Montezuma’s Daughter by H. Rider Haggard

‘Andres de Fonseca was buried to-day,’ I answered. ‘I was his assistant in his business and am his heir. If I can serve you in any way I am at your disposal.’

‘You are young–very young,’ she murmured confusedly, ‘and the matter is terrible and urgent. How can I trust you?’

‘It is for you to judge, senora.’

She thought a while, then drew off her cloak, displaying the robes of a nun.

‘Listen,’ she said. ‘I must do many a penance for this night’s work, and very hardly have I won leave to come hither upon an errand of mercy. Now I cannot go back empty-handed, so I must trust you. But first swear by thine blessed Mother of God that you will not betray me.’

‘I give you my word,’ I answered; ‘if that is not enough, let us end this talk.’

‘Do not be angry with me,’ she pleaded; ‘I have not left my convent walls for many years and I am distraught with grief. I seek a poison of the deadliest. I will pay well for it.’

‘I am not the tool of murderers,’ I answered. ‘For what purpose do you wish the poison?’

‘Oh! I must tell you–yet how can I? In our convent there dies to- night a woman young and fair, almost a girl indeed, who has broken the vows she took. She dies to-night with her babe–thus, oh God, thus! by being built alive into the foundations of the house she has disgraced. It is the judgment that has been passed upon her, judgment without forgiveness or reprieve. I am the abbess of this convent–ask not its name or mine–and I love this sinner as though she were my daughter. I have obtained this much of mercy for her because of my faithful services to the church and by secret influence, that when I give her the cup of water before the work is done, I may mix poison with it and touch the lips of the babe with poison, so that their end is swift. I may do this and yet have no sin upon my soul. I have my pardon under seal. Help me then to be an innocent murderess, and to save this sinner from her last agonies on earth.’

I cannot set down the feelings with which I listened to this tale of horror, for words could not carry them. I stood aghast seeking an answer, and a dreadful thought entered my mind.

‘Is this woman named Isabella de Siguenza?’ I asked.

‘That name was hers in the world,’ she answered, ‘though how you know it I cannot guess.’

‘We know many things in this house, mother. Say now, can this Isabella be saved by money or by interest?’

‘It is impossible; her sentence has been confirmed by the Tribunal of Mercy. She must die and within two hours. Will you not give the poison?’

‘I cannot give it unless I know its purpose, mother. This may be a barren tale, and the medicine might be used in such a fashion that I should fall beneath the law. At one price only can I give it, and it is that I am there to see it used.’

She thought a while and answered: ‘It may be done, for as it chances the wording of my absolution will cover it. But you must come cowled as a priest, that those who carry out the sentence may know nothing. Still others will know and I warn you that should you speak of the matter you yourself will meet with misfortune. The Church avenges itself on those who betray its secrets, senor.’

‘As one day its secrets will avenge themselves upon the Church,’ I answered bitterly. ‘And now let me seek a fitting drug–one that is swift, yet not too swift, lest your hounds should see themselves baffled of the prey before all their devilry is done. Here is something that will do the work,’ and I held up a phial that I drew from a case of such medicines. Come, veil yourself, mother, and let us be gone upon this “errand of mercy.”‘

She obeyed, and presently we left the house and walked away swiftly through the crowded streets till we came to the ancient part of the city along the river’s edge. Here the woman led me to a wharf where a boat was in waiting for her. We entered it, and were rowed for a mile or more up the stream till the boat halted at a landing- place beneath a high wall. Leaving it, we came to a door in the wall on which my companion knocked thrice. Presently a shutter in the woodwork was drawn, and a white face peeped through the grating and spoke. My companion answered in a low voice, and after some delay the door was opened, and I found myself in a large walled garden planted with orange trees. Then the abbess spoke to me.