"Asses!" he said, laughing at his guardians, who pushed him on before them, "could you not wait till tomorrow to perform all your mummeries? Caray! I was so sound asleep! the devil take you!"
The piaies contented themselves with shaking him rather roughly.
"Miserable bandits," he added, "if I had my sabre, I would show you certain cuts which would make you sink six feet into the ground. But all right; what I cannot do, my comrades will do, and you will lose nothing by waiting."
"The papagay is a chattering bird, that speaks without knowing what it says," a piaie interrupted in a hollow voice: "the eagle of the Andes is dumb in the hour of danger."
"In truth," the lancero continued, with a laugh, "this old rogue is right; let us show these Indian brutes how a Spanish hidalgo dies. Hum!" he added, taking a curious look around him, "these fellows are very ugly, and I should almost thank them for killing me, for they will do me a real service by freeing me from their villainous society."
After this last sally, the soldier haughtily raised his head and remained silent and calm in the presence of the danger which he had before his eyes. Leon had not lost one of the words uttered by the young man; and he felt moved with compassion, and thinking of the sorrowful fate which was reserved for the hapless prisoner. Leaning against one of the walls of the hut, he admired with a sort of irresistible fascination the bright glance of the soldier, so haughty and careless, and asked himself with tears to what punishment he was going to be condemned.
He had not long to wait; the Sayotkatta gave a signal, and two piaies began stripping off the lancero's uniform; after which they removed his shirt, and only left him his trousers. The young man did not attempt to make any resistance, and the muscles of his face remained motionless; but when one of his assassins tried to remove the scapulary, which, like all Spaniards, he wore round his neck suspended from a black ribbon, he frowned, his eyes sparkled, and he cried in so terrible a voice that the Indian recoiled in terror—
"Brigand! leave me my scapulary!"
The Indian hesitated for a moment, and then returned to his victim.
"Nonsense, no weakness!" the prisoner added, and held his tongue.