"And now, brother, you will ask me why, knowing that General Don Juan de Souza y Soto-Mayor is the man who dishonoured my mother, I did not choose among the weapons which hung from my girdle the one which should pierce his heart?—why I have not some night, when all were sleeping at the hacienda, carried within its walls the all-devouring fire, and taken, according to Indian custom, eye for eye and tooth for tooth?"
"Yes, I confess it; I should have quivered with pleasure had I seen all the Soto-Mayors, who live calm and happy a few leagues from us, writhing in the agonies of death. But I am the son of Tahi-Mari, and I have another cause to defend beside my own—that of my nation. And on the day when my arm falls on those whom I execrate, it will not be the Soto-Mayors alone who perish, but all the Spaniards who inhabit these countries."
"Ah! is it not strange to dream of enfranchisement after three hundred years of slavery? Well, brother, the supreme moment is close at hand; the blood of the Spaniard will again inundate the soil of Peru, and the nineteenth century will avenge the sixteenth."
"That is the reason why you saw me so silent at the general's house; that is why I agreed to escort him and his family to Valdivia, for my plans are marvellously served by this journey. As for the girl you love, as I told you, you shall see her again, and it will be the beginning of the punishment which is destined to fall on this family."
Diego had risen, but a moment later he resumed his ordinary stoicism.
"I have told you what you ought to know, in order to understand and excuse what you may see me undertake against the Spaniards; but before going further it is right that I should know if I can count on your help, and if I shall find in you the faithful and devoted friend who never failed me up to this day."
A violent contest was going on in Leon's heart. He asked himself whether he, who had no cause of complaint against the Spaniards, had any right to join those who were meditating their ruin. On the other hand, the sincere friendship which he felt for the Vaquero, whose life he had shared during the last four years, rendered it a duty to assist him, and did not permit him to abandon him in the moment of danger. Still he hesitated, for a secret anxiety kept him undecided, and prevented him forming a resolution.
"Diego," he asked the Vaquero in his turn, "before answering you, let me ask you one question?"
"Speak, brother!" Diego answered.
"What do you mean to do with Doña Maria?"