"And, in the prospect facing us there is one thing, I confess, that fills me with an almost abject terror."
It was Escalante who spoke, brave, firm, calm-natured Escalante, than whom there was no officer more justly honoured in the whole band for his wise spirit and unflinching courage. And yet now he uttered those craven-seeming words in low, hushed tones, and with eyes filled with a nameless horror that said even more than the words had done. His companions gazed at him in amazement.
"It is well for his present peace," said Cabrera, "that it is thyself and not another that has said that for thee, Escalante."
"Ay, indeed," ejaculated Gonzalo de Sandoval. "But what mystery lies there, Escalante, at the back of thy words?"
"No mystery," was the reply—"nought but a plain truth. The idea of falling alive into some of these heathens' hands in battle, and of then being offered up in sacrifice to their idols, and eaten after in their ghastly cannibal feasts, in very deed seemeth to me, when I think on it, to—"
"Ah! to pluck the heart out of thy breast before those fiendish hands can do it," exclaimed Cabrera, starting to his feet in sudden excitement. "I grant thee, Escalante, one has need to learn a new kind of courage to that we have hitherto required, to hold a stiff face before these thoughts."
"Not the terrors of the Inquisition itself," muttered Alonzo de Grado, "can compare with them."
But Velasquez had had enough, and more than enough, for his part, of such discourse, and flinging back his head with impetuous hauteur, he said indignantly—
"In very truth I marvel at ye all, discussing as though it were a possibility, the chance of a Spanish nobleman falling alive into the hands of a base redskin! Let us turn our tongues to themes that shall be more profitable."
"To pleasanter ones, with all my heart," said Juan de Cabrera readily. "But see, who comes yonder in such haste?"