The walls were hung with tapestries, the floor spread with
costly Eastern rugs; on an inlaid Moorish table a tall, three-
beaked lamp of beaten copper charged with aromatic oil shed light
and perfume through the apartment.
Don Rodrigo sipped his wine, and his dark, hungry eyes followed
her as she moved about him with vaguely voluptuous, almost feline
grace. The wine, the heavy perfume of the lamp, and the beauty of
her played havoc among them with his senses, so that he forgot
for the moment his Castilian lineage and clean Christian blood,
forgot that she derived from the accursed race of the Crucifiers.
All that he remembered was that she was the loveliest woman in
Seville, daughter to the wealthiest man, and in that hour of
weakness he decided to convert into reality that which had
hitherto been no more than an infamous presence. He would loyally
fulfil the false, disloyal promises he had made. He would take
her to wife. It was a sacrifice which her beauty and her wealth
should make worth while. Upon that impulse he spoke now,
abruptly:
"Isabella, when will you marry me?"
She stood before him, looking down into his weak, handsome face,
her fingers interlacing his own.
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