“Cedric,” answered Ulrica, “thou little knowest the human heart. To act as I have acted, to think as I have thought, requires the maddening love of pleasure, mingled with the keen appetite of revenge, the proud consciousness of power; droughts too intoxicating for the human heart to bear, and yet retain the power to prevent. Their force has long passed away⁠—Age has no pleasures, wrinkles have no influence, revenge itself dies away in impotent curses. Then comes remorse, with all its vipers, mixed with vain regrets for the past, and despair for the future!⁠—Then, when all other strong impulses have ceased, we become like the fiends in hell, who may feel remorse, but never repentance.⁠—But thy words have awakened a new soul within me⁠—Well hast thou said, all is possible for those who dare to die!⁠—Thou hast shown me the means of revenge, and be assured I will embrace them. It has hitherto shared this wasted bosom with other and with rival passions⁠—henceforward it shall possess me wholly, and thou thyself shalt say, that, whatever was the life of Ulrica, her death well became the daughter of the noble Torquil.

There is a force without beleaguering this accursed castle⁠—hasten to lead them to the attack, and when thou shalt see a red flag wave from the turret on the eastern angle of the donjon, press the Normans hard⁠—they will then have enough to do within, and you may win the wall in spite both of bow and mangonel.⁠—Begone, I pray thee⁠—follow thine own fate, and leave me to mine.”

Cedric would have enquired farther into the purpose which she thus darkly announced, but the stern voice of Front-de-Boeuf was heard, exclaiming, “Where tarries this loitering priest? By the scallop-shell of Compostella, I will make a martyr of him, if he loiters here to hatch treason among my domestics!”

“What a true prophet,” said Ulrica, “is an evil conscience! But heed him not⁠—out and to thy people⁠—Cry your Saxon onslaught, and let them sing their war-song of Rollo, if they will; vengeance shall bear a burden to it.”