“How! Cut off, say’st thou, lad?” And Alvarado sprang up, his hand upon his sword. He swept the circle with a falcon’s glance; then turning once more to the girl, he said, resuming the tenderness of voice and manner, “By what name may I know my love hereafter?”
“Nenetzin,—the princess Nenetzin.”
“Then farewell, Nenetzin. Ill betide the man or fortune that keepeth thee from me hereafter! May I forfeit life, and the Holy Mother’s love, if I see thee not again! Farewell.”
He kissed his mailed hand to her, and, facing the array of scowling pabas, strode to them, and through their circle, with a laugh of knightly scorn.
At the door of the turret of Huitzil’ he said to the page, “The love of yon girl, heathen no longer, but Christian, by the cross she weareth,—her love, and the brightness of her presence, for the foulness and sin of this devil’s den,—what an exchange! Valgame Dios! Thou shalt have the ducat. She is the glory of the world!”
CHAPTER VI
THE IRON CROSS
“My lord Maxtla, go see if there be none coming this way now.”
And while the chief touched the ground with his palm, the king added, as to himself, and impatiently, “Surely it is time.”
“Of whom speak you?” asked Cuitlahua, standing by. Only the brother would have so presumed.