"Your words, O King, are very strange. Why do you speak thus?"
"I can not explain to you now, Itzalmo. You will retire, and at the instance of the king have Cacami arrested immediately. Go at once, and seek not to know more at present," returned he, showing great but restrained excitement.
Itzalmo left the conservatory in a state of wonderment at what he had seen and heard, and went immediately to execute the command of the king.
Itlza gradually returned to consciousness, through the endeavors of the prince, and, when sufficiently recovered to walk, was conducted in silence to her mother, who was told that she had fainted.
In a semiconscious condition she was taken charge of by her attendants, while the king passed to his private apartments to compose, if possible, his overwrought feelings.
In obedience to the king's fiat, Itzalmo had Cacami arrested and placed in confinement, to await the further action of his royal master.
Cacami was not surprised at his apprehension. He felt quite certain that a disclosure of his secret marriage would take place, should the king persist in pressing his suit with Itlza, which he did not doubt he would do, and which would be followed by his arrest and committal. He had taken the fatal step, knowing the consequences which would in all probability ensue, and now met them as became a man of courage, which he had on more than one occasion proven himself to be.
The king was distracted to the verge of madness at what he considered his humiliation, and in the heat of passion could think of nothing but punishment for the man who had brought it upon him. He therefore permitted no delay to occur in entering his charge against Cacami. In placing his charge, he put the case beyond his authority, and at the absolute disposal of a Tezcucan court of justice.
Hualcoyotl, in reestablishing the Tezcucan government, among other things, we may presume, adopted the laws and means of enforcing them which had prevailed at the close of his esteemed father's reign.
Although the governments of Anahuac were to a certain extent despotic, there was to be found much in them that was commendable; especially was this true of Tezcuco.