They entered the yard of the church from the back, by the priest’s little gate. Soldiers were already rolled up in their blankets, sleeping under the wall. Cipriano opened the little vestry door. Kate passed into the darkness. He followed, lighting a candle.
“My soldiers know I am watching to-night in the church,” he said. “They will keep guard.”
The body of the church was quite dark, but the bluish white light burned above the statue of Quetzalcoatl, giving not much light.
Cipriano lifted his candle to the black statue of Huitzilopochtli. Then he turned to Kate, his black eyes flashing.
“I am Huitzilopochtli, Malintzi,” he said in his low, Indian Spanish. “But I cannot be it without you. Stay with me, Malintzi. Say you are the bride of the Living Huitzilopochtli.”
“Yes!” she replied, “I say it.”
Convulsive flames of joy and triumph seemed to go over his face. He lit two candles in front of Huitzilopochtli.
“Come!” he said. “Put on the green dress.”
He took her to the vestry, where were many folded sarapes, and the silver bowl and other implements of the church, and left her while she put on the dress of Malintzi she had worn when Ramón married them.
When she stepped out she found Cipriano naked and in his paint, before the statue of Huitzilopochtli, on a rug of jaguar skins.