 | II. Pelayo |  |
2. II.
It was late when Urraca awakened from her slumbers,
which had been sweeter and purer than, for a long
season before, she had ever known them. She started
with some surprise, and wondered to find Amri no
longer beside her. Her thoughts and her dreams—her
heart and its hopes, had been, and were still, so full of
his image, that it was now with a feeling of intense disappointment,
amounting to pain, that she discovered his
absence. But she was too well assured of the truth of
those pledges which he had just given her, and she
relied too confidently on his vows, to allow any disappointment
of this nature to affect her seriously or long.
She had realized, in the few preceding hours which have
been dwelt upon already, that sense of recovered peace,
and of new and reasonable hope, which must ever arise
to the abused and vicious spirit with every backward
it has so long wandered. With the resolve to lead a
purer life—to discard the ostentatious trappings, and to
reject the base allurements of that lustful self-abandonment
in which she still lived—came a feeling of quiet
peace, which had long been a stranger to her bosom.
She had learned to be weary of those false joys which
must ever end in weariness; and she was possessed
of a strength of determination and of spirit, not often
given to the debased, which supported her in the resolve
to retrace her steps, and recover whatever might remain
within her reach of the lost possessions of virtue.
The pure waters of health and untroubled joy seemed to
flow and well in the prospect which her fancy painted to
her eyes, and her heart glowed and her eye kindled
with the desire to obtain them, even as the weary and
thirsting pilgrim of the desert pants for the fountain
which gleams before his fancy in the distance, and toils
with new vigour for its attainment.
While Urraca looked around her, after her first feeling
of disappointment at the absence of Amri was over,
the person of Zitta appeared before her eyes, as she
emerged from a niche in the apartment which had
hitherto been concealed by a falling curtain.
“Zitta,” said Urraca to the woman, with a voice of
gentleness. She answered the call, and approached her
mistress; but the latter saw, at a glance, that she was
reluctant, and her looks bespoke more than ordinary
discomposure.
“Come to me, Zitta,” said Urraca—“tell me how
long is it since Amri went forth?”
“Since the first hour of day, my lady,” was the
answer of the slave, uttered readily enough, but without
any of that softening deference of tone and manner
which shows a good spirit moving the reply. At another
time such a response might have awakened the
anger of the mistress; but the returning virtue of her
subdue the quick and jealous pride of the irascible and
imperious temper.
“Said he aught to thee on going forth? Did he
not say when he would return? Left he no word with
thee for my ear?”
“None, my lady,” said the slave.
Urraca was silent for a few moments, and turned
away her eyes from the woman, who now proceeded to
her duties in the chamber. But it was not long before
Urraca again addressed her, which she did in the same
gentle and subdued tone which she employed before.
“Come closer to me, Zitta—I have something which
I would say to thee, and I feel too feeble to speak to
thee so far.”
The woman did as she was commanded, something
surprised at the singular change which seemed to have
come over her mistress, and which was shown as well
in the indulgent language which she employed as in
the soft, conciliating, and greatly altered tones of her
voice. Conscious as she was of her own evil design
upon the life of the person who addressed her, she approached
the couch to which she was bidden with a feeling
of apprehension, which showed itself in the sudden
paleness of her cheek and in the awkwardness of her
movement. But this, though observed by Urraca,
failed to arouse her anger or indignation, as had been
but too frequently the case before. The soothing
dreams which had been present to her mind, and the
hopes and thoughts with which she had dressed up the
promised life before her, seemed to have made her indulgent
in the extreme, and to have softened to meekness
a spirit only too easily aroused, and too stubborn
to be easily quelled or quieted. This very alteration in
her usual manner was of itself too surprising to Zitta
not to startle her, and in her guilty consciousness of
sort of terror.
“Sit on the couch, Zitta—thou dost not fear me?
Why dost thou tremble—what is it alarms thee? Can
it be that I have been so cruel a mistress to thee?
Wherefore thy apprehension—what is it that troubles
thee?”
“I—'tis nothing—a little sickness—I am not well,
my lady—I—” and the woman resorted to falsehood to
account for the singular emotion which she found herself
unable to conceal.
“Sick—I am sorry, Zitta—thy cheek affirms it—it
is very pale. Thou shouldst retire—thou shouldst have
rest a while; and I would despatch thee at once to thy
chamber, Zitta, but that I have something to unfold to
thee which I think will relieve thee of thy sickness.”
The surprise of the woman was duly increased by
these words, and her fears now amounted almost to
consternation. She stared, without ability to reply,
upon the face of Urraca, who, with a quiet smile upon
her lips as she witnessed the wonder of her servant,
thus continued her speech—
“You have a mother, Zitta—she is old?”
“Yes, my lady, she is very old.”
“You love her, Zitta?”
“Love her, my lady!”
“You do—you do,” said Urraca, hurriedly—“I know
you do—the question was most idle. Your mother—
you must love her. Where does she live now, Zitta?”
“At Merida, my lady.”
“Do you not wish to see her?”
“Much, my lady. I prayed thee more than once
for this privilege, my lady, which you denied me.”
“Did I deny you?—are you sure of that?”
“Most sure, my lady.”
“I do not think it. Yet it must have been,” she
said, musingly, and with a deep sigh: “my heart has
wonder I should deny thee to seek thy mother, Zitta,
when I fled so wickedly from my own.”
“You did deny me, my lady,” said the woman, studiously
repeating the words, as if to strengthen her own
resolve, for the unwonted gentleness of Urraca had also
had its effect in somewhat softening her. The strange
sense of her words, too, had greatly surprised and subdued
the slave.
“'Twas wrong in me to do so,” said Urraca: “and
you would like to see her again, Zitta—would you not
like to go to her, and live with her for ever? Say—
would you not?”
The person thus addressed did not answer this question;
but her eyes sank upon the floor, and her head
drooped, while her tremulousness returned with increasing
force, owing to the complexity of her emotions.
Her disquiet did not escape the searching eyes of her
mistress, who did not think proper farther to remark
upon it, as she ascribed it to any but the proper cause.
She again spoke to her, continuing the topic in part, and
her language was even gentler, and her manner kinder,
than before.
“Thou wouldst joy to leave me, Zitta, and to fly to
thy mother—thou wouldst joy to leave me, even hadst
thou no mother to fly to. I see it in thy face, my girl,
and I may not complain: I have been but a hard mistress
unto thee.”
“Oh, no, my lady—no!” was the response of the
slave, with something more of genuine earnestness than
she had hitherto shown, for the manner and self-accusing
language of Urraca had begun to touch her heart.
“Yes, Zitta, it is but too true. I have made thee
toil overmuch, nor have I often been heedful of thy
proper wants and thy passing wishes. I have sometimes
been careless of thy woman feelings, and thou
hast had claims which came with thy feelings, which, in
I have beaten thee with unjust blows when my
passions have been awakened, and not when thou hast
deserved them. Is not this true, Zitta, as I declare it?
Hast thou not accused me in thy heart of these things?”
“Oh, my lady—do not, I pray thee—thou dost thyself
great wrong,” said the slave, who began to be very
much moved, and could say nothing more than this in
reply. Her mistress continued—
“Though a slave, Zitta, the purchased creature of
my wealth, yet hadst thou thoughts and capacities which
fitted thee for a higher condition; and the toils and the
lot of the slave should fall only upon heads and understandings
which may not repine at tasks to which they
are fitted, but which are so greatly below thee. Thou
hast been improved by thy toils, however, and canst
now much better undertake thine own charge than when
I first took thee into my keeping—canst thou not?”
“Yes, my lady.”
“Thou wert poor then, and wretched. Dost thou
remember—it was thy own mother who sold thee in her
need?”
The woman looked down, but spoke not, yet her
tremulousness had utterly passed away.
“I taught thee what thou knowest—I made thee
what thou art. I fear me I have taught thee error, for
I showed it thee, and I practised it myself; but it was
in my ignorance of understanding—in my wilfulness of
heart—in my weakness of resolve, that I have done
this—that I have taught thee these lessons.”
The tears filled the eyes of Urraca as she spoke
these words, and Zitta became uneasy as she heard
them. She felt her own eyes tremble, and with this
consciousness, as if vexed that it should be so, she
placed her hand in her bosom, and felt the little parchment
which Amri had given her, containing the deadly
potion through which she was to obtain freedom from
and when she had done this, her eyes became dry, and
her heart grew hard and unyielding, and she heard the
mournful words, and looked upon the tearful cheeks of
her mistress with indifferent scornfulness: she thought
then only of herself.
Urraca, after the pause of a few moments, thus continued
to address her—
“I have been foolish for a long season, Zitta, and
many are the wrongs and errors which I have done and
committed in that time, which it is not in my power to
repair, and which I can only, with God's indulgence,
repent. Dost thou hear me, girl?”
The woman did not seem to hear or to heed, for her
eyes wandered away from the couch where her mistress
lay, and hence the concluding inquiry of the latter.
“Yes, my lady, I hear thee.”
Urraca proceeded—
“A change has come over me, Zitta—a happy
change; the blessed Mother of God has softened my
heart, and awakened my understanding to the knowledge
of what is good. Heretofore I have known but
little that was not evil. I have been walking blindly, but
without a consciousness of my blindness, plunging forward,
unseeing my path, with all the desperate audacity
of ignorance and sin. The scales are falling from
my vision; and though I have opened my eyes to behold
the depth of my bondage, I have opened them also to
see a little path yet left to me through which it is my
hope that I may make my way out. Dost thou not
rejoice with me, Zitta, at this prospect of my release—
of my freedom?”
The word “freedom” chilled the sympathies of the
slave, which the sweet appeal of her mistress had
begun somewhat to awaken and enkindle. She made
no answer to the inquiry. Urraca remarked her silence,
and simply placed one of her hands upon her wrist, as
shuddered and shrunk away from the touch, as if it had
been that of a glowing bar of fire.
“Why, Zitta, thou hatest me!” was the exclamation
of Urraca, greatly shocked at what she conceived to be
only an exhibition of disgust and hate. The woman
sought to remove the impression, which was, indeed, an
unjust one, by a denial couched in tones of proper
warmth and directness. It was, indeed, only because
her mistress had never before seemed in her eyes half
so deserving of her love as at this moment that she had
shrunk from contact with her hand, and sought to withdraw
her own. It was with a guilty consciousness, a
feeling of some self-rebuke, that she would have withdrawn
her criminal fingers from the touch of one upon
whose life, at that very moment, she meditated assault,
and against whom her thoughts and feelings were alike
hostile and malicious.
“Do not hate me, Zitta—I pray thee do not,” was
the imploring speech of her mistress—“do not think
ill of me because I have been and am ill, and because
thou hast seen so much that was evil in my doings and
my thoughts. For the scorn and the injustice which I
may have done thee, I pray thy forgiveness. Pardon
me my wrong to thee as thou wouldst have the Blessed
Mother intercede in thy behalf to the Father. For me,
Zitta, it is left only to repent where I may not repair,
and to repair where, perhaps, such is my sin, I may
not be suffered even to repent. I am making up my
accounts in my thought, and the table is black against
me. I have tried to review the claimants upon my
justice, and thy demands, Zitta, have not been forgotten.
I have set thee down even before many others;
and thou shalt not have reason to say, my girl, that I
have forgotten thee.”
“Oh, my lady,” exclaimed the slave, “wherefore
language—what does it mean, my lady?”
“A change possesses me, Zitta, which is almost as
strange to me as it now seems to you. My heart is
altered within me, and I tell thee that the light has
been let in, for the first time, upon my eyes. Either,
my girl, I am soon about to be made happy, and win the
peace and quiet I have sighed for, or I am about to die.”
“To die!” almost shrieked the affrighted slave.
“Yes—to die! Is death so terrible, Zitta? I do
not think it: I have sometimes thought of it as a blessing,
though now I do not, for I would live in Guadarrama
once more, and think I should be happy there. Hast
thou never thought of death—of thy death—of mine?”
“Me, my lady—thy death, my lady?” and the tones
of her voice were thick with horror and affright.
“Yes, Zitta, my death or thine. Little do we know
how soon we shall be called upon to leave the friends
and the blessings which are about us, and to go—we
know not where. It should be thy thought, my girl;
of late it has become mine; and with this thought,
Zitta, I would have thy forgiveness now, while I am
able to ask and thou to bestow it. Dost thou forgive
me for all the wrong I have done to thee?”
The woman trembled like an aspen—her frame
seemed convulsed by her emotions, and her head sank
down upon the couch, in the drapery of which her face
was buried. She could not answer.
“Well, well, thou wilt strive, Zitta—I know thou
wilt, and I will pray God to incline thee to grant the
prayer which I have made thee. Look up, my girl; I
will oppress thee no more with my sad talk; but I would
speak to thee of other matters.”
Zitta looked up as she was bidden, but her eyes
dared not encounter with those of her mistress, and her
features were wild with the singular doubts and apprehensions
in her soul.
“Hear me now,” said Urraca—“I have news for
thee which will surprise thee. I am at last resolved to
retire from Cordova.”
The woman started to her feet as she heard this
communication, but again quickly resumed her seat upon
the bedside, and said nothing. Urraca continued—
“In three days, Zitta, with the permission of Heaven,
I leave Cordova for the mountains of Guadarrama
—for peace and my native mountains I go, Zitta, there
to live the remainder of my days in a blessed quiet with
my own Amri.”
“With Amri!” said the woman, with unfeigned astonishment.
“Ay, with Amri! What is there strange in this?
Why dost thou start—why dost thou tremble, Zitta?”
“Tremble, my lady!”
“Yes, tremble. Thy lips are pale—”
“Leave Cordova, my lady!” said the woman, who
now recovered herself from the momentary and almost
overpowering astonishment which had seized upon her
—“leave Cordova!”
“Yes, for ever—and hope to leave behind me, Zitta,
the sorrows and the strife that I brought to Cordova and
found in it. Amri has sworn me his: he promises to
go with me to my old dwelling-place among the mountains
of Guadarrama; and there I hope to live in peace
and in truth for him only. I will be virtuous there—I
will break away from the shackles of sin—I will strive
for the peace I have lost, and, with Heaven's blessed
smile, I hope to be happy. Tell me, what dost thou
think of it, my girl?”
“Think, my lady—I know not what to think,” was
the response of the woman, with looks of most unfeigned
and dull astonishment.
“What dost thou feel—how does it please thee, Zitta?”
was the farther demand of Urraca.
“I do not know, my lady,” the woman rejoined.
“What! does it not rejoice thee?” asked Urraca,
who began to show some little impatience at the cold
and unmeaning countenance with which the slave had
received her intelligence.
“Rejoice me, my lady!” was the grave and gloomy
response of the person addressed—“why should it rejoice
me?—what does the slave Zitta know of Guadarrama—why
should she wish to leave Cordova?”
“True, Zitta—thou knowest but little of Guadarrama,
and the slave will not have need to rejoice with the
joys of the mistress whom she does not love: but
something thou knowest of Merida, and thy mother
there—”
“Oh, my lady—thou wilt not!” were the broken exclamations
of the woman, as she began to catch some
glimpses of the determination of her mistress.
“Will it not rejoice thee to go to thy mother? to
make her old age happy? to—”
“Thou wilt not say it, Urraca—mistress—no!” almost
screamed the bewildered woman.
“But I will! Thou art a slave no longer, Zitta—I
give thee freedom of the earth and of the air—of the
sun and of the sea—of the voice and of the hand—as
God gave it thee in his mercy, so I give it thee, Zitta,
having the will from God and the power from man to
do so. To-morrow shall the scribe be with me to put
my resolve on parchment; and in three days shalt thou
have the proof of thy freedom in thy bosom, with no let
to keep thee from thy mother. Leave me now.”
The woman sank down at the bedside in stupor and
silence, but she remained there a few moments only;
with a wild scream, mingled with broken words, in
which her mistress could only distinguish her own and
the name of Amri, the overpowered and guilty woman
rushed headlong from the chamber.
| II. Pelayo | |