to understand that so long as she remained at the court, Andre would be no more than the slave, possibly even the victim, of his wife.  Thus all Friar Robert’s thoughts were obstinately concentrated on a single end, that of getting rid of the Catanese or neutralising her influence.  The prince’s tutor and the governess of the heiress had but to exchange one glance, icy, penetrating, plain to read:  their looks met like lightning flashes of hatred and of vengeance.  The Catanese, who felt she was detected, lacked courage to fight this man in the open, and so conceived the hope of strengthening her tottering empire by the arts of corruption and debauchery.  She instilled by degrees into her pupil’s mind the poison of vice, inflamed her youthful imagination with precocious desires, sowed in her heart the seeds of an unconquerable aversion for her husband, surrounded the poor child with abandoned women, and especially attached to her the beautiful and attractive Dona Cancha, who is branded by contemporary authors with the name of a courtesan; then summed up all these lessons in infamy by prostituting Joan to her own son.  The poor girl, polluted by sin before she knew what life was, threw her whole self into this first passion with all the ardour of youth, and loved Robert of Cabane so violently, so madly, that the Catanese congratulated herself on the success of her infamy, believing that she held her prey so fast in her toils that her victim would never attempt to escape them.

A year passed by before Joan, conquered by her infatuation, conceived the smallest suspicion of her lover’s sincerity.  He, more ambitious than affectionate, found it easy to conceal his coldness under the cloak of a brotherly intimacy, of blind submission, and of unswerving devotion; perhaps he would have deceived his mistress for a longer time had not Bertrand of Artois fallen madly in love with Joan.  Suddenly the bandage fell from the young girl’s eyes; comparing the two with the natural instinct of a woman beloved which never goes astray, she perceived that Robert of Cabane loved her for his own sake, while Bertrand of Artois would give his life to make her happy.  A light fell upon her past:  she mentally recalled the circumstances that preceded and accompanied her earliest love; and a shudder went through her at the thought that she had been sacrificed to a cowardly seducer by the very woman she had loved most in the world, whom she had called by the name of mother.

Joan drew back into herself, and wept bitterly.  Wounded by a single blow in all her affections, at first her grief absorbed her; then, roused to sudden anger, she proudly raised her head, for now her love was changed to scorn.  Robert, amazed at her cold and haughty reception of him, following on so great a love, was stung by jealousy and wounded pride.  He broke out into bitter reproach and violent recrimination, and, letting fall the mask, once for all lost his place in Joan’s heart.