Thirdcase

An Armenian woman had inspired a violent passion in a young Turkish gentleman, but her prudence was long an obstacle to her lover’s desires.  At last he went beyond all bounds, and threatened to kill both her and her husband if she refused to gratify him.  Frightened by this threat, which she knew too well he would carry out, she feigned consent, and gave the Turk a rendezvous at her house at an hour when she said her husband would be absent; but by arrangement the husband arrived, and although the Turk was armed with a sabre and a pair of pistols, it so befell that they were fortunate enough to kill their enemy, whom they buried under their dwelling unknown to all the world.  But some days after the event they went to confess to a priest of their nation, and revealed every detail of the tragic story.  This unworthy minister of the Lord supposed that in a Mahommedan country, where the laws of the priesthood and the functions of a confessor are either unknown or disapproved, no examination would be made into the source of his information, and that his evidence would have the same weight as any other accuser’s.  So he resolved to make a profit and gratify his own avarice.  Several times he visited the husband and wife, always borrowing considerable sums, and threatening to reveal their crime if they refused him.  The first few times the poor creatures gave in to his exactions; but the moment came at last when, robbed of all their fortune, they were obliged to refuse the sum he demanded.  Faithful to his threat, the priest, with a view to more reward, at once denounced them to the dead man’s father.  He, who had adored his son, went to the vizier, told him he had identified the murderers through their confessor, and asked for justice.  But this denunciation had by no means the desired effect.  The vizier, on the contrary, felt deep pity for the wretched Armenians, and indignation against the priest who had betrayed them.  He put the accuser into a room which adjoined the court, and sent for the Armenian bishop to ask what confession really was, and what punishment was deserved by a priest who betrayed it, and what was the fate of those whose crimes were made known in this fashion.  The bishop replied that the secrets of confession are inviolable, that Christians burn the priest who reveals them, and absolve those whom he accuses, because the avowal made by the guilty to the priest is proscribed by the Christian religion, on pain of eternal damnation.  The vizier, satisfied with the answer, took the bishop into another room, and summoned the accused to declare all the circumstances:  the poor wretches, half dead, fell at the vizier’s feet.  The woman spoke, explaining that the necessity of defending life and honour had driven them to take up arms to kill their enemy.  She added that God alone had witnessed their crime, and it would still be unknown had not the law of the same God compelled them to confide it to the ear of one of His ministers