Faustine She, whom you have so cruelly insulted, will now reveal herself to you. A terrible disaster threatens you. Sarpi has persistently worked against you and in doing so has carried out the orders of an irresistible power, and this banquet will be for you, unless I intervene, the scene of a Judas' kiss. I have been told, in confidence, that on your departure from this house, perhaps without these very walls, you will be arrested, flung into prison, and your trial will begin--never to end. Is it possible that you can put into proper condition in one night the vessel which otherwise will be forfeited to you? As regards your work, you know how impossible it is to begin it over again. I wish to save you, you and your glory, you and your fortune. Fontanares You save me? And how? Faustine Avalores has placed at my disposal one of his ships, Monipodio has given me his best smugglers for a cruise; let us start for Venice. The republic will make you a patrician and will give you ten times as much gold as Spain has promised. (Aside) Why is it they do not arrive? Fontanares And what of Marie? If we are to take her with us, I will believe in you. Faustine Your thoughts are of her at the very moment when the choice between life and death is to be made. If you delay, we may be lost. Fontanares We? Senora? SCENE FOURTEENTH The same persons. Guards rush in at every door. A magistrate appears. Sarpi. Sarpi Do your duty! The Magistrate (to Fontanares) In the name of the king, I arrest you. Fontanares The hour of death has come at last! Yet happily I carry my secret with me to God, and love shall be my winding sheet. SCENE FIFTEENTH The same persons, Marie and Lothundiaz. Marie I was not, then, deceived; you have fallen into the hands of your enemies! And what is left to me, dearest Alfonso, but to die for you --and yet, by what a frightful death! O beloved! Heaven is jealous of a perfect love, and thus would teach us by those cruel disasters, which we call the chances of life, that there is no true happiness save in the presence of God. What! You here? Sarpi Senorita! Lothundiaz My daughter! Marie For one moment you have left me free, for the last time in my life! I shall keep my promise, you must not be unfaithful to yours. O sublime discoverer, you will have to discharge the obligations that belong to greatness, and to fight the battle of your lawful ambition! This struggle will be the great interest of your life; while the Countess Sarpi will die by inches and in obscurity, imprisoned in the four walls of her house. And now let me remind you, father, and you, count, that it was clearly agreed, as the condition of my obedience, that Senor Fontanares should be granted by the viceroy of Catalonia a further extension of time, for the completion of his experiment. Fontanares Marie, how can I live without you? Marie How could you live in the hands of your executioner?