Guards: “Four who came to kill Don Ramón.”
Cipriano: “Four men, against one man?”
Guards: “They were more than four, my Lord.”
Cipriano: “When many men come against one, what is the name of the many?”
Guards: “Cowards, my Lord.”
Cipriano: “Cowards it is. They are less than men. Men that are less than men are not good enough for the light of the sun. If men that are men will live, men that are less than men must be put away, lest they multiply too much. Men that are more than men have the judgment of men that are less than men. Shall they die?”
Guards: “They shall surely die, my Lord.”
Cipriano: “Yet my hand has touched the hand of Quetzalcoatl, and among the black leaves one sprung green, with the colour of Malintzi.”
An attendant came and lifted Cipriano’s sarape over his head, leaving his body bare to the waist. The guards likewise took off their sarapes.
Cipriano lifted up his fist, in which he held a little tuft of black feathers, or leaves.