"Bah!" Red Cedar said with a grin; "perhaps you will find it too short."
"It is I," Nathan said in a choking voice. In fact, the two of spades fell to him, and all breathed freely again.
"Well," the monk said, as he tapped him on the shoulder, "I congratulate you, my friend Nathan: you have a glorious mission."
"Will you undertake it in my stead?" the other remarked with a grin.
"I would not deprive you of the honour of saving us," Fray Ambrosio said with magnificent coolness.
Nathan gave him a look of pity, shrugged his shoulders, and turned his back on him. Fray Ambrosio collected the cards, and replaced them in his boot with evident satisfaction.
"Hum!" he muttered, "They may still be of service; we cannot tell in what circumstances chance may place us."
After this philosophic reflection, the monk, cheered up by the certainty of not being obliged to sacrifice himself for his friends, quietly sat down again by the fire. In the meanwhile, Red Cedar, who did not let out of sight the execution of his plan, had placed some lumps of meat on the fire, that his companions might acquire the necessary strength for the fatigues they would have to endure.
As usually happens under similar circumstances, the meal was silent; each, absorbed in his thoughts, ate rapidly without thinking of keeping up idle conversation. It was about five in the morning, and the sky was beginning to assume those opaline tints which summoned daybreak. Red Cedar rose, and the rest imitated him.
"Come, lad," he said to Nathan, "are you ready? The hour has arrived."