again if I had it to lose instead of having thrown it away.  And God knows, too, that for what I have done, be it good or bad, I will bear whatsoever your Majesty shall choose to say to me alone in the way of reproach.  But as I am a dying man I will not forgive that scribbler there for having seen a Spanish gentleman’s honour torn to rags, and an old soldier’s last humiliation, and I pray Heaven with my dying breath, that he may some day be tormented as he has seen me tormented, and worse, till he shall cry out for mercy—­as I will not!”

The cruelly injured man’s prayer was answered eight years from that day, and even now Perez turned slowly pale as he heard the words, for they were spoken with all the vehemence of a dying man’s curse.  But Philip was unmoved.  He was probably not making Mendoza suffer merely for the pleasure of watching his pain, though others’ suffering seems always to have caused him a sort of morbid satisfaction.  What he desired most was to establish a logical reason for which Mendoza might have committed the crime, lest in the absence of sound evidence he himself should be suspected of having instigated it.  He had no intention whatever of allowing Mendoza to be subjected to torture during the trial that was to ensue.  On the contrary, he intended to prepare all the evidence for the judges and to prevent Mendoza from saying anything in self-defence.  To that end it was necessary that the facts elicited should be clearly connected from first cause to final effect, and by the skill of Antonio Perez in writing down only the words which contributed to that end, the King’s purpose was now accomplished.  He heard every word of Mendoza’s imprecation and thought it proper to rebuke him for speaking so freely.

“You forget yourself, sir,” he said coldly.  “Don Antonio Perez is my private Secretary, and you must respect him.  While you belonged to the court his position was higher and more important than your own; now that you stand convicted of an outrageous murder in cold blood, you need not forget that he is an innocent man.  I have done, Mendoza.  You will not see me again, for you will be kept in confinement until your trial, which can only have one issue.  Come here.”

He sat upright in his chair and held out his hand, while Mendoza approached with unsteady steps, and knelt upon one knee, as was the custom.

“I am not unforgiving,” said the King.  “Forgiveness is a very beautiful Christian virtue, which we are taught to exercise from our earliest childhood.  You have cut off my dearly loved brother in the flower of his youth, but you shall not die believing that I bear you any malice.  So far as I am able, I freely forgive you for what you have done, and in token I give you my hand, that you may have that comfort at the last.”