How should I find him in this great city?  Doubtless, though I had not thought of it, de Garcia passed under some feigned name as he had done at Yarmouth.  It was bitter indeed to have been so near to vengeance and to have missed it.

By now I was at home and bethought me that I should do well to go to Fonseca, my master, and ask his help.  Hitherto I had said nothing of this matter to him, for I have always loved to keep my own counsel, and as yet I had not spoken of my past even to him.  Going to the room where he was accustomed to receive patients, I found he had retired to rest, leaving orders that I was not to awake him this night as he was weary.  So I bound up my hurt after a fashion and sought my bed also, very ill-satisfied with my fortune.

On the morrow I went to my master’s chamber where he still lay abed, having been seized by a sudden weakness that was the beginning of the illness which ended in his death.  As I mixed a draught for him he noticed that my shoulder was hurt and asked me what had happened.  This gave me my opportunity, which I was not slow to take.

‘Have you patience to listen to a story?’ I said, ’for I would seek your help.’

‘Ah!’ he answered, ’it is the old case, the physician cannot heal himself.  Speak on, nephew.’

Then I sat down by the bed and told him all, keeping nothing back.  I told him the history of my mother and my father’s courtship, of my own childhood, of the murder of my mother by de Garcia, and of the oath that I had sworn to be avenged upon him.  Lastly I told him of what had happened upon the previous night and how my enemy had evaded me.  All the while that I was speaking Fonseca, wrapped in a rich Moorish robe, sat up in the bed holding his knees beneath his chin, and watching my face with his keen eyes.  But he spoke no word and made no sign till I had finished the tale.

‘You are strangely foolish, nephew,’ he said at length.  ’For the most part youth fails through rashness, but you err by over-caution.  By over-caution in your fence you lost your chance last night, and so by over-caution in hiding this tale from me you have lost a far greater opportunity.  What, have you not seen me give counsel in many such matters, and have you ever known me to betray the confidence even of the veriest stranger?  Why then did you fear for yours?’

‘I do not know,’ I answered, ’but I thought that first I would search for myself.’

’Pride goeth before a fall, nephew.  Now listen:  had I known this history a month ago, by now de Garcia had perished miserably, and not by your hand, but by that of the law.  I have been acquainted with the man from his childhood, and know enough to hang him twice over did I choose to speak.  More, I knew your mother, boy, and now I see that it was the likeness in your face to hers that haunted me, for from the first it was familiar.  It was I also who bribed the keepers of the Holy Office to