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116. He learned at one and the same time both the infidelity and death of her whom he wished to become his wife. This was a terrible stroke." Here Don Tadeo's voice evidently broke, and he seemed as if he had lost his senses. "At the end of a year," continued the licentiate, "the Spaniard was released for want of proof; but he left the prison ruined by law expenses, and with a heart dead to all his former dear illusions. He then learned that she who had deceived him, and whom he had bewailed as dead, was still alive, but that she had renounced the world, and taken the veil in that convent to which she had been carried after the unhappy incident in the Paseo. He never attempted to see her; but all his efforts, all his thoughts were directed to one sole end vengeance! Mexican justice had been unable to discover the assassin. He set on foot inquiries himself, and succeeded, although the judges declared that success was impossible."

The licentiate here paused; the bell was still tolling, and I began to undestand the emotions these melancholy sounds awoke in his bosom.

"This Spaniard, you have guessed already, I dare say, was myself. A letter had been found on the young Creole's person, inviting her to that private interview which had nearly terminated in her death. This was the only clew I had to guide me in the intricate labyrinth where Mexican justice had been at fault. Since then commenced a dark and uneasy period of my life, which death can alone put an end to. I condescended to live among thieves and murderers in the hope of unraveling, by their revelations, that secret which entirely absorbed me. Under color of exercising my profession, I mixed myself up in all