King Philip's way to encourage two rivalparties in the State, between which he shared his confidence and sway.Thus he stimulated emulation and enlightened his own views in theopposing opinions that were placed before him. But the power of my partywas absolute in those days, and Alva himself was as the dust beneath ourfeet.

  Such eminences, they say, are perilous. Heads that are very highlyplaced may at any moment be placed still higher--upon a pike. I am allbut a living witness to the truth of that, and yet I wonder would it sohave fallen out with me had I mistrusted that slumbering passion ofmine for Anne. I should have known that where such fires have once beenkindled in a man they never quite die out as long as life endures. Timeand preoccupations may overlay them as with a film of ashes, but moreor less deeply down they smoulder on, and the first breath will fan theminto flame again.

  It was at the King's request I went to see her in her fine Madrid houseopposite Santa Maria Mayor some months after her husband's death. Therewere certain matters of heritage to be cleared up, and, having regardto her high rank, it was Philip's wish that I--who was by now Eboli'sofficial successor--should wait on her in person.

  There were documents to be conned and signed, and the matter took somedays, for Eboli's possessions were not only considerable, but scattered,and his widow displayed an acquired knowledge of affairs and a naturalwisdom that inspired her to probe deeply. To my undoing, she probedtoo deeply in one matter. It concerned some land--a little property--atVelez. She had been attached to the place, it seemed, and she missed allmention of it from the papers that I brought her. She asked the reason.

  "It is disposed of," I told her.

  "Disposed of!" quoth she. "But by whom?"

  "By the Prince, your husband, a little while before he died."

  She looked up at me--she was seated at the wide, carved writing-table,I standing by her side--as if expecting me to say more. As I left myutterance there, she frowned perplexedly.

  "But what mystery is this?" she asked me. "To whom has it gone?"

  "To one Sancho Gordo."

  "To Sancho Gordo?" The frown deepened. "The washerwoman's son? You willnot tell me that he bought it?"

  "I do not tell you so, madame. It was a gift from the Prince, yourhusband."

  "A gift!" She laughed. "To Sancho Gordo! So the washerwoman's child isEboli's son!"

  And again she laughed on a note of deep contempt.

  "Madame!" I cried, appalled and full of pity, "I assure you that youassume too much. The Prince--"

  "Let be," she interrupted me. "Do you dream I care what rivals I mayhave had, however lowly they may have been? The Prince, my husband, isdead, and that is very well. He is much better dead, Don Antonio. Thepity of it is that he ever lived, or else that I was born a woman."

  She was staring straight before her, her hands fallen to her lap, herface set as if carved and lifeless, and her voice came hard as the soundof one stone beating upon another.

  "Do you dream what it can mean to have been so nurtured on indignitiesthat there is no anger left, no pride to wound by the discovery of yetanother nothing but cold, cold hate? That, Don Antonio, is my case. Youdo not know what my life has been. That man--"

  "He is dead, madame," I reminded her, out of pity.

  "And damned, I hope," she answered me in that same cold, emotionlessvoice. "He deserves no less for all the wrongs he did to me, the leastof which was the great wrong of marrying me. For advancement he acquiredme; for his advancement he bartered and used me and made of me a thingof shame."

  I was so overwhelmed with grief and love and pity that a groan escapedme almost before I was aware of it.
She broke off short, and stared atme in haughtiness.

  "You presume to pity me, I think," she reproved me. "It is my ownfault. I was wrong to talk. Women should suffer silently, that they maypreserve at least a mask of dignity. Otherwise they incur pity--and pityis very near contempt."

  And then I lost my head.

  "Not mine, not mine!" I cried, throwing out my arms; and though thatwas all I said, there was such a ring in my choking voice that she rosestiffly from her seat and stood tense and tall confronting me, almosteye to eye, reproof in every line of her.

  "Princess, forgive me!" I cried. "It breaks my heart in pieces to hearyou utter things that have been in my mind these many years, poisoningthe devotion that I owed to the late Prince, poisoning the very loyaltyI owe my King. You say I pity you. If that were so, none has the betterright."

  "Who gave it you?" she asked me, breathless.

  "Heaven itself, I think," I answered recklessly. "What you havesuffered, I have suffered for you. When I came to Court the infamy wasa thing accomplished--all of it. But I gathered it, and gathering it,thanked Heaven I had been spared the pain and misery of witnessing it,which must have been more than ever I could have endured. Yet when Isaw you, when I watched you--your wistful beauty, your incomparablegrace--there was a time when the thought to murder stirred darkly in mymind that I might at least avenge you."

  She fell away before me, white to the very lips, her eyes dilating asthey regarded me.

  "In God's name, why?" she asked me in a strangled voice.

  "Because I loved you," I replied, "always, always, since the day I sawyou. Unfortunately, that day was years too late, even had I dared tohope--"

  "Antonio!" Something in her voice drew my averted eyes. Her lips hadparted, her eyes kindled into life, a flush was stirring in her cheeks.

  "And I never knew! I never knew!" she faltered piteously.

  I stared.

  "Dear Heaven, why did you withhold a knowledge that would have upheldme and enheartened me through all that I have suffered? Once, long, longago I hoped--"

  "You hoped!"

  "I hoped, Antonio--long, long ago."

  We were in each other's arms, she weeping on my shoulder as if her heartwould burst, I almost mad with mingling joy and pain--and as God livesthere was more matter here for pain than joy.

  We sat long together after that, and talked it out. There was no helpfor it. It was too late on every count. On her side there was the King,most jealous of all men, whose chattel she was become; on mine, therewas my wife and children, and so deep and true was my love for Anne thatit awakened in me thoughts of the loyalty I owed Juana, thoughts thathad never troubled me hitherto in my pleasure-loving life--and this notonly as concerned Anne herself, but as concerned all women. There wassomething so ennobling and sanctifying about our love that it changedat once the whole of my life, the whole tenor of my ways. I abandonedprofligacy, and became so staid and orderly in my conduct that I wasscarcely recognizable for the Antonio Perez whom the world had knownhitherto.

  We parted there that day with a resolve to put all this behind us; toefface from our minds all memory of what had passed between us! Poorfools were we to imagine we could resist the vortex of circumstancewhich had caught us. For three months we kept our engagementscrupulously; and then, at last, resistance mutually exhausted, weyielded each to the other, both to Fate.

  But because we cherished our love we moved with caution. I wascircumspect in my comings and goings, and such were the precautionswe observed, that for four years the world had little suspicion, andcertainly no knowledge, that I had inherited from the Prince of Ebolimore than his office as Secretary of State. This secrecy was necessaryas long as Philip lived, for we were both fully aware of what manner ofvengeance we should have to reckon with did knowledge of our relationsreach the jealous King. And I think that but for Don John of Austria'saffairs, and the intervention in them of the Escovedo whom you say--whomthe world says I murdered, all might have been well to this day.

  Escovedo had been, like myself, one of Eboli's secretaries in his day,and it was this that won him after Eboli's death a place at the RoyalCouncil board. It was but an inferior place, yet the King remarked himfor a man shrewd and able, who might one day have his uses.

  That day was not very long in coming, though the opportunity it affordedEscovedo was scarcely such as, in his greedy, insatiable ambition, hehad hoped for. Yet the opportunity, such as it was, was afforded himby me, and had he used it properly it should have carried him far,certainly much farther than his talent and condition warranted.

  It came about through Don John of Austria's dreams of sovereignty. Youwill have heard--as who has not?--so much of Don John, the natural sonof Charles V, that I need tell you little concerning him. In body andsoul he was a very different man, indeed, from his half-brother Philipof Spain. As joyous as Philip was gloomy, as open and frank as Philipwas cloudy and suspicious, and as beautiful as Philip was grotesque, DonJohn was the Bayard of our day, the very mirror of all knightly graces.To the victory of Lepanto, which had made him illustrious as a soldier,he had added, in '73--the year of Eboli's death--the conquest of Tunis,thereby completing the triumph of Christianity over the Muslim in theMediterranean. Success may have turned his head a little. He was young,you know, and an emperor's son. He dreamt of an empire for himself, ofsovereignty, and of making Tunis the capital of the kingdom he wouldfound.

  We learnt of this. Indeed, Don John made little secret of hisintentions. But they went not at all with Philip's views. It was farfrom his notions that Don John should go founding kingdoms of his own.His valour and talents were required to be employed for the greaterhonour and glory of the Crown of Spain, and nothing further.

  Philip consulted me, who was by then the depositary of all his secrets,the familiar of his inmost desires. There was evidence that Don John'sambitions were being fomented by his secretary, who dreamt, no doubt,of his own aggrandizement in the aggrandizement of his master. Philipproposed the man's removal.

  "That would be something," I agreed. "But not enough. He must bereplaced by a man of our own, a man loyal to Your Majesty, who will notonly seek to guide Don John in the course that he should follow, butwill keep close watch upon his projects, and warn you should theythreaten to neglect your interests the interests of Spain, for his own."

  "And such a man? Where shall we find him?"

  I considered a moment, and bethought me of Escovedo. He was able; hehad charm and an ingratiating manner; I believed him loyal, and imaginedthat I could quicken that loyalty by showing him that advancement wouldwait upon its observation; he could well be spared from the Council,where, as I have said, he occupied a quite inferior post; lastly, wewere friends, and I was glad of the opportunity to serve him, and placehim on the road to better things.

  All this I said to Philip, and so the matter was concluded. But Escovedofailed me. His abilities and ingratiating manner endeared him quickly toDon John, whilst himself he succumbed entirely, not only to Don Johnof Austria's great personal charm, but also to Don John's ambitiousprojects. The road to advancement upon which I had set him seemed to himlong and toilsome by contrast with the shorter cut that was offered byhis new master's dreams. He fell as the earlier secretary had fallen,and more grievously, for he was the more ambitious of the two, and frommerely seconding Don John's projects, it was not long before he spurredthem on, not long before he was dreaming dreams of his own for Don Johnto realize.

  From Tunis, which had by now been recovered by the Turks, and any hopesconcerned with which King Philip had discouraged, the eyes of Don Johnwere set, at Escovedo's bidding, I believe, upon the crown of England.

  He had just been invited by Philip to make ready to take in hand theaffairs of Flanders, sadly disorganized under the incompetent rule ofAlva. It occurred to him that if he were to issue victoriously from thatenterprise--and so far victory had waited upon his every venture--ifhe were to succeed in restoring peace and Spanish order in rebelliousFlanders, he would then be
able to move against England with the Spanishtroops under his command, overthrow Elizabeth, deliver Mary Stuart fromthe captivity in which she languished, and by marriage with her setthe crown of England on his brow. To this great project he sought thesupport of Rome, and Rome accorded it very readily being naturallyhostile to the heretic daughter of Anne Boleyn.

  It was Escovedo himself who went as Don John's secret ambassador to theVatican in this affair Escovedo, who had been placed with Don John toact as a curb on that young man's ambitions. Nor did he move with theprudence he should have observed.

  Knowledge of what was brewing reached us from the Papal Nuncio inMadrid, who came to see me one day in the matter.

  "I have a dispatch from Rome," he announced, "in which His Holinessinstructs me to enjoin upon the King that the expedition against Englandbe now executed, and that he consider bestowing its crown upon Don Johnof Austria for the greater honour and glory of Holy Church."

  I was thunderstruck. The expedition against England, I knew, was no newproject. Three years before a secret envoy from the Queen of Scots, anItalian named Ridolfi, had come to propose to Philip that, in concertwith the Pope, he should reestablish the Catholic faith in England andplace Mary Stuart upon the throne. It was a scheme attractive to Philip,since it agreed at once with his policy and his religion. But it hadbeen abandoned under the dissuasions of Alva, who accounted that itwould be too costly even if successful. Here it was again, emanating nowdirectly from the Holy See, but in a slightly altered form.

  "Why Don John of Austria?" I asked him.

  "A great soldier of the faith. And the Queen of Scots must have ahusband."

  "I should have thought that she had had husbands enough by now," said I.

  "His Holiness does not appear to share that view," he answered tartly.

  "I wonder will the King," said I.

  "The Catholic King is ever an obedient child of Mother Church," the oilyNuncio reminded me, to reprove my doubt.

  But I knew better--that the King's own policy was the measure of hisobedience. This the Nuncio should learn for himself; for if I knewanything of Philip's mind, I knew precisely how he would welcome thisproposal.

  "Will you see the King now?" I suggested maliciously, anxious to witnessthe humbling of his priestly arrogance.

  "Not yet. It is upon that I came to see you. I am instructed first toconsult with one Escoda as to the manner in which this matter shall bepresented to His Majesty. Who is Escoda?"

  "I never heard of him," said I. "Perhaps he comes from Rome."

  "No, no. Strange!" he muttered, frowning, and plucked a parchment fromhis sleeve. "It is here." He peered slowly at the writing, and slowlyspelled out the name: "Juan de Escoda."

  In a flash it came to me.

  "Escovedo you mean," I cried,

  "Yes, yes--Escovedo, to be sure," he agreed, having consulted thewriting once more. "Where is he?"

  "On his way to Madrid with Don John," I informed him. "He is Don John'ssecretary."

  "I will do nothing, then, until he arrives," he said, and took hisleave.

  Oh, monstrous indiscretion! That dispatch from Rome so cunninglyand secretly contrived in cipher had yet contained no warning thatEscovedo's share in this should be concealed. There are none soimprudent as the sly. I sought the King at once, and told him all thatI had learnt. He was aghast. Indeed, I never saw him more near to anger.For Philip of Spain was not the man to show wrath or any other emotion.He had a fish-like, cold, impenetrable inscrutability. True, his yellowskin grew yellower, his gaping mouth gaped wider, his goggle eyesgoggled more than usual. Left to himself, I think he would havedisgraced Don John and banished Escovedo there and then, as he did,indeed, suggest. And I have since had cause enough to wish to God that Ihad left him to himself.

  "Who will replace Don John in Flanders?" I asked him quietly. He staredat me. "He is useful to you there. Use him, Sire, to your own ends."

  "But they will press this English business."

  "Acquiesce."

  "Acquiesce? Are you mad?"

  "Seem to acquiesce. Temporize. Answer them, 'One thing at a time.'Say, 'When the Flanders business is happily concluded, we will think ofEngland.' Give them hope that success in Flanders will dispose youto support the other project. Thus you offer Don John an incentive tosucceed, yet commit yourself to nothing."

  "And this dog Escovedo?"

  "Is a dog who betrays himself by his bark. We will listen for it."

  And thus it was determined; thus was Don John suckled on the windy papof hope when presently he came to Court with Escovedo at his heels.Distended by that empty fare he went off to the Low Countries, leavingEscovedo in Madrid to represent him, with secret instructions to advancehis plans.

  Now Escovedo's talents were far inferior to my conception of them.

  He was just a greedy schemer, without the wit to dissemble his appetiteor the patience necessary to secure attainment.

  Affairs in Flanders went none too well, yet that did not set a curbupon him. He pressed his master's business upon the King with an ardouramounting to disrespect, and disrespect was a thing the awful majesty ofPhilip could never brook. Escovedo complained of delays, of indecision,and finally--in the summer of '76--he wrote the King a letter of fierceupbraidings, criticizing his policy in terms that were contemptuous, andwhich entirely exasperated Philip.

  It was in vain I strove to warn the fellow of whither he was drifting;in vain I admonished and sought to curb his headlong recklessness. Ihave said that I had a friendship for him, and because of that I tookmore pains, perhaps, than I should have taken in another's case.

  "Unless you put some judgment into that head of yours, my friend, youwill leave it in this business," I told him one day.

  He flung into a passion at the admonition, heaped abuse upon me, sworethat it was I who thwarted him, I who opposed the fulfilment of DonJohn's desires and fostered the dilatory policy of the King.

  I left him after that to pursue his course, having no wish to quarrelwith this headstrong upstart; yet, liking him as I did, I spared noendeavour to shield him from the consequences he provoked. But thatletter of his to Philip made the task a difficult one. Philip showed itto me.

  "If that man," he said, "had uttered to my face what he has dared towrite, I do not think I should have been able to contain myself withoutvisible change of countenance. It is a sanguinary letter."

  I set myself to calm him as best I could.

  "The man is indiscreet, which has its advantage, for we always knowwhither an indiscreet man is heading. His zeal for his master blinds himand makes him rash. It is better, perhaps, than if he were secretive andcrafty."

  With such arguments I appeased his wrath against the secretary. But Iknew that his hatred of Escovedo, his thirst for Escovedo's blood, datedfrom that moment in which Escovedo had forgotten the reverence due tomajesty. I was glad when at last he took himself off to Flanders torejoin Don John. But that was very far from setting a term to hispestering. The Flanders affair was going so badly that the hopes of anEnglish throne to follow were dwindling fast. Something else mustbe devised against the worst, and now Don John and Escovedo began toconsider the acquisition of power in Spain itself. Their ambition aimedat giving Don John the standing of an Infante. Both of them wrote to meto advance this fresh project of theirs, to work for their recall,so that they could ally themselves with my party--the Archbishop'sparty--and ensure its continuing supreme. Escovedo wrote me a letterthat was little better than an attempt to bribe me. The King was ageing,and the Prince was too young to relieve him of the heavy duties ofState. Don John should shoulder these, and in so doing Escovedo andmyself should be hoisted into greater power.

  I carried all those letters to the King, and at his suggestion I evenpretended to lend an ear to these proposals that we might draw fromEscovedo a fuller betrayal of his real ultimate aims. It was dangerous,and I enjoined the King to move carefully.

  "Be discreet," I warned him, "for if my artifice were discovered, Isho
uld not be of any further use to you at all. In my conscience I amsatisfied that in acting as I do I am performing no more than my duty. Irequire no theology other than my own to understand that much."

  "My theology," he answered me, "takes much the same view. You would havefailed in your duty to God and me had you failed to enlighten me on thescore of this deception. These things," he added in a dull voice, "appalme."

  So I wrote to Don John, urging him as one who counselled him for hisgood, who had no interest but his own at heart, to remain in Flandersuntil the work there should be satisfactorily completed. He did so,since he was left no choice in the matter, but the intrigues continued.Later we saw how far he was from having forsaken his dreams of England,when I discovered that he had engaged the Pope to assist him with sixthousand men and one hundred and fifty thousand ducats when the time forthat adventure should be ripe.

  And then, quite suddenly, entirely unheralded, Escovedo reappeared inMadrid, having come to press Philip in person for reinforcements thatshould enable Don John to finish the campaign. He brought news thatthere had been a fresh rupture of the patched-up peace, that Don Johnhad taken the field once more, and had forcibly made himself masterof Namur. This was contrary to all the orders we had sent, a directoverriding of Philip's wishes. The King desired peace in the LowCountries because he was in no case just then to renew the war, andEscovedo's impudently couched demands completed his exasperation.

  "My will," he said, "is as naught before the ambitions of these two.You sent my clear instructions to Escovedo, who was placed with Don Johnthat he might render him pliant to my wishes. Instead, he stiffens himin rebellion. There must be an end to this man."

  "Sire," I cried, "it may be they think to advance your interests."

  "Heaven help me!" he cried. "Did ever villain wear so transparent a maskas this dog Escovedo? To advance my interests--that will be his tale, nodoubt. He will advance them where I do not wish them advanced; he willadvance them to my ruin; he will stake all on a success in Flanders thatshall be the preliminary to a descent upon England in the interests ofDon John. I say there must be an end to this man before he works moremischief."

  Again I set myself to calm him, as I had so often done before, and againI was the shield between Escovedo and the royal lightnings, of whosemenace to blot him out the fool had no suspicion. For months things hungthere, until, in January of '78, when war had been forced in earnestupon Spain by Elizabeth's support of the Low Countries, Don John won thegreat victory of Gemblours. This somewhat raised the King's depression,somewhat dissipated his overgrowing mistrust of his half-brother, andgave him patience to read the letters in which Don John urged him tosend money--to throw wood on the fire whilst it was alight, or elseresign himself to the loss of Flanders for all time. As it meant alsoresigning himself to the loss of all hope of England for all time,Escovedo's activities were just then increased a hundredfold.

  "Send me money and Escovedo," was the burden of the almost daily lettersfrom Don John to me, and at my elbow was Escovedo, perpetually pressingme to bend the King to his master's will. Another matter on which hepressed me then was that I should obtain for himself the governorship ofthe Castle of Mogro, which commands the port of Santander, an ambitionthis which intrigued me deeply, for I confess I could not fathom what ithad to do with all the rest.

  And then something else happened. From the Spanish Ambassador at theLouvre we learnt one day of a secret federation entered into between DonJohn and the Guises, known as the Defence of the Two Crowns. Its objectwas as obscure as its title. But it afforded the last drop to the cupof Philip's mistrust. This time it was directly against Don John thathe inveighed to me. And to defend Don John, in the interests of commonjustice, I was forced to place the blame where it belonged.

  "Nay, Sire," I assured him, "these ambitions are not Don John's. Withall his fevered dreams of greatness, Don John has ever been, will everbe, loyal to his King."

  "If you know anything of temptation," he answered me, "you should knowthat there is a breaking-point to every man's resistance of it. How longwill Don John remain loyal while Escovedo feeds his disloyalty, addsdaily to the weight of temptation the burden of a fresh ambition? I tellyou, man, I feel safe no longer." He rose up before me, a blotch on hissallow face, his fingers tugging nervously at the tuft of straw-colouredbeard. "I tell you some blow is about to fall unless we avert it. Thisman this fellow Escovedo--must be dispatched before he can kill us."

  I shrugged and affected carelessness to soothe him.

  "A contemptible dreamer," I said. "Pity him, Sire. He has his uses.To remove him would be to remove a channel through which we can alwaysobtain knowledge precisely of what is doing."

  Again I prevailed, and there the matter hung a while. But the King wasright, his fears were well inspired. Escovedo, always impatient,was becoming desperate under persistent frustration. I reasoned withhim--was he not still my friend?--I held him off, urged prudence andpatience upon him, and generally sought to temporize. I was as intentupon saving him from leaving his skin in this business as I was, on theother hand, intent upon doing my duty without pause or scruple to myKing. But the fool forced my hand. A Court is a foul place always, evenso attenuated a Court as that which Philip of Spain encouraged. Rumourthrives in it, scandal blossoms luxuriantly in its fetid atmosphere.And rumour and scandal had been busy with the Princess of Eboli and me,though I did not dream it.

  We had been indiscreet, no doubt. We had been seen together in publictoo often. We had gone to the play together more than once; she had beenpresent with me at a bull-fight on one occasion, and it was matter ofcommon gossip, as I was to learn, that I was a too frequent visitor ather house.

  Another visitor there was Escovedo when in Madrid. Have I not saidthat in his early days he had been one of Eboli's secretaries? Onthat account the house of Eboli remained open to him at all times. ThePrincess liked him, was kindly disposed towards him, and encouraged hisvisits. We met there more than once. One day we left together, andthat day the fool set spark to a train that led straight to the mine onwhich, all unconsciously, he stood.

  "A word of advice in season, Don Antonio," he said as we stepped forthtogether. "Do not go so often to visit the Princess."

  I sought to pull my arm from his, but he clung to it and pinned it tohis side.

  "Nay, now--nay, now!" he soothed me. "Not so hot, my friend. What thedevil have I said to provoke resentment? I advise you as your friend."

  "In future advise that other friend of yours, the devil," I answeredangrily, and pulled my arm away at last. "Don Juan, you have presumed, Ithink. I did not seek your advice. It is yourself that stands in need ofadvice this moment more than any man in Spain."

  "Lord of the World," he exclaimed in amiable protest, "listen to him!I speak because I owe friendship to the Princess. Men whisper of yourcomings and goings, I tell you. And the King, you know well, should hehear of this I am in danger of losing my only friend at Court, and so--"

  "Another word of this," I broke in fiercely, "now or at any other time,and I'll skewer you like a rabbit!"

  I had stopped. My face was thrust within a hand's-breadth of his own; Ihad tossed back my cloak, and my fingers clutched the hilt of my sword.He became grave. His fine eyes--he had great, sombre, liquid eyes, suchas you'll scarcely ever see outside of Spain--considered me thoughtfullya moment. Then he laughed lightly and fell back a pace.

  "Pish!" said he. "Saint James! I am no rabbit for your skewering. Ifit comes to skewers, I am a useful man of my hands, Antonio. Come,man"--and again he took my arm--"if I presume, forgive it out of theassurance that I am moved solely by interest and concern for you. Wehave been friends too long that I should be denied."

  I had grown cool again, and I realized that perhaps my show of anger hadbeen imprudent. So I relented now, and we went our ways together withoutfurther show of ill-humour on my part, or further advice on his. Butthe matter did not end there. Indeed, it but began. Going early in theafternoon of the morrow to visit Anne, I
found her in tears--tears, as Iwas to discover, of anger.

  Escovedo had been to visit her before me, and he had dared to reproachher on the same subject.

  "You are talked about, you and Perez," he had informed her, "and thething may have evil consequences. It is because I have eaten your breadthat I tell you this for your own good."

  She had risen up in a great passion.

  "You will leave my house, and never set foot in it again," she had toldhim. "You should learn that grooms and lackeys have no concern in theconduct of great ladies. It is because you have eaten my bread that Itell you this for your own good."

  It drove him out incontinently, but it left her in the condition inwhich I was later to discover her. I set myself to soothe her. I sworethat Escovedo should be punished. But she would not be soothed. Sheblamed herself for an unpardonable rashness. She should not have takenthat tone with Escovedo. He could avenge himself by telling Philip,and if he told Philip, and Philip believed him--as Philip would, beingjealous and mistrustful beyond all men--my ruin must follow. She hadthought only of herself in dismissing him in that high-handed manner.Coming since to think of me it was that she had fallen into thisdespair. She clung to me in tears.

  "Forgive me, Antonio. The fault is all mine--the fault of all. Alwayshave I known that this danger must overhang you as a penalty for lovingme. Always I knew it, and, knowing it, I should have been stronger. Ishould have sent you from me at the first. But I was so starved of lovefrom childhood till I met you. I hungered so for love--for your love,Antonio--that I had not the strength. I was weak and selfish, andbecause I was ready and glad to pay the price myself, whatever it shouldbe and whenever asked, I did not take thought enough for you."

  "Take no thought now," I implored her, holding her close.

  "I must. I can't help it. I have raised this peril for you. He will goto Philip."

  "Not he; he dare not. I am his only hope. I am the ladder by which hehopes to scale the heaven of his high ambition. If he destroys me, thereis the kennel for himself. He knows it."

  "Do you say that to comfort me, or is it really true?"

  "God's truth, sweetheart," I swore, and drew her closer.

  She was comforted long before I left her. But as I stepped out intothe street again a man accosted me. Evidently he had been on the watch,awaiting me. He fell into step beside me almost before I realized hispresence. It was Escovedo.

  "So," he said, very sinister, "you'll not be warned."

  "Nor will you," I answered, no whit less sinister myself.

  It was broad daylight. A pale March sunshine was beating down upon thecobbled streets, and passers-by were plentiful. There was no fingeringof hilts or talk of skewering on either side. Nor must I show any ofthe anger that was boiling in me. My face was too well known in Madridstreets, and a Secretary of State does not parade emotions to therabble. So I walked stiff and dignified amain, that dog in step with methe while.

  "She will have told you what I have said to her," he murmured.

  "And what she said to you. It was less than your deserts."

  "Groom and lackey, eh?" said he. "And less than I deserve--a man of myestate. Oh, ho! Groom and lackey! Those are epithets to be washed out inblood and tears."

  "You rant," I said.

  "Or else to be paid for--handsomely." His tone was sly--so sly thatI answered nothing, for to answer a sly man is to assist him, and mybusiness was to let him betray the cause of this slyness. Followed aspell of silence. Then, "Do you know," said he, "that several of herrelatives are thinking seriously of killing you?"

  "Many men have thought seriously of that--so seriously that they neverattempted it. Antonio Perez is not easily murdered, Don Juan, as you maydiscover."

  It was a boast that I may claim to have since justified.

  "Shall I tell you their names?" quoth he.

  "If you want to ruin them."

  "Ha!" It was a short bark of a laugh. "You talk glibly of ruining--butthen you talk to a groom and lackey." The epithets rankled in his mind;they were poison to his blood, it seemed. It takes a woman to find wordsthat burn and blister a man. "Yet groom and lackey that I am, I hold youboth in the hollow of my hand. If I close that hand, it will be very badfor you, very bad for her. If, for instance, I were to tell King Philipthat I have seen her in your arms--"

  "You dog!"

  "I have--I swear to God I have, with these two eyes--at least with oneof them, applied to the keyhole half an hour ago. Her servants passed mein; a ducat or two well bestowed--you understand?"

  We had reached the door of my house. I paused and turned to him.

  "You will come in?" I invited.

  "As the wolf said to the lamb, eh? Well, why not?" And we went in.

  "You are well housed," he commented, his greedy, envious eyesconsidering all the tokens of my wealth. "It were a pity to lose somuch, I think. The King is at the Escurial, I am told."

  He was. He had gone thither into retreat, that he might cleanse hispious, murky soul against the coming of Eastertide.

  "You would not, I am sure, compel me to undertake so tedious a journey,"said he.

  "Will you put off this slyness and be plain?" I bade him. "You have somebargain in your mind. Propound it."

  He did, and left me aghast.

  "You have temporized long enough, Perez," he began. "You have beenhunting with the dogs and running with the stag. There must be an endto all that. Stand by me now, and I will make you greater than you are,greater than you could ever dream to be. Oppose me, betray me--for I amgoing to be very frank--and the King shall hear things from me that willmean your ruin and hers. You understand?"

  Then came his demands. First of all the command of the fortress of Mogrofor himself. I must obtain him that at once. Secondly, I must see toit that Philip pledged himself to support Don John's expedition againstEngland and Elizabeth and to seat Don John upon the throne with MaryStuart for his wife. These things must come about, and quickly, or Iperished. Nor was that all. Indeed, no more than a beginning. He openedout the vista of his dreams, that having blackmailed me on the one hand,he might now bribe me on the other. Once England was theirs, he aimed atno less than a descent upon Spain itself. That was why he wanted Mogroto facilitate a landing at Santander. Thus, as the Christians hadoriginally come down from the mountains of the Asturias to drive theMoors from the Peninsula, so should the forces of Don John descend againto reconquer it for himself.

  It was a madman's fancy utterly--fruit of a brain that ambition hadcompletely addled; and I do not believe that Don John had any part in itor even knowledge of it. Escovedo saw himself, perhaps, upon the throneof one or the other of the two kingdoms as Don John's vice-regent--forhimself and for me, if I stood by him, there was such power in store asno man ever dreamed of. If I refused, he would destroy me.

  "And if I go straight to the Escurial and lay this project before theKing?" I asked him.

  He smiled.

  "You will force me to tell him that it is a lie invented to deliver youfrom a man who can destroy you by the knowledge he possesses, knowledgewhich I shall at once impart to Philip. Think what that will mean toyou. Think," he added very wickedly, "what it will mean to her."

  As I am a Christian, I believe that had it been but the considerationof myself I would have flung him from my house upon the instant and badehim do his worst. But he was well advised to remind me of her. WhateverPhilip's punishment of me, it would be as nothing to his punishment ofthat long-suffering woman who had betrayed him. Oh, I assure you it isa very evil, ill judged thing to have a king for rival, particularly afish-souled tyrant of King Philip's kind.

  I was all limp with dread. I passed a hand across my brow, and found itchill and moist.

  "I am in your hands, Escovedo," I confessed miserably.

  "Say, rather, that we are partners. Forget all else." He was eager,joyous, believing all accomplished, such was his faith in my influencewith Philip. "And now, Mogro for me, and England for Don John. About itwith dispatch."
/>
  "The King is in retreat. We must wait some days."

  "Till Easter, then." And he held out his hand. I took it limply, thusclenching the bargain of infamy between us. What else was there for me.What, otherwise, was to become of Anne?

  Oh, I may have been self-seeking and made the most of my position, aswas afterwards urged against me. I may have been extortionate and venal,and I may have taken regal bribes to expedite affairs. But always wasI loyal and devoted to the King. Never once had I been bribed to aughtthat ran counter to his interests; never until now, when at a stroke Ihad sold my honour and pledged myself to this betrayal of my trust.

  Not in all Spain was there a more miserable man than I. All night I satin the room where I was wont to work, and to my wife's entreaties thatI should take some rest I answered that the affairs of Spain compelledattention. And when morning found me haggard and distraught came acourier from Philip with a letter.

  "I have letters from Don John," he wrote, "more insistent than ever intheir tone. He demands the instant dispatch of money and Escovedo. Ihave been thinking, and this letter confirms my every fear. I have causeto apprehend some stroke that may disturb the public peace and ruinDon John himself if he is allowed to retain Escovedo any longer in hisservice. I am writing to Don John that I will see to it that Escovedo ispromptly dispatched as he requests. Do you see him dispatched, then,in precise accordance with his deserts, and this at once, before thevillain kills us."

  My skin bristled as I read. Here was fatality itself at work. Philip wasat his old fears--and, Heaven knows, he was not without justification ofhis intuitions, as I had learnt by now--that Escovedo meditated the mostdesperate measures. He was urging me again, as he had urged me before,and more than once, to dispatch this traitor whose restless existence soperpetually perturbed him. I was not deceived as to the meaning he setupon that word "dispatch." I knew quite well the nature of the dispatchhe bade me contrive.

  Conceive now my temptation. Escovedo dead, I should be safe, and Annewould be safe, and this without any such betrayal as was being forcedupon me. And that death the King himself commanded a secret, royalexecution, such as his confessor Frey Diego de Chaves has since defendedas an expedient measure within the royal prerogative. He had commandedit before quite unequivocally, but always I had stood between Escovedoand the sword. Was I to continue in that attitude? Could it humanly beexpected of me in all the circumstances again to seek to deflect theroyal wrath from that too daring head? I was, after all, only a man,subject to the temptations of the flesh, and there was a woman whom Iloved better than my own salvation to whose peace and happiness thatfellow Escovedo was become a menace.

  If he lived, and for as long as he lived, she and I were to be as slavesof his will, and I was to drag my honour and my loyalty through the foulkennels of his disordered ambitions. And the King my master was biddingme clearly see to it that he died immediately.

  I sat down and wrote at once, and the burden of my letter was: "Be moreexplicit, Sire. What manner of dispatch is it your will that Escovedoshould be given?"

  On the morrow, which was Thursday of Holy Week, that note of minewas returned to me, and on the margin of it, in Philip's own hand,Escovedo's death-warrant. "I mean that it would be well to hasten thedeath of this rascal before some act of his should render it too late;for he never rests, nor will anything turn him from his usual ways. Doit, then, and do it quickly, before he kills us."

  There was no more to be said. My instructions were clear and definite.Obedience alone remained. I went about it.

  Just as all my life I have been blessed with the staunchest friends, sohave I, too, been blessed with the most faithful servants. And of thesenone was more faithful than my steward, Diego Martinez, unless, indeed,it be my equerry, Gil de Mesa, who to this day follows my evil fortunes.But Mesa at that time was as yet untried, whilst in Diego I knew that Ihad a man devoted to me heart and soul, a man who would allow himself tobe torn limb from limb on the rack on my behalf.

  I placed the affair in Diego's hands. I told him that I was actingunder orders from the King, and that the thing at issue was the privateexecution of a dangerous traitor, who could not be brought to trial lestthere he should impeach of complicity one whose birth and blood must beshielded from all scandal. I bade him get what men he required, and seethe thing done with the least possible delay. And thereupon I instantlywithdrew from Madrid and went to Alcala.

  Diego engaged five men to assist him in the task; these were a youngofficer named Enriquez, a lackey named Rubio, the two Aragonese--Mesaand Insausti--and another whose name was Bosque. He clearly meant totake no chances, but I incline to think that he overdid precaution, andemployed more hands than were necessary for the job. However, the six ofthem lurked in waiting on three successive nights for Escovedo near hishouse in the little square of Santiago. At last, on the night of EasterMonday, March 31st, they caught him and dispatched him. He died almostbefore he realized himself beset, from a sword-thrust with whichInsausti transfixed him. But there were at least half a dozen wounds inthe body when it was found. Diego, I have said, was a man who made quitecertain.

  No sooner was it done than they dispersed, whilst the lackey Rubio,instantly quitting Madrid, brought me news of the deed to Alcala, andthe assurance that no arrests had been made. But there was a great adoin Madrid upon the morrow, as you may imagine, for it is no everydayoccurrence to find a royal secretary murdered in the streets.

  The alcaldes set out upon a rigorous search, and they began by arrestingand questioning all who attempted to leave the city. On the next daythey harassed with their perquisitions all those who let lodgings.They were still at this work in the evening when I returned to Madrid,brought back--as it would seem--from my country rest by the news of thismurder of my friend and colleague. I bore myself as I should have donehad I no knowledge of how the thing had been contrived. That was anecessity as imperative as it was odious, and no part of it more odiousthan the visit of condolence I was forced to pay to the Escovedo family,which I found plunged in grief.

  From the very outset suspicion pointed its finger at me, although therewere no visible traces to connect me with the deed. Rumour, however,was astir, and as I had powerful friends, so, too, I had the powerfulenemies which envy must always be breeding for men in high placessuch as mine. Escovedo's wife mistrusted me, though at first she seemsequally to have suspected in this deed the hand of the Duke of Alva, whowas hostile to Don John and all his creatures. Very soon, as a result ofthis, came the Court alcalde to visit and question me. His stated objectwas in the hope that I might give him information which would lead tothe discovery of the assassin; but his real object, rendered apparentby the searching, insistent nature of his questions, was to lead meto incriminate myself. I presented a bold front. I pretended to see inthis, perhaps, the work of the Flemish States. I deplored--that I mightremind him of it--my absence from Madrid at the time.

  He was followed by another high official, who came in simulatedfriendship to warn me that certain rumours linking me with the deed werein circulation, in reality to trap me into some admission, to watch mycountenance for some betraying sign.

  I endured it stoutly, but inwardly I was shaken, as I wrote to Philip,giving him full details of what had been said and what answers I hadreturned, what bitter draughts I had been forced to swallow.

  He wrote in reply: "I find that you answered very well. Continue tobe prudent. They will tell you a thousand things, not for the sakeof telling them, but in the hope of drawing something out of you.The bitter draughts you mention are inevitable. But use all thedissimulation and address of which you are capable."

  We corresponded daily after that, and I told him of every step I took;how I kept my men about me, for fear that if they attempted to leaveMadrid they would be arrested, and how, finally, I contrived theirdeparture one by one, under conditions that placed them beyond allsuspicion. Juan de Mesa set out for Aragon on a mission concerned withthe administration of some property of the Princess of Eboli's. Ru
bio,Insausti, and Enriquez were each given an ensign's commission, bearingthe King's own signature, and ordered to join the armies in variousparts of Italy; the first was sent to Milan, the second to Sicily, andthe last to Naples. Bosque went back to Aragon. Thus all were placedbeyond the reach of the active justice of Castile, all save myself--andthe King, who wrote to me expressing his satisfaction that there hadbeen no arrests.

  But rumour continued to give tongue, and the burden of its tale was thatthe murder had been my work, in complicity with the Princess of Eboli.How they came to drag her name into the affair I do not know. It mayhave been pure malice trading upon its knowledge of the relationsbetween us. She may have lent colour to the charge by her ownprecipitancy in denying it. She announced indignantly that she wasbeing accused, almost before this had come to pass, and as indignantlyprotested against the accusation, and threatened those who dared tovoice it.

  The end of it all was that, a month later, the Escovedo family drew upa memorial for the consideration of the King, in which they laid themurder to my charge, and Philip consented to receive Don Pedro deEscovedo--the dead man's son--and promised him that he would considerthe memorial, and that he would deliver up to justice whomsoever hethought right. He was embarrassed by these demands of the Escovedos, myown danger, his duty as king, and his interests as an accomplice, or,rather, as the originator of the deed.

  The Escovedos were powerfully seconded by Vasquez, the Secretary of theCouncil, a member of Alva's party, a secret enemy of my own, consumedby jealousy of my power, and no longer fearing to disclose himself andassail me since he believed himself possessed of the means of ruiningme. He spoke darkly to the King of a woman concerned in this business,without yet daring to mention Anne by name, and urged him for thesatisfaction of the State, where evil rumours were abroad, to order aninquiry that should reveal the truth of the affair.

  It was Philip himself who informed me of what had passed, sneering atthe wildness of rumours that missed the truth so wildly, and when Ievinced distress at my position, he sought to reassure me; he even wroteto me after I had left him: "As long as I live you have nothing to fear.Others may change, but I never change, as you should know who know me."

  That was a letter that epitomized many others written me in those daysto Madrid from the Escurial, whither he had returned. And those letterscomforted me not only by their expressed assurances, but by the greaterassurance implicit in them of the King's good faith. I had by now agreat mass of his notes dealing with the Escovedo business, in almostevery one of which he betrayed his own share as the chief murderer,showing that I was no more than his dutiful instrument in thatexecution. With those letters in my power what need I ever fear? NotPhilip himself would dare to betray me.

  But I went now in a new dread--the dread of being myself murdered. Therewere threats of it in the air. The Escovedo family and their partisans,who included all my enemies, and even some members of the Eboli family,who considered that I had sullied the honour of their name by myrelations with Anne, talked openly of vengeance, so that I was driven tosurround myself by armed attendants whenever now I went abroad.

  I appealed again to Philip to protect me. I even begged him to permitme to retire from my Ministerial office, that thus the clamant envy thatinspired my persecution might be deprived of its incentive. Finally,I begged him to order me to stand my trial, that thus, since I wasconfident that no evidence could be produced against me, I should forcean acquittal from the courts and lay the matter to rest for all time.

  "Go and see the President of Castile," he bade me. "Tell him the causesthat led to the death of Escovedo, and then let him talk to Don Pedro deEscovedo and to Vasquez, so as to induce them to desist."

  I did as I was bidden, and when the president, who was the Bishop ofPati, had heard me, he sent for my two chief enemies.

  "I have, Don Pedro," he said, "your memorial to the King in which youaccuse Don Antonio Perez of the murder of your father. And I am toassure you in the King's name that justice will be done upon themurderer, whoever he may be, without regard to rank. But I am firstto engage you to consider well what evidence you have to justify yourcharge against a person of such consideration. For should your proofs beinsufficient I warn you that matters are likely to take a bad turn foryourself. Finally, before you answer me, let me add, upon my word as apriest, that Antonio Perez is as innocent as I am."

  It was the truth--the absolute truth, so far as it was known to Philipand to the Bishop--for, indeed, I was no more than the instrument of mymaster's will.

  Don Pedro looked foolish, almost awed. He was as a man who suddenlybecomes aware that he has missed stepping over the edge of a chasm inwhich destruction awaited him. He may have bethought him at last thatall his rantings had no better authority than suspicions which noevidence could support.

  "Sir," he faltered, "since you tell me this, I pledge you my word onbehalf of myself and my family to make no more mention of this deathagainst Don Antonio."

  The Bishop swung then upon Vasquez, and his brow became furrowed withcontemptuous anger.

  "As for you, sir, you have heard--which was more than your due, forit is not your business by virtue of your office, nor have you anyobligations towards the deceased, such as excuse Don Pedro's rashness,to pursue the murderers of Escovedo. Your solicitude in this matterbrings you under a suspicion the more odious since you are a priest.I warn you, sir, to abstain, for this affair is different far fromanything that you imagine."

  But envy is a fierce goad, a consuming, irresistible passion, corrodingwisdom and deaf to all prudent counsels. Vasquez could not abstain.Ridden by his devil of spite and jealousy, he would not pause until hehad destroyed either himself or me.

  Since Escovedo's immediate family now washed their hands of the affair,Vasquez sought out more distant relatives of the murdered man, andstirred them up until they went in their turn to pester the courts,not only with accusations against myself, but with accusations that nowopenly linked with mine the name of the Princess of Eboli.

  We were driven to the brink of despair, and in this Anne wrote toPhilip. It was a madness. She made too great haste to excuse herself.She demanded protection from Vasquez and the evil rumours he was puttingabroad, implored the King to make an example of men who could pushso far their daring and irreverence, and to punish that Moorish dogVasquez--I dare say there was Moorish blood in the fellow's veins--as hedeserved.

  I think our ruin dated from that letter. Philip sent for me to theEscurial. He wished to know more precisely what the accusations were.I told him, denying them. Then he desired of the Princess proof of whatshe alleged against Vasquez, and she had no difficulty in satisfyinghim. He seemed to believe our assurance that all was lies. Yet he didnot move to punish Vasquez. But then I knew that sluggishness was hisgreat characteristic. "Time and I are one," he would say when I pressedon matters.

  After that it was open war in the Council between me and Vasquez. Theclimax came when I was at the Escurial. I had sent a servant to Vasquezfor certain State papers to be submitted to the King. He brought them,and folded in them a fiercely denunciatory letter full of insults andinjuries, not the least of which was the imputation that my blood wasnot clean, my caste not good.

  In a passion I sought Philip, beside myself almost, trembling under theinsult.

  "See, Sire, what this Moorish thief has dared to write me. It transcendsall bearing. Either you take satisfaction for me of these insults or youpermit me to take it for myself."

  He appeared to share my indignation, promised to give me leave toproceed against the man, but bade me first wait a while until certainbusiness in the competent hands of Vasquez should be transacted. Butweeks grew into months, and nothing was done. We were in April of '79,a year after the murder, and I was grown so uneasy, so sensitive todangers about me, that I dared no longer visit Anne. And then Philip'sconfessor, Frey Diego de Chaves, came to me one day with a request onthe King's part that I should make my peace with Vasquez.

  "If he will retract," w
as my condition. And Chaves went to see my enemy.What passed between them, what Vasquez may have told him, what he mayhave added to those rumours of my relations with Anne, I do not know.But I know that from that date there was a change in the King's attitudetowards me, a change in the tone of the letters that he sent me, and,this continuing, I wrote to him at last releasing him from his promiseto afford me satisfaction against Vasquez, assuring him that since,himself, he could forgive the injuries against us both, I could easilyforgive those I had received myself, and finally begging his permissionto resign my office and retire.

  Anne had contributed to this. She had sent for me, and in tears hadbesought me to make my peace with Vasquez since the King desired it,and this was no time in which to attempt resistance to his wishes. Iremained with her some hours, comforting her, for she was in the verydepths of despair, persuaded that we were both ruined, and inconsolablein the thought that the blame of this was all her own.

  It may be that I was watched, perhaps more closely than I imagined. Itmay be that spies were close about us, set by the jealous Philip, whodesired confirmation or refutation of the things he had been told, therumours that were gnawing at his vitals.

  I left her, little dreaming that I was never to see her again in thislife. That night I was arrested at my house by the Court alcalde upon anorder from the King. The paltry reason advanced was my refusal to makemy peace with Vasquez, and this when already the King was in possessionof my letter acknowledging my readiness to do so; for the King was inMadrid, unknown to me. He came, it seems, that he might be present atanother arrest effected that same night. From the porch of the Churchof Santa Maria Mayor, he watched his alguazils enter the house of thePrincess of Eboli, bring her forth, bestow her in a waiting carriagethat was to bear her away to the fortress of Pinto, to an imprisonmentwhich was later exchanged for exile to Pastrana lasting as long as lifeitself.

  To sin against a Prince is worse, it seems, than to sin against GodHimself. For God forgives, but princes, wounded in their vanity andpride, know nothing of forgiveness.

  I was kept for four months a prisoner by the alcalde, no charge beingpreferred against me. Then, because my health was suffering grievouslyfrom confinement and the anxiety of suspense, I was moved to my ownhouse, and detained there for another eight months under close guard. Myfriends besought the King in vain either to restore me to liberty orto bring me to trial. He told them the affair was of a nature verydifferent from anything they deemed, and so evaded all demands.

  In the summer of 1580, Philip went to Lisbon to take formal possessionof the crown of Portugal, which he had inherited. I sent my wife to himto intercede for me. But he refused to see her, and so I was left tocontinue the victim of his vindictive lethargy. After a year of this,upon my giving a formal promise to renounce all hostility towardsVasquez, and never seek to do him harm in any way, I was accorded somedegree of liberty. I was allowed to go out and to receive visitors, butnot to visit any one myself.

  Followed a further pause. Vasquez was now a man of power, for my partyhad fallen with me, and his own had supplanted it in the royal councils.It was by his work that at last, in '84, I was brought to trial upon acharge of corruption and misappropriation. I knew that my enemies had,meanwhile, become possessed of Enriquez, and that he was ready to giveevidence, that he was making no secret of his share in the death ofEscovedo, and that the King was being pressed by the Escovedos to bringme to trial upon the charge of murder. Instead, the other charge alonewas preferred.

  It was urged against me that I had kept a greater state than any grandeeof Spain, that when I went abroad I did so with a retinue befittinga prince, that I had sold my favour and accepted bribes from foreignprinces to guard their interests with the King of Spain.

  They sentenced me to two years' imprisonment in a fortress, to befollowed by ten years of exile, and I was to make, within nine days,restitution of some twenty million maravedis*--the alleged extent ofmy misappropriations--besides some jewels and furniture which I hadreceived from the Princess of Eboli, and which I was now ordered todeliver up to the heirs of the late Prince.

  *Ten thousand pounds, but with at least five times the presentpurchasing power of that sum.

  Perquisitions had been made in my house, and my papers ransacked. WellI knew what they had sought. For the thought of the letters that hadpassed between Philip and myself at the time of Escovedo's death mustnow be troubling his peace of mind. I had taken due precautions whenfirst I had seen the gathering clouds foreshadowing this change ofweather. I had bestowed those papers safely in two iron-bound chestswhich had been concealed away against the time when I might need themto save my neck. And because now he failed to find what hesought--the evidence of his own share in the deed and his present baseduplicity--Philip dared not slip the leash from those dogs who wouldbe at my throat for the murder of Escovedo. That was why he bade themproceed against me only on the lesser charge of corruption.

  I was taken to the fortress of Turruegano, and there they came todemand of me the surrender of my papers which the alcalde had failed todiscover at my house. I imagined the uneasiness of Philip in dispatchingthose emissaries. I almost laughed as I refused. Those papers were mybuckler against worse befalling me than had befallen already. Even now,if too hard pressed, I might find the opportunity of breaking my bondsby means of them. I sometimes wonder why I did not apply myself to that.Yet there is small cause for wonder, really. From boyhood, almost, KingPhilip had been my master. Loyalty to him was a habit that went to thevery roots of my being. I had served him without conscience and withoutscruple, and the notion of betraying him, save as a very last and verydesperate resource, was inconceivable. I do not think he ever knew thedepth and breadth of that loyalty of mine.

  My refusal led those sons of dogs to attempt to frighten my wife withthreats of unmentionable horrors unless she delivered up the papersI had secreted. She and our children were threatened with perpetualimprisonment on bread and water if she persisted in refusing tosurrender them. But she held out against all threats, and remained firmeven under the oily persecution to the same end of Philip's confessor,Frey Diego. Finally, I was notified that, in view of her stubbornnessand my own, she and our children were cast into prison, and that therethey would remain until I saw fit to become submissive to the royalwill.

  It is a subtle form of mental torture that will bid a man contemplatethe suffering for his sake to which those who are dear to him are beingsubjected.

  I raged and stormed before the officer who brought me this infamouspiece of news. I gave vent to my impotent anger in blasphemousexpressions that were afterwards to be used against me. The officer wassubtly sympathetic.

  "I understand your grief, Don Antonio," he said. "Believe me, I feelfor you--so much that I urge you to set an end to the captivity of thosedear ones who are innocent, who are suffering for your sake."

  "And so make an end of myself?" I asked him fiercely.

  "Reflection may show that even that is your duty in the circumstances."

  I looked into his smug face, and I was within an ace of striking him.Then I controlled myself, and my will was snapped.

  "Very well," I said. "The papers shall be surrendered. Let my steward,Diego Martinez, come to me here, and he shall receive my instructionsto deliver the chests containing them to my wife, that she in turn maydeliver them to the King."

  He withdrew, well pleased. No doubt he would take great credit tohimself for this. Within three days, such haste did they make, myfaithful steward stood before me in my prison at Turruegano.

  You conceive the despair that had overwhelmed me after giving myconsent, the consciousness that it was my life I was surrendering withthose papers,--that without them I should be utterly defenceless. Butin the three days that were sped I had been thinking, and not quite invain.

  Martinez left me with precise instructions, as a result of which thosetwo iron-bound chests, locked and sealed, were delivered, togetherwith the keys, to the royal confessor. Martinez was asked what th
eycontained.

  "I do not know," he answered. "My orders are merely to deliver them."

  I can conceive the King's relief and joy in his conviction that thus hadhe drawn my teeth, that betide now what might, I could never defend orjustify myself. The immediate sequel took me by surprise. We were atthe end of '85, and my health was suffering from my confinement andits privations. And now my captivity was mitigated. My wife Juana evensucceeded in obtaining permission that I should be taken home to Madrid,and there for fourteen months I enjoyed a half liberty, and received thevisits of my old friends, among whom were numbered most of the membersof the Court.

  I imagined at first that since my teeth were drawn the King despised me,and intended nothing further. But I was soon to be disillusioned on thatscore. It began with the arrest of Martinez on a charge of complicity inthe murder of Escovedo. And then one day I was again arrested, withoutwarning, and carried off for a while to the fortress of Pinto. ThenceI was brought back in close captivity to Madrid, and there I learnt atlast what had been stirring.

  In the previous summer King Philip had gone into Aragon to presideover the Cortes, and Vasquez, who had gone with him, had seizedthe opportunity to examine the ensign Enriquez, who had, meanwhile,denounced himself of complicity in the murder of Escovedo. Enriquez madea full confession--turned accuser under a promise of full pardonfor himself and charged Mesa, Rubio, and my steward Martinez withcomplicity, denouncing Martinez as the ringleader of the business. Theother two, Insausti and Bosque, were already dead.

  Immediately Vasquez attempted to seize the survivors. But Mesa had goneto earth in Aragon, and Rubio was with him. Martinez alone remained,and him they seized and questioned. He remained as cool and master ofhimself as he was true and loyal to me. Their threats made no impressionon him. He maintained that the tale was all a lie, begotten of spite,that I had been Escovedo's best friend, that I had been greatlyafflicted by his death, and that no man could have done more than I todiscover his real murderers. They confronted him with Enriquez, andthe confrontation no whit disturbed him. He handled the traitorcontemptuously as a perjured, suborned witness, a false servant, a manwho, as he proceeded to show, was a scoundrel steeped in crime, whoseword was utterly worthless, and who, no doubt, had been bought to bringthese charges against his sometime master.

  The situation, thanks to Martinez's stoutness, had reached a deadlock.Between the assertions of one man, who was revealed to the judges for aworthless scoundrel, and the denials of the other, against whom nothingwas known, it was impossible for the court of inquiry to reach anyconclusion. At least another witness must be obtained. And Vasquezlaboured with all his might and arts and wiles to draw Rubio out ofAragon into the clutches of the justice of Castile. But he laboured invain, for I had secretly found the means to instruct my trusty Mesa toretain the fellow where he was.

  In this inconclusive state of things the months dragged on and mycaptivity continued. I wrote to Philip, imploring his mercy, complainingof these unjust delays on the part of Vasquez, which threatened to goon forever, and begging His Majesty to command the conclusion of theaffair. That was in August of '89. You see how time had sped. All thatcame of my appeal was at first an increased rigour of imprisonment, andthen a visit from Vasquez to examine and question me upon thetestimony of Enriquez. As you can imagine, the attempt to lure me intoself-betrayal was completely fruitless. My enemy withdrew, baffled, togo question my wife, but without any better success.

  Nevertheless, Vasquez proclaimed the charge established against myselfand Martinez, and allowed us ten days in which to prepare our answer.Immediately upon that Don Pedro de Escovedo lodged a formal indictmentagainst us, and I was put into irons.

  To rebut the evidence of one single, tainted witness I produced sixwitnesses of high repute, including the Secretary of the Council ofAragon. They testified for me that I was at Alcala at the time ofEscovedo's death, that I had always been Escovedo's friend, that I wasa good Christian incapable of such a deed, and that Enriquez as an evilman whose word was worthless, a false witness inspired by vengeance.

  Thus, in spite of the ill-will of my judges and the hatred of myenemies, it was impossible legally to condemn me upon the evidence.There were documents enough in existence to have proved my part in theaffair; but not one of them dared the King produce, since they wouldalso show me to have been no more than his instrument. And so, desiringmy death as it was now clear he did, he must sit impotently broodingthere with what patience he could command, like a gigantic, evil spiderinto whose web I obstinately refused to fling myself.

  My hopes began to revive. When at last the court announced that itpostponed judgment whilst fresh evidence was sought, there was an outcryof indignation on all sides. This was a tyrannical abuse of power,men said; and I joined my voice to theirs to demand that judgmentbe pronounced and my liberty restored to me, pointing out that Ihad already languished years in captivity without any charge againstme--beyond that of corruption, which had been purged by now--having beenestablished.

  Then at last the King stirred in his diabolical underground manner. Hesent his confessor to me in prison. The friar was mild and benign.

  "My poor friend," he said, "why do you allow yourself to suffer in thisfashion, when a word from you can set a term to it? Confess the deedwithout fear, since at the same time you can advance a peremptory reasonof State to justify it."

  It was too obvious a trap. Did I make confession, indeed, upon suchgrounds, they would demand of me proof of what I asserted; and meanwhilethe documents to prove it had been extorted from me and had passed intothe King's possession. In the result I should be ruined completely asone who, to the crime of murder, added a wicked, insidious falsehoodtouching the honour of his King.

  But I said naught of this. I met guile with guile. "Alas! I have beentempted," I answered him. "But I thank Heaven I have known even in myextremity how to resist the temptation of such disloyalty. I cannotforget, Brother Diego, that amongst the letters from the King was onethat said, 'Be not troubled by anything your enemies may do against you.I shall not abandon you, and be sure their animosity cannot prevail. Butyou must understand that it must not be discovered that this death tookplace by my order."'

  "But if the King were to release you from that command?" he asked.

  "When His Majesty in his goodness and generosity sends me a note in hisown hand to say, 'You may confess that it was by my express order thatyou contrived the death of Escovedo,' then I shall thankfully accountmyself absolved from the silence his service imposes on me."

  He looked at me narrowly. He may have suspected that I saw through thetransparent device to ruin me, and that in a sense I mocked him with myanswer.

  He withdrew, and for some days nothing further happened. Then therigours of my captivity were still further increased. I was allowedto communicate with no one, and even the alguazil who guarded me wasforbidden, under pain of death, to speak to me.

  And in January I was visited by Vasquez, who brought me a letter fromthe King, not, indeed, addressed to me and in the terms I had suggested,but to Vasquez himself, and it ran:

  You may tell Antonio Perez from me, and, if necessary, show him thisletter, that he is aware of my knowledge of having ordered him to putEscovedo to death and of the motives which he told me existed for thismeasure; and that as it imports for the satisfaction of my consciencethat it be ascertained whether or not those motives were sufficient, Iorder him to state them in the fullest detail, and to advance proof ofwhat he then alleged to me, which is not unknown to yourself, since Ihave clearly imparted it to you. When I shall have seen his answers, andthe reasons he advances, I shall give order that such measures be takenas may befit.

  I, THE KING

  You see what a twist he had given to the facts. It was I who had urgedthe death of Escovedo; it was I who had advanced reasons which he hadconsidered sufficient, trusting to my word; and it was because of thishe had consented to give the order. Let me confess so much, let me proveit, and prove, too, that the mo
tives I had advanced were sound ones, orI must be destroyed. That was all clear. And that false king held fastthe two trunks of papers that would have given the lie to this atrociousnote of his, that would have proved that again and again I had shieldedEscovedo from the death his king designed for him.

  I looked into the face of my enemy, and there was a twisted smile on mylips.

  "What fresh trap is this?" I asked him. "King Philip never wrote thatnote."

  "You should know his hand. Look closer," he bade me harshly.

  "I know his hand--none better. But I claim, too, to know something ofhis heart. And I know that it is not the heart of a perjured liar suchas penned those lines."

  That was as near as a man dared to go in expressing his true opinion ofa prince.

  "For the rest," I said, "I do not understand it. I know nothing of thedeath of Escovedo. I have nothing to add to what already I have said inopen court unless it be to protest against you, who are a passionate,hostile judge."

  Six times in the month that followed did Vasquez come to me, accompaniednow by a notary, to press me to confess. At last, seeing that nopersuasions could bend my obstinacy, they resorted to other measures.

  "You will drive us to use the torture upon you so that we may loosenyour tongue!" snarled Vasquez fiercely, enraged by my obduracy.

  I laughed at the threat. I was a noble of Spain, by birth immune fromtorture. They dared not violate the law. But they did dare. There wasno law, human or divine, the King was not prepared to violate so thathe might slake his vengeance upon the man who had dared to love where hehad loved.

  They delivered me naked into the hands of the executioner, and Iunderwent the question at the rope. They warned me that if I lost mylife or the use of any of my limbs, it would be solely by my own fault.I advanced my nobility and the state of my health as all-sufficientreasons why the torture should not be applied to me, reminding them thatfor eleven years already I had suffered persecution and detention, sothat my vigour was all gone.

  For the last time they summoned me to answer as the King desired. Andthen, since I still refused, the executioner was recalled, he crossed myarms upon my breast, bound them securely, thrust a long rod beneath thecord, and, seizing one end of this in either hand, gave the first turn.

  I screamed. I could not help it, enfeebled as I was. But my spirit beingstouter than my flesh, I still refused to answer. Not indeed, untilthey had given the rope eight turns, not until it had sliced through mymuscles and crushed the bone of one of my arms, so that to this dayit remains of little use to me, did they conquer me. I had reached thelimit of endurance.

  "In Christ's name, release me!" I gasped. "I will say anything youwish."

  Released at last, half swooning, smothered in blood, agonized by pain,I confessed that it was myself had procured the death of Escovedo forreasons of State and acting upon the orders of the King. The notary madehaste to write down my words, and, when I had done, it was demanded ofme that I should advance proof of the State reasons which I had alleged.

  Oh, I had never been under any delusion on that score, as I have shownyou. The demand did not take me by surprise at all. I was waitingfor it, knowing that my answer to it would pronounce my doom. But Idelivered it none the less.

  "My papers have been taken from me, and without them I can provenothing. With them I could prove my words abundantly."

  They left me then. On the morrow, as I afterwards learnt, they read myconfession to my devoted Martinez, and the poor fellow, who hitherto hadremained staunch and silent under every test, seeing that there was nofurther purpose to be served by silence, gave them the confirmation theydesired of Enriquez's accusation.

  Meanwhile, I was very ill, in a raging fever as you may well conceive,and in answer to my prayer my own doctor was permitted to visit me inprison. He announced that he found my case extremely grave, and that Imust perish unless I were relieved. As a consequence, and considering myweakness and the uselessness just then of both my arms, one of which wasbroken, first a page of my own, then other servants, and lastly my wifewere allowed to come and tend me.

  That was at the end of February. By the middle of April my wounds hadhealed, I had recovered the use of my limbs, though one remains halfmaimed for life, and my condition had undergone a very considerableimprovement. But of this I allowed no sign to show, no suspicion even. Icontinued to lie there day after day in a state of complete collapse,so that whilst I was quickly gathering strength it was believed by mygaolers that I was steadily sinking, and that I should soon be dead.

  My only hope, you see, lay now in evasion, and it was for this thatI was thus craftily preparing. Once out of Castile I could deal withPhilip, and he should not find me as impotent, as toothless as hebelieved. But I go too fast.

  One night at last, on April 20th, by when all measures had beenconcerted, and Gil de Mesa awaited me outside with horses--the wholehaving been contrived by my dear wife--I made the attempt. My apparentcondition had naturally led to carelessness in guarding me. Who wouldguard a helpless, dying man? Soon after dark I rose, donned over my ownclothes a petticoat and a hooded cloak belonging to my wife, and thusmuffed walked out of my cell, past the guards, and so out of the prisonunchallenged. I joined Gil de Mesa, discarded my feminine disguise,mounted and set out with him upon that ninety-mile journey into Aragon.

  We reached Saragossa in safety, and there my first act was to surrendermyself to the Grand Justiciary of Aragon to stand my trial for themurder of Escovedo with which I was charged.

  It must have sent a shudder through the wicked Philip when he receivednews of that. A very stricken man he must have been, for he musthave suspected something of the truth, that if I dared, after all theevidence amassed now against me, including my own confession undertorture, openly to seek a judgment, it was because I must possess someunsuspected means of establishing all the truth--the truth that mustmake his own name stink in the nostrils of the world. And so it was.Have you supposed that Antonio Perez, who had spent his life in studyingthe underground methods of burrowing statecraft, had allowed himself tobe taken quite so easily in their snare? Have you imagined that when Isent for Diego Martinez to come to me at Turruegano and instructed himtouching the surrender of those two chests of documents, that I didnot also instruct him carefully touching the abstraction in the firstinstance of a few serviceable papers and the renewal of the seals thatshould conceal the fact that he had tampered with the chests? If youhave thought that, you have done me less than justice. There had been somuch correspondence between Philip and myself, so many notes had passedtouching the death of Escovedo, and there was that habit of Philip's ofwriting his replies in marginal notes to my own letters and so returningthem, that it was unthinkable he should have kept them all in hismemory, and the abstraction of three or four could not conceivably bedetected by him.

  Ever since then those few letters, of a most deeply incriminatingcharacter, selected with great acumen by my steward, had secretlyremained in the possession of my wife. Yet I had not dared produce themin Castile, knowing that I should instantly have been deprived of them,and with them of my last hope. They remained concealed against preciselysuch a time as this, when, beyond the immediate reach of Philip'sjustice, I should startle the world and clear my own character by theirproduction.

  You know the ancient privileges enjoyed by Aragon, privileges of whichthe Aragonese are so jealous that a King of Castile may not assume thetitle of King of Aragon until, bareheaded, he shall have received fromthe Grand Justiciary of Aragon the following admonition: "We, who are ofequal worth and greater power than you, constitute you our king on thecondition that you respect our privileges, and not otherwise." And tothat the king must solemnly bind himself by oath, whose violation wouldraise in revolt against him the very cobbles of the streets. No king ofSpain had ever yet been found to dare violate the constitution andthe fueros of Aragon, the independence of their cortes, or parliament,composed of the four orders of the State. The Grand Justiciary's Courtwas superior to any ro
yally constituted tribunal in the kingdom; tothat court it was the privilege of any man to appeal for justice in anycause; and there justice was measured out with a stern impartiality thathad not its like in any other State of Europe.

  That was the tribunal to which I made surrender of my person and mycause. There was an attempt on the part of Philip to seize me and dragme back to Castile and his vengeance. His officers broke into the prisonfor that purpose, and already I was in their power, when the men of theJusticiary, followed by an excited mob, which threatened open rebellionat this violation of their ancient rights, delivered me from theirhands.

  Baffled in this--and I can imagine his fury, which has since been ventedon the Aragonese--Philip sent his representatives and his jurists toaccuse me before the Court of the Grand Justiciary and to conduct myprosecution.

  The trial began, exciting the most profound interest, not only inAragon, but also in Castile, which, as I afterwards learnt, had openlyrejoiced at my escape. It proceeded with the delays and longueurs thatare inseparable from the sluggish majesty of the law. One of thesepauses I wrote to Philip, inviting him to desist, and to grant me theliberty to live out my days in peace with my family in some remotecorner of his kingdom. I warned him that I was not helpless before hispersecution, as he imagined; that whilst I had made surrender of twochests of papers, I yet retained enough authentic documents--letters inhis own hand--to make my innocence and his guilt apparent in a startlingdegree, with very evil consequences to himself.

  His answer was to seize my wife and children and cast them into prison,and then order the courts of Madrid to pronounce sentence of deathagainst me for the murder of Escovedo. Such were the sops with which hesought to quench his vindictive rage.

  Thereupon the trial proceeded. I prepared my long memorial of theaffair, supporting it with proofs in the shape of those letters I hadretained. And then at last Philip of Spain took fright. He was warnedby one of his representatives that there was little doubt I should beacquitted on all counts, and, too late, he sought to save his face byordering the cessation of the prosecution he had instructed.

  He stated that since I had chosen a line of defence, to answer which--asit could be answered--it would be necessary to touch upon matters ofa secrecy that was inviolable, and to introduce personages whosereputation and honour was of more consequence to the State than thecondemnation of Antonio Perez, he preferred to renounce the prosecutionbefore the tribunal of Aragon. But he added a certificate upon his royalword to the effect that my crimes were greater than had ever been thecrimes of any man, and that, whilst he renounced the prosecution beforethe courts of Aragon, he retained the right to demand of me an accountof my actions before any other tribunal at any future time.

  My acquittal followed immediately. And immediately again that wassucceeded by fresh charges against me on behalf of the King. Firstit was sought to prove that I had procured the death of two of myservants--a charge which I easily dispersed by proving them to havedied natural deaths. Then it was sought to prosecute me on the charge ofcorruption, for which I had once already been prosecuted, condemned, andpunished. Confidently I demanded my release, and Philip must have groundhis teeth in rage to see his prey escaping him, to see himself the buttof scorn and contempt for the wrongs that it became clear he had doneme.

  One weapon remained to him, and a terrible weapon this--the Holy Officeof the Inquisition, a court before which all temporal courts must bowand quail. He launched its power against me, and behold me, in themoment when I accounted myself the victor in the unequal contest,accused of the dread sin of heresy. Words lightly weighed--uttered by mein prison under stress--had been zealously gathered up by spies.

  On one occasion I had exclaimed: "I think God sleeps where my affairsare concerned, and I am in danger of losing my faith." The Holy Officeheld this to be a scandalous proposition, offensive to pious ears.

  Again, when I heard of the arrest of my wife and children I had criedout in rage: "God sleeps! God sleeps! There cannot be a God!"

  This they argued at length to be rank heresy, since it is man's dutypositively to believe, and who does not believe is an infidel.

  Yet again it seems I had exclaimed: "Should things so come to pass,I shall refuse to believe in God!" This was accounted blasphemous,scandalous, and not without suspicion of heresy.

  Upon these grounds the Supreme Council of the Inquisition at Madrid drewup its impeachment, and delivered it to the inquisitors of Aragon atSaragossa. These at once sent their familiars to demand the surrender ofme from the Grand Justiciary, in whose hands I still remained. The GrandJusticiary incontinently refused to yield me up.

  Thereupon the three Inquisitors drew up a peremptory demand, addressedto the lieutenants of the Justiciary, summoning them by virtue of holyobedience, under pain of greater excommunication, of a fine in the caseof each of them of one thousand ducats, and other penalties to whichthey might later be condemned, to deliver me up within three hours tothe pursuivants of the Holy Office.

  This was the end of the Justiciary's resistance. He dared not refusea demand so framed, and surrender of me was duly made. But the newsof what was doing had run abroad. I had no lack of friends, whom Iinstantly warned of what was afoot, and they had seen to it that theknowledge spread in an inflammatory manner. Saragossa began to stir atonce. Here was a thinly masked violation of their ancient privileges. Ifthey suffered this precedent of circumventing their rights, what wasto become of their liberties in future, who would be secure against anunjust persecution? For their sympathies were all with me throughoutthat trial.

  I was scarcely in the prison of the Holy Office before the dread cry ofContrafueros! was ringing through the streets of Saragossa, summoningthe citizens to arm and come forth in defence of their inviolablerights. They stormed the palace of the Grand Justiciary, demanded thathe should defend the fueros, to whose guardianship he had been elected.Receiving no satisfaction, they attacked the palace of the Inquisition,clamouring insistently that I should immediately be returned to theJusticiary's prison, whence I had so unwarrantably been taken.

  The Inquisitors remained firm a while, but the danger was increasinghourly. In the end they submitted, for the sake of their skins, andconsidering, no doubt, a later vengeance for this outrage upon theirholy authority. But it was not done until faggots had been stackedagainst the Holy House, and the exasperated mob had threatened to burnthem out of it.

  "Castilian hypocrites!" had been the insurgent roar. "Surrender yourprisoner, or you shall be roasted in the fire in which you roast somany!"

  Blood was shed in the streets. The King's representative died of woundsthat he received in the affray, whilst the Viceroy himself was assailedand compelled to intervene and procure my deliverance.

  For the moment I was out of danger. But for the moment only. There wasno question now of my enlargement. The Grand Justiciary, intimidatedby what had taken place, by the precise expression of the King'swill, dared not set me at liberty. And then the Holy Office, under thedirection of the King, went to work in that subterranean way which ithas made its own; legal quibbles were raised to soothe the sensibilitiesof the Aragonese with respect to my removal from the Justiciary's prisonto that of the Holy Office. Strong forces of troops were brought toSaragossa to overawe the plebeian insolence, and so, by the followingSeptember, all the preliminaries being concluded, the Inquisition camein force and in form to take possession of me.

  The mob looked on and murmured; but it was intimidated by the show ofordered force; it had perhaps tired a little of the whole affair, anddid not see that it should shed its blood and lay up trouble for itselffor the sake of one who, after all, was of no account in the affairs ofAragon. I stood upon the threshold of my ruin. All my activities wereto go unrewarded. Doom awaited me. And then the unexpected happened.The alguazil of the Holy Office was in the very act of setting the gyvesupon my legs when the first shot was fired, followed almost at once by afusillade.

  It was Gil de Mesa, faithfullest servant that ever any ma
n possessed.He had raised an armed band, consisting of some Aragonese gentlemenand their servants, and with this he fell like a thunderbolt upon theCastilian men-at-arms and the familiars of the Inquisition. The Alguazilfled, leaving me one leg free, the other burdened by the gyve, and ashe fled so fled all others, being thus taken unawares. The Inquisitorsscuttled to the nearest shelter; the Viceroy threw himself into hishouse and barricaded the door. There was no one to guide, no one todirect. The soldiery in these circumstances, accounting themselvesoverpowered, offered no resistance. They, too, fled before the fusilladeand the hail of shot that descended on them.

  Before I realized what had happened, the iron had been struck from myleg, I was mounted on a horse, and, with Gil at my side, I was gallopingout of Saragossa by the gate of Santa Engracia, and breasting the slopeswith little cause to fear pursuit just yet, such was the disorder we hadleft behind.

  And there, very briefly, you have the story of my sufferings and myescapes. Not entirely to be baulked, numerous arrests were made by theInquisitors in Saragossa when order was at last restored. There followedan auto-da-fe, the most horrible and vindictive of all those horrors, inwhich many suffered for having displayed the weakness of charity towardsa persecuted man. And, since my body was no longer in their clutches,they none the less sentenced me to death as contumaciously absent, andmy effigy was burnt in the holy fires they lighted, amongst the humancandles which they offered up for the greater honour and glory of amerciful God. Let me say no more, lest I blaspheme in earnest.

  After months of wandering and hiding, Gil and I made our way here intoNavarre, where we remain the guests of Protestant King Henri IV, whodoes not love King Philip any better since he has heard my story.

  Still King Philip's vengeance does not sleep. Twice has he sent after mehis assassins--since assassination is the only weapon now remaining tohim. But his poor tools have each time been taken, exposed to Philip'sgreater infamy and shame--and hanged as they deserve who can so vilelyserve so vile a master. It has even been sought to bribe my faithfulGil de Mesa into turning his hand against me, and that attempt, too, hasbeen given the fullest publication. Meanwhile, my death to-day couldno longer avail Philip very much. My memorial is published throughoutEurope for all to read. It has been avidly read until Philip of Spainhas earned the contempt of every upright man. In his own dominions thevoice of execration has been raised against him. One of his own nobleshas contemptuously announced that Spain under Philip has become unsafefor any gentleman, and that a betrayal of a subject by his king iswithout parallel in history.

  That is some measure of vengeance. But if I am spared I shall not leaveit there. Henry of Navarre is on the point of turning Catholic that hisinterests may be better served. Elizabeth of England remains. In herdominions, where thrives the righteous hatred of Philip and all theevil that he stands for, I shall find a welcome and a channel for theactivities that are to show him that Antonio Perez lives. I have senthim word that when he is weary of the conflict he can signify hissurrender by delivering from their prison my wife and children, uponwhom he seeks still to visit some of the vengeance I have succeeded ineluding. When he does that, then will I hold my hand. But not before.

  "That, madame, is my story," said Don Antonio, after a pause, and fromnarrowing eyes looked at the beauty who had heard him through.

  Daylight had faded whilst the tale was telling. Night was come, andlights had long since been fetched, the curtains drawn over the longwindows that looked out across the parkland to the river.

  Twice only had he paused in all that narrative. Once when he haddescribed the avowal of his love for Anne, Princess of Eboli, when aburst of sobs from her had come to interrupt him; again when a curiousbird-note had rung out upon the gathering dusk. Then he stopped tolisten.

  "Curious that," he had said--"an eagle's cry. I have not heard it thesemany months, not since I left the hills of Aragon."

  Thereafter he had continued to the end.

  Considering her now, his glance inscrutable, he said:

  "You weep, madame. Tell me, what is it that has moved you--thecontemplation of my sufferings, or of your own duplicity?"

  She started up, very white, her eyes scared.

  "I do not understand you. What do you mean, sir?"

  "I mean, madame, that God did not give you so much beauty that youshould use it in the decoying of an unfortunate, that you should hire itat an assassin's fee to serve the crapulous King of Spain."

  He rose and towered before her, a figure at once of anger, dignity, andsome compassion.

  "So much ardour from youth and beauty to age and infirmity was in itselfsuspicious. The Catholic King has the guile of Satan, I remembered. Iwondered, and hoped my suspicions might be unfounded. Yet prudence mademe test them, that the danger, if it existed, should manifest itself andbe destroyed. So I came to tell you all my story, so that if you did thething I feared, you might come to the knowledge of precisely what it wasyou did. I have learnt whilst here that what I suspected is--alas! quitetrue. You were a lure, a decoy sent to work my ruin, to draw me intoa trap where daggers waited for me. Why did you do this? What was thebribe that could corrupt you, lovely lady?"

  Sobs shook her. Her will gave way before his melancholy sternness.

  "I do not know by what wizardry you have discovered it!" she cried."It was true; but it is true no longer. I knew not what I did. By thatwindow, across the meadows, you can reach the river in safety." Sherose, controlling her emotion that she might instruct him. "They waitfor you in the enclosed garden."

  He smiled wistfully.

  "They waited, madame. They wait no longer, unless it be for death. Thateagle's cry, thrice repeated, was the signal from my faithful Gil, notonly that the trap was discovered, but that those who baited it weretaken. Suspecting what I did, I took my measures ere I came. AntonioPerez, as I have told you, is not an easy man to murder. Unlike Philip,I do not make war on women, and I have no reckoning to present to you.But I am curious, madame, to know what led you to this baseness."

  "I--I thought you evil, and--and they bribed me. I was offered tenthousand ducats for your head. We are very poor, we Chantenacs, and soI fell. But, sir--sir"--she was on her knees to him now, and she hadcaught his hand in hers--"poor as I am, all that I have is yours to dowith as you will, to help to avenge yourself upon that Spanish monster.Take what you will. Take all I have."

  His smile grew gentler. Gently he raised her.

  "Madame," he said, "I am myself a sinner, as I have shown you, a manunequal to resisting temptation when it took me in its trammels. Of allthat you offer, I will take only the right to this kiss."

  And bending, he bore her hand to his lips.

  Then he went out to join Gil and his men, who waited in the courtyard,guarding three prisoners they had taken.

  Perez considered them by the light of the lantern that Gil held aloftfor him.

  "One of you," he announced, "shall return to Castile and give tidings toPhilip, his master, that Antonio Perez leaves for England and the Courtof Elizabeth, to aid her, by his knowledge of the affairs of Spain, inher measures against the Catholic King, and to continue his holy work,which is to make the name of Philip II stink in the nostrils of allhonest men. One of you I will spare for that purpose. You shall drawlots for it in the morning. The other two must hang."