"Come, there is some progress, you speak, hence you are not dead,"

Tranquil went on joyously, for it was he who had so cruelly frightened the monk; "follow me, you must be frozen, don't let us remain here."

And pa.s.sing his arm through the monk's, he led him away; the latter followed him pa.s.sively and mechanically, not able yet to understand what was happening to him, but still beginning to regain a small amount of courage. In a few minutes, they reached the clearing.

"Ah!" Carmela exclaimed in surprise; "Fray Antonio! By what accident is he here, when he started with the conducta de plata?"

This remark made the hunter p.r.i.c.k his ears; he examined the monk attentively, and then compelled him to sit down by the fire.

"I trust that the good father will explain to us what has happened to him," he muttered.

Everything, however, has an end in this world; and the monk for some time past had seemed destined to pa.s.s, with the greatest rapidity and almost without transition, from the extremest terror to the most complete security. When he was a little warmed, the confusion produced in his ideas by the sudden meeting with the hunter gradually yielded to the cordial reception given him; and Carmela's gentle voice breaking pleasantly on his ear, completely re-established the balance of his mind, and dismissed the mournful apprehensions that tormented him.

"Do you feel better, holy Father?" Carmela asked him, with much sympathy.

"Yes," he said, "I thank you, I am now quite comfortable."

"All the better. Will you eat? Would you like to take any refreshment?"

"Nothing at all, I thank you, for I have not the least appet.i.te."

"Perhaps you are thirsty, Fray Antonio; if so, here is a bota of refino," said Lanzi, as he offered him a skin more than half full of the comforting liquid.

The monk permitted himself to be persuaded sufficiently to prove that he was no lover of ardent spirits; then he allowed himself to be convinced, and seizing the bota, drank a hearty draught of the generous fluid. This libation restored him all his coolness and presence of mind.

"Then," he said, as he turned the bota to the half-breed, and gave vent to a sigh of relief, "Heaven preserve me; were the Evil One to come now in person, I feel capable of holding my own against him."

"Ah, ah!" said Tranquil, "It seems, my good father, as if you were now completely restored to the possession of your intellectual faculties."

"Yes, and I will give you the proof whenever you like."

"Hang it! You challenge me. I did not dare cross-question you before; but, as it is so, I will no longer hesitate."

"What do you wish to know?"

"A very simple matter: how it is that a monk finds himself at such an hour alone in the heart of the desert?"

"Nonsense," Fray Antonio said, gaily. "Who told you that I was alone?"

"n.o.body; but I suppose so."

"Do not make any suppositions, brother, for you would be mistaken."

"Indeed!"

"Yes, as I have the honour of telling you."

"Still, when I met you, you were alone."

"Granted."

"Well?"

"The others were further off, that's all."

"What others?"

"The persons who accompanied me."

"Ah! And who are they?"

"That is the question----Nonsense," he said, a minute after, as if holding a conversation with himself, "the most disadvantageous reports are current about me. I am accused of a number of bad actions; suppose I were to try and do a good one, that might change my luck. Who knows whether I may not be rewarded at a later date? At any rate, here goes."

Tranquil and his comrades listened in extreme surprise to the monologue of the monk, not knowing exactly what to think of this man, and half inclined to deem him mad. The latter perceived the impression he produced on his hearers.

"Listen," he said, in a stern voice, and with a slight frown, "form what opinion of me you like, that is a matter of indifference to me; still I do not wish it to be said, that I requited your cordial hospitality by odious treachery."

"What do you mean?" Tranquil exclaimed.

"Listen to me. I uttered the word treachery, and perhaps I was wrong, for nothing proves to me that it is so; still, all sorts of reasons lead me to suppose that it is nothing else persons tried to force me into committing for your injury."

"Explain yourself, in Heaven's name; you speak in enigmas, and it is impossible to understand you."

"You are right, so I will be clear: which of you gentlemen bears the name of Tranquil?"

"It is I."

"Very good. Owing to certain circ.u.mstances, the recital of which would not at all interest you, I unluckily fell into the hands of the Apaches."

"Apaches!" Tranquil exclaimed, in surprise.

"Good Lord, yes," the monk continued; "and I a.s.sure you that when I found myself in their power, I did not feel at all comfortable. Still, I was wrong to be alarmed; far from inventing for me one of those atrocious tortures which they mercilessly inflict on the whites who are so unhappy as to become their prisoners, they treated me, on the contrary, with extreme gentleness."

Tranquil fixed a scrutinising glance on the monk's placid face.

"For what purpose did they that?" he asked, with a suspicious accent.

"Ah," Fray Antonio went on, "that I could not comprehend, though I am perhaps beginning to suspect it."

The hearers bent toward the speaker with an expression of impatient curiosity.

"This evening," the monk went on, "the Chief of the Redskins himself accompanied me to within a short distance of your bivouac; on coming in sight of your fire he pointed it out to me, saying, 'Go and sit down at that brasero. You will tell the great Pale hunter that one of his oldest and dearest friends desires to see him.' Then he left me, after making the most horrible threats if I did not obey him at once. You know the rest."

Tranquil and his comrades regarded each other in amazement, but without exchanging a word. There was a rather long silence; but Tranquil at length took on himself to express aloud the thought each had in his heart.

"'Tis a trap," he said.

"Yes," Loyal Heart remarked; "but for what purpose?"

"How do I know?" the Canadian muttered.