"I remember, my friend. You demand then that I keep my promise?"
"I wish to know the assassin of my mother," said he, with a sad earnestness.
Zeno Cabral looked at him with gentle compassion.
"Your mother! You did not know her," said he.
"Shadowy as may be the memories of my early infancy," answered the young man, with a sad voice, "a child cannot forget a mother, when he has been happy enough to receive her gentle caresses. Often," added he, seizing abruptly the arm of the Montonero, "in my sleep I think I see her smiling face leaning towards me; her large blue eyes, full of tears, fix on me a look of ineffable sweetness; her long brown hair floats in disorder on her snowy shoulders; she murmurs words that I cannot understand; but I feel my heart swell with joy and happiness."
Zeno Cabral listened to the young man with a surprise that he did not try to conceal.
"Oh! Don Zeno," resumed the young man, with an accent of earnestness impossible to describe, "you think I did not know my mother! If she were to appear here before us at this moment, I should recognise her," added he, with an accent of intense tenderness.
With an abrupt movement Don Zeno drew his arm from under his poncho, and holding out a medallion to the young man:
"Look!" said he.
"My mother!" cried the chief.