"That opinion can be of little value to you, I presume."
"More than you may imagine. But why these words? Answer me!"
The hacendero remained mute for a time. The Tigercat, his eyes fixed steadily upon him, watched him attentively.
As to the hunter who had been almost forced to consent to serve Don Pedro de Luna as guide, his astonishment was extreme. Believing himself to be thoroughly acquainted with the character of the freebooter, he could not understand the scene at all, and inwardly asked himself what this feigned courtesy of the Tigercat would end in.
Don Pedro himself argued quite differently on the bandit's sentiments; right or wrong, he fancied he had perceived an accent of sad sincerity in the tone in which the last words had been addressed to him.
"Since you absolutely desire it," said he, "I will reply frankly: I believe your heart to be not so cruel as you would have it supposed; and I imagine that this conviction, which you inwardly possess, makes you extremely unhappy; for, notwithstanding the barbarous acts with which they reproach you, other crimes have entered your thoughts, before the execution of which you have recoiled, in spite of the pitiless ferocity they attribute to you."
The Tigercat seemed about to speak.
"Do not interrupt me," continued the hacendero hastily; "I know that I am treading upon a volcano; but you have my promise to speak frankly, and, willing or not willing, you must hear me to the end. Most of mankind are the architects of their own fortunes in this world; you have not escaped the common lot. Gifted with an energetic character, with vivid passions, you have not sought to overcome these passions; you have suffered yourself to be overcome by them, and thus, fall after fall, you have reached that depth in which you are now lost; and yet all good feeling is not utterly dead in you."
A smile of contempt flickered over the lips of the old man.
"Do not smile at me," the hacendero went on; "the very question you have put proves my assertion. Leading in the wilderness the life of the plundering savage, hating society, which has cast you off, you still hanker after the opinion the world forms of you. And why? Because that sentiment of justice, which God has planted in the hearts of all, revolts in you at the universal reprobation heaped upon your name. It has roused your shame. The man who can still be ashamed of himself, criminal as he may be, is very close to repentance; for the voice that cries aloud in his heart is the voice of awakening remorse."