"Pho, I will bandy mudballs with him at any moment," said Villafana: "I care not for the buffets of a friend. As for the noble señor, the Captain General, what you say is true. The king's letter hath set him mad. While the Bishop of Burgos was still in power, and his enemy, he was e'en a good companion,—a comrade, and no master. Demonios! 'twas a better thing for us, when his authority rested on our good-will, and no royal patent."
"Ay," said Guzman; "when we were but rebels and exiles, denounced by the governor, cursed by the priest, and outlawed by the king, Cortes was the most moderate, humble, and loving rogue of us all. I do think, he is somewhat altered."
"Oh, señor, there is no such bond for our friendship as a consciousness of dependence upon those who love us; and nothing so efficacious in cooling us to friends, as the discovery that we can do without them. His authority is no longer our gift; the bishop has fallen; the king has acknowledged his claims, and sent him, besides a fair, lawful commission and goodly reinforcements both of men and arms, a letter of commendation written with his own royal hands. May his majesty live a thousand years! but would to heaven his letter were at the bottom of the sea. It has brought us a hard master. Can your favour solve me the riddle of the king's change? What argument has so operated on his mind, that he now does honour to a man he once condemned as a traitor, and advances him into such power as leaves him independent even of the Governor of the Islands?"
"The very same argument," replied Guzman, "which has turned thee—a friend of Velasquez—into the most devoted, though grumbling adherent of our Captain—interest, sirrah, interest. It is manifest, that this empire was made to be won; and equally apparent, that the man who could half subdue it, though trammelled and opposed by all the arts and power of Velasquez, was the fittest to conclude the good work; and what was no less persuasive, it was plain, our valiant Don was fully determined to do the work himself, without much questioning whether the king would or not."
"Why, by heaven!" cried Villafana, "you make out the general to be a traitor, indeed!"
"Ay;—for, in certain cases, there is virtue in treason."
"Hark now to Villafana!" cried the hunchback, abruptly: "he will thank you for the maxim, as if 'twere a mass for his soul."
"I, curmudgeon?" exclaimed the grumbler. "There were a virtue in it, could it bring such fellows as thyself to the block. What I aver, is, that the king's honours have spoiled our general. By'r lady, I see not what good can come of sending us a Royal Treasurer, Franciscan friars with bulls of St. Peter, and Lady Abbesses to build up nunneries, unless to make up more state for our leader."
"Then art thou more thick-pated than I thought thee," replied the cavalier. "The bulls will make us somewhat stronger of heart, and therefore better gatherers of gold in a land where gold is not to be had without fighting. La Monjonaza will sanctify our efforts, by converting the women; and the king's Treasurer will see that we do not cheat the king, after we have got our rewards, as, it is rumoured, we have done somewhat already."
"Santos! I know what thou art pointing at, Don Francisco," said Villafana, significantly. "The four hundred thousand crowns that have vanished out of the treasury, hah! This is a matter that has stained the General's honour for ever. And as for La Monjonaza, thou knowest there are dark thoughts about her."