"I understand your longings to be free, and approve them the more, since it was I who first inspired you with the wish to become better acquainted with the charming daughter of Don Pedro de Luna."
"Not a word of her," said Don Fernando fiercely. "If, up to the present time, I have consented to be guided by you, and to obey your orders without discussing them, the time has now come to place the question clearly and categorically before us, so that no misunderstanding may arise between us in the future. It is this reason alone which had weight enough to bring me tonight in answer to your summons."
The Tigercat looked at the Mexican long and fixedly; then he replied:
"Speak, then, madman, who do not see the gulf which yawns at your feet: speak; I listen."
Don Fernando remained some time lost in thought, leaning against the knotted trunk of a poplar, and with his eyes cast on the ground.
"Tigercat," said he at length, "I know not who you are, nor the motives which have induced you to renounce civilisation, to take refuge in the desert, and adopt the life of the Indian; I do not wish to know them. Every man is responsible for his own actions, and must render an account of them to his own conscience. As to myself, never has a word from your mouth taught me in what place I was born, or to what family I belong. Although you brought me up—although, as far back as my memory carries me, I have seen no one belonging to me but yourself—yet I cannot think you are my father. Had I been your son, or even only a distant relative, it is evident my training would have been widely different to that which I received at your express commands."
"What are those words your bold lips utter?—How dare you venture to fling reproaches at me?" said the old man, bursting into a fit of passion.
"Interrupt me not, Tigercat; let me open my thoughts to you entirely," sadly replied the Mexican. "I do not reproach you; but from the time when, under the name of Don Fernando Carril, you forced me into the whirl of civilised life, in spite of myself, and no doubt in spite of you, I have learned two things, and my eyes have been opened. I have comprehended the meaning of two words, the significance of which was unknown to me till then. These two words have changed not only my character, but the light in which I used to look at things; for, with a purpose I cannot divine, you applied yourself from my infancy to foster every evil sentiment germinating within me, while you carefully stifled the few good qualities which my heart might haply have possessed, had it not been for the system you adopted. In a word, I have now arrived at the knowledge of good and evil. I know all your efforts have been exerted to make me a human wild beast. Have you succeeded? The future shall show. To judge by the feelings that are surging in my heart while I speak to you, you have not reached the result you aimed at; be that as it may, I am no longer your slave. I have served too long as the instrument in your hands of deeds whose aim I cannot see. You have yourself taught me that family bonds do not exist in nature; that they are absurd prejudices, trammels invented by civilisation; that no man has a right to impose his will as law on others; that the real man is he who walks free through life, unincumbered by relation or friend, recognising no master but his own desires. Well, then, I will now put in practice these precepts you have so long and steadily inculcated. What matters to me whether I be Don Fernando Carril, or Stoneheart the Bee-hunter? Following the law laid down by yourself, and elevating ingratitude into a virtue, I take back my own free liberty and independence of you, recognising no claim of yours to influence my life for good or for evil, and assuming from henceforth the right to walk after my own impulses, whatever may happen in consequence of my resolve."
"Go, my child," said the Tigercat, with his mocking sneer; "go, act as you think fit; but, in spite of all your efforts, you will soon come back to me; for say what you will, you belong to me, and will soon know it. But it does not rouse my ire to hear you speak thus; it is not you who speak—it is love. I am very old, Fernando, but not so old as to have lost all recollections of my youth. Love has mastered your heart; when he has utterly burnt it up, you will return to the desert; for then you will have learnt what that life is into which you, poor, ignorant child, are just plunging. You will have learnt that life in this world is but a feather blown hither and thither by every varying breeze; and that at the breath of love, the man who thinks himself the strongest becomes more feeble than the weakest and most wretched of created beings. But let us break off: it is your will to be free; be so. First of all, however, you have to render me an account of the mission with which I charged you."
"I will do so. Present yourself to the vaqueros in my name; this diamond"—and he drew one from his finger—"will be your passport. They have been warned: show it to them, and they will obey you as they would myself."