She represented that he had only availed himself of the rights which nature allows to everyone, those of self-preservation: that either Elvira or himself must have perished, and that her inflexibility and resolution to ruin him had deservedly marked her out for the victim. She next stated, that as he had before rendered himself suspected to Elvira, it was a fortunate event for him that her lips were closed by death; since without this last adventure, her suspicions if made public might have produced very disagreeable consequences. He had therefore freed himself from an enemy, to whom the errors of his conduct were sufficiently known to make her dangerous, and who was the greatest obstacle to his designs upon Antonia. Those designs she encouraged him not to abandon. She assured him that, no longer protected by her mother’s watchful eye, the daughter would fall an easy conquest; and by praising and enumerating Antonia’s charms, she strove to rekindle the desires of the monk. In this endeavour she succeeded but too well.