Page:Idalia, by 'Ouida' volume 2.djvu/239

228 From a priest I may surely look for immunity from their weariness."

The tiger-glitter glistened more darkly in his soft brown veiled eyes. How could he deal with this woman? Menace had no terror for her, homage no charm! Unconsciously his voice hardened and grew more imperious; she was the first who had ever braved or baffled him.

"Madame," he pursued, disregarding her words, "you know that you are liable to the full rigour of the law?" "I know that I am in the power of those who never failed to use that rigour with or without right!"

"The church cannot err," he said, with the certain fiery majesty which, tyrannous and blind in its own belief of infallibility as it was, was yet the truest and greatest thing in him. "You fall within the pale of its most severe justice; yet the church, as you know well, will not deal with you; your sins will be left to the Secular Arm. Your wealth will be confiscated, your power crushed, your life passed in a felon's cell. You must know this."

"My wealth cannot be confiscated," she answered, negligently, "for there is none of it lodged in Italy; you could scarcely imagine me so incautious! That