Nenetzin withdrew her hand from the perch, looked in the questioner’s face, then crept up to win her embrace.
“O Tula, I know you are learned and thoughtful. Often after the banquet, when the hall was cleared, and the music begun, have I seen you stand apart, silent, while all others danced or laughed. See, your eyes are on me now, but more in thought than love. O, indeed, you are wise! Tell me, did you ever think of me as a woman?”
The smile deepened on the lips, and burned in the eyes of the queenly auditor.
“No, never as a woman,” continued Nenetzin. “Listen to me, Tula. The other night I was asleep in your arms,—I felt them in love around me,—and I dreamed so strangely.”
“Of what?” asked Tula, seeing she hesitated.
“I dreamed there entered at the palace door a being with a countenance white like snow, while its hair and beard were yellow, like the silk of the maize; its eyes were blue, like the deep water of the lake, but bright, so bright that they terrified while they charmed me. Thinking of it now, O Tula, it was a man, though it looked like a god. He entered at the palace door, and came into the great chamber where our father sat with his chiefs; but he came not barefooted and in nequen; he spoke as he were master, and our father a slave. Looking and listening, a feeling thrilled me,—thrilled warm and deep, and was a sense of joy, like a blessing of Tlalac. Since then, though I have acted as a girl, I have felt as a woman.”
“Very strange, indeed, Nenetzin!” said Tula, playfully. “But you forget: I asked you what I know, and you only hope?”
“I will explain directly; but as you are wise, first tell me what that feeling was.”
“Nay, I can tell you whence the water flows, but I cannot tell you what it is.”
“Well, since then I have had a hope—”