"What you say is serious indeed," said Consuelo, "and I scarcely understand it. Will you give me time to think? Do not repel me from your bosom until I shall have questioned my heart. I know not if it be worthy of the light you can shed on it. But what sincere heart is unworthy of the truth? In what can I be useful to you? I am terrified at my impotence. To have protected me as you have done, you must have seen there was something in me. Something, too, says to me, that I should not leave you without having sought to prove my gratitude. Do not banish me then. Try to instruct me."
"We will grant you eight days more to reflect," replied the judge in the red robe, who had previously spoken. "But you must, in the first place, bind yourself on your honor, to make no attempt to discover where you are, and who are the persons you see here. You must promise not to pass beyond the enclosure, even should you see the gates open, and the spectres of your dearest friends calling on you. You must ask no questions of the persons who serve you, nor of any one who may come clandestinely to you."
"So be it," said Consuelo eagerly. "I promise as you desire, to see no one without your authority, and ask pardon humbly."
"You have no pardon to ask--no questions to propound. All the necessities both of your body and soul have been foreseen for the whole time you remain here. If you regret any friend, any relation, any servants, you are free to go. Solitude, or such association as we determine on, will be your lot here."
"I ask nothing for myself. I have heard, however, that one of your friends, disciples, or servants, (for I know not his rank) suffers a severe punishment on my account. I am here to accuse myself of the offence imputed to him, and on that account I asked to appear before you."
"Do you offer to make a detailed and sincere confession?"
"If such be required to secure his acquittal; though to a woman it is a severe moral torture to confess herself to eight men."
"Spare yourself this humiliation. We would have no assurance that you are sincere, inasmuch as we have no right over you. All you have said and thought during the last hour to us will be as a dream. Remember that hereafter we have the right to sound the secrets of your heart. Keep it always so pure, that you can unveil it without suffering and without shame."