Part 7

"The Basha is the governor's prisoner." But the strokes which were levelled at Ripperda's breast were sheathed in his son's. Before the Spaniards could check their arms, he was cut through the shoulder and stabbed in his side; but the men recoiled on finding they had wounded their leader; and in the instant, Sidi Ali mounting the height with a fresh horde of triumphant Moors, they surrounded Aben Humeya, believing the day won. But as Ali's hand planted the Ottoman standard amidst the still grappling of foe to foe, and the anathemas of the Christian against the ferocious curses of the Moor, the clouds of smoke rolled away from the eastern point of the rampart, and the golden head of the sun peered from the horizon. Its first ray shot direct upon the radiant crest of Aben Humeya, and a rifle took aim. The ball struck; and, in spite of a momentary exertion in its victim to spring forward, he staggered and fell into the arms of his followers.

A woeful yell announced to the legions below, that some direful disaster had happened. The cry was echoed from rank to rank with shrieks and howlings; and a single blast of a trumpet immediately succeeded. The breach was abandoned, as if by enchantment. The firing sunk at once into a dead calm; and the flight of the Moors through the yet hovering smoke, sounded in the darkness like the wings of many birds brushing the sands before the sweep of some coming storm.

CHAP. IX.

The Queen's cabinet at Seville was employed on many projects besides that of sealing the union between Portugal and Spain. The venerable Grimaldo was just dead; and the affairs of state falling entirely into the management of the Marquis de Castellor and the Count de Paz, she affected a warm interest in the former, though she detested him in her heart, not only as the most successful rival of her regretted Ripperda, but because his talents were equal to his ambition. And what was more provoking to a despotic woman, he made her feel that he could maintain his ground by the same surreptitious art he had obtained it.

The Count de Paz was a man of a different complexion. Covetousness, and an abject dependent on individual favour, tethered his vain-glorious spirit to a boundary he panted to overleap, but everlastingly found it a limit he could not pass. This man, Isabella used as her instrument, and by his connivance, admitted a third person to their private councils, who commanded him with the invincible power of a superior demon.

In obedience to the Queen, and this her secret counsellor, he was to influence the Marquis de Castellor to extort an act of aggression from the French arms against the German Emperor.

Since the public betrothment of Maria Theresa to the Prince of Lorraine, Isabella had become reconciled to Louis the Fifteenth; and she now wanted to attack the grasping power of the rival Empire, by a concerted act of open hostility. France was to invade Austria on the side of Germany; while Spain, in consequence of the death of the Duke of Parma, should resist the pretensions of the Emperor to that dutchy; and, in support of the rights of Prince Carlos, (the late Duke's kinsman, and Isabella's son,) overrun that part of Italy with Spanish troops.

Her secret counsellor had already moved the cardinal minister of the French King to thwart the establishment of the pragmatic sanction; and through the Queen of Spain and De Paz, he had drawn from the treasury of Philip a large subsidy to support the pretensions of Bavaria.

On the open rupture between Isabella and the Empress, the former was not long at a loss how to revenge herself on the wide ambition of her rival. Her midnight familiar whispered the means. He told her that Gibraltar was not more the fortress of England than of Austria. Whoever possessed that rock, commanded the Mediterranean, and bound all on its banks to his feet. The interest of Austria and the House of Brunswick were now the same. He therefore exhorted her to categorically demand Gibraltar of the King of England; and to make her husband and his council, see the wisdom of considering him the King of England who would restore that gem to the Spanish crown.

One of the last acts of George the First was to reject this demand with a positive refusal; and the following evening saw a tall, dark man, of a noble mien, pass into the private cabinet of the King of Spain. They were alone together for some time; and then the Queen and the two ministers of state being introduced, a paper was signed in their presence by Philip and the stranger, and the royal seals of Spain and of Great Britain solemnly affixed to the deed.

Santa Cruz met this personage as he withdrew through the vestibule of the King's apartment. He knew him, and stood with his hat in his hand till he passed.

"Do not repeat what you have seen," whispered Isabella, who found the Marquis gazing after him; "but now you read my riddle. A few months may see you governor of Gibraltar!"

"The trenches of San Roque must first be opened in England!" replied he, answering her gay smile with unusual gravity.

"No," was her reply; "there we spring a mine; and the best engineer in Christendom has his hand on the match."

Santa Cruz understood enough of her meaning, not to make a second observation in so public a passage; and bowing to her beckoning finger, he followed her into her apartment.

He held in his hand the first official dispatches from Ceuta. The last had not arrived. But the fugitive merchants from Larach were then in the palace, with their calamitous account of the fall of that fortress.

The Queen was enraged at these determined acts of hostility in the man to whom she had condescended to humble herself as a suppliant; and vehemently arraigning the insolence that durst disdain her returning favour, she preceded Santa Cruz to the chamber of her royal husband.

On the King's being told the fate of Larach; and learning, by the discomfiture of Don Joseph de Penil, how nearly Ceuta had shared the same disaster, he issued his orders that the troops just called off from the lines of San Roque, should be employed without delay in a final vindication of the Christian name in the plains of Barbary.

These forces had been intended by Isabella and her secret counsellor, to make a descent on the British shore; and there, as Santa Cruz had guessed, assert the rights of him who had purchased the support of Philip by a written pledge for the restitution of Gibraltar. But at this moment resentment obliterated every promise; and, in the rage of revenge against the man who had disdained her, more as a woman than a queen, she at once announced to her husband, that it was his own rebellious subject, the Duke de Ripperda, who, under the assumed name of Aben Humeya, but as a real apostate and a traitor, waged war in Africa against his King and his God.

Philip's amazement was creditable to his heart; and, when unquestionably convinced, his indignation against the Duke's irreligion superseded the expected resentment for his rebellion. He summoned his council; and in full assembly of the ministers and grandees, degraded the Duke de Ripperda from all his honours, hereditary and by creation; confiscated his estates; and ordered the arms of his family to be obliterated from the Spanish college of arms.

With the feelings of an ancient Spanish nobleman, Santa Cruz saw the rapidity of this act of disgrace. Not in consideration of the degraded Duke; for in becoming an infidel, he had sunk himself below the power of man to cast him lower; but compassion for his blameless and exemplary son, filled the heart of Santa Cruz with honourable sympathy.

The Queen turned on him at the moment, and observing the expression of his countenance, said with a taunting surprise;--

"Marquis, you pity this renegade!"

"Madam," replied he, "I respect the Marquis de Montemar."

Isabella drew towards the King.

"Your Majesty will grant an exception in behalf of that young man? He covered the retreat of de Penil into Ceuta, and merits some exemption from the universal stigma on his father."

"We may consider that hereafter," replied the King, "meanwhile let the edict be published."

The messenger from the surgeon at Ceuta, who dispatched him during the panic immediately succeeding the return of the unfortunate sortie, went direct to the Marquis Santa Cruz's house in Seville. The Marquis was from home, but the man delivered his credentials to the servants; and with the eagerness of a first bringer of news, gave an exaggerated account of the defeat of Don Joseph, the death of de Blas, and the wounded state of Don Ferdinand d'Osorio. He closed his report of the latter, by saying, he was rescued by the intrepid interference of the Marquis de Montemar, from sharing the fate of the governor; but as the Moorish sabres were generally venomed, little hope could be cherished of his ultimate recovery.

On Santa Cruz's return from the palace, he found his wife and daughter in speechless agony, listening to this narrative of despair. He sent the man from the room; and by reading the dispatch which the official messenger had brought, he succeeded in convincing them that the Moors did not poison their weapons, and that the life of his son was in no present danger. The Marchioness however, insisted on accompanying her husband to Ceuta; and Marcella, in a passion of tears, implored her father to permit her to be her mother's attendant.

Dreading that despairing love had precipitated the vehement nature of her brother, upon the swords of his enemies, Marcella now reproached herself for having so decisively, and therefore she thought cruelly, rejected his suit. In the paroxysm of her grief and her remorse, she threw herself at her father's feet; and to his astonishment, informed him of Ferdinand's love for the cousin of the Marquis de Montemar; declaring at the same time, her own resolution no longer to oppose his wishes of her passing her life a professed nun; provided her vows might be simply confined to celibacy, and a secluded state; and Ferdinand be allowed to marry the English lady. The Marquis was confounded, and looked at his wife.

"It is too true;" was her reply to his enquiring eyes; "Ferdinand loves Alice Coningsby; and my invaluable child would make herself the price of her brothers happiness."

"Marcella," replied Santa Cruz, turning with solemnity to his daughter; "this is not what I expected from you. You dishonour your father and your brother, by your petition. You may accompany your mother to his sick couch; and for the rest, should he recover, I hope he will find a fitter oblation to his blind passions, than a sister's and a parent's conscience."

Marcella rose humbled from her knees; and in speechless sorrow left the apartment. The Marquis looked after her and sighed; and the Marchioness taking his hand, pressed it to her lips, wet with her drowning tears, and exclaimed;--"Better that we had never met, than that the purest offspring of our heaven-sanctified union, should be consigned to a living tomb! Oh, Santa Cruz, why is she to be our victim!"

CHAP. X.

Santa Cruz did not wait for the tedious embarkation of the troops, now under orders for Africa; but set forward immediately, accompanied by his wife and daughter; who both assumed the privileged habits of _Sisters of Mercy_, in this their pilgrimage to a land of war and suffering.

When he arrived at Ceuta, he was ignorant of the attempt at storming the place. The courier with that intelligence, had been taken by an Algerine row-boat, and carried into Oran.

By this capture, Ripperda became acquainted with all that had passed in the rescued fortress; for the messenger was sent in irons to him: and the dastardly communicativeness of the man was too clear an interpreter of the brief account in the dispatches.

The Basha's wounds being aslant, and in the muscles of his breast, were slight and easy of cure; but that on his mind was not to be healed, when on awaking from his swoon, he found himself thrown across a camel, and in full retreat from the fortress he believed in his hands. He was no sooner within his own entrenchments, than both officers and men felt the weight of his disappointment. He summoned their several commanders into his pavilion, and accused them of cowardice, for having made so unnecessary, and therefore shameful a flight.

Adelmelek pleaded two reasons for this conduct. Their Basha's supposed mortal wound; and its befalling him in the moment of sun-rise, seemed so signal a judgement on the Moors for their breach of the prophet's ordinance, in pursuing the warfare into the sabbath morn, that with one consent they made the only expiation in their power, by abandoning the scene of their impiety.

Enraged at the subtlety of this apology, in which Ripperda saw that the jealousy of the Hadge was at the bottom of this retreat, he turned on him with derision, and bade him take that excuse to the Emperor, and see whether he most respected the enlargement of his empire, or the superstition of a coward.

"Aben Humeya," replied the Hadge, regarding him with equal scorn; "If I am to be your messenger, one truth at least you shall learn of me before I set out on my journey! It is impossible for a bad Christian to become a good Mussulman. Devout men are no changelings. He has little of the spirit of religion, who finds an insurmountable stumbling-block in any dispute about the letter; and in my opinion, the man who more than once alters his faith, may shew himself a consummate hypocrite, but he persuades no one to doubt the nothingness of his religion."

"Your head, proud bigot, shall answer for this insult!" exclaimed Ripperda, starting from the cushion on which he lay.

"The event of this siege," replied the Hadge, "will determine the fate of yours!" and with a threatening countenance, he left the apartment.

Nothing awed, by what he called this insolence in a man whose talents he despised, Ripperda was the more incited to shew his contempt of superstition; and the moment he withdrew, his reproaches to the officers were augmented in severity and reproof. He punished the soldiers in a more exemplary way; and published a proclamation, declaring that he would put to death any officer, let his rank be what it would, who should henceforth presume at any time to disobey his orders, or to desert his post on any pretence whatever. He finished by pronouncing himself, as the leader of the Mohammedan armies in Barbary, the best interpreter of the prophet's laws; and that while he bore the standard of Mecca, the sabbaths of Jews, Mussulmen, or Christians, should be alike free to the progress of his arms.

The rigor of these threats, and this last assertion, so contrary to the customs of their faith, filled the Moors with terror and amazement: but the full effects of the manifesto were to be seen hereafter.

While these punishments and intimidations were going on, the courier taken at Oran, was brought to the camp before Ceuta. The Basha was now convalescent; and while the reading of the dispatches inspired his coadjutor Sidi Ali, with renewed confidence in the reduction of the fortress, it doubly exasperated the passions of Ripperda, when he gathered from the report the dangerous state of his son.

The courier was commanded into his presence; and on examining him it was found that three parts of the garrison had fallen in the sortie and the defence of the town; that the Count de Blas was dead of his wounds; the commander, de Penil, incapable of service; and that the young Marquis de Montemar, whose gallant exertions filled so great a part in the dispatches, was in such extremity when the messenger came off, that it was impossible he could now be alive.

Ripperda was no stranger to the voice that rushed between him and his assailants in the breach; but it passed by him as the wind. Vengeance was then all that possessed his soul! But now that voice was hushed for ever. In his first field his son had perished,--and perished against whom?

He sprang on his feet as the horrible images pressed upon his brain. Regardless of who were present, he snatched up his sword:--

"I am alone!" cried he, "the last! the last! But I will yet uproot thee, murderous Spain, that dost thus riot in my vitals!"

The prisoner and the attendants all fled from before the terrible enunciation of his eyes. Sidi Ali alone had courage to remain and seize the aimless weapon.

"Aben Humeya!" said he, "what unmans you thus, before the eyes of slaves?"

"Were I less a man," cried Ripperda, turning his burning eye-balls upon him; "I could bear it. But now the curse has found me!"

CHAP. XI.

When Santa Cruz landed at Ceuta, he proceeded direct to the quarters of Don Joseph de Penil, and was told there of the attempt to storm the fortress, and its miraculous defence by the inexperienced but intrepid son of Ripperda. Don Joseph's wounds were in a mending state; and from him he learnt, that his son was also on the recovery; but less hopes durst be encouraged for the Marquis de Montemar.

"The worst wound is in his heart!" remarked Santa Cruz. For it could no longer be disguised from de Penil and the whole garrison, that Aben Humeya, the direful cause of all this bloodshed, was, though now an apostate and a rebel, once the great Duke de Ripperda, the universally honoured father of this noble young man!

His public attainder, and disgraced name at Seville, had made the circumstance known to all there; and the new army spread it at once through the lines of Ceuta.

But there was a kind hand which warded off a blow which might have been fatal to his blameless son. Don Ferdinand and Louis de Montemar lay in their wounds under the same roof; and by the same gentle ministry they were attended.

The Marchioness and her daughter found no difference in their hearts between the sufferers; for if the one had the claims of a brother and a son upon their tenderness, the other had purchased the life of that dear relative by the exposure of his own; and the bonds of gratitude were not less sacred than those of kindred.

Marcella sought to cheer her brother, by assuring him that her prejudices against a monastic life should no longer stand between him and his happiness, if that compliance with her father's wishes could obtain his consent to Ferdinand's union with the cousin of his friend. But she did not withhold from her brother, the Marquis's remark on the sacrifice she offered to make in his behalf.

"However," continued she, "our aunt, the abbess of the Ursalines, is too charitable to force my conscience to more than the vow and the seclusion; and I trust that Heaven will not see any crime in a Protestant nun, worshipping in spirit and in truth, by the side of sisters from whom the cloud of error has not yet been raised!"

Ferdinand gazed upon his sister while she spoke. Was the fabled Iphigenia of Tauris half so fair, or the virgin daughter of Jephthah so full of youthful loveliness, as she who now talked, with such sweet smiles, of immolating herself for him? She was indeed the victim, clad in the lilly and the rose; and the fragrance of the flowers, and the morning dew of their leaves, breathed and sparkled from her lips, as she pursued her disinterested theme. Bodily suffering, and hours of solitary reflection, had opened to Ferdinand a clear view of his former injustice in seeking happiness at the expence of his sister's liberty; and, abhorring such utter selfishness, he was ashamed to acknowledge its late power over him, even by disavowing its continuance; and with a deep blush, and deeper sigh, he pressed her hand without a word.

But in Marcella's separated heart, the vow of abjuration from the world was already registered. She had now but one duty;--to wait with her lamp trimmed, while she ministered to all who needed her deeds of charity; and, as a _Sister of Mercy_, whose garb she wore, she daily attended her mother to the couch of the preserver of her brother.

The Marchioness's eager disposition was always too hasty in imparting the evil as well as the good; and, therefore, her more considerate daughter implored her, and every body who entered the room of the Marquis de Montemar, not to breathe a word of the sentence which Philip had passed upon the name of his father. From an instinct in her own bosom, she knew that injuries are easier to be borne than disgrace; and she guarded every approach to his ear with the watchfulness of an attendant spirit.

As her own hand frequently administered the cordials to the silently-suffering patient, his eyes thanked her, though his lips seldom moved. His wounds were numerous and excruciating; and, from the opium his surgeons mixed with every potion, he was almost always in a seeming stupor. But neither his mental perceptions, nor the annotations of his heart shared the lulling faculty. His shrouded vision discerned the solicitude that hovered over him. He heard the tender voice that gave directions for his comfort; he felt the soft touch of the hand that smoothed his pillow; and his own spirit mingled in the prayer which the holy accents of Marcella murmured over his apparently unobserving form, when she gave place to the persons whose medical balsams were less healing than the balm of her presence alone.

"It is the presence of virtue!" said he to himself, "and that is the ministering angel of heaven."

Lorenzo had shared his master's dangers and his wounds, as he had shared his sorrows and his prison. He had followed him from rampart to rampart, stood by him on the breach; and sunk under the same sweep of balls which had levelled both to the earth. As soon as he was able to leave his chamber, he prevailed on his attendants to take him to that of his master; for he had been told of the news which had astonished the garrison;--that the exiled Ripperda was the man, who, under a Moorish name, now made Spain tremble; and that the impotent revenge of the Spanish court was to deprive him of a title he had already abandoned.

It was during the absence of the Marchioness and Marcella at matin prayers, that Lorenzo was borne to Louis's apartment. Ignorant that any thing which the whole garrison knew, could have been withheld from him who had most concern in it, Lorenzo, after his first felicitations on finding his master declared out of danger, began to accuse the Spanish government for not sparing the honours of Ripperda to the meritorious son, though it had found it necessary to withdraw them from the rebellion of the father. Louis started.--

"Explain yourself, Lorenzo."

Lorenzo was seized with a trembling that almost amounted to fainting, when he found that he had intimated what his master's friends had deemed it prudent to conceal. Louis regarded him with grateful pity, while he armed himself to hear whatever was then to be told.

"Do not hesitate to speak all you know," continued he; "I have suffered too much to shrink now. My heart has armour, Lorenzo, that the world guesses not."

Lorenzo burst into tears; but he instantly told him all. Louis pressed his hand; and, bidding him return to his room and take care of himself; the faithful creature, with a full heart, permitted the servants to carry him from the apartment; and when the door was closed on every body, Louis laid himself back upon his couch. That was his hour of agony; all that was yet within him of the world, mingled with the pang of filial anguish, and agitated his spirit even unto death.

Ferdinand came into the room, leaning on his sister; and taking his seat by the side of his friend's bed, gently touched him:--"Do you sleep, De Montemar?" said he. "Here is a fresh northern breeze in this sultry climate! Open your eyes and receive the genial visitant!"