Upon which he held up the cross, and bent his head as in prayer, and went first up the ladder into the light. He was pale and the sweat stood on his face. It had been a hard hour.
The others followed in due order, but Don Diego 190 eyed the wizard Cacique with a curiosity great as was his horror.
“Alone he has studied books without a tutor––sacred books––since his boyhood!” he said to Don Ruy––“think of that, and of the grief we had to persuade you to the reading of even the saintly lives! There is devilish art in this––the angels guard us from further sorcery––without a tutor! A savage magician to study strange tongues without a tutor! It is nothing short of infernal!”
But despite all opinion, Don Ruy waited and approached the man of the white robe and the cruel logic.
“You have been my friend,”––he said––“will you not eat with me and talk in quiet of these matters?”
“You do not fear then to be marked as the comrade of a sorcerer?” asked Tahn-té. “You must be a man of strength in your own land, Excellency, to dare offend your priest by such offer. Is the Holy Office no longer supreme in Spain?”
“How do you––an Indian––know of the office, of the duties of the workers there?”
“Two years of my life I lived in the camp of Coronado. To listen was part of my work. Strange and true tales were told in the long nights. They are still with me.”
“But––you will come?”
Tahn-té looked at him and smiled––but the smile held no gladness.