"Still, my friend, I believe it would be wise to take certain precautions. Remember it is a question of life or death, and we must make haste. How many times, under similar circumstances, have the best arranged plans failed! Do you think that your measures are well taken? Do you not fear lest an unhappy accident may derange all your plans at the decisive moment?"
"We are playing at this moment the devil's own game, my friend," Valentine answered coldly. "We have chance on our side; that is to say, the greatest power that exists, and which governs the world."
The young man lowered his head, as if but slightly convinced. The hunter regarded him for a moment with a mixture of interest and tender pity, and then continued in a soothing voice,—
"Listen, Don Pablo de Zarate," he said. "I have said that I will save your father, and mean to do so. Still I wish him to leave the prison in which he now is, like a man of his character ought to leave it, in open day, greeted by the applause of the crowd, and not by escaping furtively during the night, like a vile criminal. Hang it all! Do you think it would have been difficult for me to enter the town, and effect your father's escape by filing the bars or bribing the jailer? I would not do it. Don Miguel would not have accepted that cowardly and shameful flight. Your father shall leave his prison, but begged to do so by the governor himself, and all the authorities of Santa Fe. So regain your courage, and no longer doubt a man whose friendship and experience should, on the contrary, restore your confidence."
The young man had listened to these words with even increasing interest. When Valentine ceased speaking he seized his hand.
"Pardon me, my friend," he answered him. "I know how devoted you are to my family; but I suffer, and grief renders me unjust. Forgive me."
"Child, let us forget it all. Was the town quiet today?"
"I cannot tell you, for I was so absorbed in thought that I saw nothing going on around me. Still I fancy there was a certain agitation, which was not natural, on the Plaza Mayor, near the governor's palace."
Valentine indulged once again in that strange smile that had already played round the corners of his delicate lips.
"Good!" he said. "And did you, as I advised, try to gain any information about Red Cedar?"