(Continued from page 21.) A lady attired as if just returned from a drive, entered | clude the affair before so potent a personage arrived on the apartment, followed by a number of attendants. I the scene-a dim inkling of the view she would be trebled my distance, already sufficiently respectful, from Doña Inez, towards whom the queen-regent advanced with a kind and familiar greeting; but my movement was not executed so quickly as to escape her majesty's glance of surprise, followed, I was sure, by the query, though I could not hear the words, of whom the remarkable figure in drab shorts, and gaiters of the same, might be. At the same moment, all the other eyes in the room, among which there were at least a dozen of the brightest in Spain, glittered with the same expression; while I, frightfully isolated in about the centre of the brilliant apartment, remained helplessly rooted where I stood the observed of all observers, and alternately a flame and an icicle, in a profuse heat or a cold perspiration. ten minutes, during which the queen and Doña Inez This purgatory lasted about conversed with great earnestness. waved forward by Doña Inez, and had the honor of I was at length replying to a number of questions by her majesty, who appeared to take a lively interest in the Alvarez-Gonsalvo business. A dismissing gesture being at last vouchsafed, I backed away, as I had seen a mantled and feathered Don do just before, and with, I flatter myself, much imitative celerity, till brought up with a bump by one of the marble columns, in the shadow of which I remained in some sort perdu till the audience terminated. likely to take of the plebeian alliance having at last dawned on their minds. Their plan, as detailed to me by Alfonso, was feasible and likely enough; and not later than the next day but one had, I found, been fixed upon for carrying it into execution. It was this: Luisa Alvarez had been for some years accustomed to make a votive journey to the church of the convent of Los Gozos de Neustra Señora, on the anniversary of, I believe, her reputed mother's death. This was the day fixed upon, as no impediment-although both the damsels were now closely confined and watched-would be offered to her purpose, Alvarez having incidentally asked her at what hour she intended setting out and returning. her return from the convent-for it seemed that it could clothes, and, thus disguised, leave the house; and on Katerina was to dress herself in Luisa's ing place on the Guadalquivir, by which she would be not be managed earlier-step on board a boat at a landconveyed across the water to the church of San Salvador, where the indissoluble knot would be immediately tied by a priest in waiting for the purpose. The conversation between Christina and Doña Inez quickly terminated after I was done with, and I heard the queen-regent say, on rising to go; will be the best, the most prudent course to take; and "That, I think, I will take care that the captain-general of Andalucia shall have orders to assist you to the utmost of his power." Her majesty and train then disappeared, and I was once more in close conference with Doña Inez. The conclusion came to, was, that I should set out the next day for Cadiz; and, on arriving there, inform Señor Manuel and his son that Lady Inez de Calderon would speedily follow, in order to the thorough investigation of the matter I had been deputed to lay before her; but I was not to say one word of the resemblance of Luïsa Alvarez to the portrait of the deceased Lady Constancia; it being of the utmost importance, in the opinion of Doña Inez, that no hint should reach Alvarez of the suspicion which that circumstance had engendered. On arriving at Cadiz, I found the Manuels in a state of high excitement. them that Katerina would never be Alfonso's wife, if Sure intelligence had reached many days were suffered to elapse without bringing about the accomplishment of that great fact; and my news, that the Lady Inez, armed with the full powers of the captain-general, would shortly arrive, greatly stimulated the eagerness of both father and son to con 24 even had I not been fettered by the promise insisted upon by the Lady Inez, I should not, I think, have I was a good deal startled by this bold project; but, hinted a word on the possibility of Katerina's turning out, after all, to be not a grandee of the first class, but well knew, have been to quench instantly Manuel senior's chivalrous enthusiasm in favor of the distressed simply Katerina Alvarez-the effect of which would, I over, suggested a doubt of the significance of the apand amply dowered damsel. Further reflection, moreparently careless question of Alvarez respecting his reputed daughter's journey. confederates were to carry her off, or if a darker purpose had been settled upon-for I was quite sure that If the intention of the Antonio de Gonsalvo knew, from the sight he had obtained of the picture in the palace at Madrid, which was the real Constancia-it would be much easier of accomplishment when she was away from home, and journeying by herself along the solitary road leading to the convent. for Luïsa would, of course, if successfully carried into effect, mar the design of the conspirators, whatever it The proposed substitution of Katerina might be: and thus, albeit it was quite possible that the wedding-project would be frustrated, a sufficient Inez and the interposition of the captain-general, who delay might occur to permit of the arrival of Doña matter. would, I nothing doubted, make short work of the I and I was instantly summoned to her presence. seized, and given over to the custody of the Lady Inez; Alvarez and Antonio de Gonsalvo, with the latter's two servants, were also to be secured and dispatched to Sevilla, separately imprisoned there, and kept so till the exact and entire truth with regard to the alleged Constancia had been extracted from them. All papers, or other articles of a promising or suggestive kind, in Alvarez's house, or on his or his friends' persons, were also to be seized and impounded for the same purpose, I was meditating whether it might not be as well to inform these peremptory personages of the little wedding underplot going on, when I was turned mentally topsy-turvy by the general's intimation, after a sentence or two in an undertone with Señora de Calderon, that I was in the category of persons to be provisionally impounded. This was, I felt, after what had passed, very scurvy treatment; and I was coming out strong in the flag-and-freedom line, when my indignant eloquence was cut short by the general's "Tut, tut, man; no insult or harm is intended you; and the moment the different parties are in custody, you shall be releasedwith thanks. Besides, you know the road and the fellows' persons, and can assist us in that way. Lieutenant Davila," he added, addressing an officer of lancers who entered the apartment in obedience to the summons of a hand-bell on the table, "take charge of this gentleman, and see that he is properly accommodated. He sets out with us in an hour from the present time." This was no doubt excessively annoying and impertinent; but as there was no help for it, I submitted, after the first ruffle of angry vexation had subsided, with tolerable cheerfulness to a restraint which, though quite real, was civilly enough enforced. Our party reached that evening about three leagues on the road to San Lucar; and at nine on the following morning we again set off, the captain-general and Señora Inez in a carriage, and I in the centre of the leading files of a company of lancers. As we approached the dwelling of Juan Alvarez, not a soul was to be seen in or about the house or grounds till the rattling cortege halted and drew up before the outer gate, when Pedro's wonder-widened mouth and eyes greeted us from a lower window. No ceremony was used. Señora de Calderon and the general quickly alighted from the carriage, and, preceded by an officer and a couple of privates, entered the house. I remained, with the bulk of the soldiers, just outside the door; and a very few moments passed before a loud, exultant, yet agitated scream proclaimed to me that the Lady Inez had found and recognized a niece in the breathing, glowing incarnation of the picture I had seen at Madrid. It was not long before I was sent for, and found the bewildered, blushing, weeping, half-terrified girl entwined in her aunt's arms, who was perusing Luisa's handsome features with an intensity of love and grief that spoke eloquently for the tenacity of affection she had cherished for the memory of her long since deceased sister. Pedro had been caught, and was brought in at the same time; and he explained the cause of the absence of Katerina, and conjecturally that of Juan Alvarez. Katerina, habited as Luïsa Alvarez, had set out about two hours previously for the convent, and Juan Alvarez had followed by the same road about one hour afterwards, accompanied by the Señor de 'Gonsalvo. The two servants, Pedro had not seen all day. As it was of the first importance that Juan Alvarez and his confederate should be captured without delay, Lieutenant Davila was ordered off with a party of the lancers for that purpose, accompanied and guided by myself and Pedro; Señora de Calderon, Luïsa, the general, and remainder of the troop, setting off forthwith, as evening was fast approaching, on the road to Sevilla. Half an hour's smart trot brought us to a turn in the route, from which the east bank of the Guadalquivir and the road along it could be seen for a considerable distance. This was the way Katerina was to come; and we moved on more slowly and cautiously, keeping as much as possible within the shadow of the wood on our left. Presently, one of the men who rode with Pedro in advance, reined up, and pointed with his lance to the figures of two men on horseback, partially disclosed through the openings of the trees behind which they stood, intently watching, it was manifest, the path along the river from the convent. They were Juan Alvarez and Señor de Gonsalvo: there could be no doubt of that; but as they appeared well mounted, the lieutenant, instead of dashing forward into the open space which intervened between us and them, resolved upon the safer plan of making a considerable circuit, and coming upon them unawares from the rear. This movement occupied perhaps ten minutes; but almost immediately on our coming again in view of the two horsemen, they started off at a gallop towards the riverbank, just about there high, rocky, and steep. We also spurred swiftly but quietly on, the soft turf deadening the sound of the horses' hoofs, and permitting us, unfortunately, as it proved, to near them unobserved. We were quickly aware of the motive of this sudden movement. Katerina, habited in the dress-a peculiar one as to make and color-usually worn by Luïsa, had reached a part of the high, rocky bank, within, I judged, about fifty yards of the ordinary landing-place, and was waving a handkerchief and making eager gestures river-ward, Alvarez and Gonsalvo vehemently shouting to her the while. They had approached within a short distance, when an answering cry was heard from the river, and Katerina, with her back to the pursuers, began to descend slowly the bank on the other side. Another minute or two, and she must have been safe in the boat which had arrived so opportunely; and the certainty that she would be so, no doubt determined Señor Gonsalvo to prevent her escape by any crime and at all hazards. Sharply reining up, and snatching a long cavalry-pistol from its holster, he, with at least the tacit consent of Alvarez, who rode close by his side, and might easily have struck his arm up had he so willed, levelled a pistol, fired-the explosion, and a piteous scream from the unfortunate girl as she toppled over the crag into the river, mingling with the fierce execrations of myself and the greater part of the soldiers with whom I rode, who were by this time close upon them. They turned, panic-stricken at the 26 sound, and although taken at such disadvantage, made | had made any revelation beyond a declaration by a desperate effort to escape. A sergeant and three Alvarez that the fatal shot was fired without his men were briefly bidden to ascertain the young woman's consent, and appealing with well-simulated pathos to fate, whom I should have accompanied but for a for- all men who were fathers on the impossibility of the bidding gesture of the lieutenant's; and we started in crime with which he was charged. The examining headlong chase. that it was Katerina, not Luïsa, he had been accessory judge had then been careful to conceal from him as yet to the destruction of, reserving that, I concluded, for a sudden blow at a later and more suitable part of the process; and it was in order, no doubt, that the effect of the announcement, which I very well understood, might elicit an involuntary confession of great importance for the determination of the legal claims of the Señora de Calderon's niece, should not be marred in consequence of its prematurely coming to his knowledge, that I and others likely to speak of the change of dress and persons on that unhappy afternoon, had been temporarily secured and silenced. At the distance of about four miles from the scene Sevilla. We reached Sevilla on the third day of the journey. The captain-general, whom we found there, was pleased to express a polite regret for the unpleasant duress I had been subject to, excusing it, however, on the plea of necessity; pleasantly adding, that in the interest of justice it was necessary that I should remain for some time longer under the surveillance of Lieutenant Davila, who would treat with every civility and consideration consistent with not permitting me, on any pretence, to communicate, even by letter, with a living soul. This cool insolence was really unbearable, and I flamed away at a great rate till I was out of breath-to all which the sole reply vouchsafed was, that the instant the trial of Alvarez and his confederate for the murder of the young woman by the Guadalquivir, for which my evidence was required, had concluded, I should be set at liberty! The sergeant of lancers and his men-Lieutenant Davila had informed me, previous to this interview-were arrived, and had reported that the assassin's bullet had pierced the brain of the unfortunate girl, and that death had consequently been instantaneous. me alone that the high and mighty captain-general It was not treated in this infamous manner. lieutenant, two or three days subsequently, informed me Señor Manuel-the -having arrived in Sevilla in obedience to the general's summons, bringing with him some letters that were wanted, was arrested the moment he entered the city, and, to his infinite surprise and indignation, placed in solitary confinement, which he was rendering incessantly vocal by ejaculations to all the saints in the calendar-San Jago, in particular-touching the astounding treatment to which he, a loyal and wealthy Spaniard, was so incomprehensibly exposed. His expostulations, like my own, were only laughed at, and we perforce waited for such explanations as time might bring of the extraordinary treatment to which we were condemned. It was not long before I pretty well guessed the motives of all this precautionary rigor. Neither of the prisoners, I heard from the lieutenant, who was tolerably communicative in some respects, investigation going forward was, but in a very inferior It was soon quite plain to me, that the object of the murderers, even as regards the officials, high and low, of the Sevilla Chancellaria. The chief aim manifestly degree, the conviction and punishment of Katerina's was to obtain judicial proof that Luïsa was the legitimate Gonsalvo heiress, and this purpose was, I must say, worked out with equal skill, audacity, and perseto the shooting by the Guadalquivir, but with elaboverance. They examined me very slightly with respect rate minuteness as to the conversations I had with Alvarez relative to the Señor de Gonsalvo, with a view, it seemed, to show the animus of the confederates. Josè Perez was brought from Madrid for the same purpose, and deposed to the conversation on the Puerta del Sol, already given. forms having been gone through, the trial of the prisoners was about really to commence, and that myself At last I was informed that most of the preliminary and other witnesses would be present to hear our evidence read over, that it might be confirmed in the presence of the accused. The Hall of Justice at Sevilla is, or was, a large and placed at a baize-covered railing, and the question- raised and pointing upwards, that we had spoken the | so white, rigid, motionless, were his aspect and posture. truth as in the presence of God and his saints. Antonio de Gonsalvo was the first interrogated. He answered in substance, that the pistol had gone off unintentionally; that he had merely meant to frighten the girl; and no one could more lament the fatal result than he did a result in which he could have no sinister interest whatever. "Had it been the young person known as Katerina, who, it was asserted, had claims, whether ill or well-founded was another matter, to the Gonsalvo estates and honors, there might have been some color for the heinous but utterly unfounded | crime; but, under the actual circumstances, none whatever existed." A meaning smile glanced, as the accused spoke, towards the Lady Inez and the captain-general, from the president-judge, but no commentary in words followed the coolly audacious statement. I glanced towards De Gonsalvo. He also was strongly agitated, but in a much less degree of course, and was wiping his clammy forehead with a handkerchief. At last he said, after three or four efforts which had died upon his parched and twitching lips: "It is a trick, Juan-a trick, be assured!" Alvarez heard him, turned slowly round, and fixed his burning eyes for a few moments upon De Gonsalvo's face, then closed them, and pressed the palms of his hands forcibly over the lids, as if to calm himself, and rally his bewildered faculties by the extrusion of exterior objects. "You know your daughter's writing?" said the president, after á lengthened and unbroken silence. De Gonsalvo, I should state, had been removed, in obedience to a sign from the judge. The question was repeated three times without eliciting an answer. At last an attendant alguazil shook the prisoner roughly by the arm, and repeated it in a harsh, menacing tone. "Yes-yes," Alvarez slowly said: "I do." "Then read this letter, and convince yourself of the truth of what you have just heard." A letter-one from Katerina to Alfonso Manuel, detailing the scheme arranged with Luïsa for a change of dresses—was handed across the court, and placed in the accused's hands. He glanced at the lines, shudder It was soon Juan Alvarez's turn, and after much inconsequent interrogatory, to which he mainly replied -exhibiting all the while an affectation of intense grief --that whether the pistol was discharged by accident, as he believed, or by design, he, Juan Alvarez, was entirely innocent thereof; his whole purpose in gallop- | ing towards his daughter (whose strange position and action, in making signals to somebody on the river, he had, from accidentally passing that way, beheld with astonishment) being to inquire the meaning of such conduct the real business of the audencia commenced.ed, the paper dropped from his nerveless grasp to the "The time is at length arrived, Juan Alvarez and Antonio de Gonsalvo," said the presiding magistrate with grave solemnity, "when it is necessary that I should inform you both, that we are aware of a circumstance which entirely destroys the very slight plausibility of your statements. You, Alvarez, attempted to substitute your own child for the one placed in your charge "Ha!" 66 Ay, now, that is a natural movement and expression. This cheat Antonio de Gonsalvo discovered, taxed you with, and finding further deception vain so far as he was concerned, you agreed with him to confine Luisa in some remote place, by virtue of your usurped authority of father; or—and this, from what subsequently passed, has a more horrible likelihoodyou finally, perhaps reluctantly, consented to a darker "Never, never! I swear by the holy saints!" exclaimed Alvarez, whose features, like those of De Gonsalvo, were changing to the hue of ashes. "Never, I swear!" "Listen, unhappy man. I have another and much more terrible revelation to make: she whom you met, at whose life your confederate in crime levelled his murderous pistol-with your consent, I can hardly doubt was in very truth your own child, Katerina, who " A wild frenzied cry from Alvarez interrupted the magistrate. But for the flashing eyes, from which lightning had seemed to leap as the president's words fell in thunder upon his brain, one might have thought the wretched man had been suddenly changed to stone, floor, and he said faintly: "I know the character. It is Ka- hers. Read for me: my eyes dazzle." His request was complied with. During the reading, it would have seemed, from the long-drawn, agonizing groan which accompanied it, that a sword was passing slowly through the body of the writhing wretched man, whose head had sunk down upon the railing in his front. There was another long oppressive pause, terminated by the president saying: "I will remove any doubt that may yet linger in your mind. If the project mentioned in the letter had not been persisted in, you would have met Luïsa, as you believed you did, instead of Katerina. Let the former lady be brought in," he added with a sign to an attendant, "and confronted with the prisoner. Now, Juan Alvarez, look up, and disbelieve if you can the evidence of your own senses." As the president's voice ceased, and amidst a breathless stillness, the prisoner's head was gradually raised and directed towards that part of the hall where the swinging of a door and the shuffling of feet announced the entrance of the new-comer. A renewal, but much weaker, of the terrible cry which the first intimation of the truth had wrung from Alvarez, proclaimed his recognition of the supposedly slain Luïsa. It was followed by a convulsive but vain effort at articulate speech, and the next moment he had fallen across the railing without sense or motion. The sitting of the tribunal was immediately suspended, and the prisoner removed, and a buzz of excitement pervaded the auditory for perhaps half an hour, when the president resumed his seat, and the murmuring hum of voices subsided once more into profound |