That is why I gave it you, as naturally I should not desire to detain you against your will." Lysbeth heard and was aghast, for this man's cleverness overwhelmed her.
At every step he contrived to put her in the wrong; moreover she was crushed by the sense that he had justice on his side.

She _had_ bought and she _must_ pay.

Why had she bought?
Not for any advantage of her own, but from an impulse of human pity--to save a fellow creature's life.

And why should she have perjured herself so deeply in order to save that life?
She was a Catholic and had no sympathy with such people.
Probably this person was an Anabaptist, one of that dreadful sect which practised nameless immoralities, and ran stripped through the streets crying that they were "the naked Truth." Was it then because the creature had declared that she had known her father in her childhood?
To some extent yes, but was not there more behind?
Had she not been influenced by the woman's invocation about the Spaniards, of which the true meaning came home to her during that dreadful sledge race; at the moment, indeed, when she saw the Satanic look upon the face of Montalvo?
It seemed to her that this was so, though at the time she had not understood it; it seemed to her that she was not a free agent; that some force pushed her forward which she could neither control nor understand.
Moreover--and this was the worst of it--she felt that little good could come of her sacrifice, or that if good came, at least it would not be to her or hers.

Now she was as a fish in a net, though why it was worth this brilliant Spaniard's while to snare her she could not understand, for she forgot that she was beautiful and a woman of property.