"Then I invite you to do the same, unless love keeps you awake," he added, laconically. "In that case, the best thing you can do is to spend the night in walking round the hut in which your fair one is reposing, that her sleep may not be disturbed; and much good may it do you."
"Diego," Leon answered, sorrowfully, "what you are saying to me is not right. What have I done to you that you should address me so roughly?"
"Nothing," the half-breed said, with a regretful tone. "But come," he said, kicking the bed over which he had taken so much pains in preparing, "you really seem so anxious to speak to me that I might fancy that you had important business."
"What makes you suppose that I want to speak to you?"
"Oh, good Heaven! Leon, we have lived together long enough for us to be able to read on one another's faces what our thoughts are. Confess that you are suffering, that you are anxious, and that you have come to ask some explanation of me. Come, if it be so, tell me frankly what you want of me, and I will answer. For on my side I also have to speak with you about the grief and sorrow which seem to have assailed you since yesterday. Speak; is it the engagement you made to support me in the struggle I am preparing, for that seems to you too heavy to carry out? Only say one word: there is still time, and I will give you back your word; but speak, for I am anxious to come to a decision."
"Brother," said Leon, without replying directly to Diego's injunction, "I notice bitterness in your words and mocking on your lips: still, in order to remove from the discussion anything that might resemble passion or annoyance, I have let the whole day pass over the event about which I wish to speak to you, for it is the friend I am addressing, and not Tahi-Mari."
"Well, what do you want?"
"I will tell you."
Leon drew from his belt the ring which he had found, and handed it to Diego.
"Do you know this?" he asked him.