"A barrier between us! What do you mean? Speak, I beseech you, and end this unparalleled and humiliating scene," spoke the patience-tried prince.
With head bowed down, the kneeling maiden answered in a shrinking voice:
"I mean, O king, that I am the wife of another."
Now, indeed, was Hualcoyotl dumbfounded. Had the earth opened at his feet he could not have been more astounded. He finally said, becoming angry and excited:
"Who has dared to come between the king and his chosen—his intended queen?"
Itlza was almost prostrated from the strain upon her feelings; and now, at hearing the prince's angry tones, began to sink, but managed, in a hoarse whisper, to say "Cacami," and then fell to the ground insensible.
Hualcoyotl was staggered as by a blow when he heard the name of Cacami fall from Itlza's lips. That estimable young warrior, counted among his closest friends, had deceived him. He turned away for a moment to strive with his rising anger and feelings of resentment; then back to where Itlza was lying. He looked at her in a commiserating manner, and exclaimed in a hard, pained voice:
"Itlza! Itlza! this from you, whom Hualcoyotl would have delighted to honor, and been so proud!" Her appearance seemed to stir the nobler impulses within the man, for he knelt down and began trying to bring about her resuscitation. While thus engaged he was suddenly made aware of the presence of Itzalmo, who, in passing through the conservatory, had discovered him striving with the unconscious maiden, and, becoming alarmed, cried out:
"Father of Light! what is the meaning of this? Is the child dead?"
"She is not dead, but 'twere better if she was," returned the prince, without pausing in his efforts to restore her to consciousness.