"What is your opinion?" the monk asked.
"It is a matter of perfect indifference to me; but I wish you to understand one thing, once for all, as I am intimately convinced that we shall fall into the hands of our pursuers, I care very little whether it happen today or in a week's time."
"Confusion! You are not at all encouraging, gossip," Fray Ambrosio exclaimed. "Have you lost your courage too, or discovered any suspicious trail?"
"My courage never fails me; I know very well the fate reserved for me, and hence my mind is made up. As for suspicious signs, as you say, a man must be blind not to see them."
"Then there is no hope," the three men said, with ill-disguised terror.
"On my honour I do not think there is; but," he added, with a mocking accent, "why do you not roast the meat? You must be almost dead of hunger."
"That is true; but what you tell us has taken away our appetite," Fray Ambrosio remarked, sadly.
Ellen rose, approached the squatter, and laying her hand softly on his shoulder, placed her charming face close to his. Red Cedar smiled.
"What do you want, my girl?" he asked her.
"I wish, father," she said, in a coaxing voice, "that you should save us."