“I stole the old count’s son. The child wept and clung to me. Why should I pity him? They had shown her no mercy. Here with him I came--a fire blazing as when my mother died. I closed my angry eyes, raised high the child above my head, and dashed it screaming on the burning embers. Then, looking forth again, I saw--I saw--the count’s own child still living.” “Then thou hadst destroyed--” “My son--my own dear son.” And she grovelled on the ground, hiding her face with her hands. “Then am not _I_ thy son?” Suddenly she looked up fearfully. “Yes--yes, boy, thou art my son--my own dear son.” “And yet thou didst say--” “Ne’er heed what I say, son, for am I not sometimes daft? Thy mother--have I not been a tender mother to thee all thy life?” “There’s not a day that I recall when thou wast otherwise.” “Did I not save thy life, my son--my own dear son? When they said you lay dead on Pelilla’s field, did not I seek thee--find thee--cure thee? Thinkest thou I would do all that for the stranger?” “A noble wound! If, when Di Luna rushed upon me with his score of men, I fell--I fell as falls a soldier, mother.” “Di Luna! And so he rendered thee reward for the life thou gavest him, when he stood before thee in a duel, and was conquered. Thou shouldst love Di Luna, e’en as thy brother; Di Luna, whom thou, my son, hast spared.” And she laughed scornfully. “I may not know wherefore, but when my sword was pointed at him--when the next moment I should have slain him--some power held back my sword, and I heard whispered in mine ear the word, ‘Mercy!’” “But if again thou meetest him, thou dost promise to slay him--without mercy? Slay him,” she said again, as if to herself, and turned away without waiting for his reply. As she turned, a trumpet sounded near at hand. A herald appeared, and brought Maurico a scroll from the rebel chief, in whose ranks he and his people now fought. The stronghold, Castellor, had been wrested from the royalists, and Maurico was ordered to take its command. The scroll also incidentally mentioned that the Lady Leonora, believing in Maurico’s death in the late fight, was about to take the veil in a neighboring convent. The gipsey-mother saw him turn, and quickly fling his cloak about him, and place his helmet on his head. “Whither goest thou?” “To duty.” “I command thee, stay.” “But my _general_ commands me.” “And thy wound! thou must not leave me. It may open again; and if I am not near thee, son, thou mayst die; therefore thou shalt not go.” For answer, he wrapt his cloak more closely about him. She threatened him, but it was useless. Soon she was gazing after him as he wended his way down a mountain pass. * * * * * Go we now to the cloisters of the convent, where the luckless Lady Leonora was about to take the vows that were to separate her for ever from the world.