Espinosa smiled. "How many kings and princes have been compelled
to conceal themselves under disguises?" he asked oracularly. And
seeing them stricken, he must play upon them further. Nothing, it
seems, was sacred to him--not even the portrait of that lovely,
desolate royal lady in her convent at Madrigal. Forth he plucked
it, and thrust it to them across the stains of wine and oil that
befouled their table.
"Look at this beautiful lady, the most beautiful in Spain," he
bade them. "A prince could not have a lovelier bride."
"But she is dressed as a nun," the woman protested. "How, then,
can she marry?"
"For kings there are no laws," he told her with finality.
At last he departed, but bidding Gregorio to think of the offer
he had made him. He would come again for the cook's reply,
leaving word meanwhile of where he was lodged.
They deemed him mad, and were disposed to be derisive. Yet the
woman's disbelief was quickened into malevolence by the jealous
fear that what he had told them of himself might, after all, be
true. Upon that malevolence she acted forthwith, lodging an
information with Don Rodrigo de Santillan, the Alcalde of
Valladolid.
Very late that night Espinosa was roused from his sleep to find
his room invaded by alguaziles--the police of the Alcalde.
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