the polished floor. "What can detain the knaves? Say, girl! where can they
be lingering?"

Strasolda made no reply to this impetuous enquiry. She was no longer the
excited and impetuous Uzcoque heroine, invoking the spirit of the storm
amidst the precipices and caverns of her native shores. A total change had
come over her. Her look was subdued, her cheek pale, her eyes red and
swollen with weeping. She cast an humble and sorrowful glance at the lady,
and a tear trembled on her long dark lashes.

"Why come they not?" repeated the angry dame in a voice half-choked with
passion. "By all the saints!" she continued, with a furious look at
Strasolda, "I believe thy father, Dansowich, to be the cause of this delay;
for well I know it is with small good-will he pays the tribute. But if the
thieving knaves thus play me false, if the Easter gift is wanting, and for
lack of jewels I am compelled to plead sickness, and pass to-morrow in my
apartment, instead of, as heretofore, eclipsing every rival by the
splendour of my jewels, rest assured, maiden, that thy robber friends
shall pay dearly for their neglect. A word from me, and thy father,
brethren, and kinsmen grace the gallows, and their foul eyrie is leveled
with dust."

Strasolda pressed her hands upon her heart, and burst into a flood of
tears. Then throwing herself at the lady's feet--

"That word you will never have the cruelty to utter," cried she. "Bethink
you, noble lady, of the perils to which they are exposed. The bravest
cannot command success, and you know not yet whether their last expedition
may not have been unprosperous."