Old Court Life in Spain (Vol.1&2). Frances Minto Elliot

      THE INTERIOR OF SAN ISIDORA, WITH TOMBS OF KINGS.

      “She rejoices,” was his thought. “We are leaving the boy behind. Let further search be made,” he commands, turning back the soldiers, whose feet were already on the stairs.

      “The boy is with the dead,” Frandina had said. Now the words came back to him with a special meaning, for the walls were lined with tombs which stood out conspicuous in the vivid glare of the torches, striking on the marble panels. On one was the escutcheon of an ancient knight, surmounted by a coronet; there a sculptured figure in armour lay at rest; further on a deeply indented effigy in coloured stone, upon which an inscription set forth the valour of the mouldering bones within. The tomb of Florinda, white and glistening by the side of the others, displayed her effigy in polished marble, a delicately chiselled form—this at once attracted the attention of the Fakir.

      “Who lies there?” he asked, turning his twinkling eyes, overshadowed by hairy eyebrows, on the shrinking figure of Frandina, who, trembling from head to foot, sought to hide her face in the deep shadow of a pillared vault, beside the gate of entrance; “this tomb seems the newest.”

      “It is my daughter’s tomb,” replied Frandina; but with all her fortitude, she was conscious of a trembling in her voice, and her dry lips could scarcely articulate the words, “She is but lately dead.”

      The Fakir eyed her with a devilish glance. Then, turning to the Moorish soldier, whose eyes rolled under the high turban with a wicked satisfaction at the discomfiting of the Christian—

      “Search within,” he orders, his gaze bent on her. Alas! it was soon done. The entrance of the recently entered monument was partly open; within lay what death had spared of Florinda, the bier covered with a fine cloth of Eastern tissue, the hands covered with precious stones.

      At first, the Nubian guard, staggered at the strange sight, fall back, but soon recalled by the stern voice of the Fakir, they lifted the pall. The boy lay underneath! He was asleep, his soft cheek turned upwards, cradled on his arm.

      Like a figure carved in stone stood Frandina, but when she saw her son her mother’s heart gave way. With a shriek, so piercing that it woke the echoes in the prisons underneath, she dashed forward and cast herself upon the child.

      “Mercy, O Emir! if you have ever known a mother’s care! Mercy! mercy! This is my only child—the joy of my life—my little son! Take me for him!” and raising herself on her knees with frantic passion, the boy clinging round her neck, she tries to grasp his hands.

      Wrenching himself from her as if she were some noxious animal, Alabor thunders to the guards: “Take this woman’s son from her, and bear her hence to the deepest dungeon.”

      The boy stood alone before the Emir, big tears rolling down his face, not from fear, but for the sake of his mother, whose frantic screams were heard long after they had dragged her away.

      If Alabor had but a spark of human pity, he would have melted to the pretty boy, who faced him so bravely, but he had sworn the destruction of Don Julian’s race, and his heart hardened within him as he gazed on the innocent eyes. With a keen searching glance he measured the slight figure of the child, and smiled to see how frail he was and small.

      “Yusa,” he said to the Fakir, “be you the keeper of Julian’s son. Guard him as you love me.” And so he and his guards departed, leaving them alone.

      “I pray you,” said the boy, undaunted by the looks of his grim companion, who stood holding a torch and watching him under his overhanging eyebrows, “to give me air. I have lain three days in this close tomb, and I am faint.”

      Without a word they mount the winding stair, until they reach the platform of the keep. Through the high turrets was a wondrous view across the Straits, lined by broad currents of varying blues and greens, to where, dim in the distance, lay the lowlands of Spain. Round and round flew the seagulls, below the waves beat, thundering on the rocks which guard the harbour, cresting back in foam. As the child stood near the battlements, the sea wind raising his curly hair, he gave a cry of joy and clapped his hands.

      “Do you know what land that is opposite?” asks the Fakir, pointing to the dim coast line, an evil leer upon his lips.

      “It is my country,” is the answer, “we come from Spain; my mother told me.”

      “Then bless it, my boy; stretch forth your arms.”

      As the boy loosened his hold of the parapet, the cunning Fakir seized him by the waist, and, with a sudden motion, flung him over the battlements. Every bone in his delicate body was broken ere it reached the rock where he lay, a little lifeless heap.

      “How fares it with Julian’s son?” asks the voice of Alabor, as he appears on the platform of the keep.

      “Well,” is the brief answer.

      “Is he safe?” he asks again, looking round.

      “He is safe,” answered Yusa; “behold!”

      And the Emir looked over and saw the battered form, like a slight speck below, around it the seagulls and vultures already circling.

      The following morning, at the break of day, in the great court of the castle, from which all the issues to the different towers open, Frandina is led out for execution.

      That she knows her son is dead, is written in her eyes. No word passes her lips. Like a queen she moves, command in every gesture. With her the Christians of the garrison are brought forth to suffer. As the dismal procession passes round the court, the voice of the insatiable Alabor is heard:

      “Behold, O men of Spain, the wife of your commander. See the ruin to which her treason would have brought you. Let every man take a stone and fling it at her till she dies. He that refuses shall have his head struck off. In the hand of God is vengeance. Not on our heads be her blood.”

      How or where Julian himself died is not certain. Some chronicles say he perished in the mountains of Navarre, where he had taken refuge; others that he met his death in the castle of Marmello, near Huesca, in Aragon. A violent death of some sort came to the great Kingmaker of Spain.

      On his name a perpetual curse rests, and to this day, in Spain “Julian” is synonymous with traitor.