"And should they say—ah, dearest, how it pains me now to say it!—’Sarita ruined us, and then fled—for what?—to marry the man who ruined all by thwarting the one means that could alone have saved everything; by saving the usurper whose tyrant agents have wrought this havoc’? Can you save me from that!" "It is not you, but Quesada," I cried again. "I tell you, as I have told you again and again, all this was planned and in readiness. Do you think that this raid on Daroca, with all the special knowledge shown in it of the Carlist plans there, with all the wide and detailed arrangements for police and military movements, with its swift and dramatic action, was the work of a moment? And not in Daroca only, but in every centre where you were strong. In Saragossa, Alicante, right up the seaboard even to Barcelona, and inland to every spot where you were in strength, Sarita, listen to reason. You were but as a child in his strong, ruthless hands. It was his scheme to use you Carlists to get the King removed from his path, and then crush the life out of your whole Carlist movement, even as he is doing at this hour, that there might be none to stand between him and the power at which his ambition aimed. The plans were laid weeks and probably months ahead. His spies and agents have been everywhere, even in your midst, working, prying, scheming, and so getting together the information that has made this day’s work possible." "Then, if I have been the dupe, I must suffer the dupe’s fate. I cannot fly. No, no, Ferdinand," she cried with reviving energy. "Let us face the full truth. Our love must be strong enough to bear the strain of truth. Between us there stand two bars: my duty to my friends, and—I must say it, dearest—your act in rescuing the young King. Even if it be true that Quesada has aimed all through at our destruction, how can that make your act less a betrayal of us Carlists? He was in our power, you took him from us; what question of Quesada’s treachery can alter that fact, or wipe it away? Nothing. Nothing can alter it. Nothing could make me leave my people to be happy with you, with that fact between us. In truth, I am almost distracted when I think of it." "Will not your love lead you to pardon me and forget it?" "The woman in me throbs with desire to do so, but—I am a Carlist, too, dearest; and the Carlist in me can neither pardon nor forget. You break my heart by this pleading. Will you believe I can never alter, and speak no more of it? I do love you; the Holy Virgin knows that in my woman’s heart there is no room for thought of another man but you. Dearest, ever to be dearest to me, you believe this?" and she again put her arms about me, and lifted her face to mine. "I know it, Sarita," I answered, infinitely moved.